Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Miscellaneous/2012 October 3

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October 3

Why do Koreans eat dog meat?

--168.7.232.215 (talk) 03:42, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Why do Americans eat cow meat? HiLo48 (talk) 03:46, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

For the same reason the French eat frog meat. Because they enjoy doing so. See dog meat (and not forgetting hot dog).--Shantavira|^{feed me} 08:12, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

I recall a New York Times article about some animal rights group (PETA? I don't know) demanding some kind of sanctions against South Korea for permitting dogs to be butchered. They interviewed a dog butcher for his reaction to the outcry, and he defended the practice, saying, "We only kill the ugly ones." Apparently a cute and well-bred dog is worth more as a pet than meat. Someguy1221 (talk) 08:21, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Us Brits eat rabbits. The Japanese (and Dutch) eat horses. The Japanese eat dolphins and whales. We are a meat eating species. We eat meat, whether it looks cute or not. And why not - most other predators do, so why should we be an exception? It's not often a shark or a tiger or a crocodile smiles at a baby boy (or a puppy) and thinks, "Oh, too cute to eat." They just attack and eat the thing. On a personal note, I ate dog in China (not Korea), and it was not bad. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 10:12, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Did it taste like chicken? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:30, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Funnily enough, it did. It's a white meat. And it smelled like a dog, which sort of put me off, but was helped a little bit by the copious amount of chilli sauce. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 06:49, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

The consumption of horse meat is actually quite widespread. Twitchiness about it seems to be limited largely to the English-speaking world—though it has made inroads there too, among chefs and (now) foodies who have brought it in from other cultures' and countries' cuisines and traditions. (Anglos have also managed to quite readily get over their sense of taboo when faced with high prices or a shortages of other meats; horse meat was widely consumed in the U.S. and the UK during World War I and the Great Depression.) Given that these same countries have no qualms about other ungulate meats, including beef and venison, drawing a line at horse seems rather arbitrary. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 13:22, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Dog meat was commonly consumed by native Americans it seems. Francis Parkman partakes in this in The Oregon Trail. --Xuxl (talk) 14:13, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

The taboo in the UK could go back to pre-history and veneration of the horse. The article on Epona suggests she would be too late to be the source, but it could be a continuation of an earlier goddess or totem. Also, the changes the Romans made to the cult of Epona might not have been so effective in the UK as elsewhere in the Empire. Today, Italians eat a lot of horse meat even though the cult was widespread in the Roman Empire.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.131.110.106 (talk • contribs)

I am currently reading Undaunted Courage. One of the early chapters states that one of the native tribes was happy to eat dog meat, but surprised (or appalled or disgusted - I can't remember the exact wording) that the Corps of Discovery were willing to eat horse meat. Certainly, Lewis tried dog meat and then got quite a taste for it. More info in the Dog meat article. Astronaut (talk) 16:20, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Regarding eating horse meat in the UK, I am reliably informed (by my late mother) that there used to be specialist horse meat butchers in England before World War 2. After tea I'll see if I can find a reference for you. --TammyMoet (talk) 17:08, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Here's a couple, including a picture. [1] [2]. Incidentally, there was outrage and letters to the paper about the donkey sausage sold on a stall at the continental market in my local town a few years ago. No sympathy for the poor processed wild boars in the next basket, though. - Karenjc 18:06, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

The human consumption of horse meat in the UK seems to have started during the war, as in the first reference, which isn't surprising given the food rationing because horse meat wasn't rationed. I found an article which mentions that horse meat was sold pre-war for dog food. "...the horse-meat shop, which previously had sold its products only for dogs, now bore a notice on some of its joints occasionally, 'Fit for Human Consumption'" http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ww2peopleswar/stories/92/a1110592.shtml

All predators eat meat, by definition. If we stopped killing and eating animals, we would no longer be predators. Moral (or other) objections to eating animals, or certain kinds of animals, can't just be swept away by pointing out that other species eat meat too, as plenty of other species routinely practise cannibalism, rape, and infanticide, which are almost universally considered morally objectionable by humans. According to dog meat, eating of dogs in Korea goes back to the neolithic era at least, so it is unlikely that anyone knows how the practice started, though it is not unique to Korea - dogs are apparently commonly eaten in parts of the Arctic, Africa, India, Indonesia, the Philippines and China, as well as in some Native American tribes, and historically in Japan, Polynesia and the Aztec Empire. Dogs have also often been eaten in other places during sieges or other crises. 130.88.73.65 (talk) 14:29, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

It's not so much a question of when the practice started in each culture, as when it stopped (became taboo). Presumably starving cavemen ate just about any meat they could get their hands on (with a possible exception for cannibalism, due to the likelihood of spreading disease). However, when dogs became more valuable for other purposes, like guarding livestock, then eating them no longer made sense. Technically you could still eat the useless ones, but when something becomes taboo, it's often only a rough approximation of what should really be avoided. A similar example is how unrelated kids raised together develop the incest taboo toward each other, even though there is no genetic risk, if they were to reproduce. StuRat (talk) 19:39, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

What starving cavemen are we thinking about? Palaeolithic hominids? Or Neolithic modern humans? Itsmejudith (talk) 19:57, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

No need to make a distinction. Neither are likely to have had a reliable enough food supply that they could afford to be picky about what they ate. StuRat (talk) 20:13, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

I can agree. The Scots eat deep-fried Mars Bars. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 06:53, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Check out Dog meat consumption in South Korea. Shadowjams (talk) 04:27, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Sub discussion moved to talk page here Shadowjams (talk) 04:28, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Regarding horse meat... Would people really slaughter a young, healthy horse for food (barring desparate circumstances)? Or would they be more likely to slaughter an old, worn-out horse whose meat might well be tough and unsavory? As in this Billy Murray recording from ca. 1905.[3] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:44, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

If they were into horse meat, as many civilised societies have been and continue to be, why would they limit themselves to old, tough meat? We don't do that when it comes to sheep meat (yearling lamb --> veal --> mutton), chicken (spring chicken --> old boilers), beef or any other meat. -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 06:14, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Horses and dogs have been important for surviving and thriving, at least in the pioneer days, so it stands to reason that we wouldn't slaughter them unless they had become useless otherwise. In contrast, I'm not so sure that pulling your plow with sheep or having chickens shepherding your livestock would really work out all that well. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:00, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Horse meat in Japan is generally served as sashimi, which is raw, and generally very soft. The age of the horse is not written on it so you can never be sure how old it was, but it's fairly soft, as far as meat goes when compared with fish. Lovely with a bit of soy sauce, garlic, and ginger. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 06:57, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Perhaps the real question is not why other countries eat these various sorts of meat, but why are Americans and some other Western countries so intolerant? I mean, it's next to impossible to find mutton here except in a very large city. I only happened across horse once, and ostrich is very rare (though delicious, and not that much more expensive than steak). God knows what they'd do to someone with dog. I don't understand why people here put up with only having beef-pork-chicken-turkey period, and that's despite living here. The theory of capitalism is that somebody would have opened a market with 31 flavors of meat, like they did with ice cream half a century ago. Wnt (talk) 08:07, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Intolerant?! Just when I removed my chastising of this ridiculous tangent to the RD:talk, you bring it right back again. Who's intolerant here? The OP because they asked about a cultural culinary practice? A few people jumped onto the first response and thought it was a moral judgment about diet. EVEN IF IT WAS, you want to talk about intolerant, try getting a burger in India, or a pork chop in Riyadh. The west doesn't typically imprison people for dietary violations these days (and before anybody mentions it, I've read a recent New Yorker article about raw milk [and other foods] in California, and how they're prosecuting some of them; I think laws that protect children from unpasteurized milk are fine; if adults want to risk diarrhea or worse, that's up to them). This kind of statement has no business on the RD when the question actually asked here is answered with a SINGLE ARTICLE THAT WE HAVE.

This has got to be a shining example of the worst of the reference desk I've seen in a long time, and not because anything outrageous has been said by anybody, but because this kind of opinion bating is just par anymore around here. Shadowjams (talk) 12:33, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Yes, as if the anonymous IP will ever read that article. We all know it's a troll, so we are having fun, and at the same time giving factual information. Come on, calm down. We are all doing this for free. The only one who gets paid from this is His Majesty Jimmy. Just relax. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 13:07, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

I had Ox's penis in China. There is no limit to what people will eat (or serve in restaurants). KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 08:15, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Did that taste like chicken? Did you drench it in chili sauce? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:01, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

No, it was in some sort of milky creamy soupy thingy. It was just like hard jelly, with no taste of its own. Pretty pointless meal, to be honest. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 12:53, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

If you object to the plain white coloring, perhaps spotted dick would be more to your liking ? StuRat (talk) 05:05, 7 October 2012 (UTC)

I will tell you now, it was very easy to spot. It was so big, even people in passing planes could spot it. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 08:01, 7 October 2012 (UTC)

Um... --Wirbelwindヴィルヴェルヴィント (talk) 00:01, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

W.C. Fields, in one of his movies, eating at a lunch counter, says to the waitress: "I didn't complain about the steak... I just said I didn't see that old horse you used to have tethered out back." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:18, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

During the Korean War they pretty much ate anything thats how bad it used to be. Marketdiamond (talk) 14:16, 11 October 2012 (UTC)

Hands while Praying

Why do people put their hands together when praying?--85.211.199.83 (talk) 06:05, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

There can be lots of types of hand gestures while praying, and lots of different reasons for adopting them, it depends greatly on the religious traditions of the person praying. Wikipedia has an article titled prayer that covers many traditions. As a Christian myself, speaking only for myself and no one else, I do so, along with bowing my head, as an act of subservience and reverence. I also don't always do so. If you want some broader answers than can be found in Wikipedia, I typed "folding hands while praying" into Google for you, and there's a wide variety of perspectives on the practice. See here. --Jayron32 06:11, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

It keeps you from playing with yourself while praying, and God's not a big fan of that. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.79.94.5 (talk) 07:06, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

See Añjali Mudrā. -- Q Chris (talk) 10:14, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Clearly this reference is related but it raises a further question, how did this yoga gesture find its way into Christian practice. It may have been the same way that we have a widespread image of Jesus Christ, by old master painters. I can recall a number of pictures by El Greco which exhibits this praying gesture of the hands. If he came from Greece there is a possibility that he may have encountered practitioners of yoga and he noted the reverential gestures. (faulty memory, i was thinking of Tears of St. Peter, but it's not the same gesture) It would be interesting to know what is the earliest recorded painting showing this praying pose. Hmm, how long has a praying mantis been called thus. Richard Avery (talk) 13:15, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

A little more ferreting discovers Giotto's Legend of St Francis which clearly shows some monks in the hands-closed praying posture. This was painted pre-1337 so this has been around for some time. Another possibility may be related to the swearing of allegiance by closing the hands of the lower order within the hands of the lord, monarch, bishop or pope. Richard Avery (talk) 13:49, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Eastern traditions call this position gassho or Namaste. I would suggest that it predates Christianity. --TammyMoet (talk) 17:06, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

This article on a Catholic website, "The Meaning of Praying Hands", suggests that it is derived from a now discarded Jewish custom, although it does mention the Buddhist and Hindu traditions too. Another Christian custom of raising the palms upwards in prayer is called Orans - our article says; "Until the 9th century, the posture (orans) was sometimes adopted by entire congregations while celebrating the Eucharist. By the 12th century, however, the joining of hands began to replace the orans posture as the preferred position for prayer." I'm not sure how a Hindu custom would come to be adopted by medieval Europeans, so I suspect that it is just a coincidence. Alansplodge (talk) 20:18, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

When I was a catholic kid years ago (I'm Buddhist now), it was explained to us that the hands are pointing to heaven, and we had to cross our thumbs to remember the crucifiction. This is how it was explained to us. I have never seen this practice at all in Japanese Buddhism, except for lay people (who actually know nothing about Buddhism, because for lay people it's all mixed up with Shamanism and Shinto, and a desire to get a random imaginary spirit to come and help, while they don't realise the basics of Buddhism, and that is that you help yourself - no prayer is necessary. You just do it). KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 08:09, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

• The origin is as an act of submission - the hands are (were) placed together so that they can be bound by the would-be captor. Slightly longer explanation (and a broken reference link) in the third entry here. The symbolism is still widely culturally understood, for example the video game Civilization III, in some of its variants, uses an icon of hands together (but fingers clenched rather than straight) to denote the practice of enslavement. The fingers-clenched/interleaved variant, and occasionally the fingers-straight variant, can be seen in plenty of (older?) film representations of people begging for mercy, and I also saw the former used by children "begging" for things in the second half of the twentieth century. --Demiurge1000 (talk) 22:17, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

It is done in Japan before eating a meal, whilst saying 'itadakimasu', which means 'I am receiving this', so basically giving thanks to the person who provided it. In South Asian countries it is done as a greeting, to show respect. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 08:10, 5 October 2012 (UTC)

Shaking hands in Victorian England

I was reading a play script yesterday (The Woman in White, adapted by Constance Cox from the novel by Wilkie Collins) and a stage direction struck me as anachronistic; but my attempts to find anything to confirm or refute my thought have so far drawn a blank. The play is set in 1861 (not quite sure why, when the novel was published in 1859).

The stage direction is "Laura and Gilmore shake hands".

There are two things about this which struck me as odd. The first is that Laura and Gilmore know each other - Gilmore is her uncle's solicitor. Now I know from my own experience that fifty years ago people in Britain did not shake hands with people they already knew: Americans and other foreigners did this, but for us shaking hands was something you did only on first meeting. I don't know what the custom was a hundred and fifty years ago, but it doesn't strike me as right. Secondly, while I've no doubt that men shook hands then, I'm not convinced that gentlemen shook hands with ladies. I'm more ready to be contradicted on this one, though. Does anybody have a resource which throws light on these questions? --ColinFine (talk) 08:30, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Cassells Household Guide (c. 1880s) says that "the term 'shaking hands' is inappropriate; the mode of salutation consisting of gentle pressure and very slight movement from the wrist." However, it goes on to say that this does occur between ladies and gentlemen, with the proviso that "except of the greatest intimacy, the gentleman is not the first to offer his hand: unless he be the superior of the lady in age and station, he waits till she makes the advance." Clarityfiend (talk) 09:08, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, Clarityfiend. That disposes of my second doubt, which was in any case weaker than the first. I wonder if anybody will come up with any information about the first. --ColinFine (talk) 13:43, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Hmmm. Cassells talks of introductions several times, and never mentions shaking hands in that context. It begins to look as if the custom was the opposite of what I remember from 50 years ago: that you did not shake hands on first acquantance but only on meeting again. But it is not clear. --ColinFine (talk) 13:56, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure that the premise of your question is correct. I distinctly remember, almost exactly 50 years ago, shaking hands with my grandfather whenever we met and parted. He was born in 1882, and as a former ship's captain in the merchant service, would have had a reasonable knowledge of etiquette. In fact, my father (b.1918) always gets up and shakes my hand whenever I visit - he's not one for all this hugging nonsense. I'm not an expert on these things, but I would imagine that the conclusion of an agreeable meeting with your solicitor would be an appropriate moment for a handshake, to show that business had been completed in an amicable way. Alansplodge (talk) 17:46, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

Quotes from the novel The Woman in White. Laura's half-sister greets the family solicitor Gilmore when he arrives to discuss the marriage settlement thus: "Miss Halcombe ... advanced to shake hands with an old gentleman ... Mr. Gilmore had arrived." Laura gives Hartright her hand "with the frank, innocent good-will of happier days" at that evening's supper. At bedtime Hartright "could not trust myself to look at her when I took her hand" and, after a few words "[H]er voice failed her, her hand closed gently round mine - then dropped it suddenly." On Hartright's last morning at Limmeridge, he holds out his hand to bid the women farewell and "Miss Halcome, who was nearest to me, took it"; two minutes later: "She caught me by both hands - she pressed them with the strong, steady grasp of a man". Again, moments later, he's holding out his hand to Laura, who takes it (although admittedly he kisses hers rather than shaking it this time). I also recall that in Sense and Sensibility, written half a century earlier, Austen has Marianne shaking hands with the dastardly Willoughby, who has broken her sister's heart, at a key moment of parting and forgiveness. It does appear that there were circumstances back then under which a woman and a man who had previously met could respectably shake, or at least clasp, hands when meeting or parting. - Karenjc 18:51, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

I shake hands with people I know all the time, and I'm pretty sure that's not a new thing. I believe the traditional etiquette was that you shouldn't shake hands with someone unless you had been introduced to them, but once you have been introduced you then shake hands on any subsequent meeting. --Tango (talk) 20:25, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

I can see where ColinFine is coming from; on meeting an acquaintance in the street a raised hat might have been more appropriate than a handshake, which might have seemed a bit over-enthusiastic. But a handshake might fit the bill for a close relative or someone that you hadn't seen for a while. Alansplodge (talk) 20:34, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

In the novel, Walter and Laura shake hands a lot ("we shook hands at night and morning"). The book isn't about a typical Victorian situation or family, and Collins certainly wasn't a typical Victorian writer. Zoonoses (talk) 06:45, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Thanks, everyone, and especially Karenjc for a clear answer. I'm very surprised at what Alansplodge and Tango say, but I haven't any corroboration for my very clear memory (of how "foreign" I thought it for people to shake hands with those they already knew). --ColinFine (talk) 15:21, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Might just be a regional thing. Alansplodge (talk) 21:06, 4 October 2012 (UTC)

Resolved

Fabric arts

I just found entries about "Polstitches" on the internet that seem to be about a variation of cross stitch, for which there is an article in Wikipedia, that is followed by an entry: "Related stitches and forms of embroidery". Would Polstitches fit into that category also, and what exactly are polstitches? 108.83.111.49 (talk) 23:29, 3 October 2012 (UTC)

"Polstitches" appears to be the name of a company that sells cross-stitch sewing kits. All references I can find point back to them. So I don't think the word describes a variation of cross stitch, merely a vendor. --Tagishsimon (talk) 23:37, 3 October 2012 (UTC)