SAFARI
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The method of obtaining shark fins is to catch sharks, cut off their fins and toss them back to die of asphyxiaton (sharks have to keep moving to breath - and they need fins for that). Shark meat, which is very fine grilled and cooked many other ways, is not harvested because it doesn't fetch so high a price for so little work as fins do.
This fishery is not only totally inhumane, it is done without any regard to the endangered status of any particular species of shark, or to the ecological balance of the world's oceans.
To be fair, those who oppose the ban claim to be against cruelty to sharks, but they say "This is not a California problem, this is an Asian problem". So true - but somebody has to get reform started - the Chinese certainly won't do it themselves - they'll need to be shamed into it.
One restaurateur has stated he would be hurt financially because as much as a third of his business involves serving shark fin soup. So tell me, Jackie, if nobody could serve shark fin soup, would Chinese in California simply stop having wedding banquets because there wouldn't be soup? I rather think they would not - the impact on your business would be rather small. Of course no Chinese banquet hall can discontinue shark fin soup alone without losing business - all must do it together, and that takes legislation.
The Asian markets around here sell "artificial shark fin" for soup. I haven't tried it and have no way to compare it to the real thing without buying real shark fin, but the main reason it would not be acceptable is it simply isn't expensive enough. It's the high cost of shark fin that makes it so essential to banquet hosts. Surely some other ridiculously costly dish can be found to replace it.
As for "the fine cuisine of China" disappearing - that's total bull byproducts. One could easily come up with 10,000 perfectly fine Chinese recipes, ranging from complex palace cuisine to the peasant hut, that do not involve mutilation or species extinction - and that's a real 10,000, not a traditional Chinese exaggeration meaning "more than 10".
Here at CloveGarden we are enthusiastically in favor of legislation banning posession, consumption, and sale of shark fin. Our fish page has urged people to avoid shark fin for as long as we've had a fish page.