Personally, I've never been very fond of eating foot.  :P

Some of the things have made me drool a bit, though: honey cakes, spit roasts, that fancy food Elayne made, etc. Just a bit about the no coffee (or kaf).

A lot! A lot! A lot!  :'( :'(

Anyhoo ... who did that totally hilarious take on the sword form names? Dude, that was awesome!  ;D

It is clearly stated time and again the the books from many POV that gentling/stilling/burning out is a fate far worse than death.  The Aes Sedai know this very well.  So in fact, the Sea Folk are far more gentle and ethical when it comes to their treatment of male channelers, while the Aes Sedai knowinlgy lead male channelers to the worse fate known to their organization.  Even darkfriends get the gallows.

 

Gentling of men is a separate matter altogether from women burning out or being stilled.

Stilling is done for a grievous crime. The punishment for such crimes should be severe. In most societies today, imprisonment is considered a better alternative to hanging. Many arguments have been held over which is actually the more humane treatment.

Burning out is an accident - it more than likely happens amongst all groups of channelers, apart from the Seanchan. (On a side note: it would be interesting to hear how Sea Folk handle that. We've seen the Wise Ones doing their best to keep the AS who were burned out, alive.)

Now, getting to the gentling of men who can channel. There are 2 main consequences for men who can channel:

a) They go mad and become a danger to themselves, those around them, and possibly the world.

b) They suffer the most revolting and horrifying physical effects - they start rotting while alive.

The Aes Sedai method of gentling them, prevents those two things, while still leaving the possibility that these men might lead a reasonably content life.

If one takes your argument that it would be better to just kill them, and apply it to our world (just to make it less of an abstract and theoretical situation):

Would you also think it's more humane to just kill a person with breast cancer, rather than perform a mastectomy? Or one with ovarian cancer who needs a hysterectomy? For most women, losing their breasts or their ability to have children are a HUGE issue. It causes severe and debilitating depression, a lack of will to live, a lack of self-worth (anything sounding familiar here?), not to mention the actual physical problems, like premature aging, etc. I just grabbed 2 examples familiar to me, since I'm a woman, but I'm sure there are ones more applicable to men.

I just want to say one thing:

Do you see the little QUOTE icon at the top right hand corner of other people's posts?

USE IT !!!!