Some People On Vancouver Island Adopted a Rescue Pig And Ate It

This is the story of Molly, a rescued Vietnamese potbelly pig recently adopted by a BC couple who promptly slaughtered and ate her. Naturally, some people are angry.

The RCMP have said they are not investigating the couple who adopted the pig/free dinner as killing and eating a pig is not an illegal act in Canada—even if it’s adopted as a pet. A Facebook post by Rasta Sanctuary, who were involved in the rescue of Molly, says the pig was one of 57 that were rescued from a “hoarding situation.” According to Global News, Molly was nursed back to health and adopted out on January 19 to a couple.

At some point between that January day and February 16, the new owners realized they didn’t know how to care for a pig and turned Molly into pork.

[Author’s note: here is some recommended reading music for this article.]

“It takes a special type of person to adopt an animal from a rescue organization simply to take them home to kill them, and eat them,” reads the Facebook post by the sanctuary.

Most would assume that when an animal is adopted you can’t just like, you know, kill it—well, most people would be wrong. Lorie Chortyk, a spokesperson for the BC SPCA, explained this to Global News.

“Because animals are considered property under the law, once an adoption agreement is made, that person is the full legal owner of that animal, whether it’s a dog, or a cat, or a pig or whatever so the minute the adoption is signed we lose all legal rights to that animal,” said Chortyk. “The new person has all legal rights to that animal.”

“The reality is, it’s not illegal to kill your own animal in Canada. Someone can take a gun and shoot their dog in the head and as long as the dog dies instantly, unfortunately there’s no law against that.”

The rescuers who saved Molly from her original owners only to have her be eaten by her new owners posted a meme of two pigs looking at a shooting star to show their angst over the situation.

The Rasta Sanctuary also shared screenshots of a Facebook account they purport belongs to the man who ate darling Molly which show him speaking callously about the act. The couple also apparently Snapchatted videos of them seasoning and preparing the meat. As you can imagine, a number of people are rather upset at the couple, especially as the SPCA said they specifically adopted the pig as a pet. The society said the person who took and ate the pig has been banned from adopting more critters from them in the future.

Rasta Sanctuary said that what happened to Molly is why they don’t typically rehome animals like pigs and instead act as a sanctuary for them, saying that “while we recognize that we could rescue more animals by rehoming them, unlike with dogs and cats, the risk of our residents ending up on someone's plate is just too high and it's not something we're willing to consider.”

According to a website that caters to rural Americans, pot belly pigs apparently aren’t meant to be food as their meat isn’t that good—especially if they have the diet of a pet pig. That said, they are a pig and one of the few skills humans have is the ability to eat pigs.

VICE could not confirm what recipe the owners used for Molly, but this story will be updated if new information comes out.

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