Whole Foods Won't Sell Live Lobsters Anymore, Citing Animal Cruelty

Dang, that's like my favorite store! I love paying eight dollars for a box of organic mueslix!

The Austin-based grocer spent seven months studying the sale of live lobsters from ship to supermarket aisle, trying to determine whether the creatures suffer along the way.

In some stores, they experimented with "lobster condos," filling tanks with stacks of large pipes the critters can crawl inside. And they moved the tanks behind seafood counters and away from children's tapping fingers.

Ultimately, Whole Foods management decided to immediately stop selling live lobsters and soft-shell crabs, saying they could not ensure the creatures are treated with respect and compassion.

"We place as much emphasis on the importance of humane treatment and quality of life for all animals as we do on the expectations for quality and flavor," John Mackey, Whole Foods' co-founder and chief executive, said in a statement.

Animal rights activities were thrilled with the decision, not just because of the way lobsters are harvested, shipped and stored but because of the fate that awaits many of them — being dropped alive into a pot of boiling water.

"The ways that lobsters are treated would warrant felony cruelty to animals charges if they were dogs or cats," said Bruce Friedrich, a spokesman for People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

But, see, they're not dogs or cats.

They really take this non-discrimination thing pretty far, huh? A lot of this stuff is semi-justified when we're talking about mammals. But lobsters? They are, no kidding, pretty much large insects. They're bugs allowed to grow large because size scales differently under water.

But they're tasty.

On the other hand, thinking about them as bugs just really put me off them.

Thanks to MoveOnandShutUp.org.

posted by Ace at 04:02 PM

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