"CHOMPr hamburger grasper" news and stories

Yes, you read that right. Thanks to the modern phenomenon of solutions to problems no one has, there exists concept design for a device which, depending on your viewpoint, is genius, preposterous, useless, or somewhere between the three. Please meet the CHOMPr hamburger grasper, which according to the copy is "a conceptual hamburger grasping device for high-end restaurants." Looking like two coffee tables from a dollhouse from the Eames era held together by those pins Ikea gives you to keep your bookshelf from collapsing, the CHOMPr seeks to ameliorate the conflict between the informal process of eating a hamburger and formal surroundings.

To some, whether you need a hamburger grasping device beyond those at the ends of your arms is sort of, well, silly. But it is very interesting as an etiquette question, because it raises the related issues of utensils as a dimension of table manners and hands as a dimension of utensils. For the former, utensils are a mark of civilization precisely because they aren't your hands, and the development of utensils has followed a trajectory more or less complimentary to the Industrial Revolution, culminating in the Victorian era, when a fully outfitted silver trousseau could top out at 500 pieces and counting.