Yulin

Yulin, in Shaanxi province, has a meat festival. Every year, fifty thousand dogs and cats—mostly illegally bred or stolen off the street—get killed and cooked for it. I went to see what that looked like. The cages are cramped, animals packed in barking. The vendors stand behind stalls that reek. You see dogs waiting and meat already hanging and the casual brutality of it all hits different when you’re standing in it rather than reading about it on your phone.

The animal rights activists show up every year to protest. The vendors and festival goers have an answer ready: the West kills hundreds of thousands of cattle and pigs annually. Nobody’s picketing the slaughterhouses. So why is dog meat worse? It’s actually not a stupid question. The double standard is real—we keep ours as pets and eat theirs and pretend we’re morally superior. That part stayed with me.

There was a boy at the festival with his dog. He didn’t want to eat it.

When I asked what the meat tasted like, the response was simple: Like lamb.