An arcade game in Japan causes outrage among netizens after a video showing a man playing the claw grabber and won a puppy as prize became viral in social media.
Normally, these games feature cuddly toys as prizes, but the game in the video shows an actual living dog cramped in little buckets as the large metal claw snatches at them inside the glass case. At the end of the video, it can be seen that a man collected his prize, which shows a pup in his hands.
“Some of those puppies in that game in #Japan are real. WTF. RT. #BeKindToAnimals,” said biologist Daniel Schneider in his Twitter post. Some said the video originated from China. Though it is still not clear whether the video originated in Japan, the video shows a serious threat to animal welfare.
“Animals aren’t disposable toys, and PETA urges Chinese authorities to look into this video as a matter of urgency – if the dog are real, it’s not a harmless arcade game, but rather a matter of life and death,” Elisa Allen, director of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), told The Mirror in an interview.
She added that live animals, including marine animals such as lobsters, turtles and crabs, are commonly used as prizes in claw machines across China.
“They can easily be hurt by being repeatedly dropped, and some have been left to endure a painful death from dehydration or starvation,” she said.
Apart from getting hurt from the metallic claws, the dogs may have been kept in unsanitary conditions, too, since they do not have enough space in that glass case.
Having dogs as prizes also poses great threat to the animals, because those who get the pups may not know the responsibility of owning a pet, thus creating a big chance of animal abuse or neglect.
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