[UA] TABOO

[Tim Toner]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Eric Eves" <eeves at erskine.edu>
To: <ua at lists.uchicago.edu>
Sent: Friday, April 19, 2002 3:44 PM
Subject: Re: [UA] TABOO


> Royal Minister of Stuff wrote:
>
> > I included Cannibalism (A person slowly turning into a
> > Lovecraftian-style ghoul due to magic ceremonies
> > using, well, various "religious tracts" authored by
> > Sandy Petersen.)
>
>
> On a bit of the aside, am I the only one who doesn't get the big
> revulsion thing with cannibalism?
>
> I mean, sure, it's unsanitary, and it's obviously unethical if you're
> killing people for the meat.  But if they're already dead, what harm
> does it do?  After all, it's not like anybody /else/ is using the body
> anymore.  I know I wouldn't mind if somebody ate /my/ corpse.

I've had this paranoid thread running through my head ever since
Underground, by Ray Winninger, came out.  There was a burger franchise
called Tastee Ghoul, and the homeless could sell themselves to Tastee Ghoul
for a few bucks, and when they popped off, the body would be picked up for
eventual 'recycling.'

I thought, "Damn, that's a long way off."  But then I recalled how creepy
the StarKist Tuna ads were, where Charlie the Tuna WANTED to be eaten!  And
I saw Babe, which reveals the dogma of the pig--those who are selected go to
piggy heaven.  Time passed, and Transmetropolitan came out, as well as a few
others that explored this concept, and the amount of ads with talking
foodstuffs increased, culminating in the king of them all, the M&M
commercial which has Tia Carrera taking a bite out of our anthropomorphic
hero.

And I'm thinking, "They're getting us ready.  Just because we TALK and have
NAMES doesn't mean we're off the menu."  I soon shrug off those thoughts,
but still anticipate the day when dolphin steaks will be on sale at the
local food store.





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