CNN had this report Tuesday about China considering a ban on eating dogs and cats (warning: contains images of dogs and cats in cages and a cook cutting up a piece of meat):

What I find most outrageous about this report (done in my hometown, by the way) isn’t whether it’s biased against eating dogs and cats, but that it treats the fact that people in China eat these animals as some sort of new revelation. The first 1:30 of the two-and-a-half-minute report isn’t even about the ban, but instead takes a gawking, “look what we discovered: people here eat cats and dogs!” angle. It’s 1) sensationalist, and 2) presenting old, old news as something new. Seriously, there have been plenty of images about dogs and cats being eaten in China, so what’s the point of sensationalizing the report by having the reporter gawk at that?

Other thoughts:

• Interesting to note that the argument by the Chinese animal rights activists, as cited in the CNN report, is that even though cats and dogs are routinely raised to be sold as pets, there’s always a chance that one could be somebody’s lost pet. Notice why they are advocating for banning eating cats and dogs — not because they feel it’s fundamentally wrong to eat them, but because it’s wrong to mistakenly eat someone’s pet. Also note the other argument cited by the report — quoting a professor as saying that this ban would demonstrate that China has reached a new level of civilization — the implication that the benefit of the ban is not so much that it’s wrong to eat these animals, but that it’s good to show the rest of the world that China is hip to the new ways.
• As for my personal view on eating cats and dogs, see most of the comments on the BoingBoing post about the CNN report. I’ll just say that I can’t wait till the day China takes over the world and imposes its own culinary taboos on other countries. Buying frozen packs of long-dead chicken instead of picking out a clucking hen from the market, taking it home, bending its neck back and running a knife across it, draining its blood, plucking it, and cooking it? What disgusting barbarian ways!!

Disclosure: I’ve never eaten cats, but I have eaten dog meat in China on a couple occasions in my youth. It tasted, well, not like chicken. However, too many years in the United States has corrupted me and I can’t bring myself to eat either now. But there’s plenty of stuff that Cantonese people eat that Westerners might find bizarre or revolting. All I can say is, it’s your loss. Trust me.