Blog

[Update July 26, 2017] The Venerable Matthieu Ricard has responded to our campaign.

The Venerable Matthieu Ricard has responded to our campaign by writing and publishing this article: A Dog for Dinner? on his homepage as well as in the Huffington Post. It’s written in his native language, French, as well as in English.
Click HERE for English. A Dog for Dinner?
Click HERE for Français (French). Du chien pour le dîner?

We appreciate that The Venerable Ricard spoke out against the dog meat cruelty while also emphasizing the need for compassion toward all animals. Thank you!!

The Venerable Matthieu Ricard – sometimes called “the happiest man in the world” – was born in France in 1946. He trained in biochemistry but left science behind to become a Buddhist monk, living in the Himalayan region. He is a humanitarian and a prominent speaker on the world stage, in addition to being a French interpreter for the Dalai Lama, a photographer, and an international best-selling author on subjects such as ‘Happiness’, ‘A Plea for the Animals’ and the meeting of Buddhism with science.

We would like The Venerable Matthieu Ricard to speak out against the practice of eating companion animals and the cruelty involved in the dog and cat meat trades, and to share the Buddha’s teachings on compassion to animals with people across the world.

Please call, email and write to The Venerable Matthieu Ricard today! You can use our sample letter below or use your own words.

• Click HERE to send online message.
• Send letter:

  The Venerable Matthieu Ricard
  Karuna-Shechen USA
  237 West 35th Street
  Suite 1101
  New York, NY 10001
  United States

  The Venerable Matthieu Ricard
  Karuna-Shechen Asia
  Suite 2801, 28/F., China United Centre
  28 Marble Road, North Point, Hong Kong

  Sample letter

  Dear Venerable Ricard,

  You teach that: “every bear, dog, or mouse experiences sorrow and feels pain as intensely as we do”.

  We ask you to please watch the videos of South Korea’s dog meat industry: https://youtu.be/cCdTceduKcY

  Each year, around 30 million dogs are slaughtered and eaten in Asia, including Korea, China, Indonesia and Vietnam. In South Korea alone, it is estimated that, annually, 2.5 million dogs and thousands of cats are brutally slaughtered and eaten.

  Dogs that are bred on dog farms live in miserable conditions. In South Korea, dog meat consumption is illegal but their Government is allowing it to continue, thereby causing immense suffering to these animals. All breeds of dog are used for meat, including stolen pets and abandoned dogs. They are confined to small, filthy cages, given rotten food and scraps which are unfit for consumption, denied space to exercise, and given no shelter from extreme weather conditions. They cannot even feel the ground beneath their paws as they are contained in wire cages, raised off the ground. These conditions are deplorable and cruel.

  Dogs are slaughtered in the most brutal and painful methods, often in front of other dogs which watch in fear for their lives. They are beaten, stabbed, hanged, butchered, thrown into pots of boiling water, skinned, electrocuted or blow torched – often whilst still alive. This inhumane torture has to stop.

  Venerable Ricard, you also teach that “compassion towards … beings, including our fellow animals, is the direction towards which any enlightened society must aspire.” South Korea is a successful and prosperous nation, but it is not ‘enlightened’: there is little compassion shown to any of these animals, in any of the processes in the dog and cat meat trades. Please join us in speaking out openly against the violence that is being perpetrated daily in South Korea towards these animals; please help stop these barbaric acts of torture, and the unimaginable suffering.

  An online petition calling for your support to help end the horrendous dog and cat meat cruelty is in progress: https://www.change.org/p/mr-matthieu-ricard-mr-matthieu-ricard-please-speak-out-against-the-brutal-dog-meat-trade-in-south-korea.

  Thank you in advance for your response.

  Yours sincerely,

  [Your Name, City and Country]

• Send a message through Facebook page: The Venerable Matthieu Ricard
• Send a Twitter message!

  Suggested Twitter text

  .@matthieu_ricard Plz speak out against horrific #dogmeat #catmeat #cruelty in #SouthKorea https://goo.gl/NzN6y8 https://youtu.be/cCdTceduKcY

Video: Media Triage: The Dog Meat Professionals: South Korea.