Some vegetarian groups like VIVA! (Vegetarians
International Voice for Animals) and the Physicians Committee for
Responsible Medicine believe that the new animated movie "Chicken Run"
will cause a lot of people to go vegetarian. The movie features
claymation chickens trying to escape from a prison camp poultry farm.
Dr. Neal Barnard, president of PCRM, thinks that the
backlash against chicken will be similar to what happened to pork sales
after the movie "Babe" was released. PCRM has a banner link at their
site which reads "Seen Chicken Run? Ready to Switch to a Vegetarian
Diet?" The link leads to a PCRM article about the health risks of
consuming chicken.
Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine
http://pcrm.org/
And in England, VIVA! has produced a short commercial featuring a
chicken in a battery cage called "Chicken Can't Run" to be shown at
selected London theaters before screenings of "Chicken Run."
I hope the movie does change a few eating habits, that
it makes a lot of kids turn up their noses at fried bird for a while,
but it makes me wonder how cute talking pigs and animated lumps of clay
can have more influence in an hour and a half than all the years we
VegActivists have been writing and talking about health risks and animal
suffering. Go figure.
Maybe we in the movement should be making movies. There
are plenty of pro-AR Hollywood stars that would probably work cheap
doing the voices. But I read that "Chicken Run" cost 40 million to make.
Maybe we should start small, I have a camcorder and some sock puppets.
"South Pork" -- a story about some cute but vulgar
piglets who don't want you to bring home the bacon.
Naw, never mind.
Seriously (semiseriously said, tongue in beak), if any
of our non-vegetarian readers see "Chicken Run" and it makes you want to
stop eating animal products, write us with any questions you may have
about Veganism and we will be glad to take you under our wing.
In a bizarre piece of irony, Burger King has a
promotional tie-in with "Chicken Run" and is offering two whoppers for 2
dollars. Their ads show cartoon chickens urging people to ''Save the
Chickens - Eat a Whopper.'' I drove by a Burger King today and noticed
that right beside that poster in their window was another poster
promoting their spicy chicken sandwich. Huh?
The restaurant chain Chick-fil-A just announced plans to
sue Burger King for copyright infringement. Chick-fil-A claims that BK's
ad is stolen from it's own ad campaign showing cows with signs that say
"Eat Mor Chikin." We certainly hope that these two animal exploiters
waste a lot of money in the courts on this trivial lawsuit.
Hey!!! Burger King and Chick-fil-A,
Animal Rights Online has a new slogan....
"Save the Cows AND the Chickens, Go Vegan"
Go on to Fourth of
July Pet Safety by DogAdvocat@aol.com
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