I have many colleagues who are pescetarian (although I notice they prefer the term vegetarian), and my sister had a long affair with vegetarianism many years ago (plus a shorter one with veganism - she found she couldn't live without ice cream). My mother is currently beginning to drift toward vegetarianism, too.
I feel great guilt about being a greedy-guts when it comes to eating meat - partly over the animal cruelty and intensive farming ethical issue (Richard Holloway's description of battery farming in Between The Monster And The Saint has made me spend more pennies on free-range chicken), and also over the relative health risks of consuming too much meat. I've never felt that guilty, though: I eat steaks like cows are moving to another planet tomorrow.
The thing that freaks me out most is the 'mock' meat that is widely available. I visited a Buddhist vegetarian restaurant when I was in China, where we were served 'fish' and 'pork' that were made out of tofu. All I can say is, if you want to eat meat, eat meat. Don't pretend to be vegetarian when you're a raving carnivore at heart and being deprived of meat-based protein could turn you into an axe-murderer.
So the news a couple of months ago about PETA offering a cash reward for the succcessful and commercial production of 'in vitro', or laboratory-grown, meat was, shall we say, eyebrow-raising. Can something artificially-created ever taste like the real thing? How long will they study it before declaring it truly safe for human consumption? Is there a less unappetising name for it?
In the true spirit of the democratic Web, I've created a poll: Would you eat 'in vitro' meat if it was commercially and cheaply available?
