In his piece “Consider the Lobster” David Foster Wallace argues whether our thoughtfulness about what we eat is really true since most people choose not to think about how their animal products are prepared before they consume them. Wallace refers to the Maine Lobster Fest as “something like a Roman circus or medieval torture-fest” although to most tourists and Mainers alike, the festival seems like nothing more than a fun family activity. This contrast between the reality of the event and how most people perceive it is a good example of the way that most people neglect to think about what it took to get their food on their plate. Wallace’s example of the Nebraska Beef Festival really put his whole argument in perspective for me. He says, “Try to imagine Nebraska’s Beef Festival at which part of the festivities is watching trucks pull up and the live cattle get driven down the ramp and slaughtered right there on the World’s Largest Killing Floor or something […]” For most people this example seems outrageous and inhumane, but I think that it really shows Wallace’s argument and how true it is that most of us try to pick and choose what we think about rather than always trying to follow our moral compass.
The simple answer to Wallace’s question would be no it is not okay to torture another sentient being for any reason. However, when we look at this question from a self serving standpoint many people feel that the end justifies the means because lobster -and all other animal products- are just so tasty. As someone who was a vegetarian for five years and has seen many videos about what it really takes to get meat on your plate, I personally will never feel as though it is all right to kill or harm any type of animal for my own pleasure. Admittedly I eat meat anyway. I think that the answer to the question that Wallace proposes is really up to each person to decide. Most people would consider it inhumane to torture and kill a human for their own pleasure despite the fact that we do it to animals every day. This is mainly because so many of us value the life of a human over the life of an animal, and since we have no way of knowing the pain of an animal it’s up to each of us to decide our own morals and how they impact our decisions every day.
Some of Wallace’s footnotes, especially those about the meaning of a term he used, seemed like a drag to have to read. Initially I thought that the short footnotes would be better and the longer ones were going to be awful, but as I was reading I ended up really liking a lot of the information that he included through footnotes. Some of them I felt as though he could have included directly in the reading instead. Some of them I felt like he would’ve been better of leaving out of the reading completely. However, many of them included information that I thought was very valuable to the reading, especially for those who read his piece with very little prior knowledge about the meat industry or the Maine Lobster Fest.
I think that Wallace’s “Consider the Lobster” and “This is Water” are very similar pieces because they both offer the same overall message. In Wallace’s speech he urges us to consider life from other people’s perspectives and take a second to think about how they may feel in a situation that we are also experiencing. In his piece about the Maine Lobster Fest, he leads us to do the same but with animals instead of people. Both of these tasks that he is proposing for us to try are very difficult without practice since none of us can physically put ourselves in anyone or anything else shoes except our own. However, I feel like “Consider the Lobster” is much more of a moral dilemma for people than trying to consider someone else’s point of view. This is because most people would probably agree that generally speaking all human lives should be considered equally valuable, and it’s undeniable that each of us have feelings.
