Certain food preferences seem natural to us. We usually do not recognize that they are natural only because we have grown up with them; they are quite likely to be unnatural to someone from a different culture. In southeast Asia, for example, the majority of adults do not drink milk. To many Americans it is inconceivable that people in other parts of the world do not drink milk, since to us it is a "natural" food. In China, dog meat is a delicacy; but the thought of eating a dog is enough to make most Americans feel sick. Yet we can see how this is part of a cultural pattern. Americans keep dogs as pets and tend to think of them as almost human. Therefore, we would not dream of eating dog meat. Horses, too, sometimes become pets, and horse meat is also rejected by most Americans, although not because of its taste. You may have eaten it without even knowing it, and you probably would not recognize it if someone didn't tell you what you were eating. On the other hand, we generally do not feel affection for cows or pigs, and we eat their meat without any feeling of regret. In India a cow receives the kind of care that a horse or even a dog receives in our country, and the attitude of Indians towards eating beef is similar to our feeling about eating dog meat. On the other hand, in China dogs are not treated as kindly as they are in the United States. Since they are not pets, the attitude of Chinese people towards dogs is similar to our attitude towards cows.