And chickens being cramped in small coops is better than this?

Well, no. Thats the reason that so many people protest it and others only buy free range eggs & chicken bits (that and they're better quality)

No, mate - you actually missed the point by getting the point, as it were. And aye, I buy freerange eggs. So tasty. So...not-filled-with-the-flavor-of-evil.

I'm not sure how we treat them any better in the west.

What we do over here, at least, is to buy crabs directly from the fishermen. Live, of course - it takes a very short time for a dead crab to spoil and become dangerous to eat. We fit as many as we can into plastic bags and take them home. They can live for quite a while without water, but if it's hot we need to hurry. When we get home, we put them in a big pot of boiling water. I don't know of anyone who kills them before they're boiled.

Someone mentioned a crab crane game, yes? Well, it exists.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HT02HeGUMKg

80% of me feels bad for the crabs
20% of me thinks that music is too entertaining to care about it

Either way, I wouldn't protest or hand out propaganda or some shit.
I'll just avoid it altogether and not put my money in the machine.

...which is actually fairly humane, since their time spent in plastic bags without water is brief, and they're insensitive to the water temperature rising.