The Unsettling Reason Whoopi Goldberg Won't Eat Lobster

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We're fascinated by celebrities' food preferences — including their dislikes — and love getting to the bottom of them. We know sushi is the popular food Donald Trump refuses to touch (it's a far cry from his preferred fast food burgers), and celebrity chef Chris Santos won't eat shellfish, as he's allergic. Joining our list of famous people who steer clear of seafood is Whoopi Goldberg, who will never again eat lobster. Her reason? She was once served lobster at a function, and she claims her meal moved on her plate.

"I don't eat lobster," Goldberg explained during a segment of "The View" (via Facebook), "because years and years ago we were in a giant group of people, and so everyone was having lobster, and they had not finished cooking mine, and it moved." Goldberg said she left the function and has not eaten lobster since that day, nor shrimp with the head still intact. "Nothing with a face on it," she clarified.

The topic arose during a discussion about a 2026 study published in Scientific Reports indicating that lobsters experience pain and distress when they're boiled alive. The study stated that the crustaceans have the capacity for nociception (brain activity associated with pain), which scientists suggested could warrant further discussion about humane treatment. Boiling live lobsters is illegal in Norway, Switzerland, and New Zealand, and the U.K. is reviewing a ban at the time of this writing. "Will this make you think twice about eating that lobster roll?" Goldberg asked.

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After the episode of "The View" aired, members of the public offered theories about Whoopi Goldberg's experience. A commenter on a People article about the segment wrote, "...[the lobster] moved because of involuntary muscle twitch after heating. I'm sure they weren't bringing her a still raw, 'alive' lobster..."

Goldberg's cohost Alyssa Farah Griffin was sympathetic to the study's findings but not willing to swear off eating lobster like Goldberg. She admitted she's never been able to pick a live lobster from a restaurant tank to be sacrificed for her dinner, "but if it's served to me on a plate with butter, I am going to eat it."

Aversion to "dispatching" the animal keeps many people from cooking lobster at home, according to chef Andrew Zimmern. On his YouTube channel, however, Zimmern described two ways to kill a lobster without causing the creature physical pain or emotional distress. "The most humane way to dispatch a lobster — and the one that separates the dispatcher from the act — is to simply put it in the freezer for 5 to 10 minutes and let it go to sleep," Zimmern said, noting that once the lobster is asleep, the chef can boil or otherwise prepare it humanely. The second method he mentioned is to plunge a sharp knife through the carapace in the spot directly between the eyes and the first joint.