El Paisano

The Paisano gives us the perfect opportunity to discuss one of the suicidefoodists' most endearing gambits: The Shrug.

Look at el pollo. Doesn't his stance fill you with fond feelings? Can't you feel your misgivings melt away like so much cotton candy? Where were we? And what were we talking about, anyway?

It's The Shrug! The Shrug works like a sly magic upon the massed forces of rationality.

The Shrug serves to highlight not the animals' powerlessness—although we don't like seeing ourselves as tyrants—but their apathy. And if they can't be bothered to flee, object, or even care, surely we are off the hook.

The Shrug tells the tale of cheerfully abided resignation. The chicken's response to destruction: Oh well!

So, shrugging at the dismal, vicious fate that awaits them—shrugging, that is, instead of attempting to avoid it—they saunter to their death. And we watch them go, somehow believing there was nothing anyone could have done. The Shrug told us everything we needed to know about life, its purpose and possibilities, its perils and promise.







Addendum: Cows can do The Shrug too! (And so can slabs of ribs.)