On Bestiality

Peter Singer reminds us that not so long ago any form of sexual expression that did not result in the conception of a child was perceived to be, at best, wanton lust, or at worst, a perversion. Over time we’re seeing that, one by one, taboos are falling, and bigots and stigmatisers progressively becoming defeated. Thankfully, most people aren’t offended by the idea of more creative, alternative expressions to the traditional, “let’s make a baby and nothing more” method between two people, or by solitary practices and indulgences, which in some faiths are still acknowledged as a form of ‘self-abuse’. Things like contraception, homosexuality and pornography had all at one point in time provoked widespread moral panic and are now widely accepted with applause and enthusiasm.

The idea of bestiality in common contemporary thinking is however very different. Regularly condemned in the same arena as paedophilia, the practice of bestiality is considered outrageously immoral. Despite this, reported occurrences of humans coupling with animals are apparently not so rare. In the 1940s, Kinsey, in his famous endeavour into the private lives of ordinary (and not so ordinary) people, surveyed twenty thousand Americans and found that 8% of males and 3.5% of females reported that they had, at some time, had a sexual encounter with an animal. Among men living in rural areas the figure reached 50%.



Carved on the exterior of a temple in
Khajuraho

 While there have been no solid indication that at any point in history, bestiality had once been accepted and embraced, fragments from the past certainly reveal humanity’s perpetual fascination with the concept of sexual intimacy between man and beast, depicting such transgressive acts in art, sculpture and mythology. An illustration dating back from the Bronze Age was uncovered depicting a man having sex with a large, quadruped beast of indeterminate species, a vase from ancient Greece shows a man having sex with a stag, an Indian miniature from the seventeenth century portrays a deer mounting a woman and from nineteenth century Japan, one that I find most amusing, a traditional style drawing depicts a woman tangled in the tentacles of a pleasuring, giant octopus. Today, while the subject still remains deeply taboo, there is no shortage of pornographic websites dedicated to offering people footage and images of women and men engaging in erotic activities with various farm animals, readily available for an evidently substantial demographic.



German lifestyle magazine
pushing the boundaries

 If we were to take Singer’s rationalist stance, it would seem that the only problem with such practices is animal abuse, but this highlights the apparent inconsistencies in social attitudes concerning animal welfare. Take meat consumption for example: is slaughtering an animal to satisfy our taste and hunger more justifiable than having sex with an animal to satisfy our sexual hunger? This is a typical argument made by proponents of legalised zoophilia, who also point out the difference that certain animals, such as dogs, may visibility consent to such activities. But while we’ve all been in that embarrassing situation of kicking away our lustful canines from frantically rubbing up against the legs of our houseguests, the idea that such affections could ever be reciprocated remains very hard for most of us to stomach.

Dog Meat – What’s So Wrong with Eating Man’s Best Friend?

Before I’d set off for a recent trip to Northern China, I remember my friend pulling me aside at a dinner party, and with that slurred solemnity induced by four shots of vodka, she made me promise her that I would not eat dog meat. Thinking about the various dishes I’d sampled at local restaurants and side streets, I really can’t be sure if I’ve broken my half-hearted vow to her, but I doubt it. Dog meat, according to the Chinese side of my family, has a distinctly pungent taste and aroma. Regarded as ‘the fragrant meat’, it’s been part of a longstanding culinary tradition, known to keep diners warm in the winters and to speed up the metabolism. This however, as expressed by the pleading, wide-eyed horror of my friend, can be very difficult for many of us to stomach. While we suffer no qualms feasting on the flesh of other animals, dogs and cats are simply out of the question. A dog is no gentler than a lamb, smarter than a pig or even more affectionate than a goose (as anyone who has kept a pet goose or chicken that nestles in your lap while you watch the television and follows you keenly around the house would know), so is it really a matter of morality or cultural gap?

Rationally speaking, one might encounter some difficulty deciding why it is essentially more wrong to eat dogs than it is to eat any other creature. Some argue that dogs are bred for their companionship, but this of course is restricted to the West. In countries like China and Korea, dogs are specifically bred to end up on dinner plates. Anti-dog-trade activists claim that it is ‘uncivilised’ to eat dogs, but one can recognise the hypocrisy of this argument, coming from countries where factory-farmed livestock are crammed like sardines into overcrowded pens and blasted with antibiotics to be kept alive until they’re finally ready to be slaughtered. Dogs bred for consumption are kept in no better conditions, but with just as much self-awareness as those creatures routinely slaughtered and served up on the Western dinner table, it is very difficult to understand why treating dogs in this way is any less moral or ‘civilised’. Peter Singer, Australian philosopher and specialist in applied ethics, reasons that all animals are equal and that one cannot reasonably proscribe the eating of certain animals and permit the eating of others based on subjective, moral grounds. This however, is what has been happening in recent years, with the Chinese government allegedly yielding to the pressures of anti-dog-trade activists and Western ideals of ethical eating.

10 year companionship: Man and his goose near
Ijburg in Amsterdam after enjoying a swim in the ocean

During the Beijing Olympics in 2008, official ordered dog meat off the menus at local markets and in the southern province of Guangzhou, where dog meat is widely consumed, vendors were reportedly warned to stop selling dog meat ahead of the Asian Games which will be held later this year. The Chinese government has signalled a willingness to completely ban the sales and consumption of dog meat on a national scale, and harsh penalties are allegedly being considered for individuals and businesses that are found violating this impending law. The move is certainly controversial, with spectators claiming that the ban is tantamount to succumbing to foreign prejudices, and in disregarding the long culinary tradition of consuming dog meat in China, it does appear to be a classic example of cultural imperialism. Despite this, it is only natural for our emotional bias to take precedence over proper reasoning, and once such bans set in, many of us will raise our voices in triumphant cheers while heedlessly stabbing into our Sunday roast.

See also: Bizarre Trends in Pet-Keeping