In Slate, William Saletan vented his disgust at the dangerous and grotesque display of gluttony that is competitive eating, likening it to pornography (esp. in the article’s title — ‘Deep Throat: the Depravity of Major League Eating’). At Jezebel, Katy Kelleher dismissed his concerns. “Enjoying huge amounts of food or copious amounts of sex,” she says, “does not make one self-destructive, gluttonous, or depraved.” She’s right about sex but wrong about eating competitions. Since sex (safe sex) in large quantities doesn’t carry such a big health risk, there’s nothing wrong with it. In fact, it might even have the added value of boosting brain growth. Kelleher sets aside the health risks resulting from overeating by comparing them to the risks that stem from other sports. She suggests that we should just let people assume these risks if they choose to. But what about the other extreme for eating, namely, anorexia? Would she allow people to cultivate this condition, too, as long as they were aware of the resulting health risks?
“Sexual cannibalism is common in the Australian golden orb-web spider (Nephila plumipes), in which the tip of the conductor typically breaks during copulation. … The likelihood of the conductor breaking depends upon the copulatory history of the female insemination duct: males were more likely to break their conductor if they inseminated a ‘virgin’ rather than ‘mated’ insemination duct.” (pdf)
