from Let Them Eat Dog: A Modest Proposal for Tossing Fido in the Oven /   Jonathan Safran Foer

Following is an excerpt from novelist Jonathan Safran Foer’s controversial article “Let Them Eat Dog,” which appeared in the Wall Street Journal in 2009.

Despite the fact that it’s perfectly legal in 44 states, eating “man’s best friend” is as taboo as a man eating his best friend. Even the most enthusiastic carnivores won’t eat dogs. TV guy and sometimes cooker Gordon Ramsay can get pretty macho with lambs and piglets when doing publicity for something he’s selling, but you’ll never see a puppy peeking out of one of his pots. And though he once said he’d electrocute his children if they became vegetarian, one can’t help but wonder what his response would be if they poached the family pooch.

Dogs are wonderful, and in many ways unique. But they are remarkably unremarkable in their intellectual and experiential capacities. Pigs are every bit as intelligent and feeling, by any sensible definition of the words. They can’t hop into the back of a Volvo, but they can fetch, run and play, be mischievous and reciprocate affection. So why don’t they get to curl up by the fire? Why can’t they at least be spared being tossed on the fire? Our taboo against dog eating says something about dogs and a great deal about us.

The French, who love their dogs, sometimes eat their horses.

The Spanish, who love their horses, sometimes eat their cows.

5 The Indians, who love their cows, sometimes eat their dogs.

While written in a much different context, George Orwell’s words (from Animal Farm) apply here: “All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.”