Let’s reframe cannibalism, shall we?
We can just call it “recycling humans.”
This is apparently for real, although the guy presenting the idea isn’t actually a scientist:
A conference about the food of the future called Gastro Summit being held in Stockholm Sweden featured a presentation by Magnus Söderlund claiming that we must get used to the idea of eating human flesh in the future, as a way of combating the effects of climate change.
Söderlund refers to the taboos against it as “conservative.” Yep, he claims those who don’t want to eat your dead relatives are old fogys who don’t want to save the planet. He adds that people can be sold on the idea little by little, first by persuading people to just taste it.
Here’s an article about the natural revulsion humans have toward cannibalism.
[NOTE: I am proud that I managed to avoid any Soylent Green references in the post.
Till now.]
Flanders and Swann are people we don’t eat.
“It’s people!!” “Soylent green is people!”
[NOTE: I am proud that I managed to avoid any Soylent Green references in the post.
Till now.]
I’m actually very disappointed in the lack of Soylent Green references. Very, very disappointed.
sdferr:
I know that song by heart.
I was raised on Tom Lehrer plus Flanders and Swann, who I saw twice in person.
http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1080/1080-h/1080-h.htm
A MODEST PROPOSAL
For preventing the children of poor people in Ireland,
from being a burden on their parents or country,
and for making them beneficial to the publick.
by Dr. Jonathan Swift, 1729
I wish I could think that this Swede is doing this tongue in cheek, like Dr. Swift. I fear he’s not.
Putting aside the “Yuck!” factor and societal taboos…
A human being consumes, on average, 35 tons of food in a lifetime. By the time a person dies of natural causes, the amount of nutritious food that could be rendered from his corpse is reduced considerably due to loss of muscle mass. For argument’s sake, let’s say it is 50 pounds. So each person, upon dying, would only contribute 0.071% of the total lifetime food needs for one person. Obviously, this amount is negligible and would not produce any significant improvement or change.
This guy is either an idiot or is simply using shock value to get attention.
Do you want ‘Mad People’ disease because that’s how you get ‘Mad People’ disease, when animals are fed parts of the nervous system for their own species the prions do funny stuff and with bovines you get mad cow disease, at least that’s the way I understand that stuff.
Next, people are creatures with God given souls and as messed up as our society is we are still special creatures way, way up at the top of the heap of critters, you take away the divine of our fellow persons and you can end up in a downward spiral where it makes sense to do away with the undesirables as in the very civilized culture of German in the 1930’s and the first half of the 1940’s when the unter-menchen were disposed of for the good of mankind and al the crazy stuff coming out recently scares me to the depth of my heart and soul.
I have one word to share, “Kuru.”
Aside from the initial yuck factor, when I think about the drugs – both legal and illegal – consumed in volume (at least if TV ads are any indicator) sure make me wonder how _anyone_ can consider this a good idea! How many dying people do you think are “organic” and “drug free”?
Ask Saul….
Were the Swedes not a failed society, they would immediately commit Söderlund to a mental institution… for clearly he’s demonstrated his disconnection from reality.
> I have one word to share, “Kuru.”
I was under the impression that cannibalism was actually fairly common in the past, and still persists in some parts of Africa and New Guinea and was found in parts of the Philippines not so long ago. The currently popular idea that is was always rare and due to bigoted reports by European observers is probably PCBS. There are other things that were once common and are now less so: slavery, plural marriage, and human and animal sacrifice. Civilization does change things, how permanent those changes are is another question.
…and here I thought The Zombie Apocalypse was just a metaphor.
Marketing. It figures.
#CecileTheCannibal says to reduce, reuse, recycle.
Well, there is clinical cannibalism, which is in part supplied by the selective-child industry, guardians of the wicked solution, reproductive rites, protected by the established quasi-religion Pro-Choice.
1: Yes, that’s true. But to be perfectly frank I… I like my meat a little more lean. I’d rather eat Hodges.
?: Oh well, all right.
5: I still prefer Johnson.
Lifeboat Sketch:
C: I wish you’d all stop bickering and eat me.
1: Look. I tell you what. Those who want to can eat Johnson. And you, sir, can have my leg. And we make some stock from the Captain, and then we’ll have Johnson cold for supper.
Crew: (cacophonous) Hmm, yes, good idea, excellent thinking, very good, I don’t suppose we could have Hodges in the morning, jolly good idea, etc.
Cannibalism exposes humans to prions. Prions are indestructible and slowly destroy the brain. We don’t want the human version of mad cow disease, apart from all the moral issues this issue brings up.
It’s disgusting and normal people, with normal thinking, will be disgusted by it.
It’s part of the trend by anti-Christians to normalize disgusting thoughts, so that there is a constant greater acceptance of abnormal stuff as “normal”.
Drag Queen reading hours for children remains worse, and likely more damaging because so many feel it’s not only not disgusting, but even good, to expose kids to such sexual deviancy early.
Part of the strength of the Left’s assault on post-WW II “normal” is that so many attacks are occurring at the same time, on so many levels. It’s very discouraging, and dangerous, and ominous.
Trump is strong against some silly socialism, but other social hedonistic ideas that were “unthinkable” are being talked about. Most with some pushback, but often only weak pushback. In the meantime, Truth that is not PC, is being relabeled as hate speech and is being treated as illegal (whether this treatment is constitutional or not).
[Edit was available here, thanks.]
I’m pretty sure Cannibalism (and socialism too) was being reframed since at least 1580 by Michel de Montaigne. https://www.wwnorton.com/college/english/nael/16century/topic_2/cannibal.htm
They have continual war with the nations that live further within the mainland, beyond their mountains, to which they go naked, and without other arms than their bows and wooden swords, fashioned at one end like the head of our javelins. The obstinacy of their battles is wonderful, and they never end without great effusion of blood: for as to running away, they know not what it is. Every one for a trophy brings home the head of an enemy he has killed, which he fixes over the door of his house. After having a long time treated their prisoners very well, and given them all the regales they can think of, he to whom the prisoner belongs, invites a great assembly of his friends. They being come, he ties a rope to one of the arms of the prisoner, of which, at a distance, out of his reach, he holds the one end himself, and gives to the friend he loves best the other arm to hold after the same manner; which being. done, they two, in the presence of all the assembly, despatch him with their swords. After that, they roast him, eat him amongst them, and send some chops to their absent friends.
…
I am not sorry that we should here take notice of the barbarous horror of so cruel an action, but that, seeing so clearly into their faults, we should be so blind to our own.
If Donald Trump comes out against cannibalism, Democrats will be in favor of it.
Esther: very possibly so; he already made them defend rats!
I’m not a frequent it or contemporary tv watcher, but I can think of “Bones,” “The Good Wife,” and another show I can’t name at the moment that had cannibalism themes.
Seems like the idea is working up the pipeline.
Valentine Michael Smith would approve.
Karl: I see what you did there. But that was ritual, not actual (well, yes, slightly actual, but not much).
Here’s an article about the natural revulsion humans have toward cannibalism.
I seem to recall reading somewhere that there are two near-universal taboos that run across almost all human cultures — one is cannibalism, the other is direct incest — that is, incest with your parents or immediate siblings. and perhaps Aunts/Uncles. While we discourage first cousins, that’s actually not a real issue unless it occurs several generations in a row (e.g., the interbreeding of Euro Royalty)
Clearly, there ARE some exceptions for both — classical jokes about Appalachian family units and some of the more obscure tribes of Melanesia notwithstanding… Almost all other cultures forbid it strongly.
I was under the impression that cannibalism was actually fairly common in the past, and still persists in some parts of Africa and New Guinea and was found in parts of the Philippines not so long ago.
Pretty sure you’re wrong on that. Those Melanesian exceptions you note are partly due to the tribes in question having exceptionally little access to animal proteins and an odd adaptation of the ideas of “essence” leading to the eating of one’s enemy’s brain.
Other than that, it seems to only be resorted to during times of extreme starvation.
We can start with the professor!
Swing your razor wide, Sweeny.
Hold it to the skies.
Freely flows the blood of those who moralize!
(Had to get that in there…)