Crabcake Factory USA

Here is the self-abnegation we have come to expect from our suicidal (and demented) “food.” This crab cake could hardly be more delighted. Raising his frosty mug, he offers a toast: “To the chef! To me! To my consumer!” This is optimism and suicidal fervor unbounded. The cake’s attitude is breath-taking in its surreal chipperness. For what is a crab cake? What hell must a crab undergo on its journey from living thing to that ignominious final form, crab cake?

First, of course, the crab must be trapped. Then boiled alive. Then pried apart, the shell split, legs wrenched free. The flesh is scooped out. Minced. Transformed from carcass to “ingredient.” Folded into other ingredients. Sautéed. Shaped. Baked. And all of this on the uncaring factory floor, no less.

After all this—the injuries, assaults, mockeries, and insults—the crab cake, a one-time living being, still smiles! His only regret? That he can die but once.