Vietnam suggests changing name, limiting public view of pig slaughter fest

The Department of Culture, Sports, and Tourism of the northern Vietnamese province of Bac Ninh has proposed changing the name and limiting the number of people witnessing the slaughtering segment of a local festival, following a complaint about its cruelty by an international animal rights group.

Its proposal has been sent to the provincial People’s Committee after the Hong Kong-based animal protection NGO Animals Asia called on people to sign a petition urging relevant Vietnamese agencies to end the Nem Thuong Pig Slaughter Festival because it displays brutality.

At the festival, which attracts thousands of locals and visitors, including children, and is annually held on the sixth day of the first month of the lunar year in Nem Thuong Village, Khac Niem Commune, Tien Du District, pigs are carried around the village and then slaughtered in front of the spectators as a sacrifice to God.

People then daub sheets of money with the pig’s blood in the hope of getting luck in the new year.

The proposal suggests gathering public opinion on changing the name of the festival to “Pig Offering” instead of “Pig Slaughter,” as well as limiting the public part of the fest to the time when the pig is carried around the village in front of the crowd.

The slaughtering part will be done at a quieter place with limits placed on spectators, instead of in front of thousands people like the present.

People will not be allowed to daub sheets of money with the pig’s blood either, the proposal said.

The province’s leaders said they will assign people to guard the slaughter in order to make sure only a limited number of people can witness the bloody scene.

After Animals Asia’s appeal, the Vietnamese Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism said it does not approve of festivals that include brutal and barbarous rites.

However, Prof. Ngo Duc Thinh, former dean of the Vietnam Institute of Cultural Studies, said the best method is not to use administrative measures to interfere in cultural, religious, and spiritual festivals across the country.

“Every cultural and religious activity in folk festivals of Vietnamese people has its root and reason,” Thinh said. “But activities like hacking a pig in the past were done only in front of local people, not like today.”

“I suggest that if they cannot end such activities, competent agencies should allow local people to continue organizing them while placing a cap on the number of participants who are only locals, not visitors,” he added. “When local people feel those festivals are not appropriate any longer, they will end them themselves.”

On January 27, Animals Asia released a message to call on people to end the Nem Thuong Pig Slaughter festival for a number of reasons.

According to the organization, the festival is offensive and could have a negative effect on witnesses as well as the Southeast Asian country’s tourism image.

Hacking apart healthy, live pigs is a cruel act to animals which could freeze the feelings of witnesses, especially children who have an incomplete and vulnerable psychology, the organization stressed.

Animals Asia also cited research as showing that witnesses of cruel treatment toward animals tend to cruelly treat other people in the community.

The NGO also underlined that the festival causes unnecessary suffering for animals as they can also feel pain.

Moreover, Animals Asia said traditional culture changes over time, so unsound customs should be changed, and any festival needs to spread humanity to the next generation.

“Festivals in which animals are used as tools instead of being respected like beings which can feel pain are erasing Vietnamese people’s good traditions,” Animals Asia said.

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