Anthony Bourdain

On vegans:

They're rude! People's choice to become vegan, from people I've spoken to, seems motivated by fear. Like, "it's possibly toxic, or ungroovy, or poisonous, or loaded with chemicals or some kind of harmful things that'll make me less healthy." I certainly don't see that as a good reason to do anything, certainly not a good reason to be rude to your host.

How can you travel? Before you've even left home, you've already decided, "I reject most of the world's bounty and the expression of their hopes and dreams and culture." Some nice, possibly impoverished Vietnamese rice farmer is nice enough to offer you the one chicken he can kill a month, or a week, and you say, "Sorry, I can't"? It just seems antihuman. It's antisocial.

And for anyone who says that everyone should eat like that -- it completely ignores the fact that, well, we can't afford to. We've got hungry people in this world. Go stay with the Bushmen for a week. Ninety-eight percent of their diet is meat. [Chuckles darkly.] That would be a funny reality show.

on obese people:

I just don't see [obesity] as a lifestyle decision. If you need a support system, if you're blocking egress from a burning building or taking up half my seat on a plane, that is not a lifestyle choice. That is a menace to society.

What's sad is that so few obese people are even getting big on good food. They're chawing themselves listlessly to death on crap. I don't think people should be encouraged to look like Kate Moss; I think that's unreasonable. I think the normal human body should be glorified.

on banning practices some regard as cruel:

It would be nice to think that people know the difference between a crap chicken and a good chicken. If you can afford a good-quality free-range chicken, it's nice that you have options. A lot of people in the world can't afford that.

I like the idea that we could live in an agrarian wonderland, where there are heritage animals wandering freely and making delicious farm-fresh eggs, but that ain't gonna happen; there are too many hungry people in the world.

I love Whole Foods talking about lobster and clam cruelty, when people are being fucked to death, kidnapped, starved, bombed. [The grocery chain recently stopped selling some live shellfish on the grounds that the practice is inhumane.] There is so much cruelty to humans -- so much cruelty to animals -- in this world. And people are worried about a fucking mollusk. Unbelievable.

on "workers from countries to the south of us" working in our restaurant kitchens:

Listen, in 25 years, I don't remember ever seeing an American-born kid of any income level walk into my restaurant, or any restaurant owned by any of my friends, and ask, Do you have a dishwasher job, or a prep job, or a job for a kitchen porter? We're not willing to do it. If somebody else wants to come over here and do it, that's fine with me.

And yeah, I think we should open our borders, for a variety of reasons. First of all, we've got plenty of work for people, apparently. People say "they're taking our jobs" -- well, no one's asking for those jobs.

I also like the idea of people from other places coming to our country and multiplying. It makes for better food, higher expectations, more diversity and cuter people.

via Rogier van Bakel