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Nicole

and Team / Co
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Jul 22, 2013
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CNN said:
A Japanese theme park which froze 5,000 sea creatures into the floor of an ice rink was forced to close the attraction on Sunday after a public backlash.

Fish, crabs and other shellfish were embedded in the ice as part of a special winter attraction, called "Freezing Port," at Japan's Space World theme park.

The park advertised it as a "world first" and posted images of the fish on its official Facebook site with captions including "I am d... d... drowning, s ... s... suffocating."

Full article
 
I don't hope anyone gets fired. It looks cool and is only somewhat strange. Sure, this thing could never happen in the US, but for Japan, not nearly the same PC culture as here.

The captions were..an odd choice...


P.S. I'm not a vegan.
 
I wonder if they expected people to skate over the fish that were sticking out of the ice. It is strange, but as a foreigner I don't think I would complain to them. However, the caption to me sounds like a depiction of suffering. If I didn't know anything else, I would be a bit more bothered (even as a foreigner to them).
 
The fish sticking out picture was taken before they were finished. The final ice was smooth, with all of the fish below the surface. I'm gonna take the unpopular stance here, though. I thought it looked pretty freakin' cool. And they used fish that were unfit for consumption. These were the leftovers from the fish market that were just going to the landfill anyway.
 
I would normally just assume that cultural differences explain the appeal of skating on ice filled with dead animals. Given the public outcry in Japan, however, I have to infer that the installation was completely tone deaf there, as well.

The concept, regardless of the execution, seems callous to me. The decision to market it by quoting the fish as suffering and dying underlines that further.

To me, the fact that they used dead fish doesn't mitigate the impression that the choice to use animals as decoration makes.
 
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