Every year during the event, South Korean dog and cat meat markets cruelly, mass slaughter thousands of animals for their flesh. Picture: Ahn Young-joon/AP Photo.

For this time of year marks the start of ‘Boknal,’ South Korea’s dog-eating festival. A three-week event that coincides with the height of the summer growing season.

Every year South Korean dog and cat meat markets mass slaughter thousands of animals for their flesh.

The festival itself is deeply rooted in myth and superstition.

Claire Fryer, PETA Australia’s campaign co-ordinator told news.com.au: “Many people in South Korea incorrectly believe that consuming dog meat during the hottest part of the summer will cool their blood.”

While the consumption of dogs and cats is distressing enough in itself, the horror these creatures endure during their short lives is extreme.

Ms Fryer explained: “Dogs on farms in South Korea are confined to crowded, filthy cages. Before being killed, they’re often beaten to increase the flow of adrenaline, which dog-flesh peddlers claim improves the flavour of the meat and increases male virility. Cats are kept under equally cruel and terrifying conditions in markets before being boiled alive in pressure cookers in order to extract their “juice” for use in ‘tonics’.”

Ms Fryer believes that drawing awareness to the practices that take place would change many South Koreans’ attitudes towards the festival.

“Much like many Australians have never visited an abattoir to see how cows, chickens, pigs, and lambs are killed, many South Koreans have never visited a dog-meat farm and are unaware of the suffering of animals used for food.”

Animal rights activists in a cage stage a campaign opposing eating of dog meat by South Koreans in Seoul, South Korea. The letters on cards read ' Don't eat Dog Meat.' Picture: Ahn Young-joon/AP Photo.Source:AP

So before people point the finger and label the South Korean practice as savagery, Ms Fryer urges us to look at our own eating habits.

“The thought of killing, cooking, dismembering, and eating dogs is enough for most of us to lose our lunch, but there’s no rational reason why that same revulsion shouldn’t arise at the thought of eating a pig or any other animal,” she said.

“All animals about to be slaughtered feel terrified, and none wants to die. Right here in Australia, scared lambs, chickens, cows, and pigs are killed as we wilfully turn a blind eye to the fact that they’re no different from the dogs we cry for. It’s easy to point the finger at other cultures, but let’s be honest and decent enough to question our own cruel habits.”