April 2, 2007, about 200 some Chinese immigrants and their supporters held their third rallied in front of TV Channel CW 11 headquarters, chanting “Racism no! Defamation no!”, “Report the news. Not make up the news!” and “Boycott CW11!” The first two rallies were Feb 4 and Feb 26 respectively. The second rally had gathered more than a thousand people.

The protest was ignited by a news reported from CW 11 which claimed that a customer allegedly found a order from New Food King restaurant in Canarsie, Brooklyn contained meat resembling “rat meat.” Statements such as “disgusting find,” “sickening surprise,” “nasty dining experience,” and “rodent slathered in garlic sauce” were used in the report. Though, the Chinese restaurant insisted that they did not use rodent, and questioned the report did not have any scientific evidence. The TV channel rolled out a follow-up report on January 31 which claimed the meat was testified as rodent meat. However, the TV channel does not allow the restaurant’s owner to inspect the meat which claimed to be rodent meat. Some people also questioned the credibility of the report which found many grammatical mistakes and misspelling, and the test was though to be performed by an unknown scientist. The restaurant stated that they are seeking litigation in court, and the protesters are going to protest until the TV Channel announces its apologue.

Do Chinese people really eat rat? Or it is another stereotyping.

It would be an endless debate of whether the meat in the report was really a rodent or not. If you want to know more about the protest, you can check on the links I provided at the end of this article which connected to some of the news reporting the protest.

Although we may not know the true behind this story, it comes to a question of whether Chinese people themselves eat rat. If you asked, “Do SOME Chinese people really eat rodent?” then the answer is “Yes.” However, if you asked, “Do ALL or MANY Chinese people eat rodent?” then the answer is “No.” Further more, do they eat any kind of rodent including those living in sewer? And why do they eat rodent?

In China, who are eating rodents?

In reality, only small fractions of the population in China are eating rodent. To find a restaurant selling rodent may not be easy as well. Most likely you can find restaurants selling rodent is in Guangzhou located in the south China. In 1991, The Wall Street Journal published an article titled “Waiter, There’s A Rat in My Soup, And It’s Delicious!” The article reported a Chinese restaurant opened in Guangzhou claimed to be the first restaurant in China dedicated to serve rodent. Now, there are more than one restaurants serving rodent in China. Besides rodent, you may also find restaurants selling worm, and other insect. However, keep in mind that even people, who are living in Guangzhou, do not mean they all eat rodent or other insect.

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