Linette and I went to visit her parents on New Year’s day. We had a good time. We took waffle batter and black bean cakes with home-made salsa. Her mom and dad had made fruit salad and sausage. It was yummy… and surreal. During the meal, Linette’s mom talked a lot about a story she’d heard on the radio about a Chinese man who had eaten a human baby.
The rest of us sitting around the table didn’t know what to make of it. By the end of the discussion I think we’d all come to the conclusion that she must have misheard something. I was thinking that a Chinese company might be marketing a baby-shaped cake. I just now did a search and came up with this British news story though. Apparently, it’s not a cake. According to the story, a Chinese artist ate a human baby as performance art.
I remember a more innocent time, one when pulling potatoes out of your butt was considered shocking performance art. It seems almost Victorian now. In another ten years, I bet we’re all eating babies. I bet there’s even a chain of KFBs.
Maybe it’s not real, but here’s a quote from the story.
A controversial television programme which shows images of a man eating a baby will be screened tonight.
Chinese artist Zhu Yu said he had no need to defend himself because “an artist does not give answers”.
But he conceded he was right “to be scolded” adding that it was his “responsibility” to spark debate about art and morality.
Channel Four will screen the documentary, Beijing Swings, which shows photographs of the 32-year-old washing a dead stillborn baby in a sink and putting its dismembered parts in his mouth.
Wait, does he eat the baby, or does he just, “(put) its dismembered parts in his mouth”? That makes all the difference to me. I don’t have so much of a problem if he just sticks a foot in his mouth and sucks on it for a few minutes, but actually cooking and eating a baby, that would be too much.
I like his response that, “an artist does not give answers.” I wish Michael Jackson had used that response when he was being accused of child molestation. I would have loved to have seen OJ take the stand and say that.
I also think it’s pretty good of this artist to say that he’s right “to be scolded.” It’s good of him to concede that much at least.
Here, if you’re interested in the story, is the link.
If you’re really, really interested, here’s another story on a fellow in China who claims to have eaten a human baby. There’s even a photo! As this story is from 2001, it may or may not be related. My guess is that this started as a hoax and then someone, the artist, decided to actually do it. That’s just a guess though. They might all be hoaxes. I’m done thinking about this now.
Well, I’m almost done…. One last thought. What would one eat with baby? Mashed potatoes? Perhaps a small garden salad?
