Burger King Attempts to Conquer the World

Whopper Virgin Documentary

Usually I post things on here that I like. This is something that makes me want to go on a very, very angry rampage. If I were the sort of person who made moralistic judgments, I would be doing so right now- but instead I will go through it point by point. Watch the video first, or this won’t make any sense.

One- This is a very cleverly designed ad campaign. Notice how they select out the few people who, most likely out of context, seem to be friendly with the advertisers, inviting them back to their villages, etc. I imagine just as many people flat out told them no, or spit the burger right back out, or told them to get the hell out. But they chose not to show you that, of course.

Two- The whole premise- that there are very few people in the world who haven’t tried hamburgers, and that this is a wonderous thing, going around and introducing hamburgers to the “whopper virgins” of the world, is presumptuous and condescending. Thank the stars there are still people in the world who have never eaten a hamburger. The implication by Burger King that they are bringing enlightenment to the world in the form of the whopper is a disgusting example of our culture’s mindset that our way is the only way, and those who haven’t yet been exposed to it should be brought around to see the light.

Three- This is demonstrated in how they focus on the way most of the people filmed are unsure as to how to approach a burger- whether to take it apart or cut it up or what- as if this is quaint and adorable in the way a very small child tries to figure out how to use an unfamiliar object.

Four- The simple fact that they developed a portable Burger King grill to take on the road, and complained about not being able to plug it in at many of their stops- well, another example of condescension. I’m surprised a lot of people even had electric outlets to start with, and the fact that Burger King felt the need to go into their communities, disturbing their way of life, and plug in an “official” Burger King grill- I have no words.

Five- In the same vein, it’s interesting that they chose locations as close to Burger King restaurants as possible- clearly this has nothing to do with the fact that Burger King has so saturated the market that they have very little room for expansion, and are looking for ways to bring their products to the last reaches of the earth, because we have a growth economy and this is the only way to increase profit.

Six- Which is really what it comes down to: how can you increase profits when there are already more burgers in existence than people, in theory, could legitimately eat? The advertising expense for this ad campaign must have been tremendous, and you know Burger King wouldn’t put out that kind of money if they didn’t expect some kind of return.

Seven- Overall, I find the entire campaign distasteful and disrespectful to traditional cultures to an extreme. I cheered when they asked one man if he liked the whopper better than seal meat, and he answered that he preferred seal meat. Good for him. Homogeneity in food is one of the biggest causes of global issues- poverty, environmental destruction, destruction of indigenous ways of life, I’ve covered this on this blog many times over. Not to mention that the reason whoppers all taste the same is that the taste is manufactured in a plant, out of chemical ingredients, and basted over the meat to give it that familiar flavor. Nothing to do with the actual meat, which probably tastes like cardboard. At least that’s how I remember fast food burgers in my memory- but it’s been at least ten years since I quit eating them.

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Deadline Extended - Please Enter Now! 60 Seconds or Less Video Festival

Showcase the work you’ve already done in classes! Make a trailer for a longer video assignment, re-edit something that’s over a minute - we want to make sure your work gets seen because we know there are great projects out there on campus now!

(And - if you think you can turn something out quickly, why not make that idea into reality or turn in another quick project?)

You now have until Monday, April 6th at 12:00 pm to turn your videotapes in to Nancy Cross in the Miller Library (Lower Level.) Don’t miss this great opportunity to show your friends what you’ve created this year.

There’s still a chance to win a digital video camera or hundreds of dollars worth of prizes! If no one enters, no one wins and we’ve only got five entries total at this point. Still lots of chances to come away with something.

The Awards Presentation Reception and Ceremony will be April 7th and will kick off at 6:00 pm with wine, cheese, fruit and candies from around the world in Toll Atrium. The video presentation and awards ceremony will start at 7:00 pm in Litrenta.

Hope to see your entries soon (full rules at www.wcmc.tv) and see you in Toll!

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George Goes Green! Again.

Once again, it is time for our annual George Goes Green marathon! As George Goes Green is now practiced all year round, and not just in April, we've made this year's theme: An Action a Day Keeps Global Warming at Bay. On the George Goes Green website you can find a calendar with tips and suggestions to help make every day a green day. We'll also be posting tips, pictures and video here on the blog throughout the month of April.

This year we also are leaving behind the energy competitions of the past. As this is the fourth year of George Goes Green, we figure you've got the idea by now and should be saving energy ALL year round. Instead, we're focusing on individual actions and innovative solutions to sustainability, through a series of events (including our sustainability workshop, which I will blog about at some point) and the annual George Gets Ingenious competition. Here is your chance to win $250.

No, for real. YOU CAN WIN $250. I know I could use that much.

The rules and guidelines are posted here for your edification: click here

Photos, suggestions, and other submissions can be sent to tholste2@washcoll.edu. For Washington College students, faculty and staff ONLY please.

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Spring Break '09

I awoke to the sound of rain softly beating against the side of the tent. The sides of the canvas were damp, but I barely felt it, wrapped tightly in my sleeping bag. Somewhere outside I could hear a vulture rustling it’s wings, most likely eyeing the camp, trying to determine if it was safe to approach. I glanced up at the tent window, and saw that the sun had not yet risen. The sky was still a solid, deep gray.

Eventually the sun would crest the edge of the beach, washing the sky with a light pink haze, edged in brilliant red. By the time it had moved beyond the tops of the palms, we would all be awake, perched on the picnic tables eating bagels and slathering on sunscreen before the day’s activities. It’s not a normal college schedule, rising at dawn and falling asleep shortly after dark, but when the days are filled with volunteering, canoeing, swimming, and hiking, it’s best to get an early start, and by the time the sun sinks below the ocean and the moon has risen to bathe the campsite in pearly white, all we can think about is sleep.


Each day brought a new adventure: whether meeting a panther face to face (literally), and learning that panthers, cougars, and mountain lions are in fact the same species (who knew?), or clearing brush to keep a trail clear for other explorers, each day of volunteering exposed students to the ins and outs of the Everglades ecosystems, especially with an up close look at what doesn’t belong- the tigers, snakes, monkeys and other exotic animals at the Everglades Outpost, rescued after escaping from research facilities or being abandoned by people who thought keeping a Bengal tiger for a pet would be a good idea, or the invasive species that plague the parks and choke out native plants.

Students also entered the Everglades themselves, getting as close as possible to the water while canoeing through mangrove tunnels, feet away from alligators, wading birds, and the other denizens of the swamps and waterways that make up the 1.5 million acres of the Everglades National Park, where we spent most of our time. A night hike during the full moon brought us within range of a group of feeding alligators, animals which look like nothing so much as baking logs during the day, but which come out in numbers in the cool of night to thrash through the swamp, snapping their jaws on unfortunate fish with a sound like a trunk closing. It is a rare group that gets to see a “feeding frenzy”- and a sight not quickly forgotten.

On another day we were able to get even closer to the wildlife, spending an afternoon on a beach in Key Largo, resting before the long drive back to Maryland, soaking in the sun, and snorkeling in the protected bay, which sheltered numerous fish and crabs, which could be seen hiding among the roots of the mangrove trees. The sky remained a perfect, incandescent blue throughout our trip- the temperature a perfect 81∞ each day, and bliss to our group, having just come from the melting snows and blustering winds in Maryland. An afternoon spent lying under the shade of a palm, listening to the waves brush softly against the beach, and watching wisps of cloud skirt across the sky, drifting in and out of sleep, was a perfect conclusion to a week spent out-of-doors, as near to the land as possible, without cell phones (no reception) and only about two watches between the lot of us, telling time by the angle of the sun and our own growing familiarity with the Florida skies.

The Everglades are a lesson in ecology. The climate is somewhat different from what we have here in Maryland: only two seasons, wet and dry. We were fortunate to visit during the dry season, when there are fewer bugs, almost no rain, and a higher likelihood of seeing animals, as they are bunched together around the few remaining large pools of water. The Everglades itself is actually a very, very slow moving river- 60 miles wide and 100 miles long, twice as wide as the Bay but half as long. During the wet season, May through November, the area floods to form acres of wetlands and swamp, which serve an important role in buffering Florida from hurricanes and flooding. Much of the damage done to Florida by storm systems in past years has been the result of the destruction of many of the wetlands that once absorbed the flooding caused by storms. The park itself is protected under a number of preservation efforts- but this doesn’t account for the encroaching development that threatens coastal regions elsewhere in Florida and around the world.

On the last night before we returned to Maryland, we came back to our campsite tired and sunburned, to find the site surprisingly dark. All week the moon had been so bright we had rarely needed lanterns to find our way around, but on this night, the moon hadn’t yet risen, and we could barely see our tents as we stumbled out of the vans. A few steps out of the parking lot, however, and we all stopped dead in our tracks. Without the moon, the sky was overflowing with more stars than most of us had seen in years, or in some cases, ever. The Milky Way was clearly visible, as were thousands upon thousands of stars we could only imagine even in a place with as little light pollution as the Eastern Shore. A group of us, without any planning or discussion, sprawled out in the grass to look up at the breathtaking span, sharing stories about constellations we could identify, and making up our own when we ran out of ones we knew. One girl pointed out that the light coming to us so strongly had been traveling for thousands of years to get here- and in many cases, the stars that originally gave off the light had at this point burned out. Looking up at the sky, which wrapped around us in an enormous dome unobstructed by any building or even trees, it was easy to feel small, a tiny speck in a vast expanse, and at the same time immensely connected to it all: to the stars, and the palms, and the cry of a heron somewhere in the night; to the alligators, and the flowing river where it met the sea within view of our campsite, and to one another, lying on our backs in the grass.

View photos of our trip here.

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Well, for sure

A friend sent me this article, knowing my predilection for rambling on about disaster scenarios. And even though this article doesn't talk specifically about disaster, it does speak directly to something I'm always prattling about on this blog: the fact that we, as humans, are not exempt from the same laws that govern every other species and every ecosystem on the planet. Which means, when we overshoot our resources, we suffer a collapse. Simple as that.

If you relate it back to the earlier discussions on this blog about corn and monocropping, it fits with this article: corn is our attempt to become as efficient at growing food as possible, or at least to have as much minute control over the growing of food as possible. Of course, it doesn't always work out that way, as we've seen.

This guy puts it in fancier scientific terms than I'm normally inclined to use, but he hits it spot on.

Our Panarchic Future

I wonder if it would make sense to start calling myself a panarchist?

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Just a friendly reminder to our many readers

The third annual international Earth Hour is this weekend! On Saturday, March 28, at 8:30 pm, join millions of individuals and organizations throughout the world as they switch off the lights in their homes and businesses for one hour. The action is a symbolic stand against global warming.

Click here (and here) to see some amazing images of the impact Earth Hour has had.

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Plasmic energy

It's hard to not be skeptical of innovative "green" technologies, but this one actually seems pretty cool. Florida's St. Lucie County has announced plans to team up with Jacoby Energy (a self-proclaimed "environmentally friendly" corporation) to develop the United States' first plasma gasification plant. This would allow the county to not only produce energy via landfill waste, but to also- hopefully- reduce the need for landfills at all.

According to Scientific American, creating and maintaining such a system is a fairly complicated process. Electrical energy would be used to heat solid waste up to 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit, and this waste would then be broken down into plasmic ore that can be used to generate electricity. The new, Floridian plant has been estimated to produce enough energy to power more than 50,000 homes.

But all of this is not an entirely new concept. Inhabitat explains that NASA invented the idea of gasification over forty years ago as a way to create proper re-entry temperatures for shuttles and satellites. And Taiwan, Japan, Canada, and England have all touted the establishment of their own plasma gasification plants. While these systems have not come without criticism, they have also been acclaimed by engineers, environmentalists, and chemists throughout the world.

Being the overly-skeptical cynic that I am, I had a few questions about the environmental safety and "greenness" of plasmic gasification. A few minutes of research, however, led me to find some scientifically-sound answers:

• Question: Wouldn't gasification plants release harmful chemicals and metals into our atmosphere? Answer: Not necessarily. Landfill incinerators don't have to gasify every item in the trash. Some items, like those containing lead or mercury, would most likely be spared from incineration. No answer yet on the sulphur and chlorine contained in plastics.
  

• Question: Is this process actually sustainable? Wouldn't we be wasting a ton of energy to keep the plant running? Answer: Some scientists argue that gasification is a highly sustainable process. The only energy really required is the power used to start the plant. After that, the gasification process is self-sustaining. It will be able to power itself.

I don't claim to be an expert at chemistry or physics, and I know just as much about energy and plasma as the next person. Plasma gasification, as wordy and initially-inconceivable as it is, has nevertheless managed to spark my interest in aspects of "going green" that I had really never considered. It will be interesting to see how this technology pans out in the future.

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