Cooked & Eaten Alive
Or view the video on the server at:
https://video.tsemtulku.com/videos/CookingAndEatingSnakesAndFishALLiveeeeeeeee.mp4
Take a few moments to absorb what you see in the video here. It’s not a long video, but it is a video sure to have very strong impact on you. Take a closer look at the dishes on offer, and consider how satisfying our palate has become a game rather than a necessity. Put yourself in the place of these animals for a minute especially that poor fish. Why would anyone wish to eat meat that the animal is still moving and alive. What is the thrill of that?
Called the “alive fish” dish, the chef takes a wet cloth to wrap around the fish’s head. In this way, the chef can keep the fish alive and breathing. Next, the body of the “alive fish” is dipped into boiling oil until it is cooked. The chef must have the “skill” to cook this dish and it is consider a failure if the fish dies before it is served.
I am just numb from how sick people have to be to eat their meat while it is still alive. Think of the heavy pain it creates for the animals. How can you be eating the animal while it is in pain and still alive? How can you enjoy that? It takes a very disturbed type of taste to enjoy this for sure. Eating animals is already pretty bad, but eating them alive? Think of the heavy karma of the cook and participants. Think what results will come for them in the future?
Is it appetizing to have your meal die halfway while you are eating it? Leave your comments, share this link, let others know and be aware.
Tsem Rinpoche
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This is so painful to watch. It is terrible as we know that animals can feel, and they get prepared, cut, and even cooked alive. It is so painful to image what they are going through and what a barbaric practice this is. It is also very heavy karma. Nobody should eat meat and this is a good example of how cruel our eating habits are and how the killing of these animals creates so much pain.
Eating meat is wrong, killing animals for our pleasure is wrong. Is it one thing to not know but nowadays there are vegetarian options which do not involve harming animals.
Nobody would want this for anyone to experience. Why not seeing animals as someone instead of something and stop eating them.
Eating live animals is not new for us. Many cultures eat live insects as a staple source of protein in their diets. In some countries eating certain animals while they’re alive, or partially cooked. The dish is a delicacy and uses special bullfrogs raised for cooking. Live-food connoisseurs actually believe meat tastes better if the animal is still alive but not me. Its cruel to me and could imagine the poor animal had to suffer. While most people balk at the idea of eating snakes or any other animals because it’s cooked alive moments before it’s served. Watching the video is sickening, the snakes been served while still gasping for air. To enjoy a dish in such a condition is bad but to some they really enjoy eating it . Not only that the more the snakes move while chopped alive one could hear laughter and clapping of hands. To them is fun and compete among themselves to be a winner. May these be stopped , eating animals or whatever alive is really bad. Many have objected to this practice on the basis that animals can experience pain. Give them a chance and respect. These days many countries ban these dishes for ethical reasons . It’s considered animal cruelty or torture to have a chopped-up, but still breathing animal on your plate.
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing this.
People can be creative for some beneficial ideas which we can accept but for this, I really can’t. This is worse than killing them. These people just need to imagine themselves as the animals that they tortured and feel the pain. If they can’t take it what makes the animals can just because we can’t understand how the animals reacted to it. These people just think of they superior to the animals and animals are meant to be food to humans. This is totally wrong to believe and need to change the perspective. The animals are just the same as us in the way that they have feeling too. They can feel pain and scared just like us. They can feel joy and happiness just like us. So what makes the human think that they can do anything to the animals? We as a human has a greater advantage in using our brain should operate at a higher level which is to see things in a more compassionate way. We are not live to eat which animals are so we should not act like one. We should see that the earth is a place for all beings and we are just one of the tenant that temporarily occupying as small space just like any other being. Hence, we should respect all beings and live with respect and harmony in order to bring peace to the world and ourselves.
Stop hurting animals and start respecting them and if we can’t help them, at very least don’t harm them.
Sigh. Any form of meat consumption is no difference in bringing pain, lots of pain and suffering to animals, whether they are mammal, birds, fish, reptile or amphibia. No living beings deserved to be slaughtered for the pleasure of the taste buds. Let’s be a vegetarian today!
Its awful and very cruel. How can these people making killing of live snakes and fish as a game or competing each other to be a winner.
Inhuman act in front of spectators could be in hundreds as I could see and hear the cheering .How would anyone wish to eat a half cooked fish or snakes when the animal is still moving and alive. Horrific to watch that video .Hope some authority will put an end to these animal cruelty.
Thank you Rinpoche for sharing these article to create awareness so as more people who feel the pain themselves to be a vegetarian.
This is really cruel and sickening enough for me to faint. I really don’t understand how they can fry and eat them alive…awwwwhhhh!!!!
i hope there is a ban for this kinda cruelty.
Watching this again makes me realise how degenerate our humanity has become. I wonder what’s next and what could we possibly come up with for a game show? Oh lord hearing the announcer say…”the fish’s mouth has to be moving, if not the Chef fails”. Wow! Imagine you being gutted and skin peeled and then deep fried on both sides and then served… I cannot imagine the pain of these poor animals. Why do we need to eat them in such a inhumane way?
Educating the world on animals and the cruelty must never stop, not for the sake of these poor animals and not for the sake these poor people who will be born as those very animals they kill and probably be fried just like that!
There can be no other realm of rebirth than one devoid of compassion if one cannot see(feel) the wrong doing of participating in these ‘practices’. That’s not to point any fingers in rage but a very logical conclusion. If your karmic energy is drawn to these ‘experiences’ and you enjoy them, how can any destination other than hell await at the moment of death? I’m pretty sure you aren’t eaten alive in heaven!
Dear Rinpoche, about 2 hours ago… I watched a few videos about weird food in Vietnam and China. (Maybe I shouldn’t say food…I can’t think of any other word to describe it.) Some of them are really gross. And what am I trying to say is that all animals are the same right Rinpoche? Then why do people would think that fish, chicken, cow, pig, etc are meant to be food but dog and cats will mostly being turned into our pets which we love them very much. All lives are the same, shouldn’t we set the animals free into the wild?
Most of us can’t even stand the pain cause by a little scratch, can you imagine how is it feels like to be boiled, fried, skinned alive? We have no idea the amount of pain the poor animals have to go through before they end up our table, the amount of pain is tremendous.
Dear Rinpoche, I feel really sad for these fishes and snakes. Imagine the pain being sliced, cooked and chopped into pieces while still ALIVE! It’s feels like people adding salt on your wound. What must I do to stop people from killing animals for all sort of stuffs?
This is awful – all the more so because it is completely unnecessary. It really struck me what Rinpoche said about this becoming a game more than a necessity because this really is what it has become – just a mere game, entertainment, pleasure at the complete expense of another being’s extreme suffering. How do we derive happiness or any sort of pleasure when it is based entirely upon suffering? It seems such a total contradiction to me. There are many other awful incidences like this – I’ve heard of people grilling bear paws while they are still alive by making them stand upon hot coals; or chaining a monkey to the middle of a table, cracking his skull open and eating his brain while he’s still alive.
We considered ourselves (humans) as more intelligent, more reasonable when in actual fact we are the only ‘animals’ on the planet that would kill another animals for mere pleasure; all other animals on the planet kill only for survival or out of instinct and defence. Knowing that we supposedly have a greater capacity to think and reason, why do we still use this supposed intelligence to inflict suffering just for our own amusement? Does this determine how intelligent we are and is this what intelligence is about? I should really hope not. Surely, if we’re that intelligent, it would be well within our means and abilities to find thousands of other food options that doesn’t inflict even a fraction of this pain on any other being.
This is terrible, i cant imagine the amount of pain the fish is in when it is being chopped up and boiled ALIVE! Why would people do this? I just dont understand the reasons of such actions. I will share this with my friends Rinpoche.
Really bad karma . How come they can eat the fish while it still alive and breathing . If you were the fish ,you were ate by someone , what is the feeling at that moment? Really sad on those peoples who organised this event and the participants too.
It is very sad to satisfy one’s appetite by resorting to eating food prepared in this manner. It is highly due to ignorance too. Not understanding the law of karma and the pain we inflict on another being. We grew up thinking such food is a given for our sustenance. Years back I was also a culprit who enjoyed eating seafood. We would select them from the tanks and enjoy its freshness when served. It is due to Rinpoche’s kindness in tirelessly educating us on compassion and promoting vegetarianism that many of us are now opting a healthier and more humane diet.
There are many people after watching these videos they will scold how cruel are they, but before scolding, have they ever know the piece of meat they put in their mouth does contributed to this cruelty? So when scolding them, does it mean we are scolding ourselves too?
Now human’s desire has gone to a stage that we can’t think of others, feel for others, what we concern is only for ourselves and our enjoyment, even though the enjoyment brings pain to others.
The link below is another video of chef cutting a crab alive, watch how much the crab suffers… jeez, just imagine if you are the crab..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yPtpPQDZ98E
I can’t believe this was being made as a competition, but i wouln’t blame on the some culture that eat raw food. But this so called game competition kills animal alive and need it to be still alive while being served. It’s so disgusting….
This is so sick. How can people torment the animals just for the sake of ‘face’?! Through these actions, we know that how China values life, the ‘face’ is actually more important than tormenting animals. Such unnecessary yet cruel practise must be stopped now!
Thank You for sharing Rinpoche.
Love, beatrix.
I don’t feel good (in the sense of puking) after watching this horrible video. Not to offend them but these people are very cruel to animals. Many snakes and fishes are sliced,chopped,gutted, steamed and died in this competition. Why should these poor animals die because people wanted to win in this competition. Imagine this, if you are one of the fishes or snakes and your body have been chopped into pieces or being sliced open and the most painful thing is being eaten alive. Please stop killing and eating animals. Please promote vegetarianism. Thank you.
A drop of hot oil can and that makes us howl, imagine dipped into oil. Rinpoche did teach us not only to have compassion for those animals but also the people who have caused harm to the animals. As the people who are causing harm to the animals they will still have to experience the pain of harming those beings.
It’s a matter of taste. My girlfriends and I have enjoyed the live fish meal several times. It tastes yummy and it is hilarious to watch the fish as it watches us eat it. We try to finish the meat before it dies. Then we pour alcohol on its head and mouth. This must burn or something because it quivers and flops around for a while. We laugh at it! These fish are incredible. We have seen one live for an hour after all the meat was eaten. We just sat there and talked and drank wine until it died.
I confess I had on several occasion indulged in sashimi live lobster meals before I became vegetarian 2 1/2 yrs ago.
It will take awhile for me to purify this sick action which I regret deeply.
We are humans because we have a conscience.Without training our mind,we will not be able to prevent our attachment to sense pleasures to overcome our greed.Our capacity for kindness is too weak to resist habitual sense gratification.
We need to take personal responsibility for our negative eating habits which make us less human. Eating animals and causing suffering to them to satisfy our taste buds is not an option. But there are plenty of other food options to replace eating meat.
An immediate benefit would be we can sleep well without our conscience disturbing us.
The numbness these ‘savages’ have in hurting the animals makes them inhuman. How can anyone ignore the unbearable immensed pains, strife,grief and fear suffered by these living creatures just to satisfy the sadistical lust of these ‘sick’ people. Eating the flesh of these animals are already sinful, but eating them alive with their bodies dipped into burning oil is something out of this mad mad world, meant perhaps for people with intensed sickness of insanity! Such sense of feeling is truly cold, hard, cruel and sadistical, which will eventually bring more problems to those who inflicted such pains and sufferings. As in the golden quotes of Thich Nhat Hanh – “In every country in the world, killing human beings is condemned, the Buddhist precept of non-killing extends even further, to include all living beings.”
What kind of sick practice is this. They should ban it as it is harming animals for entertainment rather than food. It is bad enough eating the animal when it was dead. It is even worse when the animal is eaten ALIVE. There is so much heavy negative karma on both the chefs and the consumers. I hope they stop this.
What terrible heavy negative karma have these fishes and snakes created in the past for them to experience such sufferings? What about these chefs, judges, spectators watching in the cooking competition? What causes them to be so cold blooded to be involved in these acts of Killing for the mere pleasure?
The world talks about basic human rights but what about basic animal rights? Animals also have the right to live on Planet Earth and not be subject to human consumption.
Modern Science has proven the law of cause and effect. Why is it that people continue to kill or consume meat? Don’t they realise they WILL reap what they had sowed? There is an urgent need to educate the World about the effects of Killing and consumption of meat.
OM MANI PADME HUM
The world is changing so fast, I think there will unfortunately much more of this as people panic to keep things as they always have been. If they run out of food, there’s lots and lots of people in China so they won’t starve!! If you get my meaning. Maybe there clever chefs will have to learn to serve something new! SAMSARA NEVER ENDS.
Hi there. I’ve been a Buddhist my whole life but I didn’t really learn much from the religion, only recently I started to question certain teachings from Buddha Himself. As Buddha once said, along the lines of “Whatever is it that you do, use your own sincere judgment to discern what is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’, before deciding upon something.” Anyway, I’m not here to have debate on my beliefs, and have no intention of doing so.
I’m to ask you what do you think of the following video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wI-9RJi0Qo
I still remember in the past before I became a vegetarian, out of ignorance, I thought nothing of eating seafood. I used to go to Klang for seafood with friends and family and we would order a variety of seafood like steamed fish that was still swimming in the aquarium before we ordered the dish, plates of shell fish (Locally known as La La) that were alive before it was cooked for us, drunken prawns where live prawns that were flambe before our very eyes etc etc.
I thought nothing of the suffering inflicted on the fishes, prawns, shellfish etc at that time, enjoyed it and rejoiced that I had such a good meal of fresh seafood after that.
Now that I know better, I can’t take this anymore. I regret my past ignorance. I would never make another being suffer so that I satisfy my taste buds.
How could people enjoy the fish’s flesh or the chopped-up writhing snake. It is plain obvious that the animal is in tremendous pain as their death is prolonged for the enjoyment of these people. Seeing the animals suffer would usually deter people from eating the flesh of these poor animals. Tremendous negative karma for those who kill and partake. This video is a perfect reminder of how meat delicacies are a result of great suffering and having meat is just perpetuating this pain and as a result, we reap what we sow.
I have actually eaten the alive lobster and the alive fish, each once. Always in China, and always for special dinners.
This is more than ten years ago.
When we eat the lobster we actually see the lobster still moving and slowly dying right there, standing on a timber platter in the middle of the table for his last performance. The lobster is trying to grab to life with his claws and his antenna are moving about slower and slower until its life force evades him completely.
It’s chilling!
By then, I was told by my Chinese hosts that we had to eat the fish or the lobster before the animal die, true enough, everyone was happily eating while giggling at the dying animal in front of them. They also explained to me that these dishes are traditional dishes that demonstrate the freshness of the meat and the skill of the chef, so they give face and reputation to whoever host the dinner.
Well, so much for face and reputation… really!
Once, I ordered that lobster by mistake, it happens often in China when one does not speak Chinese, I remember that at our table we were so mush at a loss when we saw that tortured animal arrive on our table, we quickly sent it back to the kitchen with some sense of guilt, out of my sight! Out of my sight!
Today, I just could not take this as curiosities anymore, I know more. And I also know that it is simply not acceptable!
there are many great thing about China peoples.There are also many bad thing of them.Still uncivilised and do not know their action can be harmful.They should change their entire education system in China so that the people can learn about humanity and moral values such as the Confucius.
This make me sick to my stomach.
what adds to the already sick mind of these game is that the fish mouth must be moving and alive then it is consider successful, that is really sick.
i’ve heard and seen ppl talking about enjoying exotic delicacies such as eating the brain of a monkey alive, and served with chinese wine or hearbal soup, seeing the poor monkey head being cut open exposing the brain while the poor thing being lock or tied under the table with its head exposing out of the center of the table, and then pour a boiled herbal soup onto the brain, and seeing the poor creature writhing and screaming in pain, while the ppl enjoy the so call exotic delicacy is something very disturbing. It just show how Homosapien can go a long way just to satisfied the insatiable lust of food or so called “delicacy”, and causing not only harm, but suffering of other sentients being, worst off is eating them alive is an enjoyment?? It’s really sickening.