Now that is fresh fish!!!!!

by robert neff on November 20, 2009

To be honest, I am not sure why this bothers me; I have eaten live cuttlefish before but this just doesn’t seem right.

{ 63 comments… read them below or add one }

1 WangKon936 November 20, 2009 at 3:26 am: Neff,

I’m having the same problems…
2 jefferyhodges November 20, 2009 at 4:16 am: Part of the problem is the calloused laughter at the fish’s apparent suffering. The fish has had its body fried but in such a way as to leave its head alive, which is bad enough, but to laugh at the unfortunate animal as it attempts to breathe through its gills and even to poke it to get a reaction, and then laugh again . . . well, that borders on the psychopathic.

Jeffery Hodges

* * *
3 cm November 20, 2009 at 4:28 am: wow, that just ruined my appetite.
4 WangKon936 November 20, 2009 at 6:00 am: Humm… san nakji looks almost humane in comparison.

With san nakji the brain and guts are taken out so while the octopus is squirming… it’s still dying and should not feel pain as you eat it since the central nervous system has been taken out.

I have no love of carp. They are a junk fish that pollute the lakes here in California… but a death where you are partially burned, being eaten alive AND asphyxiating is a little cruel.
5 Sonagi November 20, 2009 at 6:45 am: It is hardly surprising that ordinary Chinese would take a perverse pleasure in an animal’s suffering. Pets were forbidden until recently, and the police enforced regulations by strangling or beating to death dogs in front of their owners. Even now, the required license for a dog is about $100, a fee that most owners refuse to pay. The police periodically crack down by posting notices threatening to kill unlicensed dogs.
6 NetizenKim November 20, 2009 at 8:09 am: Did ya take a look at all the comments on that youtube page?

Dirty bastard chinks!
Fucking Asians!
Let’s nuke em again!

Why don’t they all band together and form a group called “Racists against Animal Cruelty”?
7 WangKon936 November 20, 2009 at 8:35 am: “Dirty bastard chinks!”

I can see that comment coming from a Korean…
8 Robert Koehler November 20, 2009 at 8:53 am: I can see that comment coming from a Korean…

It’s possible, actually — I saw a headline for this on Naver.com yesterday.
9 abcdefg November 20, 2009 at 9:03 am: I don’t see this coming from a Korean:

“fucking chinky gook bastards”

–

If I had a soul, I’d find the video sad. Well then I guess I do have a soul because I am disturbed by the video. The fish looks innocent and the other fried part of itself looks painful.

Or it might be that I just don’t find – Cantonese? – very appealing to the ears.

Another part of me thinks that the fish is just a fish. It’s like an organic robot, a bundle of fibery reflexes, and not more, and what is there is but a simulacrum of sentient life.
10 Cymrodor November 20, 2009 at 9:03 am: I felt terribly uneasy last week watching some seashell creature wriggle in its upturned shell in the flames of a charcoal barbecue. This, however, is quite different. Don’t fish have three-second memories?
11 abcdefg November 20, 2009 at 9:08 am: “seedy fucking slant eye fucks”
12 Koreansentry November 20, 2009 at 9:24 am: Is this from Hong Kong? wow that’s very cruel. So fish was half fried and breathing the last air before it gets eaten by hungry Chinese family.
13 Koreansentry November 20, 2009 at 9:27 am: cm November 20, 2009 at 4:28 am
wow, that just ruined my appetite.

I thought your Chinese.
14 ZenKimchi November 20, 2009 at 9:28 am: It may also be disturbing to watch because fish are more closely related to us than cephalopods, having four limbs/fins and a face.
15 WangKon936 November 20, 2009 at 9:52 am: Speaking of the intelligence of fish vs. cephalopods like octopi… In my undergrauate marine biology class the professor told me that octopi are very smart creatures with very developed memories and problem solving skills.

Once when he was working at an aquarium the octopus tank and the shrimp tank were across from each other about 20 feet. He would turn off the lights and return the next day and find the shimp missing. Odd. He replaced the tank with more shrimp and a couple days later they became missing again. So he checked the security cameras and found out that once the lights went off, the octopus lifted the cover to its tank, slithered 20 feet across dry land to the shrimp tank, lifted the cover to that tank and ate all the shrimp.

There’s several things at play here. First of all is that octopi have very developed eyes, probably have binocular vision just like us, so it can see through water, through glass distortion and into another glass to see small shrimp 20 feet away. Second of all, it has enough sense to slither back to its own tank. Many times predators just stay in the place of where they ate their prey. For example, a dog eating spilled food oblivious to the angry cries of its master. Lastly, it knew how to lift and close lids. Dogs can’t open door knobs, but I’d say that an octopus probably could if it had to.
16 WangKon936 November 20, 2009 at 10:05 am: Undergraduate, not undergrauate. Sorry, typo.
17 Seth Gecko November 20, 2009 at 10:39 am: It seems like the beginning of a Twilight Zone episode. After the fish tormenting and eating scene, the Chinese guy stumbles drunk into an alley, gets lost, and then loses his footing as he’s walking along the river.

He struggles in the water, fighting for air, until he is lifted out by a large net. He’s safe! Or is he? He can’t breathe! And the net he’s in is full of fish… and he’s a goddam fish too!

Then we have scenes of half frying him, and serving him to his Chinese friends! He’s yelling “Chow Young, it’s me! Ming Lao!”

But Chow Ming can’t hear him.
18 WangKon936 November 20, 2009 at 10:45 am: That was sick Seth…. but I’d love to see it!
19 yuna November 20, 2009 at 10:55 am: Dogs can’t open door knobs
you knew this was coming didn’t you it’s got a funny ending.
20 seouliva November 20, 2009 at 11:20 am: thanks yuna for that cute chaser to a hard shot of reality~it also reminded me of a dog that could pull a rag to open a fridge door and retrieve a beer.

wangkon, octopi (octopuses is correct too!) can spin Rubik’s cubes too. Amusing creatures.
21 komtengi November 20, 2009 at 12:52 pm: “With san nakji the brain and guts are taken out so while the octopus is squirming… it’s still dying and should not feel pain as you eat it since the central nervous system has been taken out.”

what drugs are you smoking?? 세발낙지 is where you pick up the octopus whole, wrap it around a chopstick and it goes in your mouth all at once… nothing has been removed, it goes from fishtank to mouth.
also I’ve had lobster sashimi here in Seoul and the lobster was still moving, much like that fish. as well as live prawns, rip the shells off them while they are alive and put it straight in your mouth.
granted it’s not a nice thing to look at but here in Korea that eat almost the same thing
22 StevieBee November 20, 2009 at 1:58 pm: The correct plural of octopus is actually ‘octopodes’. It’s a Latinized form of a Greek word, see.
23 WangKon936 November 20, 2009 at 2:15 pm: komtengi, I was under the impression that san nakji is usually served in pieces and when it’s served whole, the guts and brains are usually squeezed out of the octopus before it’s set on the customer’s table. That’s how it was served in OldBoy…
24 bumfromkorea November 20, 2009 at 2:34 pm: They do de-gut/de-brain even 세발낙지 before serving – not for the sake of the octopodes (thank you for the info, steviebee), but for the customers… I guess it tastes pretty disgusting. The way they move in the little water bowl is postmortem spasm and not “Oh god, oh god, these barbarians are gonna eat me alive!”
25 Curzon November 20, 2009 at 5:09 pm: We previously had a discussion on this, on the topic of whether or not this was right…
http://www.mutantfrog.com/2009/04/27/a-history-of-violence/
26 NewYorkTom November 21, 2009 at 12:26 am: If you could stomach that shit while eating, you have the potential to do something sick too. Im certain most of these fuckers grew up torturing stray dogs and cats or at the very least, not caring that others do.
27 Mizar5 November 21, 2009 at 1:04 am: This is a classic example of cultural context. Anyone in Korea who loves fresh hwae, like myself, has eaten fish from the tank with the gills still moving, octopus still writing etc. There is nothing inherently more cruel about this than in the slaughter of livestook and the boiling to death of live lobster in the West.

When I lived in Ulsan back in the day, I partook of whale meat even though I knew it was an endangered species.

If I were principled enough, I’d eliminate meat from my diet altogether for numerous reasons, but for now, I’ll just continue to be a self-acknowledged hypocrite on the issue.
28 NetizenKim November 21, 2009 at 1:36 am: In the US, livestock are routinely slaughtered under conditions that would resemble the Holocaust on steroids.

Westerners are OK with eating animal flesh as long as they don’t have to see that it was once live nor witness the death of the animal.

In the case of fish, the manner in which fish is caught (line and hook) is a process that causes extreme pain and agony to the fish. However, Westerners are OK with it because it’s happening underwater and out of sight.

Westerners are horrified and offended by a half-cooked fish whose head is still live and writhing because they are moral cowards. If you consider a fish a sentient creature that can feel pain, etc and you cannot look a fish in the eye before devouring it, then you are a coward. Asian have no such sentimentality.
29 slim November 21, 2009 at 1:50 am: @28: Christ, do you paint with a broad and very sloppy brush!
30 Mizar5 November 21, 2009 at 2:35 am: NK, it’s not a matter of “moral cowardice”, whatever that means, because, while I do not fish or hunt, I’d do either in an instant if I really needed to. It’s not a matter of not being able to look a fish in the eye before devouring it but of not wanting to be the inflict agent of pain and suffering, which is in fact, moral integrity.

The commitment to one’s moral imperatives is largely a matter of circumstance and degree, as some famous psychological experiments have shown. The more removed one is from the immediate situation, the more abstract the act becomes. In addition environmental influences affect a person’s response.

But I get your point. If you can zing it to white people, go for it, and invent the justification afterwards. Knowing you’re not normally like that, so I’ll give you a pass for the mistake.
31 slouching_tiger November 21, 2009 at 2:37 am: can you imagine having this fish on your dinner plate?:
32 slouching_tiger November 21, 2009 at 2:41 am: This is a link
33 slouching_tiger November 21, 2009 at 2:42 am: transparent fish head
34 NewYorkTom November 21, 2009 at 2:51 am: It’s the indifference towards suffering. Im sure someone will say “dont eat meat”. That’s not the pt. I hope that whatever animal we eat, they were killed fast and efficiently. For you to sit there and not caring about the fish suffering is what’s sickening.

It goes for hunting too. I dont mind people hunting/fishing if they’re gonna take it home and eat it. The fact that people kill for the thrill or “sport” is disgusting.
35 NetizenKim November 21, 2009 at 3:38 am: can you imagine having this fish on your dinner plate?:

No, as a pampered and squeamish Westerner, I’d much rather prefer that any infliction of pain and killing of an animal for my consumption be done, away from my immediate sight, by undocumented workers in a distant meat-processing facility.
36 slim November 21, 2009 at 3:54 am: So I guess you kill what you eat there in Manhattan, NK?

What do you imagine “Eastern” slaughterhouses to be? Do animals just take lethal cocktails and expire to Buddhist chants and soothing pipa sounds? Do morally brave Asian children stare down and stab the little piggies that become their tonkatsu?

Why are you so prone to absolute junk analysis when you are not a dumb fellow?
37 yuna November 21, 2009 at 6:42 am: my cousin told his 6 year old son who was finishing off all the sushi on the big sushi boat “이게 뭔지 알아? 너 지금 니모(Nemo)를 먹고 있는 거야…Nemo 맛있어?”
the poor boy stopped for 3 seconds, and then said “응” and went on eating.
i thought it was a funny way to educate them early.
38 wookinponub November 21, 2009 at 11:18 pm: One Thanksgiving Day, I heard yelps and a hacking, thumping sound out of the kitchen window. I looked out to see what was obviously a former household pet, a smallish terrier type dog, in the middle stages of butchering for eating. Some people don’t give a shit. Livestock or not.
39 Sonagi November 22, 2009 at 2:05 am: Why are you so prone to absolute junk analysis when you are not a dumb fellow?

I thought NK’s retort was on the mark and implied nothing regarding Korean slaugherhouses or eating habits.
40 slim November 22, 2009 at 2:19 am: What mark? I see only the usual half-baked East-West essentistialist crap he traffics in. Many modern Asians are no less sqeamish than most Westerners when it comes to a lot of these culinary practices, and the usual claims to be more in harmony with nature than Westerners are another facet of essentialist nationalism.

As you noted above, PRChinese are quite cruel to animals, or at least callous to their suffering. It is not moral cowardice to be repulsed by unnecessary cruelty.
41 JW November 22, 2009 at 2:56 am: Well, I’m not sure what is meant by “moral cowardice” but I would say the indignant reaction is somewhat hypocritical. It’s sort of like how rich koreans and other peoples back in the day ate meat to their heart’s content and yet denigrated the meat handlers as being part of a dirty and inferior class of people. If you are *that* outraged by animal pain, how in the world for example do you eat chicken or lobster without feeling any pangs to the conscience?
42 JW November 22, 2009 at 3:01 am: Being outraged by animal pain or the cavalier human reaction to it… I would say is two sides of the same coin.
43 mkaplan November 22, 2009 at 3:24 am: Being outraged by animal pain or the cavalier human reaction to it… I would say is two sides of the same coin.

I think this is a good way of summing up this issue. The different sides taken on this issue seem to have to do with signaling status, group identity, difference, etc., more than anything.

There are some good ideas about this here.
44 mkaplan November 22, 2009 at 3:26 am: *The link above should be this.
45 Sonagi November 22, 2009 at 4:05 am: I see only the usual half-baked East-West essentistialist crap he traffics in.

That aptly describes NK’s earlier comment, which I missed.

It is not moral cowardice to be repulsed by unnecessary cruelty.

It is not moral cowardice to be repulsed by unnecessary cruelty, but what defines “necessary cruelty”? Youtube videos of baby male chicks tossed into grinders or downer cows hosed through the nostrils with water get 1 million + views but haven’t changed people’s shopping or eating habits.

If you are *that* outraged by animal pain, how in the world for example do you eat chicken or lobster without feeling any pangs to the conscience?

I don’t eat lobster on my school teacher salary. The chicken I’ve been eating the last few days spent the nine months of its life running around a large pasture with its friends, enjoying a steady food supply and protection from wild predators. The only suffering it experienced was the brief trip into the decapitation funnel.
46 thekorean November 22, 2009 at 4:10 am: Why are you so prone to absolute junk analysis when you are not a dumb fellow?

Has it ever occurred to you that, given that the arguer is not a dumb fellow, that there must be a more respectable interpretation to his argument?

Internet would be a lot better place if people respected one another’s intellect and earnestly address the opponent’s best argument, rather than cram their arguments into the worst possible (mis)interpretation, then tar and feather it with personal attacks and hyperbole.

But then again, why would I expect that from commenters here?
47 JW November 22, 2009 at 6:14 am: 소나기누님,

꽃게는여? 간장게장에 밥 한 공기….크아…끝내주는데 말이죠.
48 Sonagi November 22, 2009 at 6:25 am: Has it ever occurred to you that, given that the arguer is not a dumb fellow, that there must be a more respectable interpretation to his argument?

Intelligent people make stupid arguments, sometimes intentionally, sometimes not.

Internet would be a lot better place if people respected one another’s intellect and earnestly address the opponent’s best argument, rather than cram their arguments into the worst possible (mis)interpretation, then tar and feather it with personal attacks and hyperbole.

I’m having a flashback to one of your blog threads about an international comparison of critical thinking skills in reading and science.
49 thekorean November 22, 2009 at 6:59 am: Intelligent people make stupid arguments, sometimes intentionally, sometimes not.

Take it from a professional argument maker — intelligent people can make frivolous, misleading, or unpersuasive argument. But calling them “stupid” — even though you might think it so — rarely advances the argument; it forecloses the argument instead. It really should not be so hard to call it frivolous, misleading, or unpersuasive, instead of resorting to a visceral language that is sure to disrupt the flow of the argument by provoking an emotional response. Because so many (intelligent, I should add) commenters of this blog nonetheless resort to such language, I am led to believe that they are just not interested in making arguments — they only want the masturbatory satisfaction calling someone stupid.

For god’s sake, everyone needs a lesson in rhetoric.

I’m having a flashback to one of your blog threads about an international comparison of critical thinking skills in reading and science.

You are referring to this one. I thought the argument advanced fairly well until the very last exchange.
50 thekorean November 22, 2009 at 7:14 am: I will add that I am spending this lovely Saturday in my office coming up with arguments as to why my client is not liable, most of which I consider to be dubious…
51 Mizar5 November 22, 2009 at 12:28 pm: Wow, thekorean is really a man after my own heart. Nice work!
52 thekorean November 23, 2009 at 12:21 am: Whatever Mizar. Your grandstanding is so much worse than calling anyone stupid.
53 Mizar5 November 23, 2009 at 12:18 pm: Grandstanding? I’m not sure you really understand the term, given your misuse of it above, but I suppose the best response to that statement would be to quote a very well-turned phrase that gets to the point better than any other in this thread:

“Internet would be a lot better place if people respected one another’s intellect and earnestly address the opponent’s best argument, rather than cram their arguments into the worst possible (mis)interpretation, then tar and feather it with personal attacks and hyperbole.” – thekorean>

Well done, thekorean. If that’s “grandstanding” I’d love to see more of it.
54 Koreansentry November 23, 2009 at 12:21 pm: Hey everyone Mizar5 is German-American idiot.
55 mkaplan November 23, 2009 at 1:05 pm: I thought he was Jewish.
56 Mizar5 November 23, 2009 at 1:14 pm: I’m everything anyone wants to see in me.
57 mkaplan November 23, 2009 at 1:18 pm: Kind of like Obama.
58 Mizar5 November 23, 2009 at 1:20 pm: That’s quite a compliment.
59 mkaplan November 23, 2009 at 1:27 pm: Better than being called Jewish, I suppose.
60 Mizar5 November 23, 2009 at 1:38 pm: Nobody is called Jewish. Even in Israel, the “who’s a Jew” debate continues…
61 mkaplan November 23, 2009 at 1:40 pm: Nobody except for you that is. You are Jewish.
62 Mizar5 November 23, 2009 at 1:46 pm: Yes, I’d love to be, and I have often said that every New Yorker is partly Jewish at heart. A chazer nleibt a chazer!
63 Mizar5 November 23, 2009 at 1:47 pm: A chazer bleibt a chazer that is.