3: The Savagery of Bok Nal in South Korea

Bok Nal, What is it?

Bok Nal is a festival in South Korea in which people consume dog meat. The dogs are consumed during the hottest days of Summer due to a superstition in which people believe that doing so will cool their blood. Obviously, many can already tell why this is such a controversial event, but the one thing that worsens people's opinions on the event greatly is the method of killing for cooking. Many of the dogs are either boiled alive, skinned alive, beat to death, or cut into pieces while still alive. Keep in mind, this is all done publicly for people to experience and record as they please. So, you might be thinking: How is this a topic that can be discussed when we can clearly see that it is just animal cruelty and brutality? I am in no way defending Bok Nal, just talking about it from a different perspective. Bok Nal is a religious and superstitious event. We might see how terrible it really is, but to the Southern Koreans, this is culture. Think back to slavery. White Americans believed that religion made it right for them to have slaves and wipe out tribes from Native Americans from existence. How much worse is this event compared to that? You can argue that we, as humans, are much more civilized now, but culture is still culture and beliefs are still beliefs. Wars had to be fought and lives had to be taken to end slavery and nothing has been done to end Bok Nal other than online petitions, so as of right now, the tradition most likely will not go anywhere soon.

Progress: With this project, I fought for a side I didn't support by using evidence. Writing about topics like this will greatly help my future writings and assessments as I won't always support the topic that I must write about. I looked at the event from a different perspective and was able to pull out the reasoning of what the people did and their thoughts. Previously, if I didn't support what I was writing about, I would generally not try very hard at my analysis, as I couldn't think of anything.

Reflection: Again, as I wrote about this topic, I was able to defend a side I didn't support. To do well in my future and current essays, I must be unbiased with my writing and use the facts that I am given to support my analysis and writing about this topic has greatly helped me with that. I feel as if with this topic, I was able to analyze the event and do cross-connections with another event, which I am proud of. I am not completely satisfied with the end result, as I feel as if I could make stronger connections and arguments but that will be something I will continue to work on.