Comments on Could You Just Sit There and Watch This Cute Baby Lamb Die?

Mmmmmm, Lamb. Somehow seeing how cute they are just makes them seem all the more delicious. But maybe that's just me....

Oddly the baby pigs do not bother me that much. The calf a little bit but hell..wait awhile and have a great steak out of it!

The lamb though IS SICK!!! (I hate lamb as a meat). SAVE THE CUTE LITTLE LAMB!!

Screw the pigs and hold off on the calf!!

I could. Whatevs.

You add "...to boost their ratings" as if that's an unusual or somehow sinister motivation. Everything on television, except ads, is there to boost ratings. So eliminate that redundancy and the question reduces to whether it's okay to televise the slaughter of young farm animals at all.

You haven't offered any reason why not, other than the animals are cute. If it's okay for people to eat cute animals, it's okay for people to see them die.

Sure. If you think it's not OK but still eat meat, you live a lie.

When I Grow Up, I'm Going To Bovine University

After a few viewings, it probably gets less repulsive. Maybe a little appreciation for the entire process would make us more critical of industrial food and more tolerant of higher prices associated with smaller farms. Once while ordering lamb from a farmers market vendor a man buying vegees yelled, "killers! I won't shop here again." The vendor, a consumate do-good hippy, said, "What are we supposed to do? We raise sheep, but we can't keep every lamb." The pasture-fed, hippy-loved little lamb was delicious and we were careful not to waste any. (For some reason, I think nothing of throwing away a Dick's burger.)

This is one reality show I would actually watch..

Absolutely. If it's good enough to eat, it's good enough to watch being killed!

BTW @6: When I grow up, I'm gonna marry a carrot!

Furthermore, what's so fucking special about a baby lamb as compared to, say, an ugly old alligator? I can buy arguments that it's more disturbing at some level to see more intelligent and sentient animals be killed, so e.g. eating pigs and dolphins can be seen as more troubling than eating chickens and sardines. But cuteness is such a bullshit measure of the value of life.

I imagine that the National Famers Union opposes this (which seems surprising at first) because there could be a substantial backlash against meat producers and, hence, a drop in profits for them. So, if you're opposed to it, maybe it's good to let it run so that people might become less inclined to eat meat.

Of course it's "OK". Free speech, yada yada. But I won't be watching it. I don't watch "Heroes", or "Grey's Anatomy", or "Lost"- why the fuck should I start with an anti-omnivore snuff film?

Will viewers be forced to watch it? If not then what the hell do I care?

I eat meat. I love meat. Even meat from baby animals. I'm well aware of how they are killed, I grew up on a farm. We raised pigs and sheep. When the babies were born we named them. We played with them. We bottle fed them. They are adorable. They are also food.

I'm with #5

It's OK, I guess ... but it would be better if the killing part was done by pit bulls.

the "cuteness" factor is hardly bullshit. it is either a product of evolution, or a learned social behavior to find babies cute. that they are cute and helpless makes us value protecting them more. that this sometimes translates to other animals is a product of that. desensitizing yourself to the desire to value babies may not be wrong, but it could have social implications.

Of course it "smacks of sensationalism." It is sensational that this crap still goes on in wealthy societies.

Eating meat is the ultimate sign of social conservatism. It's the #1 cause of global warming, #1 cause of preventable death (maybe tied with smoking), #1 cause of obesity, and absolutely unnecessary.

It's tradition over rationality. Just like baby Jesus, homophobia, racism, sexism, etc.

Sure it's OK. Just like it's OK for an alt weekly to publish a story about hunting and killing critters in the city in order to boost circulation.

oh, nevermind. i need to think things through before typing sometimes.

Uh, does the BBC bother with ratings? Aren't they state-run? I was always under the impression that BBC 1,2,3 & 4 were the only British TV networks...?

Am I wrong about that?

This show is disgusting. I don't care what anyone says- I know my beef patties grow on a tree out back of the Safeway.

mmmm... tree patties!

People SHOULD know and see where their food comes from. If they're repulsed by it...GOOD. Maybe more people will stop eating animals or eat less or at the very least become more aware. I see that as a positive outcome. However, it's impossible to know what the actual outcome of the show will be.

They ought to make it a reality game show instead. Week 1, chicken wings, week 10, monkey's brains.

Do people think lamb and veal fall out of the sky and magically appear in the supermarket? People should know how these animals die, and why. Maybe they would think twice about their choices. I was raised on a farm too, and I have decided that it is not worth the pain and suffering to eat these animals. More power to the BBC.

The goyium are pork eating idiots. They do not practice halaka because they are incapable, their dark souls hold them back.

In Judaism every animal is killed in a kosher way that the Torah commands. The long established method of slaughter results in a sudden loss of blood from the head, causing animals to feel virtually nothing.

As Jews we fight any attempt to prevent a practice required by their religion and central to our way of life.

a market weight lamb is 105-130 pounds. they are not particularly tiny and look just like an adult sheep.

Producers of the British TV series “Kill It, Cook It, Eat It” are coming under fire for their decision to screen the slaughter of baby lambs, piglets, and veal calves on TV

All moral issues aside...

the title of the show IS "Kill it, Cook it, Eat it", correct?

Mmm... they all look so delicious.

does watching baby animals die really help ratings? I'd have guessed the opposite.

Everybody realizes the producers want to shock everyone into vegetarianism, right? (And to make money, of course. Never miss an opportunity to do good by doing well.)

Infrequent @ 15 is right. The cuteness factor is not bullshit. It is hardwired into our brains. We are hardwired to recognize small soft creatures with big doe eyes as cute. It is what prevents (most of) us from killing or abandoning our own squalling, barfing, shitting, newborn offspring.

Our rational brain can overcome this compulsion not to harm small, soft, doe-eyed animals. But the basic compulsion is very real for most people.

Human death is exploited all the time to boost TV ratings - just look at any typical nightly news broadcast.

So, why should the depiction of killing lil' baby animals for consumption be any different?

Exactly as okay as it is to eat them, surely?

Mmmmm....people eatin' tasty animals!

That baby cow looks kinda ticked off, though....

It is reality, and I think it important to show what it takes for food to be on a plate, and the morality of taking an animal's life to satisfy a person's appetite.

Agreed with others...maybe this will convince some people eating meat is bad for animals, people and the world. At the very least it will hopefully make people more sensitive to industrial farming.

Or, the crazies who lust after blood will just watch it and get more violent.

mmmm blood, yes i lust for it, but lets keep that between you and me../

my rep is at steak, he he get it? steak..

anywhooo!

babyjesus--aka yourmama@heaven.com

Perhaps I would eschew this sort of challenge had vegetarianism/veganism not morphed from a simple lifestyle choice into an irritating evangelical quasi-religion. I've cleaned chickens and ducks before, so I for one would be ready to move on up to lamb.

@19
Uh, does the BBC bother with ratings? Aren't they state-run? I was always under the impression that BBC 1,2,3 & 4 were the only British TV networks...?

Not state run, financed by a compulsory licence. You gotta TV? Gotta have the paperwork.. There are also commercial stations, lots of 'em, paid for by advertising.

I watched the first series and it was interesting. The only objection I had was that beef needs to be hung for a couple of weeks to get the best flavour/ texture. We saw it being cooked minutes after being killed.
We DO need to accept responsibility for the way our food is raised. Too many people have lost the connection between animals and meat.
If they show 'The River Cottage Treatment' over there, watch it. Groups of fast/junk food eater shown where it comes from, how it's treated and what the better alternatives are.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Cheetah_with_impala_kill.jpg

Proud tradition.