: It's very hard for me to make a decision for or against. I don't eat it but both sides of the argument are so wishy-washy, the manipulation of language is incredible. That's why I find it so hard. Oh well.Well, I suppose that's something of a victory for us anti-McD's people. When you consider that McD's spends "over $1.8 billion a year" on advertising, a reasonable doubt is no bad thing, considering the resources on "our side" are whatever we can beg, borrow or scrounge...
As for wishy-washy, I'll try and put a few simple questions in language as clear as possible, along with their answers;
1. Do animals suffer as a result of McD's existence?
The answer is pretty clearly "Yes". As the judge in the Mclibel trial found, McD's were "culpable of cruelty" to animals in their food production. Of course, as McD's is following 'industry standard' practices, it follows that pretty much all fast food joints in existence are guilty of cruelty.
2. Is McD's trying to silence critics?
Yes. By serving over 30 libel writs in the UK at people who criticised them. They can do this thanks to our uniquely bad libel laws. In Texas, where a similar law was passed a year ago (the 'food defamation' law), Oprah Winfrey is standing trial because a guest on her show criticised the beef industry. You can find the case notes in McSpotlight on the current front page.
Similarly, in past cases where McD's have been found guilty of bad practice (as in the Stella Liebeck case in Albuquerque in 1992), they have settled out of court and bought the plaintiff's silence (part of the settlement of the case was that Mrs. Liebeck was not allowed to talk to the media about the case). You can find details of that case at:
http://caoc.com/mcdonald.html.
3. Do McD's destroy rainforest?
No. They destroy 'dry tropical forest'. So that's all right, then...
4. Are McD's responsible for polluting their surroundings?
Yes. Not only in the increase in litter that accompanies the opening of a new McDonald's but also in the increased traffic congestion they cause. This may not be such a problem in Australia or the US, but here in London, it's quite a major thing.
Those four questions should do to be going on with. Of course, there are many more things I could go into (they "exploit children", according to the judge, they pay their staff badly (again, according to the judge).
There are many more issues than I've raised here. But if you take any one of the above questions to McD's or their employees, I'd be interested to hear what they said to you...
(In the case of London Greenpeace, they hired private eyes to spy on the group and used contacts in the police to try and obtain confidential information on the group, not to mention burgling the office twice...)
Gideon.
None.
