What should you do when relatives ask to eat your ornamental fish?

Reader submission: I have a dozen or so discus fish at home. An older relative (90+) keeps asking me for some, wanting to taste a few, claiming that after a lifetime of eating countless river and sea delicacies, they have never eaten this kind of fish, and they keep asking me again and again. I raised my fish from the size of a one-cent coin, and now they are 15 to 17 cm in diameter, and I treasure them very much. Many relatives urge me, saying he does not have many days left, so let him taste them, but I really cannot bear to part with these fish.

I wonder if everyone felt something after reading the above. Encountering an elder in your own family who wants to eat the ornamental fish you raise is probably rare....... It feels a bit bizarre, but if you switch it to a pet dog you raised yourself, and a relative insists on killing the pet dog to eat, then you can probably feel it, because more people keep pet dogs than pet fish. A pet you raise yourself is like your own family member, and you have poured emotion into it, yet one day someone actually asks for it to be eaten!! There really are such blunt people, and the difficulty is that this is an elder, a very elderly elder.

Editor's view: Although many relatives urge this fish keeper to part with his beloved fish and let that elder taste them, the reason is that they think he probably does not have many days left, so it is better to grant him this. But this is also a hidden risk. The elder is already very old, and his remaining lifespan is likely short, but if, just if, because he ate this fish keeper's discus fish, he unfortunately has an accident, then would the other relatives not think it was a problem with the fish keeper's fish, that he could originally have lived a few more days, but ate this fish and died early? The fish keeper would find it hard to escape responsibility; at least in others' eyes, he would not be able to avoid involvement. If the elder's family members are reasonable, then this matter will pass and all will be fine, but if they are overwhelmed by grief over the elder's accident, or if they are simply unreasonable? They sue you and demand compensation, what then? Do not say the editor is thinking too darkly. In this world, are there few bloody news stories caused by conflicts within one's own family? Because you must prepare for the worst, I think you cannot give them, and should refuse directly. (This only represents my personal view.)

If fellow fish keepers encounter such a situation, how should they solve it? What methods are there to help this fish keeper who is caught in a dilemma?