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So they're finally getting a Whole Foods supermarket up in Portland, Maine, but they're fighting over whether or not to sell live lobsters.
In Maine.
Live lobsters.
You can't swing a dead cat without hitting someone selling live lobsters in Maine, so frankly if the Whole Foods people are so against it, I think they could probably skip the whole thing and be none worse for it. Instead, as you've probably read, they're going to give each lobster its own cozy little room in the tank instead of the usual "pile 'em up in one big tank" approach.
Oooookay.
I guess it's okay to be concerned about the suffering of lobsters, though it seems to me we're investing a lot more in their suffering than the suffering of human beings (anyone who's taken a walk down Congress Street in Portland will know exactly what I'm talking about).
Once again the Whole Foods folks are being a bit hypocritical. They don't want to cause suffering for live lobsters and they don't promote boiling them live either -- they will gladly stun them for you using a "humane" device called (and I am not making this up) "The Crusta-Stun". But let's say you are too squeamish to buy a sea mudbug, living or stunned, and instead opt for the convenience of packaged lobster meat. Well, the Whole Foods folks are glad to sell you some of that, too, but this is the big-ass machine they use to get that meat -- a high pressure machine that literally forces all of the meat out of every last nook and cranny of a lobster shell, even the little tiny legs (as every REAL Mainer knows, you always suck the meat out of the legs). I'm not entirely clear on how this is more humane than boiling, or even the infamous ice-pick method of lobster murder. I suspect it's humane the same way we "humanely" slaughter cows, chickens and pigs -- i.e. mechanized to the point that it doesn't seem like slaughter.
Me, I am a traditionalist and firmly believe in tossing live lobsters directly into a big ol' pot of boiling water. It has been my own personal tradition for some time now to kiss each lobster on the carapace before I throw them in the water to let them know that they are loved for their tasty sacrifice. I think that's pretty humane. Maybe the Whole Foods store can hire a lobster kisser to bid each one adieu as they leave the store.
(links via The Secret Life Of Lobsters)
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