Sunday 16 March 2008

CANNIBALISM...!

The phenomenon that is Spam has always seemed a strange business to me. There has never been a shortage of wacky ideas. But, the way I look at it, trawling through e-mail keeps me abreast of weird things on the web. I read everything. There are websites that explain how not to pay your television license and others, more charmingly, which tell about dildos, ball-bearings, penis extensions, how to commit suicide and the availability of teenage virgins. Not that there is a lot of competition in the last category.


I should know, I used to be one.


Though I must confess that, in all honesty, I am presently searching the internet for a young man willing to be eaten. Culinary cannibalism, as you may or may not know, is now completely mainstream, much in vogue among wealthy young men with nothing better to do. More of a male than a female thing, apparently. Significantly, though feminists have long regarded women as men’s victims, Herr Armin Meiwes, the famous German cannibal, claimed he was never much drawn to dining on females. I know, for many of you, that's a disappointment, though, astonishingly, hundreds of men volunteered when he advertised for a suitable subject. Including, if I’ve got this right, Dennis Nielsen, the necrophiliac from Muswell Hill, who was convicted of six murders in the early 1980s.



My best friend Alice, too, seems to have toyed with the idea. When shopping for men, she says, avoid the urge to bite them. Which seems kind of Freudian to me. Indeed, it may seem rather extraordinary, but what we once considered acts of suicidal mutilation have now become a culinary lifestyle choice. One can sympathise, of course. There appears to have been no specific legislation in Germany governing the act of cannibalism. It is very worrying. But it's not an ethical question. Male genitals served with horseradish cream rather than Dijon mayonnaise, apparently make a remarkably lively dish, and even though dining on other people’s body parts is a freaky concept, once the toes are cooked to perfection, they are, I’m told, a delicatessen to the true hominis connoisseur.


Gunther von Hagen’s Body World tour drew millions to savour his ’plastinated’ corpses. You may well have seen it. Though it can’t have been much fun for Professor Hagen and his entourage, it’s been profitable. Which is precisely why the London Science Museum is planning to introduce a new salacious exhibit to its controversial adults-only wing: a decomposing human body in a glass box. These things can cause a lot of excitement. Besides, cannibalism is not on the list of seven sins drawn up by Pope Gregory the Great in the 6th century. So if you are serious about the enterprise do some research. And I am not making this up. The internet Cannibal Cafe is a cosy, very lunchy sort of place full of cognoscenti with its relaxed gourmet style cachet and its smart feel of young trendies eschewing McDonald’s as a natural life-style choice. And although I love to eat out anywhere from New York, London, Paris to Rome or Mumbai, I haven't yet found anything to match that kind of repertoire. Though, obviously, only those with strong stomachs are recommended to come here. And if you have a large rear-end, a big chest or a prominent belly, make sure not to take part other than from the neck up (there have been claims by New Guinea cannibals that the brain is not good to eat) and include plenty of fruit and vegetables to provide anti-oxidant vitamins.


Bon appetit...


Mademoiselle Dreamy

12 comments:

Jonathan said...

Are cannibals drawn to human flesh because of the taste in and of-itself, or because of the psychological kicks and thrills they experience knowing that it is human flesh and that they are breaking taboos and engaging in the transgressive? If the latter, doesn't this somewhat delegitimise the act; if the former, is it really that much better that chicken or pork (which apparently taste similar) cannot suffice?

Isn't being engaged in an act merely because it is transgressive embarrasingly childish? And revealing of issues that have little to do with an actual need for what is forbidden.

As for those who want to get eaten, again, is this really what they want, or are they actually wanting something else, but despair that they can't get it.

Its like suicide itself. See how it weirdly hold hands with the desire for self-abnegation enshrined in the socially sacralised ambition of Enlightenment/holiness. Cut it how you like, but in both the self is wanted to be escaped from.

What is there on the other side of the dialectic of shocking and being shocked, I wonder?

Anonymous said...

You are not eating me! My mother warned me about girls like you.. I can see her now. Swaying in the garden, holding onto the swing for support - bottle of Gordons in one hand and a fag in the other and her old face red and wrinkled "Don't go on those internets !" she used to say "They is full of cannibals and werewolves..." and what I thought was a drunken delusion turns out to be true!!

Selena Dreamy said...

Don’t be like that Mutley, there are only so many dietary recipes a girl can try before she wants to attempt something new - with a whiff of genuine necrophilia about it...

Selena Dreamy said...

Suicide is a form of self-abnegation, Jonathan, that - particularly in our time - appears to undergo sharply diminishing returns...

Kizzy R. Hannah said...

Well, that's certainly food for thought ......

I have heard about this before. I just cannot understand why anyone would want to be eaten, or to eat another human being. Unless, of course, if it's a case of eat or be eaten.

Nice to see you at my blog. I shall be back here again xxx

Jonathan said...

What do you mean re Suicide Dreamy..not sure I catch your driftwood.

I think cannibals are cannibals, supermum, because they want to shock, to kick against the system of prohibition and tabboo, possibly in order to sharpen the ego identity as set against a history of repression; well, unless they are stranded and have nothing else to eat but each other.

Kizzy R. Hannah said...

So .... are they just a bit sick in the head then. They have to me mentally unstable.

Anonymous said...

Personally I would prefer some nice spaghetti maybe a carbonara and a glass of red wine...

Jonathan said...

Well, if I said they were 'sick in the head' they might think I was being judgemental more than analytical, and perhaps want to refer me to some notion of moral relativism by which they could then say : 'who are you to say that my eating you is wrong'...etc...and this will need to take us in a very dreary metaphysical direction difficult to resolve. Whereas by merely analysing their motives I take a different approach.

Kizzy R. Hannah said...

Jonathan, I see where you are coming from. My problem is I don't think before I blog :)

Jonathan said...

Actually, I don't think I do either. It just kind of happens as I write. I think I may be 'listening' to some kind of voice in my head, if that doesn't sound too mad (it probably does)

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