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There is no "humane" way to take the life of an animal for food or for other reasons. There are, however, degrees of "humaneness." Some people don't eat veal, but are okay with chicken for this reason. This is not to say, however, that the chicken is treated "humanely"; it still gets its head chopped off in the long-awaited end.
This preparation of fugu is no exception. If it is unnecessary to do this to the live creature, then doing so is at the cost of added cruelty—simply put.
I say if you're going to eat meat, at least choose the kinds where undue cruelty and suffering isn't on the menu. I suppose this is where factory farming can be a problem as well. This fugu preparation isn't a unique situation.
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Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön
Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot
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