Lion of the Blogosphere

Ethics of lab-grown meat

Can Hindus eat lab-grown beef?
Can Jews eat lab-grown lobster?
Can vegans eat any lab-grown meat?

Written by Lion of the Blogosphere

February 12, 2018 at 5:09 PM

Posted in Uncategorized

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115 Responses

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  1. 1) Yes. It wasn’t a cow.
    2) What’s the point of kosher laws? To prevent cruelty to animals, or to prevent Jews from eating like gentiles? If the former, then no problem. If the latter, well, then you have to ask if it’s really lobster if it was never alive.
    3) Absolutely. Veganism is predicated on not causing harm to other animals. Lab-grown meat presumably accomplishes that.

    Half Canadian

    February 12, 2018 at 5:29 PM

    • Some Vegans think it’s about health, and don’t give a darn about killing or harming animals (note, not I).

      Some Guy

      February 12, 2018 at 10:42 PM

      • @Some Guy, Not the vegans I know. They admit that it might not be an optimal diet but that not harming animals is paramount. I sort of admire this, although i don’t agree w/it.

        @Half Canadian – it’s to prevent Jews from eating like gentiles. If it were about cruelty then pigs could be slaughtered in kosher fashion. But let’s see what the rabbis come up with.

        gothamette

        February 13, 2018 at 7:10 AM

      • I was a ‘health’ vegan for nearly ten years. I really didn’t care one way or another about animals and happily wore my uggs. I thought veganism was the healthiest way to eat based on books like eat to live.

        I ended up type 2 diabetic despite being thin and never eating sugar. Maybe it’s genetics or maybe all that quinoa caught up with me.

        toomanyspiders

        February 13, 2018 at 11:24 AM

      • It’s the quinoa. Switch to a paleo keto type diet and your type II diabetes along with your need for insulin will mostly disappear.

        Paul Ryan's Sickly Old Lap Dog

        February 13, 2018 at 3:02 PM

      • @tms – Most of the vegans I know are closet sugar freaks.

        gothamette

        February 13, 2018 at 6:09 PM

      • paul ryan, any food with carbohydrates raises my BG, even the healthy/ paleo stuff like fruit and root vegetables. I basically eat a zero carb diet of fat and meat and have controlled it that way. but thank you for the suggestion.

        toomanyspiders

        February 14, 2018 at 4:47 PM

    • @tms – have you tried Metformin?

      gothamette

      February 14, 2018 at 5:19 PM

      • yes 2000 mg. It makes no difference except make me sick as a dog. metformin is nasty stuff.

        toomanyspiders

        February 14, 2018 at 8:18 PM

      • OK. I take Metformin and except for a bit of flatulence, have zero symptoms. The human body is so damned weird. (I’m up to 1500 and will be increasing soon.)

        gothamette

        February 15, 2018 at 9:52 AM

  2. I believe the Hindu prohibition is rooted primarily in what Haidt calls Care/Harm (the emphasis is on nonviolence against cattle), while the Jewish prohibition is rooted in Sanctity/Degradation (the emphasis is on not ingesting unclean meat). Though Hinduism and its sources are diverse, so who knows.

    I think vegans combine the two: Meat is murder, plus vegetables are more pure and better for you and what Gaia intended for you to eat until men/white people/Republicans tricked everyone into eating meat.

    Eating lab meat is a violation of Sanctity but perfectly fine from a Care/Harm standpoint. So Hindus would allow it, Jews would probably forbid it, and vegans would tolerate it but the most sanctimonious vegans would still abstain from it.

    Wency

    February 12, 2018 at 5:38 PM

  3. You left out Muslims – Islamophobe!

    gothamette

    February 12, 2018 at 5:41 PM

  4. Looks to me like vegans should be ok with it from an ethical point of view, I don’t know about Hindus.

    As for Jews it is not a question of ethics but a question of religious laws. If the meat was generated from a kosher source, meaning the original cell came from a meat that is kosher and was slaughtered according to the Jewish rules, it should be kosher also. If it came from a non kosher meat it is an interesting question because the cell might not be considered as “meat” and therefore the rules will not be applied to it and therefore it will be kosher.

    But there are other interesting questions, for example Jews are not allowed to mix meat and dairy products, the original reason in the bible is that it is cruel to mix a cub in the milk of his mother, so it has some ethical idea behind it. But the rule applies to any kind of meat and any kind of dairy, not necessary when they are from the same family.

    To decide about this question we will have to look at another aspect of the Jewish law, something called “Mariit Aiin” which means how things will look to the casual observer. Sometimes there are things which are technically ok but are forbidden because it might look like it is against the law. Here it is a classic example, someone who mix lab meat with cheese might look like a sinner to the casual observer. On the other hand, if lab meat becomes common people will understand that it is a lab meat.

    There are couple of other considerations which I am not going to get into but those will be the main ones when the experts will have to come to a decision.

    Hashed

    February 12, 2018 at 5:53 PM

    • I never understood the rules about honey. It’s kosher, but it comes from an unclean animal. Bees are unkosher, honey is kosher. I think the rabbis decided that because honey is not an actual product of the bee’s body, but science says that it is.

      gothamette

      February 13, 2018 at 7:13 AM

      • About honey, the formal explanation in the Talmud (Bekhorot 7b) is that honey is not manufactured from the bee body, it just pass through it, unlike milk for example. There is some grain of truth in it because the nectar is processed by enzymes is a separate container, not in the digestive system of the bee and those enzymes mostly evaporate. At least that was the perception of the Talmudic scholars.

        Hashed

        February 13, 2018 at 6:55 PM

      • @Hashed, thank you for refreshing my memory. I had read about that but for some reason couldn’t understand it. You’ve made it very comprehensible. I actually think that there is a grain of truth in what they’re saying, however, I do think they are forcing the conclusion, because who could possibly resist honey?

        It brings up another question. Is there a way to synthesize be honey outside of a bee’s stomach? Theoretically, yes but in practice, I don’t think so. The process by which honey is synthesized in that extra stomach of the bee is extraordinarily complex.

        Marvelous are the ways of God, or nature depending on your opinion.

        gothamette

        February 14, 2018 at 8:00 AM

      • Well, it’s not like I exactly remembered it all, just googled the issue in Hebrew and obviously someone already discussed it somewhere in the internet.

        Hashed

        February 14, 2018 at 8:52 PM

      • Yeah but you put it in a way that an ignoramus like me could understand it. Todah-rabah.

        gothamette

        February 15, 2018 at 9:51 AM

    • Human flesh and breast milk are both considered pareve. The former is a halachic issue as when cutting or grating food it is not uncommon to cut or scrape yourself and get a miniscule amount of skin or blood in the food. So just by being a flesh like substance, or a dairy like substance, this does not automatically render a food item into either group. This is why I have a feeling at least some halachic authorities will deem lab meat pareve.

      I missed the point about hinduism. The question was specifically about beef. I’m going to vote ‘no’ on this as the cow is so holy culturally and doctrinally in india that even the concept of fake beef, or almost fake beef, would not take off.

      toomanyspiders

      February 13, 2018 at 7:49 AM

      • Regarding milk falling into meat, if it is a minuscule amount smaller than 1 out of 60 of the dish it shouldn’t be a problem even if it is a cow milk (Batel Beshishim principle). Now you can say that the cell from which the meat was derived is less than 60th of the total meat and therefore doesn’t affect it, but on the other hand when some food is derived from some other food it is usually gets the same status as the original food, like milk from a non kosher animal is also non kosher.

        Hashed

        February 13, 2018 at 6:58 PM

  5. Veganism is about reducing animal suffering. Rational vegans defend eating road kill (provided it was unintentional), and dumpster-diving (also called Freeganism and Meeganism). As long as animals do not suffer, it’s OK to eat lab-grown meat.

    An effective lab-grown alternative could be one of the most morally transformative breakthroughs in the history of the planet. Jonas Salk’s polio vaccine would seem trivial by comparison.

    Vince

    February 12, 2018 at 5:56 PM

    • The most morally transformative breakthrough? Untold millions of people have been killed by war in our lifetime alone. Newborn baby girls are killed daily in India and Pakistan just because of their gender. Upward to a million people commit suicide each year, and you’re worried about animals?

      toomanyspiders

      February 13, 2018 at 8:15 AM

      • Humans are privileged, and if they can’t manage to not die despite their massive privilege compared to animals, it serves them right. We must protect the underprivileged animals.

        Lion of the Blogosphere

        February 13, 2018 at 9:27 AM

      • Not only are you morally daft, but you lack perspective when it comes to human history.

        Despite the horrors of modern warfare, we’re living in a relatively peaceful time. Even when we consider the crimes of Stalin, Hitler and Mao, the 20th century compares favorably to — oh, say — the pre-state societies that defined the human condition for almost 99% of our history.

        The vast majority of the world will respond with moral outrage to infanticide in India and Pakistan (as well as a elite segments within those societies). Meanwhile, mass animal death is largely ignored. Your other example of suicide is even less persuasive as it tends to be more common in rich, well-ordered nations.

        Tens of billions of animals are animals are killed each year, often in gruesome ways.

        Vince

        February 13, 2018 at 8:02 PM

      • Goats should be higher than gays on the victim hierarchy.

        666 goat 666

        February 13, 2018 at 10:09 PM

      • I always felt that most of these vegans and vegetarians are Nazis and perverts. They pine over animals but don’t care about people. I have nothing but total contempt for them.

        Yakov

        February 14, 2018 at 7:50 AM

  6. People who are vegan for ethical reasons would be doing animals a disservice by not eating lab grown meat. Lab grown meat would need to scale in order to become affordable and have any real impact on the meat industry. I hope it happens. I’ve spent 20 years of my live as a vegetarian and a few of those years as a vegan. I finally gave it up in my mid-30s when I came to grips with the fact that my vegetarianism was primarily a signalling behavior. In general, the dairy industry is just as bad as the meat industry and excluding meat from your diet while consuming dairy is an arbitrary choice that doesn’t help animals in any meaningful way.

    The Impossible Burger (at six restaurants in Manhattan) is impressive and I ate it at Bareburger, which sucks. It would have fooled me, but I still don’t regularly eat beef. The Beyond Meat burger is easily the best veggie burger I’ve ever had, but it isn’t going to fool anyone. You can get those at Whole Foods.

    OT: Lion, how about a review of “I, Tonya.” It was easily the best movie of 2017 and it deserved a best picture nomination.

    Horace Pinker

    February 12, 2018 at 5:59 PM

  7. Is replicated meat considered ‘vegetarian’ on star trek? Do vulcans eat it?

    re hindus: most hindus eat meat. The idea of hinduism being a strict vegetarian religion is a myth perpetuated by ISCON (hare krishna movement) who were militant vegetarian.

    halachically lab grown meat could be considered pareve. (imo)

    strict vegans would not eat it since ANY animal origin for a food negates it. So even honey (for example) is not allowed since it is an ‘animal product.’

    toomanyspiders

    February 12, 2018 at 6:02 PM

    • Hindus abstain from eating beef. Many Hindus pressed for the slaughter of cattle to be illegal in India at the time of its founding, but they lost the fight. But even non-religious Indians often stay away from beef. An atheist Indian coworker came with us to lunch at a local burger place and ended up just ordering some sides (this place had no non-beef burger options).

      As for vegetarianism, it’s far more common in India than anywhere else, maybe 1/3 of the population. You will notice this if you go to Indian restaurants, where vegetarian options always feature prominently. This appears to be deeply rooted in history:

      https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2016/03/30/cornell-study-finds-some-people-may-be-genetically-programmed-to-be-vegetarians/?utm_term=.7b6ce0199bf2

      70% of South Asians have the vegetarian allele, compared to 17% of Europeans,with other groups in the middle.

      Wency

      February 13, 2018 at 7:50 AM

  8. No, lab grown flesh resembles exactly what mother nature has put forth, unless the animal of which the flesh originates, was not lab grown and non-existent, in this case, it then becomes disputable.

    JS

    February 12, 2018 at 6:11 PM

  9. Jeff Sessions triggered liberals by referring to the “Anglo-American heritage” of the USA’s law enforcement. Fun stuff.

    IHTG

    February 12, 2018 at 6:30 PM

    • I wish Jeff Sessions would trigger Leftists by actually prosecuting (rather, appointing an investigator for) Hillary, Obama, and their criminal cadres in the CIA, FBI, State, etc.

      Panther of the Blogocube

      February 13, 2018 at 5:34 PM

  10. Lab grown meat, which doesn’t involve the use of living breathing animals—especially those with nervous systems and the highly developed ability to feel pain—is a million times better than the alternative. Lion, your question is tantamount to debating whether automated textile factories are more ethical than those which use the labour of eight-year olds in the the third-world.

    Roli

    February 12, 2018 at 6:32 PM

    • This is obviously not appropriate for the European civilization. Others have been doing it since forever.

      Yakov

      February 14, 2018 at 5:59 AM

      • Pretty disgusting but not perverse. What’s perverse is giving massive doses of hormones to a man who says he is a woman, to enable him to nurse a baby. This happened. Jewish female doctor at Mt. Sinai. We are nuts. What about the baby? Won’t the baby ingest a lot of drugs?

        gothamette

        February 14, 2018 at 7:10 PM

  12. why? i don’t know. but as far as food goes…everything fake is bad for your health. lab meat is way too much like soylent green. the solution is fewer people not fake food.

    A way a lone a last a loved a long the

    February 12, 2018 at 7:34 PM

    • Not everything fake is bad for you. But you’re best bet is definitely to eat traditional foods.

      Magnavox

      February 13, 2018 at 4:39 PM

      • Eat everything, but as little as you can – that’s the best diet. I heard it from professor Saveliev. Makes sense to me. Simple and guaranteed to work.

        Yakov

        February 14, 2018 at 5:56 AM

  13. And if not for the first two cases, what about “designer drug” meat that’s identical to beef or lobster, but for which the DNA has been modified enough that it’s technically a different species?

    Lab grown meat sounds pretty gross but objectively I’m sure it’ll be far less gross than livestock/slaughterhouses are now.

    snorlaxwp

    February 12, 2018 at 7:59 PM

    • *if no

      snorlaxwp

      February 12, 2018 at 9:04 PM

  14. If Vegans will be able to eat lab grown meat, how quickly will they backtrack from the scientific consensus on the vegan diet being “superior”.

    Paul Ryan's Sickly Old Lap Dog

    February 12, 2018 at 8:07 PM

  15. lion, second episode of current iteration of queer eye for straight guy features a nerdy indian man with exceedingly poor personal hygiene. Gay guys re-educate him extensively. By the time they are finished with him indian guy is almost, barely almost handsome (at least compared to his initial appearance). [I don’t watch this but others in my household do, so I am captive audience.],

    I found the whole dowry suitcase fascinating. Do all unmarried pakistani and indian men wander the earth with suitcases full of silver and gold in case they happen upon a potential bride?

    Either way this poor guy clearly had attachment issues and felt closer to his dog than any human being.

    toomanyspiders

    February 12, 2018 at 8:09 PM

    • “had attachment issues and felt closer to his dog than any human being.”

      You don’t have dogs I gather.

      Dogs have been living with humans for somewhere in the vicinity of 11K years. As a person of European heritage, my ancestors have been living with and around herding or birding dogs for much longer than they’ve been living with and around Arabs, Asians or sub-Sahara Africans. And, for most of that time, dogs thrived by learning to read and manipulate humans, thus making them extremely pleasant to be around. An old guy I once knew told me that the older he got the more he appreciated dogs, especially compared to humans. It is an entirely reasonable sentiment.

      Curle

      February 15, 2018 at 12:49 AM

  16. I have a vegetarian friend who is one for moral reasons. She says she can’t wait for lab grown meat.

    CamelCaseRob

    February 12, 2018 at 8:42 PM

  17. “Can Hindus eat lab-grown beef?”

    Maybe athletic performance improves. India with a billion+ people, has participated in some 34 different Olympics but has gotten only 28 total medals. Norway, with less than 1/100 of the population is closing in on 500 medals.

    Dan

    February 12, 2018 at 9:29 PM

    • Actually Norway’s population is 1/250th of India. Meaning a Norwegian 4.46 hundred thousand percent more likely to get an Olympic medal.

      Dan

      February 12, 2018 at 9:39 PM

    • There are seven Croatians playing in the NBA right now, according to Wiki; population of Croatia is 4.28 million.

      Garr

      February 13, 2018 at 4:36 AM

  18. It will save billions of sentient creatures from a life of torture and misery on factory farms. Not to mention the terror of slaughter. I hope it comes to pass as soon as possible. What we do tonbillions of innocent creatures is really the worst thing humanity has done besides our cruelty to each other.

    Bill

    February 12, 2018 at 9:35 PM

    • There’s a huge beef cattle industry you’ll have to contend with.

      gothamette

      February 13, 2018 at 7:15 AM

      • There was a huge slave industry which had to be contended with but slavery was abolished nonetheless.

        Roli

        February 14, 2018 at 2:30 PM

      • After a costly & ruinous war. No one just said, “Here, take my slaves. It’s on us!”

        gothamette

        February 14, 2018 at 4:31 PM

    • “It will save billions of sentient creatures from a life of torture and misery on factory farms.”

      Nonsense. Beef cattle on feedlots spend every day of their life doing what they love most, which is standing around eating and getting fat. They aren’t even especially confined.

      It is the small family farms which must confine cattle to tiny spaces chained up in barns. I’ve seen both up close and if I were I cow, I know what I’d prefer.

      “Not to mention the terror of slaughter.”

      Right because cows stand around pontificating on their mortality. I doubt death occurs to them even as it happens.

      Dan

      February 13, 2018 at 12:04 PM

      • Dan is absolutely correct here.

        As a child, I once witnessed a sow accidentally trample her own piglet to death and then immediately turn around and start eating it. I was horrified, but the other pigs didn’t much react. This was the moment I learned that pigs are not Wilbur from Charlotte’s Web — they are ANIMALS.

        In retrospect, I’m glad I learned this lesson young, as a lot of adults still seem not to have registered it. I’d suggest spending some time around livestock, but given the way people anthropomorphize their pets these days, I’m not sure it would do any good.

        Wency

        February 13, 2018 at 7:21 PM

    • If you can grow muscles and organs in a vat you’ll make a sammich instead of human organs for transplant?
      People like you are why science is now a sick joke.

      Joshua Sinistar (@Joshua06716)

      February 13, 2018 at 2:23 PM

      • The lab grown meat is like hamburger. They’re not saying, “Eh, I could grow a fully functioning human heart, but instead I’ll grow a side of beef and grind it up.”

        Wency

        February 13, 2018 at 7:27 PM

  19. Lab-grown meat is a pipe dream. Will always be too expensive – the need for sterility and rich expensive growth medium cannot be obviated.

    nickedP

    February 12, 2018 at 11:05 PM

    • Agreed. Vegetarianism is one goal of the left that will never be realized in any broad way, because it requires leftists themselves to deny their hedonist drives, which very few of them are willing to do, it turns out.

      There are many other ways to virtue signal, at less personal cost.

      Dan

      February 13, 2018 at 1:33 PM

  20. Someone has to come out with an etiquette book for the SJW/Twitter age. Bari Weiss, the new “conservative” Times pundette, lauded Mirai Nagasu’s great achievement in landing a triple axle, with a tweet that said, “”Immigrants: we get the job done.”

    Nagasu herself is American-born of immigrant parents. Weiss was called a racist, a ghoul and got death threats. Bari calls this evidence of “civilization’s death.” I agree with her but I could think of better examples.

    gothamette

    February 13, 2018 at 7:18 AM

    • I’ve looked up Weiss and she is a graduate of Columbia University (where there is a lot of East Asian students) and she works for the NYT. Far from being a conservative, SWPL types often don’t like groups of “other people” competing for the same prestige. It’s easy to virtue signal, when a destitute immigrant comes across the border is involved.

      JS

      February 13, 2018 at 12:44 PM

    • Weiss only tweeted it because she was angling for some cheap Social Justice points, so it serves her right it boomeranged on her. Don’t sharpen the knife if you don’t want it pointed at you.

      Richard

      February 13, 2018 at 3:45 PM

      • Agree 100%. I enjoy watching SJWs devour one another.

        gothamette

        February 13, 2018 at 4:42 PM

  21. Toomanyspiders says that she has seen heaven in her astral travels. Has she ever seen Hell?

    We also want to hear more about the “weird” realms she’s seen.

    Otis the Sweaty

    February 13, 2018 at 10:50 AM

    • Jeesh ask me on my blog. I would happy to discuss it.

      toomanyspiders

      February 13, 2018 at 2:25 PM

    • I see demonic faces morphing and moving expressively, looking at me, sometimes when I’m on the way to sleep. It’s kind of fun; once I get past the initial recoil-instinct I think of them as friends.
      I wish I could photograph some of the scenery I imagine sometimes when I’m heading sleepward.

      Garr

      February 13, 2018 at 2:48 PM

  22. You mates have nothing better to do? Like who cares if it’s kosher? Who’s gonna eat it anyway? Not me. I wanna eat real animals and birds.

    If you Google for it, you’ll see that some rabbis have been discussing this already. I’m not interested though.

    Lion, yoga is going great, you should totally go. From your posts about a market crash and and lab-grown cows I can see that you need to get your mind right and do a detox. It may even improve your blogging and investment success.

    Yakov

    February 13, 2018 at 12:15 PM

    • Does religion liberate you or repress you? Which is it?

      Why are some rabbis discussing if man-made pork is Kosher? Pork is always non-kashrut, so be it.

      JS

      February 13, 2018 at 1:35 PM

      • It’s how you relate to it. It has both aspects for most people. Fundamentally, religion is about man serving G-d, it’s not about G-d serving man. Abraham sacrificed his son for the Almighty in a prophetic vision. Jesus was sacrificed by the Almighty for Humanity. This is a fundamental difference. Who serves whom?

        Yakov

        February 13, 2018 at 4:57 PM

      • ‘Why are some rabbis discussing if man-made pork is Kosher? Pork is always non-kashrut, so be it.’

        The fundamentals of the law are clarified in dealing with extreme cases. This is typical of the Talmudic discussion.

        Yakov

        February 13, 2018 at 9:50 PM

      • Obviously, man is tempted to cross boundaries into something when they are not suppose to. So many religious Jews have never eaten pork, and now one questions if an artificial creation of this meat can serve as liberation of something that was always forbidden.

        JS

        February 13, 2018 at 11:11 PM

      • @JS

        WTH are you talking about? Eating some lab grown stuff is going to liberate someone from something? Gotta be a moron, right? I mean, who in their right mind gonna agonize about not eating a swine? Lion does, but I consider that trolling, obviously. Mate, life is a serious business. Don’t turn it into a joke.

        Yakov

        February 14, 2018 at 7:55 AM

      • wat I’m takin bout — Again, why do rabbis need to deliberate if man-made pork is Kosher or not?

        What is the purpose of this activity?

        Real Judaism forbids Jews from eating pork. Is this to repress Jews?

        Pork is non-Kosher, end of story!

        JS

        February 14, 2018 at 9:31 AM

    • Yoga’s for fags.

      Garr

      February 13, 2018 at 2:50 PM

      • Not that there’s anything wrong with being homosexual.

        Lion of the Blogosphere

        February 13, 2018 at 4:01 PM

      • How does yoga detox a person?

        Visiting Zion National park, that’s a detox.

        gothamette

        February 13, 2018 at 4:45 PM

      • @Garr

        That’s what I used to think and I still think it’s true, but I do my own thing regardless of what anyone thinks. I mean, I know who I’m so whatever people think does not bother me.

        Yakov

        February 13, 2018 at 4:48 PM

      • Lion, don’t make me laugh now. What’s right with being a homosexual? Nothing. So it’s all wrong. This is very simple.

        Yakov

        February 13, 2018 at 4:49 PM

      • But there is something wrong with being a faggot

        Hashed

        February 13, 2018 at 7:00 PM

      • ‘How does yoga detox a person?’

        No phones are allowed for 90 minutes. Just for this alone it’s worth it.

        Restoring the health and control of your body is the first step. You’ll take the next step yourself once you feel that you are in control.

        Yakov

        February 13, 2018 at 11:20 PM

      • “Not that there’s anything wrong with being homosexual.”

        Male homosexual acts as well as behaviors greatly increase the spread of social diseases because some gays live double lives, these diseases often spread to unwitting females and on to the larger heterosexual population. Plus, they make it weird to shower at the YMCA.

        In addition, gays form their own in-groups and almost always try to dominate or take over important social institutions, especially those wielding power. There’s a theory that the Catholic Church’s prohibition on marriage was imposed on the church by nobles looking for a place to dump gays who had a bad habit of causing trouble through their in-group power seeking, the hope being that they could be neutered if placed under the control of the Church. British history supports this view, both Richard II and Edward II being deposed due to hostilities directed at homos wielding power under these Kings. My experiences in and around politics has shown me that gays are heavily over-represented in both parties and among the staff of both parties. The number of closeted gay men in the Republican party is large,

        Curle

        February 15, 2018 at 1:04 AM

    • How do you find a yoga gym? Any talent there (female variety)?

      Paul Ryan's Sickly Old Lap Dog

      February 13, 2018 at 3:16 PM

      • They are all over. This is hilarious – yesterday I was the only guy among a dozen girls. I focused and stretched and held my asanas so I don’t even know who was in the room. I would only recognize the instructor on the street. What’s talent of female variety?

        Yakov

        February 13, 2018 at 4:51 PM

  23. Would you eat lab-grown human flesh Lion, or would you consider this cannibalism?

    prolier than thou

    February 13, 2018 at 1:28 PM

    • I confess that it sounds gross.

      Lion of the Blogosphere

      February 13, 2018 at 3:58 PM

      • I suppose that is how religious people would feel about violating their taboos as well then.

        And there’s maybe a slippery slope element to it: if you got a taste for synthetic human, or if Muslims got a taste for ersatz pork, maybe this would weaken their resolve against trying the real thing.

        In fact I think you would do it if only to blog about it. I can really imagine coming home from work in a few years time to see a blog entry here that says something like ‘I ate human flesh today’–nothing gross. Just that new synthetic meat deli in Manhatten. It tasted like synthetic pork’ Followed by a comment from one of your loyal readers saying ‘synthetic meat is prole’

        prolier than thou

        February 13, 2018 at 4:33 PM

      • Lab grown human flesh? Groan.

        Sorry. But seriously folks, if it’s lab grown, it’s not lobster, pig, cow or human. It’s just lab meat.

        gothamette

        February 13, 2018 at 4:44 PM

      • “man made-meat is prole”

        Apparently, these types of products are not consumed by proles (the types defined by Lion and Fussell), who prefer real meat coming from the slaughter house.

        JS

        February 14, 2018 at 1:22 PM

      • “Lab grown human flesh? Groan.

        Sorry. But seriously folks, if it’s lab grown, it’s not lobster, pig, cow or human. It’s just lab meat.”

        Human DNA codes for the proteins that make up human skin, pigs and cows do the same So if the lab was making the meat based on the DNA of the various animals, why shouldn’t it be cow or human?

        If you were having a skin graft from lab-grown meat and they told you they’d run out of human lab flesh, so they were going to stitch some lobster meat onto your face I bet you’d think they were different then.

        prolier than thou

        February 14, 2018 at 2:36 PM

    • Allegedly tastes just like pork. The claim is a lot of the pork taboos flow from cannibalism concerns.

      Firemen and combat veterans report that roasting human flesh basically smells like bacon.

      bobbybobbob

      February 13, 2018 at 10:08 PM

      • No way human flesh tastes like pork. Humans are very much red meat everywhere. Pork is mostly pink, because of the 5-10 times lower heme content than in beef. Heme, with its iron ion, is one of the major determinants of meat taste. The pork taboo has got to have a better explanation.

        nickedP

        February 13, 2018 at 11:56 PM

      • “Any animal that divides the hoof and has the hoof split in two and chews the cud, among the animals, that you may eat. Nevertheless, you are not to eat of these among those which chew the cud, or among those that divide the hoof in two: the camel and the rabbit and the shaphan, for though they chew the cud, they do not divide the hoof; they are unclean for you. The pig, because it divides the hoof but does not chew the cud, it is unclean for you. You shall not eat any of their flesh nor touch their carcasses.…”

        Lion of the Blogosphere

        February 14, 2018 at 6:58 AM

      • “No way human flesh tastes like pork.”

        So what does man-meat taste like? And are there racial differences? Personally, I’ve always felt that in the event of an apocalypse I’d be hard pushed to eat a black man because they look too unappetising–like ‘bush meat’. But if you ever get close to a Chinese person who works in a Chinese takeaway, you can smell the MSG and fried food smell on them, which is nice, and they are not an off-putting colour, so I’d start there. White people look OK, but obviously I’d want to keep them to Volkishly rebuild the nation, so I’d only eat fat people and chlorine-washed hippies.

        prolier than thou

        February 14, 2018 at 2:44 PM

  24. Internal Dem poll says Trump’s popularity is rising. Disconcertingly, ResetEra isn’t dismissing it: https://www.resetera.com/threads/internal-dem-polling-shows-trumps-standing-on-the-rise.23047/

    Some of them are playing it down but some are openly concerned. They are usually a good contrary indicator.

    Some have mentioned that the Dems need to get off of Russia and the Dreamers. First time any of the woke left has suggested as much.

    Otis the Sweaty

    February 13, 2018 at 3:35 PM

  25. Kashrut goes by species, which is determined by the mother. So if, for instance, you artificially gestated a pig embryo in a goat, the resulting pig would be kosher, as would all its piggly descendants.

    For meat grown in a lab, since the original cell is not detectable by the senses, I assume that the Law would be something like the law on worms in fish flesh; since the worm larvae enter the fish at a stage when they are too tiny to see, the worms are considered like part of the fish. So I think that there shouldn’t be an issue of kashrut according to the Torah.

    As for whether the authorities followed by most Torah Jews will allow eating this kind of meat, it’s an open question. Perhaps it will be like eating udders-udders are allowed by the Torah (since the milk inside a slaughtered animal is considered part of its body, not really milk), but forbidden by the Talmud, unless you cut the udder open and drain the milk, or flame-grill it. So maybe they will put some stringencies in place to keep people from getting confused and accidentally eating real pork by mistake.

    Or it might be like a ben pku’a; if you slaughter a pregnant animal, the fetus is considered one of its organs, as it were, and can be eaten. But if the fetus is born alive after the slaughter, according to the Shulchan Aruch it does not require kosher slaughter in its turn; you can just shoot it behind the ear, or whatever. And ditto its descendants. However, when a guy in Israel attempted to create a herd of cattle like this, the rabbis stopped him. Though it’s technically permissible, they did not see fit to create a normative situation when Jews are eating the meat of animals which have not been slaughtered.

    B

    February 13, 2018 at 4:24 PM

    • That could have put a lot of slaughters, butchers and rabbis out of work. I wouldn’t eat from that herd though. But just want my meat the way the Jews had it for millennia. No freaky modern stuff. Let the tradition rule and the older the tradition the better.

      Interesting thing is that just after three yoga practices I’ve lost like 75% of my interest in eating meat. This is karma. Who knows where I may end up? A vegan? Who knows? I’m to new to it to talk.

      Lion, drop everything and run to Yoga. Yesterday’s practice was amazing. I’m progressing in restoring my former flexibility and so can you.

      Yakov

      February 14, 2018 at 6:09 AM

  26. It has been done already.
    Gaines-Burgers.
    Easy on the colon, too.
    Your dog would crap out soft-serve feces
    after feasting on these ‘meety’ delights.
    Today, your pet is expecting grass-fed elk for dinner while you wait for test-tube steaks to get grill marks from a 3-D printer.
    Meanwhile in Venezuela ,they chase live cows around the Not-So Golden Corral. Socialism it’s what’s for dinner…(make a nice commercial if Republicans were not so bovine in their thinking. Slap a Bernie bumper sticker on that poor beast.)

    KnoMad

    February 13, 2018 at 5:24 PM

  27. Leon — Why do you write so much about the ethics of eating meat? Are you vegetarian or something?

    destructure

    February 13, 2018 at 9:36 PM

  28. Shaun White is awesome.

    gothamette

    February 13, 2018 at 10:02 PM

  29. So what is everyone giving up for lent?

    toomanyspiders

    February 14, 2018 at 2:16 PM

    • I could give up blogging.

      Lion of the Blogosphere

      February 14, 2018 at 2:25 PM

      • Only if you provide us with a lab-grown equivalent blog first.

        toomanyspiders

        February 14, 2018 at 4:49 PM

      • Please don’t Lion. I might not agree with your politics at times but I am addicted to your blog. Your writing is very compelling and love to read your opinions regardless of our political differences.

        mpt

        February 14, 2018 at 7:11 PM

    • whiskey. which is why i just stocked up on tequila.

      Seth Largo (@SethLargo)

      February 14, 2018 at 5:10 PM

  30. what the hell lion, the shooting happened like two hours ago. i need the definitive LotB verdict on motive.

    Seth Largo (@SethLargo)

    February 14, 2018 at 5:09 PM

  31. Lion: another school shooting. Parkland, Fl. Sounds bad.

    gothamette

    February 14, 2018 at 5:20 PM

    • School shooting is prole. Dying from school shooting doubly prole.

      mpt

      February 14, 2018 at 6:54 PM

      • That’s right! This kind of stuff never happens at elite private schools.

        Lion of the Blogosphere

        February 14, 2018 at 6:55 PM

      • Making jokes about school shooting is prole.

        gothamette

        February 15, 2018 at 9:52 AM

    • has anyone watched the film elephant? perhaps deserves a lion review. @seth largo I’ll give up whiskey with you. hooyah!

      toomanyspiders

      February 14, 2018 at 8:23 PM

  32. Hey, new beta male rage incident?

    IHTG

    February 14, 2018 at 5:24 PM


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