Eating your dining companions is not nice. But it’s happening RIGHT NOW at a Japanese restaurant near you. Reader Karen Teoh, a children’s entertainer, found herself sharing her table with a medium-sized lobster. Its top half waved politely at her. Its bottom half had been sliced open and the flesh diced up sashimi style. The waitress expected her to eat the tail while enjoying the company of the head. Eww!

Being eaten alive is an AGONIZING DEATH that no sentient being should ever have to suffer, with the exception of bear bile farmers, spam forwarders, the Generals of Myanmar, people who run pet shops, the teacher I had in third grade, the guy who got the last seat on my bus this morning, and so on. (I’ll finish the list later.)

This trendy dish is now being served at many Japanese restaurants throughout Asia. It’s a real-life horror story that makes me want to give all my worldly wealth, had I any, to People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.

The seafood-lovers at the bar were scornful. "PETA is a group of sexist bimbo extremists who complain about ridiculous things," one said. "They even complained when [US President Barack] Obama swatted a fly last week." He later forwarded me a news report headlined: "PETA miffed at President Obama’s fly execution."

The seafood lover was referring to an incident in which Obama swatted a fly and gloated, "I got the sucker." Commentator Jimmy Fallon said: "Makes Obama look like a bad a… Yeah, better watch out, Ayatollah. The US Prez can KILL A FLY with his BARE HANDS. Woah, he da man.

Did PETA really complain? I investigated. What really happened was that the media bombarded PETA’s offices with calls and a spokesman replied that Obama’s action was normal. "Believe it or not, we’ve actually been contacted by multiple media outlets wanting to know PETA’s official response to the executive insect execution," the spokesman told Reuters. "In a nutshell, our position is this. He isn’t the Buddha, he’s a human being, and human beings have a long way to go before they think before they act." He sent Obama a device that catches flies without harming them. Perfectly reasonable.

What about the accusation that PETA is sexist? It’s true that members you see in the newspapers are mostly babes in lettuce-leaf bikinis. A reader who likes to be known as Veggie Girl defended them: "It’s an undeniable fact that the average vegetarian is sexier than the average meat-eater. Veggies are healthier, they are slim without being anorexic, they have better skin, and they have more energy and stamina."

Evidence comes in the shape of Bollywood’s Shahid Kapoor and Taiwanese singer Barbie Hsu, who have just been voted Asia’s sexiest vegetarians. Barbie told the press: "Eating meat is like eating corpses." Technically, she’s right.

Hey, Barbie-girl, if you don’t want to eat a corpse, you can just go to the nearest Japanese restaurant and ask for "lobster sashimi".

(I don’t think she’ll like it.)

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