Several of my acquaintances would be disturbed by this story.
From the Mainichi Daily News:
WELLINGTON, New Zealand -- Some customers say wild horses couldn't drag them to the table at a New Zealand restaurant that's offering a chargrilled horsemeat dish called "Mr. Ed is Dead."
Restaurant owner David Kerr said Wednesday that he received lots of complaints and abusive phone calls after he started serving horse steaks at his eatery in Hamilton, North Island, as part of an annual event during which restaurateurs compete to offer the best out-of-the-ordinary culinary delights to diners.
The calls were "pretty lively and disgusting and not comforting for the staff," Kerr said, adding that "there was swearing, cursing, horrible language," compelling him to call the police.
Nevertheless, some customers couldn't wait to chow down when horse appeared on his menu at the weekend. Kerr said he sold 10 horse steak meals on Monday night.
An official for Monteith's Wild Food Challenge, Kerry Tyack, said that horse is a "different" menu item but there's nothing wrong with it. If people don't care for it, Tyack adds, "stay away."
My take is that people should be allowed to eat whatever they desire and it's pretty much none of my business. Of course, I'm excluding people who want to eat other people.
Companion post at Interested-Participant.
Ignoring the militant vegetarians for the moment, I guess the issue arises because we sentimentalize our views about "pets." Those who would think nothing of eating a cow or a pig suddenly get uptight when a dog is involved. Logically there's no differentiation between the two, since you can argue that a domesticated cow (almost all cows) are "pets" of some sort.
And in this particular case it's not even pets; it's wild animals. As long as the animals aren't hunted to extinction, I see no problem here.
Of course, of course.
Posted by: Ontario Emperor on July 21, 2005 05:19 PM
