TO SERVE MAN — ^{A Cannibalist Manifesto}

Oh, I love food!!! But it's killing me. And it's probably killing you too, SUCKER, unless you're very careful and self-disci­plined. And it's helping to kill our planet and our moral sense. Bother. We should do something. We must do something. But what, and how, and why, and when, and to whom?

The US, the world, humanity, are at yet another of those delicious turning points that we love so much to twirl around. Various factors intrude: adequate nutrition, the availability or lack of sufficient calories and nutrients to maintain human life; the sources and distribution and costs of that nutrition; the effects of the courses we've charted for ourselves. Huh? Let me explain.

Evolved Omnivores

Most people on Earth today don't each much like earlier humans. By examining the pollens and seeds and scat and other detritus of early encampments, by examining the teeth and other body structures in human and hominid remains, researchers have been able to reconstruct the diets of our progenitors. These diets did NOT include much in the way of tofu, french fries, candy bars, wheat germ, lemonade, or most of the other constituents of what we might consider either healthy or unhealthy diets.

Rather, until around the end of the last Ice Age about 11,000 years ago, our esteemed ancestors feasted on roots and tubers, fruits and nuts, bugs and grubs and MEAT MEAT MEAT, depending on what was around and what they could catch. We didn't start cultivating grains until rather recently. We did not evolve to eat massive amounts of starch, although we did get some complex carbohydrates in all those roots and tubers and fruits.

Those arguing for vegetarian / vegan diets, or high-meat or high-carbohydrate diets, certainly can't point to our ancestors as role models. Vegetarianism may have many merits, but such will not be found in human biological history. Our teeth show us to be opportunistic omnivores, devouring whatever is available.

Agribusiness Addiction

Everything changed when we started cultivating grains, and the change didn't take very long. Researchers estimate that in the core regions of Mesoamerica and Mesopotamia, the transition from semi-nomads saying, "let's plant and harvest some amaranth / maize / barley / rye / wheat seeds so we don't have to depend on the luck of those damn hunters," to the establishment of cities and authoritarian regimes that quickly became Irrigation Empires (controlling the flow of water), was well under 500 years.

So about 500 human generations ago, we rather quickly switched from eating whatever we could scrounge or catch (or starving when pickings were slim) to raising grains that could be transported for trade, or stored for lean times, or fermented for happiness, or whatever. This meant we needed to learn accounting (to measure the crops), geometry / surveying (to measure the fields), justice (to settle disputes between landholders), technology ( to facilitate the processing and distribution of crops), lotsa stuff. We couldn't be happy anarchists anymore. Bother.

Somebody had to control / mediate just how foods were grown, processed, distributed, etc. So we got kings (with armies and taxmen) and lords (owning the mills and fields) and merchants (working the tactics of trade) and all the other amenities of modern life. And thus evolved empire and agribiz, and we're quite addicted to these, for without them we die.

Cannibal Connection

But WHY did that agricultural revolution occur? Homo sapiens had existed for many tens of thousands of years with brains just like our own but without our societal control sturctures. Why couldn't we go on living in our (well-nourished) states of natural grace?

Blame the Space Aliens, of course, who landed ten millennia ago and taught / forced us to live in new ways. Or blame the gods & demons (same thing), or the stars & planets (damn astrology!), or mutant humans. Or blame... the weather?

Note that the Big Change started at the end of the last Ice Age. Humans were restricted to the Old World but had plenty of big animals to devour. Then things warmed up, humans moved into the Americas and found even MORE big game.

But that climate change also disrupted ecosystems, so many of those big animals died. Those that didn't die on their own got EATEN by skilled opportunistic human hunters. In fact, it's likely that New World humans managed to devour almost EVERY SINGLE BIG ANIMAL in the Americas in a matter of mere centuries.

What happens when you run out of animal protein? You start growing and eating plants. And you start eating people. In the New World, where the protein deficiency is greatest, you build big platforms (like MesoAmerican pyramids) where you can sacrifice folks and roll their bodies down to the butchers, while proclaiming that it's all a Divine Plan.

Continuation Economics

Now we have other ideas about Divine Plans, and some of them don't include devouring animals. Animal Rights ideology is growing in influence and power, and may one day become the Dominant Paradigm. If you accept the concept of Animal Rights then we humans have no moral basis to continue eating cattle, poultry, pigs, any voiceless victims of our rampant lust for flesh.

But people will still want to eat meat. In early American cannibalism, human flesh wasn't a dietary staple of the common folk, but a reward for the warriors and nobles upon whose support the priest-kings depended. In a Vegan world, the powerful and their potent minions will still want their pounds of flesh - and with animals proscribed (and maybe unavailable), that'll be human flesh, long pig, YOU.

Cannibalism is logical. We easily digest human flesh and obtain all our necessary nutrients. When other protein sources are limited, cannibalism is inevitable. And there are too many people on the planet already, so cannibalism may be our last hope for environmental salvation. PEOPLE are the perfect health food! EAT PEOPLE and save the planet! The question then becomes, Who shall profit?

Cannibalistic Options

The common people can forestall their own appearance on the dinner table by taking preventative actions: Eat the Powerful, Eat the Rich, Eat the Politicians. Yeah, fat chance - just TRY to get past their robot-like bodyguards to reach their sleek, sweet, succulent bodies...

No, it'll be those same Rich & Powerful bastards who'll gain the most, who'll feast on our flesh as they now feast on our wallets and fears. That can't be prevented. We are many but weak; they are few but strong, and hungry, and ruthless. They will cull us. They will devour us. Social order will be preserved.

Cannibalism is thus the wave of the future. So, learn to live with it - or become Rich & Powerful yourself, so that YOU can gain too. You can't beat'em, so you'd better join'em. The choice is yours: pork-out or perish.

It's so hard to be an organic cannibal. —R.N.Carter

References:
• Cannibals And Kings - Marvin Harris
• Cannibal Manifesto - Oswaldo de Andrade
• God-Forsaken Cuisine - George LaMort
• The Pristine Myth - Charles C. Mann

Gentle Readers: Please send me your recipes, links etc regarding cannibal cuisine or ethics - you'll be credited if you so desire. Click on my email address below. —Ric