Thousands of shark fins found on top of Hong Kong roof.

[Catta]

Doesnt work, they have modern medicines but mistrust them.

Then flood the market with stuff indistinguishable with the "real" deal. I mean - its already being done by people there and they are making big bucks...

---------- Post added 2013-01-07 at 04:13 AM ----------

there's no chinese race, IIRC

Theres only one human race... But the term has come to mean something else.

[Deleted]

It's not the fact that they eat shark fins. It's about the fact that they cut off the fins then drop the live shark back into the ocean to die a slow and painful death.

You know how Foie gras is made? Or how those cows you eat on a daily basis are raised and killed?
I'd say the shark got the better and of the stick here.

[Nanaboostme]

i see no problem with this. You have no qualms about breeding and mass slaughtering cows and pigs. But you take issue with these sharkers merely because attention is brought upon it?

This place REEKS of hypocricy.

Except sharks are endangered species, not cows and pigs.

[Crissi]

It's not the fact that they eat shark fins. It's about the fact that they cut off the fins then drop the live shark back into the ocean to die a slow and painful death.

Not just that, but they are doing it indistinguisably. They pray upon endangered sharks the same as common sharks. Sharks are also much more important to their ecosystem than cows and chickens are, so severely reducing their population is going to have a higher negative effect than if we did the same for cows.

It would be one thing if they were 1) using most of the animal and 2) doing it sustainably but they arnt. The whole region tends to think of the right now of themselves, rather than the future of the stuff they consume.

[Roose]

People are stupid. People adhere to archaic rituals because they make them feel safe and comfortable.

It is a shame that they do not care about being so wasteful and destructive with nature. If they were eating the whole shark I would not have a problem.

Cultural differences. What are you gonna do...

I love Gordon Ramsey.

[yurano]

People are stupid. People adhere to archaic rituals because they make them feel safe and comfortable.

Shark Fin is no different from Ivory. People like it because they're expensive and exclusive. NOT because it makes them feel 'safe and comfortable'.

It is a shame that they do not care about being so wasteful and destructive with nature.

They're not being 'wasteful', at least not wasting human resources.

Because shark meat is worth much less, the finless and often still-living sharks are thrown back into the sea to make room for more of the valuable fins.[7] In the ocean, the sharks either die from suffocation or are eaten because they are unable to move normally.

Some eastern countries just have a different view of acceptable humane treatment of animals.

[Goatfish]

i see no problem with this. You have no qualms about breeding and mass slaughtering cows and pigs. But you take issue with these sharkers merely because attention is brought upon it?

This place REEKS of hypocricy.

You mean the cows and pigs that are killed cleanly before any of the butchering process is done? Many of which cows are field raised (at least in my area. pigs not so much since they ruin the farmland). Perhaps the fact that the cows and pigs are bred specifically outside of their normal environment so it doesn't impact the species as a whole and drive them towards extinction? How about that the only thing really 'wasted' from the butchering of cows and pigs is the unedible sections, and even then they are sometimes sold or given away for soups and other rare dishes?

I work as a butcher and know these things first hand. Want me to go on? I really think I've put enough down to hopefully show you the difference between mutilating a living animal and releasing it back into the wild and the proper hygenic and mostly humane treatment of general livestock. We aren't exactly going out and chopping a steak off the side of a living cow then throwing the cow back into the wild to wander off and die somewhere.

[Deleted]

Shark Fin is no different from Ivory. People like it because they're expensive and exclusive. NOT because it makes them feel 'safe and comfortable'.



They're not being 'wasteful', at least not wasting human resources.

Because shark meat is worth much less, the finless and often still-living sharks are thrown back into the sea to make room for more of the valuable fins.[7] In the ocean, the sharks either die from suffocation or are eaten because they are unable to move normally.

Some eastern countries just have a different view of acceptable humane treatment of animals.

If you as a person (not saying YOU) find it acceptable for animals to be treated like the finned sharks, then you have serious moral issues, and lack of empathy.

[Ihnasir]

I don't like how it's done... but I am quite the adventurous eater.

[yurano]

If you as a person (not saying YOU) find it acceptable for animals to be treated like the finned sharks, then you have serious moral issues, and lack of empathy.

The OP and the quoted post is a criticism of shark fin consumption. NOT shark-finning as described by Wikipedia. Please get your facts straight before making a knee-jerk angry post.

Its not like western countries treat their life stock much better than the shark hunters are treating sharks.

[Goatfish]

Its not like western countries treat their life stock much better than the shark hunters are treating sharks.

Livestock, and yes, we generally do treat it much better than that. If any farmer was caught just chopping hunks off their cow while it was still alive they would be imprisoned. Not just a fine, not just a slap on the wrist, they would get jail time. Period.

[Roose]

The OP and the quoted post is a criticism of shark fin consumption. NOT shark-finning as described by Wikipedia. Please get your facts straight before making a knee-jerk angry post.

Its not like western countries treat their life stock much better than the shark hunters are treating sharks.

How do you think they get the fins to eat? What are you trying to say? The issue people have is with the treatment of the sharks, not the fact that the soup is shit and does nothing.

We use all of the livestock we process here. Every hoof and snout.

Other cultures can do what they want. The rest of the world is free to look in at them and call their behavior atrocious. No two cultures are going to agree on everything.

[Spoiler]

If your gonna kill the shark, make sure to use the whole thing. Killing the shark just for the fins is messed up.

[DEATHETERNAL]

This would be akin to tearing out a cow’s eyes to sell and leaving it to bleed out by its eye sockets. Instead, the cow is rendered unconscious before being killed or cut (no, I don't care if PETA can show a one in ten thousand instance of a cow being cut up while still alive, standard practice is that they are unconscious), and the large majority of the cow is eaten or turned into other products.

To kill an animal with an unwasteful purpose respects God for having given the animal to us from his bounty and is just and good. To kill an animal while being merciful to it out of respect for the love that God shows to animals in caring for them is just and good.

I see neither of these things in the killing of these sharks.

[yurano]

Livestock, and yes, we generally do treat it much better than that. If any farmer was caught just chopping hunks off their cow while it was still alive they would be imprisoned. Not just a fine, not just a slap on the wrist, they would get jail time. Period.

You'd be surprised at how 'unhumanely' livestock is slaughtered. The same animal rights organization who criticize shark-finning also criticize factory farms in their inhumane treatment of livestock when they're alive and the 'cruel' process in which livestock is slaughtered.

We use all of the livestock we process here. Every hoof and snout.

We use every available part of cows and pigs. Massive difference.

Why? Due to profit. If livestock was harvested instead of factory farmed, the outcome would be much much different. Just take a look at how Canada harvests seals:

Ninety percent of sealers on the ice floes of the Front (east of Newfoundland), where the majority of the hunt occurs, use firearms.

An older and more traditional method of killing seals is with a hakapik: a heavy wooden club with a hammer head and metal hook on the end. The hammer head is used to crush the seals' thin skulls, while the hook is used to move the carcasses.

- the seal also did not appear to have been killed before being hooked and brought on board.
- The veterinarians examined 76 seal carcasses and found that in 17% of the cases, there were no detectable lesions of the skull, leading them to conclude the clubbing likely did not result in loss of consciousness.
- "The Burdon et al. evidence cited above addresses the question of whether seals were likely conscious or unconscious at the time they were skinned, using post-mortem examination of skulls. In marked contrast, the figure cited from Daoust et al.’s report represents the number of seals clubbed or shot that were brought on board sealing vessels while still conscious. That number ignores any and all animal suffering that occurs between the time animals are clubbed or shot until they eventually reach a sealing vessel, usually on the end of a hook or gaff."

How do you think they get the fins to eat?

Shark fins are not illegal in western countries (like the US). Shark finning as a practice IS illegal. The post I quoted earlier and the OP are directly criticizing the consumption of shark fins, not the practice of shark finning. Please read my post thoroughly before making an uninformed post.

no, I don't care if PETA can show a one in ten thousand instance of a cow being cut up while still alive, standard practice is that they are unconscious

Lol what?

[Runeweaver]

Its a terrible practice, they cut the fin off the shark and throw it back into the sea to die a slow death. For this reason I will never eat shark fin soup.

This is exactly why I'm totally against it.

i see no problem with this. You have no qualms about breeding and mass slaughtering cows and pigs. But you take issue with these sharkers merely because attention is brought upon it?

This place REEKS of hypocricy.

However, cows and pigs etc are bred specifically to be eat once fat enough. The sharks used in these soups are mostly gathered from open water.

[Realsykes]

Shark FIN? No thanks. I might try shark meat though just to see what it tastes like. Wasting all that shark meat like that is absurd.

It's very tough... and tbh not that great.

[Stir]

there's no chinese race, IIRC

Actually...
Ming mongoloids.

Sorry, but there kind of is. Sure; China is a country, and chinese people just live there, but the overwhelming majority of the Chinese populace is ming mongoloid.
It also happens that all ming mongoloids are from China. The only ones outside China are immigrants from China, or their progeny.

So it's still tremendously racist, as 'Chinese' is usually used to mean 'ming mongoloid.'

Anyway, as for the shark fin soup: Bizarre. I mean: Sure; shark-fin soup is something I personally agree with, and have always agreed with. What I don't get is how the tasteless fin is perceived as the prime cut of a shark, to such an extent even that they toss the actual shark away to die slowly and painfully.
Shark-fin soup is left-overs, people! Not the main dish! It's what you cook when the rest of the shark is already eaten!

Ninety percent of sealers on the ice floes of the Front (east of Newfoundland), where the majority of the hunt occurs, use firearms.

An older and more traditional method of killing seals is with a hakapik: a heavy wooden club with a hammer head and metal hook on the end. The hammer head is used to crush the seals' thin skulls, while the hook is used to move the carcasses.

- the seal also did not appear to have been killed before being hooked and brought on board.
- The veterinarians examined 76 seal carcasses and found that in 17% of the cases, there were no detectable lesions of the skull, leading them to conclude the clubbing likely did not result in loss of consciousness.
- "The Burdon et al. evidence cited above addresses the question of whether seals were likely conscious or unconscious at the time they were skinned, using post-mortem examination of skulls. In marked contrast, the figure cited from Daoust et al.’s report represents the number of seals clubbed or shot that were brought on board sealing vessels while still conscious. That number ignores any and all animal suffering that occurs between the time animals are clubbed or shot until they eventually reach a sealing vessel, usually on the end of a hook or gaff."

Two things:
-Two wrongs don't make one right.
-Killing something that is eaten isn't as bad as killing something for novelty value. Sure; seal furs are sold as a precious commodity, but the seal flesh is also eaten. Sharks are killed purely out of commodity (that is: Rare fin soup). The shark mostly isn't eaten. So for a better analogy, the seals you mentioned should be hooked, dragged into a boat, then mutilated and then, alive but slowly dying, be tossed back into the ocean.
Instead, your analogy goes as far as: The seal is captured, then killed somewhat inefficiently, and then used for flesh and fur.
If you cannot see the difference between hunting and wasteful mutilation, then I'm sorry to say, but you simply should.

Doesn't make the inefficient killing good, by the way. Just less bad than the shark fin trade. Also: Wolves kill like that, as well. Doesn't make it good, and we could certainly do better because of fists and tools. It's not an excuse, it's just not the same as shark fins.

[breadisfunny]

i would like to try it. i love seafood.

[xylophone]

Its a terrible practice, they cut the fin off the shark and throw it back into the sea to die a slow death. For this reason I will never eat shark fin soup.

Which is ridiculous seeing how shark is delicious.