Sharks! Didn't think about that
Since I started thinking about sharks today and joined a related cause on Facebook.
Each time I attend a wedding, the traditional shark's fin dish is STILL there. Even after all the recent awareness campaigns, conservation movements, environmental messages. People CONTINUE to insist on having this "delicacy" on their menu as a sign of what, Wealth? Prosperity? C'mon! It's been done and over-done and it doesn't mean anything. I tend to look over at the bride and groom (friends? family?) in disappointment. No doubt family pressure had something to do with it, but how long is your grandma going to be angry with you because you didn't order her favourite dish?
How about NOT ordering it to send out a message of Awareness? Care? Social and Environmental Intelligence? Instead of just "following the norm" why don't we have the courage to break the tradition and do something good instead.
And the sharks. Imagine if some alien life-form conquered earth and found human-legs a delicious dish for their weddings and family reunions. Just the legs, nothing else - the remnants of the still alive person left on the road, bleeding and unable to move, waiting to get hit by a passing car. Now add to that the prospect of extinction.
"Honey, for our upcoming Martian Wedding, let us order tasty bowls of human-leg soup for the second dish. Vegetable soup? Nah, what would our alien grandparents and their friends think?? Besides, human-leg is so sumptuous, nutritious and helps us develop our athletic abilities. Just remind them to remove the hair."
Each time I attend a wedding, the traditional shark's fin dish is STILL there. Even after all the recent awareness campaigns, conservation movements, environmental messages. People CONTINUE to insist on having this "delicacy" on their menu as a sign of what, Wealth? Prosperity? C'mon! It's been done and over-done and it doesn't mean anything. I tend to look over at the bride and groom (friends? family?) in disappointment. No doubt family pressure had something to do with it, but how long is your grandma going to be angry with you because you didn't order her favourite dish?
How about NOT ordering it to send out a message of Awareness? Care? Social and Environmental Intelligence? Instead of just "following the norm" why don't we have the courage to break the tradition and do something good instead.
And the sharks. Imagine if some alien life-form conquered earth and found human-legs a delicious dish for their weddings and family reunions. Just the legs, nothing else - the remnants of the still alive person left on the road, bleeding and unable to move, waiting to get hit by a passing car. Now add to that the prospect of extinction.
"Honey, for our upcoming Martian Wedding, let us order tasty bowls of human-leg soup for the second dish. Vegetable soup? Nah, what would our alien grandparents and their friends think?? Besides, human-leg is so sumptuous, nutritious and helps us develop our athletic abilities. Just remind them to remove the hair."