Talk:Last meal

Most of my edits has been to add some breif details about last meals and their rules in US prisons.Some may see this info as offensive (not me , I see it as just extra info-- I treid to stick to pure facts and the more you know the more you can comment on stuff) Anyway, I wrote this as an exercise in looking up info on the web that I thought may be of use.should a warning be given in article? what about last meals in history and in other countries-- hopefuly more can be added to those otherwise entry looks very unbalanced.Thoughts? Ludek9 09:49, 5 Sep 2004 (UTC)

• Add a warning about what? Web research is fine, but for significant sources, a ==References== section would be nice. By all means, don't hesitate to add useful information to this interesting topic! (Well, I guess it's not so interesting for the people who have to eat their last meals.) --Ardonik.talk() 01:26, Sep 6, 2004 (UTC)

Dropped this link:

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dallas/tsw/stories/121003dntexlastmeal.9d7d8.html

It no longer goes anywhere: presumably the Dallas Morning News, like most newspapers with an online edition, drops older articles from its website or moves them to a paid-access archive section. Ellsworth 20:43, 14 May 2005 (UTC)

• Was the last meal, in Western Society at least, offered to reflect Christ's Last Supper perchance? I have no concrete sources. But does anyone think it's worth pursuing or has anyone's research directly refuted this?Angrynight 05:09, 11 February 2006 (UTC)

Stanley "Tookie" Williams

A minor correction, but one that probably deserves a heads-up: I changed "Stanley "Tookie" Williams" to "Stanley Tookie Williams", without the quotes. Most people know him by that name, which is why I won't change it to "Stanley Williams", but "Tookie" should not be in quotes, since it is not a nickname, but is in fact his real middle name. 68.9.205.10 00:51, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

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Josh Cooper link is incorrect

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NPOV? Verifiable?

The line "Apart from having been constantly coerced since the death sentence, the poor sinner's solemn last meal was a significant symbol for the mob that he or she finally accepted the punishment." seems problematic. How do we know that people who were under a sentence of death had been "constantly coerced" from the time of their sentence to the time it was carried out? Is there a source for this? What type of coersion are we talking about here?

I ask about NPOV because the line seems to carry a fair amount of anti-death penalty sentiment to it. I'm not a supporter of the DP, but I don't think that comments on it should be in an article on last meals, which are a separate issue.Mcglotda 19:11, 21 August 2006 (UTC)Dennis

I wrote that. My original word wasn't "coerced", but "brainwashed". We know that from various mediaeval and early modern sources throughout Europe. My refernces are cited as well in the further reading section: van Dülmen, von Hertig, Michel Foucault. Honestly, I don't understand your criticism. It's perfectly neutral: First of all it's about restoring by-gone reality: The history of executions under the ius talionis. It doesn't state anything about the excutions as such, but about how they were carried out. We can assume that the poor sinner wasn't particularly keen on being painfully executed, we know that out of superstition the mob expected the poor sinner to play along and could challenge the verdict if he/she didn't (because the violated law needed to be re-balanced in their eyes and for fear of the doomed becomming a possible revenant). And we know that the executioner made quid-pro-quo-deals with the doomed: I'll make it rather quick if you give in. And/or the priest tried to persuade him/her according to ars moriendi: Accept your guilt to be avenged, die well and you may stand a chance at Judgement Day.

The whole thing is trying to explain the European tradition of granting a last meal. What's POV-ish about it? Teodorico 20:53, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Points taken. I was probably thinking of the original language (I remember seeing "brainwashed" the first time I read the article) when I wrote the note. Plus, I was obviously being a bit too anal-retentive about language (the connotation of "coerced," and all that.) My apologies. Mcglotda 15:47, 23 August 2006 (UTC)Dennis

not to be pedantic, but to describe the meal as "solemn" and the condemned as a "poor sinner" seems ill-befitting of an encyclopedia. would it not be appropriate to cast aside such value judgements, even if they are properly evocative of the (undefined) period's ethical reality? 66.133.194.174 07:36, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

This section draws heavily on social theory (I immediately recalled Foucault's "Discipline and Punish"). It certainly is valuable theoretical work, but as such it is certainly a point of theory and not fact. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.139.13.7 (talk) 23:24, 9 December 2009 (UTC)

Famous last meals

If there are no objections, I will remove the "famous" last meals where the name is red. I think if he doesn't even have a stub in Wikipedia, he can hardly be that famous —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Snakemike (talk • contribs) 15:36, 3 January 2007 (UTC).

Saddam Hussein

Lately, there seems to be one problem: Someone has made a change to the subject of the "famous last meals" list, and that subject was Saddam Hussein. Whoever does this should pay attention and have a look at the chapter part called: "Prior to execution" on the Execution of Saddam Hussein article. --Angeldeb82 00:58, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

Well, good news! Aude has confirmed the news regarding Saddam's last meal as follows:

"The news article used as a citation for "hamburger and fries" refers to him eating this during his "last days" and doesn't say he ate that as his last meal. "Chicken and rice" is correct, per the cited source listed here."

Hope this can clear up the confusion! --Angeldeb82 21:19, 22 January 2007 (UTC)

Ummm... somebody made a joke saying he wanted a can of beer but got a long neck, i deleted it.

This is spurious. Saddam had no more than an hour's notice before his execution. There was no last meal of any kind after he was told he was going to be executed. His final meal, earlier in the day, was standard Iraqi chicken and rice, served for virtually every meal at most prisons. I know; I was there. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.230.126.184 (talk) 12:09, 24 September 2011 (UTC)

Paradise City

"The Guns N' Roses song Paradise City is about a man asking for a cigarette as his last meal."

No it's not. I removed this uncited (and inaccurate) statement. Phoneclear 09:34, 23 July 2007 (UTC)

List of special meals

A lot of famous peoples special meals say that they "declined" the special meal, only to immediately say that they chose and ate their special meal (whether it be KFC, pizza or pasta or whatever). So why does it say that they declined the meal while at the same time saying they accepted the meal? JayKeaton (talk) 13:37, 22 July 2008 (UTC)

Texas Last Meal Refrence

I feel that this change may be too new to include. The source is secondary and the rule has NEVER been enforced. I would wait until it is enforced to actually cite it.

Daviwrng (talk) 23:04, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

BBC's recent documentary series 'Life and Death Row' features Texas Death Row Inmate Anthony Haynes talking about looking forward to his last meal of Fried Chicken. He got a stay just over 2 hours before execution, apparently before his meal was served. However, he did say that his holding cell did feature a range of cookies and beverages. So I can't say for sure whether he would have got or will get his fried chicken (he remains on death row), but it seems like there remains some kind of last meal protocol, if somewhat more unofficial. http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b03ytxmh Maloot (talk) 01:44, 29 March 2014 (UTC)

Non-notorious last meal requests

I am very sympathetic to the subject matter and have tried to cleanup and organize the huge list of last meal requests. I do not feel that every run-of-the-mill murderer should have an entry in this article because there are simply too many.

I think that if the subject is not notorious or notable in some regard because of their case that we need to exclude them.

There is no big rush, I think that if in the next few weeks that inmates in the "Other prisoner requests", the latter section, should be deleted on the grounds that the list is just too long and that these entries are not notable.

I would like to propose that if you feel that an individual's entry is worth keeping, please move that entry to the International or US sections. Even though I mentioned this previously, I think a month from this notice is a reasonable time-frame so I would like to remove the individual remaining in the last section by 15 November 2011. Veriss (talk) 04:17, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Why is there a section "International" and another "USA". Wikipedia is supposed to be from a world pov - 'international' should not be used to mean 'non-USA' — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.135.227.46 (talk) 12:06, 26 October 2012 (UTC)

I have fixed this.Czolgolz (talk) 17:34, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Alphabatized

Why are the names in order by FIRST name? Czolgolz (talk) 14:11, 21 September 2013 (UTC)

Why include declines?

In an article about what people ate, why bother including those who didn't eat anything? Especially if they're non-notable? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.230.232.119 (talk) 17:17, 1 October 2013 (UTC)

Romantic Nonsense

I'm afraid that I couldn't help laughing out loud when I read the nonsense peddled in the following paragraph:

In pre-modern Europe, granting the condemned a last meal has roots in superstition in that a meal was a highly symbolic social act. Accepting freely offered food symbolized making peace with the host. The guest agreed tacitly to take an oath of truce and symbolically abjured all vengeance. Consequentially, in accepting the last meal, the condemned was believed to forgive the executioner, the judge, and witness(es). The ritual was supposed to prevent the condemned from returning as a ghost or revenant to haunt those responsible for his or her killing. As a superstitious precaution, the better the food and drink, the safer the condemned's oath of truce.

Do we have the slightest scrap of evidence that this was the case? Surely the convention of the last meal derives partly from a commendable impulse of humanity towards a condemned prisoner, and partly from self-interest. Guards and jailers had, and still have, an interest in carrying out an execution with the minimum of resistance on the part of the condemned, so a gesture of this kind is readily explicable. I cannot think of a single medieval text that suggests that the authorities were seriously concerned about being haunted by the ghosts of executed prisoners. I suggest that this paragraph be deleted unless somebody can produce any evidence in its support.

Djwilms (talk) 07:02, 8 July 2014 (UTC)