Why do people have no problem boiling lobsters alive?

Question

Lobsters do feel pain - all animals do.

Next time you are cooking, I dare you to dip your finger in boiling water for even a couple of seconds. You probably won't be able to - because it's excruciating.

Yet, most people have no problem dropping a live creature into a pot full of boiling water for 20-30 mins because 'it tastes so good'.

Frankly I could never live with myself if I put an innocent creature through such unbearable agony - yet most people have no problem with it. Why is this and will it ever change?

Answer 1

I have problems with this practice. There are more humane ways to kill them off than to drop them in boiling water while they are alive. I've been sorely tempted to 'liberate' every last lobster in the tank at a seafood place. But honestly, what would that do other than get me in a lot of trouble? Perhaps land me in the 'odd news' section of the AP, but that is hardly one of my life goals.

Strangely enough, I do eat meat. I just can't eat anything that looks like an animal, has toes, has a thumb, etc, etc. The rules I set for myself for meat eating make me basically a vegetarian. It's the 'oh, yuck!' or 'how terrible!' factor for me, however, rather than a 'save the animals' kind of thing. I tend to avoid meat products I know are produced in particularly cruel ways and I buy my cheeses, etc, only from small producers to minimize the suffering. Small local producers tend to treat their animals much better than the large producers. We need extremists on both sides of an issue so the rest of us can find a middle ground. So while I do occasionally eat meat, I also give generously to animal rights causes and groups.

Why do some peple have no problem with this practice? Well, they lack compassion/don't care is my first guess. My second would be they simply don't realize ALL animals do feel pain and do suffer. Many people rather wrongly think that fish and crustaceans cannot feel pain. The ability to feel pain is one of the requirements for survival as a species. It's a warning signal to the brain, no matter how tiny and primitive that brain may be, that there is something dreadfully wrong. Any successful species will have the ability to feel pain. Where some people got such a silly idea that highly successful species such as fish and crustaceans cannot feel pain is simply beyond my comprehension.

Maybe these people DO know the critter feels pain, but because a lobster isn't fluffy and cuddly, they don't empathize with it as much as they would a puppy being boiled alive. Perhaps they are simply in denial. Who's to say what some people are thinking?

Will it ever change? This is much like asking if radical Muslims and radical Jews are ever going to just get along. I should certainly hope so. Sadly, I don't expect to see it my lifetime.

ETA: I did not see in this question where the OP was trying to dictate another person's eating habits. For the ones who feel this is the case, could you please point out where this happened? I'm not seeing it at all. I just saw the OP maybe making some people maybe a little defensive and perhaps even a little uncomfortable.

~Morg~

Answer 2

I don't like lobsters. But I remember more than once Graham Kerr (The Galloping Gourmet), talking about the dropping of lobsters into a pot of boiling water. He thought it was the most inhumane treatment of a living creature.
The way he did it was to put the lobster into a pot of water at babies bath temperature. That way the lobster went to sleep. You turn up the heat and the creature would pass on painlessly. You can be a Chef and humane too.
Try that method next time, the taste is the same.
There is some speculation that when it dies under duress, the lobster releases toxins into its meat.

Answer 3

That is how you cook them. Are you suggesting people are stranegly unobjective in what they kill? Most all meat in the human must be rendered in-alive by a human before consumption, save those few instances where we have trained animals to do the work for us (I was thinking of falconing, for instance, perhaps we can also train seals to catch lobsters for us too...)

Answer 4

As you say in your question they are dropped into boiling water and the shock of that kills them instantly.
I think that a large number of people are convinced that they start off in cold water which is then brought to the boil. That in my opinion would be barbaric.

Answer 5

As Anthony Bourdain says,"lobsters are baisically big f**k**g bugs,theyre too stupid to know whats happening"He recomends cutting them in half with a big knife while they are still alive.
If you do that right you chop through all 8 ganglia at the same time, killing it instantly

Answer 6

Everything we eat has been alive so what is the problem here? How do we know that a carrot doesn't shriek out in anguish and pain when it is pulled from the ground?

Answer 7

I like lobsters but I have a pb boiling them alive.
There is a solution:
Before boiling a lobster put it in a freezer compartment for 10 mns.
It will then be asleep and wont be suffering any more.

Answer 8

Because not everyone thinks the same as you.... some people dont love animals... some people luv eating meat etc which im guessing you dont. I luv fish, chicken, beef etc so im guessing i wont get the thumbs up and the ten points then? lol oh well, i will go back to cutting the head of my pet cow

Answer 9

I have never eaten a lobster, but my b/f is a chef and cooks them every day. That is the most humane way to kill them apparently, and if they are kept in a fridge first the cold makes them drowsy, they die instantly. There is no squealing, that's just air escaping from under the shell. You choose not to eat them, that's great for you, but if other people choose to eat them, that's up to them. You don't have a right to dictate what others eat, the same as I have no right to tell you what's right for you to eat.

Answer 10

Sparkleything... we are not talking about what is ok to eat, we are talking about what is ok to KILL for the purpose of eating it.

It's not the same! What if Hannibal Lechter started talking about people's rights to eat whatever they wanted?