California’s shark fin ban is standing strong

Last year, California passed a ballot measure banning shark fins from being used in restaurants. The measure takes effect in six months, when restaurants will be prohibited from using any newly-harvested shark fins. (In a loophole, restaurants will be able to keep serving fins that had already been harvested. I wonder how long those will hold out? Shenanigans!)

Yesterday a federal judge in Oakland struck down the latest challenge to this ban. Opponents of the ban charge that it amounts to racism, that shark fin soup is a key part of the Chinese cultural heritage. The way they frame the discussion, it’s as if shark fin soup is like communion wafers to Catholics. The truth is that, although shark fin soup is a high-profile luxury dish in China, it’s hardly a cornerstone of Chinese culture.  

And even if it was, so what? How far does the “cultural heritage” argument extend to the wholesale torture and slaughter of the ocean’s sharks? Shark fins are harvested by dragging sharks out of the water, cutting off the fins, and throwing the sharks back into the water to die.

The finned sharks slowly drift down through the water, thrashing helplessly, unable to swim away, before eventually dying of either blood loss or suffocation. The suffering is unconscionable, as is the waste. (What kind of fishery cuts off the fins and throws the rest of the fish away?) Every year, between 26 and 73 million sharks are killed this way worldwide, all so that people can dine on an extremely expensive bowl of soup.

The nearest equivalent to shark fin soup, culturally speaking, would be something like Cristal. An expensive meal for the upper classes. Something you order because it’s expensive. And if Cristal was made by cutting the fins off animals and throwing them away to die slowly, I would support a ban on Cristal as well.

Image courtesy of Flickr/lynac