Eating a live lobster

 

Having a friend for dinner takes on a new meaning

EATING YOUR DINING companions is not nice. But it’s happening RIGHT NOW at a Japanese restaurant near you.

Reader Karen Teoh (above), a children’s entertainer, found herself sharing her table with a medium-sized lobster. Its top half waved politely at her. Its bottom half had been sliced open and the flesh diced up sashimi style. The waitress expected her to eat the tail while enjoying the company of the head. Eww! 

Being eaten alive is an AGONIZING DEATH that no sentient being should ever have to suffer, with the sole exception of bear bile farmers, spam forwarders, the Generals of Myanmar, people who run pet shops, the teacher I had in third grade, the guy who got the last seat on my bus this morning, and so on. (I’ll finish the list later.)

This trendy dish is now being served at many Japanese restaurants throughout Asia. It’s a real-life horror story that makes me want to give all my worldly wealth, had I any, to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, a group of mostly bikini-wearing women known as PETA.

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The seafood-lovers at the bar were scornful. “PETA is a group of sexist bimbo extremists who complain about ridiculous things,” one said. “They even complained when [US President Barack] Obama swatted a fly last week.” He later forwarded me a news report headlined: “PETA miffed at President Obama's fly execution.”

I have always thought PETA was rather cool. After all, the group is amazingly successful at getting attractive women to remove their clothing, something that I can only achieve by marrying them.

The seafood lover was referring to an incident in which Obama swatted a fly and gloated, “I got the sucker." Commentator Jimmy Fallon said: "Makes Obama look like a bad ass." Yeah, better watch out, Ayatollah. The US Prez can KILL A FLY with his BARE HANDS. Woah, he da man.

Did PETA really complain? I investigated. What really happened was that the media bombarded PETA’s offices with calls and a spokesman replied that Obama’s action was normal. "Believe it or not, we've actually been contacted by multiple media outlets wanting to know PETA's official response to the executive insect execution,” the spokesman told Reuters. “In a nutshell, our position is this. He isn't the Buddha, he's a human being, and human beings have a long way to go before they think before they act." He sent Obama a device that catches flies without harming them. Perfectly reasonable.
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What about the accusation that PETA is sexist? It's true that members you see in the newspapers are mostly babes in lettuce-leaf bikinis. A reader who likes to be known as Veggie Girl defended them: “It’s an undeniable fact that the average vegetarian is sexier than the average meat-eater. Veggies are healthier, they are slim without being anorexic, they have better skin, and they have more energy and stamina.”

Evidence comes in the shape of Bollywood’s Shahid Kapoor and Taiwanese singer Barbie Hsu, who have just been voted Asia’s sexiest vegetarians. Barbie told the press: “Eating meat is like eating corpses.” Technically, she’s right. 

Hey, Barbie-girl, if you don’t want to eat a corpse, you can just go to the nearest Japanese restaurant and ask for “lobster sashimi”.

(I don’t think she’ll like it.)

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Technorati Tags: Karen Teoh,Barbie Hsu,Shahid Kapoor,PETA,lobster sashimi

Comments

[Tips]

PETA - the amnesty international of the animal world. (and I don't mean that in a good way).

[Dave the Rave]

I thought I was leaning towards vegetarianism, but after reading the column above i have decided that i would like to eat barbie hsu, and you can interpret that any way you like!!

[Priyantha Liyanage]

Nury,
You have opened a 'whole can of worms". People have been debating about vegetarianism for ever. I am a vegen myself but it;s not because it's a "sin" to eat meat but because 1. I don't have the heart to eat something which was alive 2. I don't want my tummy to be a cemetary to dead animals 3.I try to think how the animal would have felt at the time of it's execution. 4. Today it's a known thing that meat eating can expose oneself to various illness like cancer.
However in my humble opinion one does not creat "sin" by eating animal flesh as long as the eater does not get involved with the killing personally or by direct consent. Meat on your plate is no differant to Lettuce on your plate[Fardel, pls note]. There is no longer a living thing on your plate but " lobster sashimi" is a whole differant ball game altogether!

[Vince A]

For dinner tonight my wife prepared very tasty fish cadavers, bits of pork carcass, and of course sausaged corpse of cow, with unspermed chicken eggs.

I really don't see why veggies wouldn't touch the stuff.

[Jules]

I am most definitely a carnivore (or more accurately, an omnivore), but I would expect the meat on my plate to:

a) be dead (and cooked, preferably)
b) have been killed in as humane a manner as possible

And I don't think those are unreasonable expectations.

[Mira]

Whats the difference, killing them just before eating them and killing them a long way before eating them (in the middle of which they get processed). I think the glitch is in the taste. THAT is what its all about. Now isn't there a faith where killing is forbidden, except for purposes of eating? First of all its like don't kill the poor thing, its a sin. But if you are hungry and theres a meal walking around, you're allowed to knock it over . and if you have killed it, you better eat it, else its a sin. Conversely if you eat it, it better be killed, else its a sin... see, meat eaters will always find a way.

[Angela]

I veg to differ!!!

We meat-eaters are just as sexy, slim without being anorexic. Nothing wrong with our skin, in fact it is glowing with health and vitality. Energy and stamina? We are highly sought after by the opposite sex for our warm blooded passion and open-mindedness :)

I am unrepentant meat-eater and though my tummy is a processing plant for dead animals, how is it different from a vegan's tummy which is a compost pit for dead plants?

I eat the cow that ate the grass and other vegetation so I am really eating plants that have been processed by the helpful cow. That makes meat-eaters a distant cousin of the veg-eaters. Let's all just hold hands and sing khumbaya over the camp fire while roasting a pig.

[David V]

Eating live animals,..mmm reminds me of a (good) book...I think Mr Wong would have told us that it is never good to eat food alive. It can bring lots of "unintended" consequences :) (no spoiler here don't worry)

[TS]

Omnivore here (except durians), I second Jules about how I prefer meat:

a) be dead (and cooked, preferably)
b) have been killed in as humane a manner as possible

but will add:

c) ethically farmed, the animal should have lived a dignified life.

Here in the UK you can find meat that have been marked with farming method and sometimes even the name of the farm. Meat packaging without these markings can pretty much be assumed to come from a KZ farm.
Don't fall for the old "organic" trick, a barn raised chicken can be labelled as "organic" just by giving it organic feed.

It's true that animals will have to die to feed us meat eaters, but most of them wouldn't have lived in the first place if it wasn't for meat farming.

The sea is not about to run out of fish either. The reason that catches are diminished is that all the fish that are smart enough to avoid fishnets are the ones that are breeding. So after hundreds of generations of ever smarter fish, they are getting harder to catch. In fact, we should be worried that they are not getting too smart, all our undersea internet connections are very vulnerable and..%£& 8%^43&&

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[sej]

Here's something to re-spark the carnivore vs. herbivore argument again!

As reported in New Scientist magazine, a philosopher has suggested we should use the advances in neuroscience and genetic engineering to develop animals who do not feel pain...

For those interested in readin the whole article: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20327243.400-painfree-animals-could-take-suffering-out-of-farming.html

[Supak]

I am not in support of killing animals anonymously but its important to have fish/meat in meal because those are the first class protein providers (contains all the necessary amino acids needed for human growth as a whole) while plants are second class protein providers (no single plant have all the necessary amino acids).