The Fishbowl

Finger food: Charles Miller, over at The Fishbowl asks his readers a question: If those kooky stem-cell researchers were to discover a way to grow human meat in a vat, such that it was never at any point a real, living human...

I would not eat it, but I would take up a life of crime; break into houses and beat people until They ate it.

How exactly did this come up in conversation??

I'd start a production line, based on my own stem cells and market it as "Soylent Green".

Seriously, no, but I am a city boy, only reconciled to the idea of eating dead cow/pig/chicken through the magic of not thinking about its source.

Yep, I'd eat it. Maybe take a dip in one of the vats too.

I'd actually feel more comfortable eating real human - vatmeat is just creepy.

Hell yes!

Especially if I could duplicate my own flesh, that would make it like, 10 times cooler.

I'm not sure if the taste of my own flesh would make me want to eat better (to improve the taste) or worse (to make me taste worse). I'm not sure if I like the idea of being a tasty-treat...

Even the concept of vatmeat that is NOT human disgusts me.

The thought that I am eating human carcass grown in a vat, never lived or not, would be too disturbing. It would not get passed my pursed lips, even if there was a guy breaking into my house and beating me until I ate it.

errrm

Probably not, from all the accounts of cannibals that i have read, it doesnt really taste that good, a bit bland.

I won't eat Spam, why would I eat Ham?

But I DO somewhere have a nice recipe for Longpig Loaf if anyone wants it.

... or would that be Spuman?

IIRC, Delany has a character in The Stars In My Pockets Like Grains Of Sand being disgusted when he discovers bones in his meat; meaning that it came from a real, once-living animal, rather than being vat-grown. Vat grown meat could exhibit no cruelty to animals, so it (logically) ought to be acceptable even to vegetarians (depending on their reasons for being vegeterian, of course).

It's a cultural thing, really: just a matter of getting used to it ;-)

I'm with Sean Malloy: no vat pork, no vat chicken, no vat beef, no vat meat of any kind. Thanks but no thanks.

I grew up as a country boy and generally knew the name of animal I was eating. (A proper name, that is: "This is Betsy. Mmmm, Betsy makes a tasty burger.") I remember having a hard time adjusting (mentally) to eating "store bought" meat when my family decided to stop raising our own cows.

I'm going to go eat some hot-dogs now.

Hell, yeah. I'm all for the Tastee Ghoul fast-food cannibal cuisine chain. I want Roast French People and Baby Back Rib. Soylent Green fried long-pork rinds for snacking on.

You are what you eat.