(CN) Shanghai prosecution, 1939

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From The National Humane Review, September 1939, page 6:

 

 

A Gruesome Case

 

Food for humans, especially for the poor Chinese, is a

problem in the war zone of the Far East. Two Chinese who did a

lucrative business right in the Settlement at Shanghai, have just

been sentenced to three months' imprisonment.

An anonymous letter put the authorities wise to a nefarious

business that had been going on for months. The men had been

collecting dogs and cats, stray and pets, slaughtered them and told

the meat as " rabbit meat " quite openly from a stall. Hoardes of poor

people had been daily patrons at the stand. Two baskets of meat were

part of the evidence presented at the trial of the men on a charge of

fraud.

 

 

---------

 

 

The last word of the item above is the most significant. The

crime was not selling dog and cat meat (even in the Settlement,

which was the foreign-controlled part of town); it was

misrepresenting it.

 

I believe this uncredited item was probably authored by R.N.

Swann, the then-director of the Hong Kong SPCA, who frequently

submitted news items to the National Humane Review, and had a good

reputation for getting his facts straight. (I verified another of

his articles by finding a second source just today.)

 

Assuming his facts were correct as stated above, the

implications of the article include:

 

1) Eating dogs and cats was not widely accepted in Shanghai in 1939;

 

2) Dog meat and cat meat was not considered a luxury item.

 

3) Dog meat and cat meat had to be disguised in order to be sold.

 

4) The deception was a prosecutable offense.

 

5) Dogs and cats have been eaten in & around Shanghai for a

much shorter time than has been generally believed.

 

 

Otherwise, the perpetrators had no reason to commit fraud in

order to sell dog and cat meat.

 

 

--

Merritt Clifton

Editor, ANIMAL PEOPLE

P.O. Box 960

Clinton, WA 98236

 

Telephone: 360-579-2505

Fax: 360-579-2575

E-mail: anmlpepl

Web: www.animalpeoplenews.org

 

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