It's definitely not "common" (i.e you are not going to have cats or dogs server in a restaurant) but I have already heard that some peasant or in some states it can happen from time to time, mostly by older peoples.

It's mostly a fake outrage that pop up in the news from time to time, mostly in free tabloid newspaper, but most peoples don't give a damn about it either way.
Actually that's mostly an urban legend, very few Swiss cheese apart from Emmental actually have holes in them and the iconic "Swiss Gruyere" doesn't actually have any hole in it.

Just remember, this isn't a new or bad thing. A dog is no different than a cow. A cow is more efficient to kill and eat, but dogs provide good sources of nutrients. The stigma comes from some weird places. What's the difference between a cow and a horse? What about a pig and a cat? There is none, except we've been conditioned to believe some animals are edible and others aren't. Some cultures revere cattle and don't care about dogs. Others worshiped cats, and almost everything else was edible. Why do we draw such lines?

It's not like they eat squid or octopus...

EDIT: Yuck, yes they do. That is just disgusting.

Disgusting? In Germany we eat raw pork meat! That's disgusting! But tasty :D

Which is why I don't see why there is the big 'moral barbarianism' taking place. If we were that sensitive we wouldn't eat any animal at all and only have plants and get our protein in some other way.

We have an attachment to dogs and cats because... well... it's how our society has grown to have a idle Hunter taking out pests and having a partner who will love you loyally forever do help you at the same time.

It could be goats, pigs, geese, rats, possums, racoons, lobsters, chicken, and any other assorted number of animals could be our pet and suddenly going for 'kung-pow chicken' or 'rat stew' or 'red lobster' and it suddenly becomes a moral dilemma.

When I was in korea. I learned about Gaegogi, and although I didn't eat any I realized it was a smaller farmed animal they could raise and slaughter, since they didn't exactly have a few thousand acres to dedicate for cows.

oh well... enough on the 100% agreeing rant...

Nevermind it's probably heavily salted and kept in a specific condition of being cool and given something like 18 months for any bad bacteria to die before it's safe to eat...

But that's purely food preservation techniques mixed with seasoning it while it cures...

Butchers actually have to sell it the very same day they've prepared it. And people who buy it normally eat it within an hour or two (it's a breakfast thing). If you have some of it left after breakfast, you can be sure that someone will start the "You think we can still eat this tomorrow?" discussion. We know that it's stupid to eat raw pork :P

Joking aside, that is actually really interesting to me. Seriously. Thanks for that tidbit.

Thanks for sharing opinion! I am going to link your post in OP.

This seems wrong. I heard there are specific viruses and bacteria that lives in pork that is hard to kill/sterilize and was forbidden from Jews because they couldn't properly cook/prepare the meat (due to limited technology) vs it being a bad food source and thus a real religious issue.

Although... if Germans have a hearty enough constitution, I suppose that works too...

Eating cats, dogs or monkeys seems to be explicitly prohibited in Germany (here's an article from German tabloid BILD about this: http://www.bild.de/ratgeber/recht/haustiere/in-welchen-laender-essen-sie-haustiere-ist-das-essen-strafbar-oder-das-toeten-37730526.bild.html ; Wikipedia agrees). Don't know about other Western countries.
I don't know if horse meat is really forbidden anywhere, it's probably not common and more of a luxury food, but I can't recall ever having heard of it being banned somewhere.

You're serious? No really, you're serious?

You link an article which points out, and I quote:
"Exactly how many people in Switzerland have partaken of cat or dog meat is impossible to establish." and
"... but as far as I know, it’s very, very rare; 99.5 per cent of the Swiss would be against eating cats and dogs"
yet you assume that it's rather common or even widespread. WTF?

Fact is, I live for nearly 5 decades in this country and neither have I heard of such a case before nor could I point at anyone who did it.
But I would assume you could find 5 guys in ANY country, who anonymously would admit that they did.

Fuck you.

Ok, thank you, I will include your opinion!

PS: I assumed "somewhere between 50% to 10% of real population eats them" due to reactions of Swiss citizens in comments made by Swiss citizens of Swiss article in Swiss newspaper.

The link, which "points out, and" you "quote" to swissinfo (again, official Swiss site:correct me?) was not used to approximate percentage ("99.5"), since there it is an unsourced number. Swissinfo was used to confirm or deny existence of the problem itself. For real percentage, I linked the reactions of Swiss citizens themselves.

Also, please note that I do not generalize - I wrote "Is it true that ...(do)... in Switzerland", and not that "is it true that all Swiss citizens ..(do).. in Switzerland".

Best regards.

I think it's highly unlikely that 50% or even 10% of Swiss people eat cat or dog meat. How many people really have the time, ressources and inclination to breed cats or dogs for their own consumption and then slaughter them (most people would be too squeamish for that, especially people living in larger towns or cities who get all their food from supermarkets etc. and are totally removed from the realities of meat production). And there doesn't seem to be any evidence for a large-scale underground trade in cat or dog meat.
So probably it's mostly a thing among predominantly rural enthusiasts for traditional food.

If one attempts this in Russia, one will be charged with cruelty against animals (includes killing and use as food) under Criminal codex, Article 245 and general population will be outraged. See this as example. I assume this roughly same in the West.