Is It Wrong to Eat Lion Taco?

Taco Fusion sure knows how to create a roaring controversy, and they ain't lyin'! The Tampa, Florida eatery is offering tacos with (perfectly legal) exotic meats in their "Safari" menu like bison, shark, ostrich, octopus, gator, gazelle, rabbit, duck, camel and even kangaroo. But the "mane" attraction? Lion meat.

And that has got critics pouncing, as ABC Good Morning America reports [self-starting video]:

Since Taco Fusion, a Mexican restaurant known to offer unusual game meats like ostrich, camel, and bison in its tacos, added lion meat to its menu of "Safari Tacos" on May 2, the restaurant has had to field hostile calls from critics who are up in arms over the menu choice.
"[People have been] coming into the establishment and throwing punches," the restaurant's manager Brad Barnett told "Good Morning America." "They say they are going to bomb us, burn us down, blow us up."
"They threatened to kidnap Brad [Barnett] and the owner," another manager, Bayardo Alvarez, told ABC News.

But Taco Fusion is fighting back:

Fast forward to 2013: Paranoia has set in as some folks have had their reality challenged. They say that we’ve “crossed the line” by serving Lion. But let me ask you this, did you cross the line when you ate Beef, chicken, or Pork this week? [...]
How is a cow that is injected with hormones, crammed in a dark pen it’s whole life, and then unceremoniously slaughtered any better than a hormone free- free range animal that was raised for meat consumption? One is “majestic” and the other is overweight? One is a fierce predator, the other is a weak link? What exactly is the criteria for which animal has more importance? [...]
Who decides which animals are worthy? If the argument is that a Lion is “Majestic” so you shouldn’t breed them for meat consumption- then what is the lesson here That only the majestic pretty girls get treated well and the ugly ones go to the slaughter pen? How pompous and idiotic does that sound?

We dish up more neat food posts at the Neatolicious blog

So, what do you think, Neatoramanauts? Is it wrong to eat lions?

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Well, you can always substitute ditch panther for lion meat. Good idea, considering the massive damage they do to birds and wildlife every year.

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the only question is where the lion meat comes from. Just calling it "legal" even if you have papers to somehow back that up (I'd certainly like to understand the legality of procuring lion meat for consumption in the US), are we breeding them for meat? That's weird, but promotes an industry that's less kosher. Maybe if lions are so easy to breed for meat that we can safely eat lion meat in the US, all the poachers should just become lion farmers.

My own thoughts on the subject are - as long as it doesn't actually contain something that makes humans sick when they eat it, I don't care what people eat. Eating a Lion is no more strange then Eating a Cow to me. The only difference being that the Lion is an endangered species, which shouldn't be a candidate for eating. There's plenty of other stuff to eat.

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I am glad that there is a plethora of thought going on here! I would also like to include that it has been shown that even if there is a supplier of this legally, this market drives an illegal market in lion products.
http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0005941
It is irresponsible to therefore have lion products on the market and from the commentary from the restaurant owner, he seems to be something of a lummox and prone to irresponsible behaviour.

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right...that's the issue here, not whether lions are inherently "too noble to eat" but whether eating them contributes to a threat to their survival as a species...