Read your book, Mr. Gore!

[Ecofarm]

LOS ANGELES — Look out, Al Gore ... PETA says you are refusing to face one very "inconvenient truth."

On Monday, the animal rights organization launched the campaign Offsetalgore.com (conveniently in time for Earth Day) in an attempt to counter the effects they say the former vice president's meat-laden diet has on Mother Nature.

While reps for Gore had no comment, Pop Tarts confirmed with people who have worked with Gore that he loves his steak and sausage, plus he's notoriously known for chowing down the almost all-meat Atkins diet during his run for president.

A recent report published by the United Nations determined that raising animals for food generates about 40 percent more greenhouse gas emissions than all the cars, trucks, ships and planes in the world combined.

"Livestock are one of the most significant contributors to today’s most serious environmental problems," said Henning Steinfeld, chief of the Food and Agriculture Organization's Livestock Information and Policy branch and senior author of the report. "Urgent action is required to remedy the situation.”

So while Gore is known worldwide for his environmental activism and efforts to build awareness about global warming, is our steak-lovin' "Earth Day" man a hypocrite? PETA certainly seems to think so.

The campaign encourages people to go vegetarian for 30 days and claims that that is enough time to prevent the release of more than 270 pounds of carbon dioxide into the Earth's atmosphere. Studies suggest that this will prevent more pollution than if a person left his or her car at home every weekday for 30 days.

Speaking of which, researchers at the University of Chicago also found that converting to a vegan diet is about 50 percent more effective in countering global warming than switching from a standard American car to Tinseltown's fave Toyota: the Prius.

"Americans now eat one million birds an hour, and yet Mr. Gore has not mentioned the fact that poultry production is a huge problem, one reason we have him holding a drumstick in our ad asking him if he’s “too chicken to go vegetarian," said PETA President Ingrid E. Newkirk.

"Given the fact that vegetarians are on average much slimmer than meat-eaters, Mr. Gore doesn’t even remotely look as if he is fond of vegetables, grains and fruit." Ouch.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,351943,00.html

Look at this guy! Environmentalist or politician?

I'm not a fan of PETA, but I'll publicize them when it suits my agenda!

 

[brennan]

How sad can the anti Al-Gore looby get?

 

[holy king]

i hope all peta members get eaten by animals.

 

[Ecofarm]

How sad can the anti Al-Gore looby get?

They are not anti Al Gore. They are anti fat-arsed hypocrites.

I hardly think PETA is a republican organization; crying "partisanship!11!!1" on this = lose.

 

[QuoVadisNation]

I hope PETA loses all of its money in pointless lawsuits.

 

[I'm Cleo!]

I don't think the Fox News editors know what the word "hypocrite" means. I don't recall Al Gore asking people not to eat steak.

But contributing to this Two Minutes' Hate is pointless -- everything Al Gore does is evil, because the things he does are evil, because he's Al Gore, because . . .

Cleo

 

[Dragonlord]

I'm neither vegetarian nor Vegan, and I'm not going to join in the Gore-bashing.... but PETA does have a point here!
I can't test the numbers they give, but certainly eating less meat is a good idea for a variety of reasons: personal health (weight problems), food shortages and now global warming.

More pasta, less hamburgers and chicken wings, people!

 

[Fifty]

The evidence is mounting... but it still tastes so good! argggggggggggggggg!

 

[Ecofarm]

I don't think the Fox News editors know what the word "hypocrite" means. I don't recall Al Gore asking people not to eat steak.

But contributing to this Two Minutes' Hate is pointless -- everything Al Gore does is evil, because the things he does are evil, because he's Al Gore, because . . .

Cleo

Fox is not calling him a hypocrite, PETA (a left-wing organization) is.

 

[brennan]

They are not anti Al Gore. They are anti fat-arsed, private plane flying hypocrites.

I hardly think PETA is a republican organization. Crying partisanship on this = lose.

PETA have launched a tongue in cheek ad campaign, the word hypocrite has only been used by Fox News as far as i can see, Partisan? I think so.

 

[Ecofarm]

PETA have launched a tongue in cheek ad campaign, the word hypocrite has only been used by Fox News as far as i can see, Partisan? I think so.

PETA calls Al Gore a hypocrite:

http://blog.peta.org/archives/2007/03/clearing_a_few.php

http://www.ecorazzi.com/2007/08/30/al-gore-vs-peta-the-fight-for-global-warming/

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/people/news/article_1274083.php/PETA_plea_to_Al_Gore

http://ibgj.blogspot.com/2007/03/this-just-in-from-what-hell-department.html



Fox is just reporting. But sure, kill the messenger and ignore the message - that's best.

 

[holy king]

The evidence is mounting... but it still tastes so good! argggggggggggggggg!

come on, it's meat not a drug... you think it's bad to eat it, stop eating it...

i stopped eating meat when all this "ooohh the world hunger problem, we gotta make the world a better place by boycotting the meat industry. (but in fact we just use this to feel morally superior so we can have a wank thinking of ourselves)" stuff mattered to me, and 4 years later i started to eat meat again when i found out it makes no difference and i didnt give a sh*t anymore...

 

[I'm Cleo!]

Ecofarm,

Then they don't know what it means.

Cleo

 

[brennan]

PETA calls Al Gore a hypocrite:*snip*

Where? All I can see are blogs, I don't see an official quote from PETA that uses the word 'hypocrite'...

In fact i didn't see the word hypocrite at all actually...

 

[Nylan]

CFC needs a thesaurus.

 

[Ecofarm]

Where? All I can see are blogs, I don't see an official quote from PETA that uses the word 'hypocrite'...

In fact i didn't see the word hypocrite at all actually...

Then you didn't look closely. Each contained the word hypocrite and the first came from the peta.org blog

The following are a few inconvenient truths that the former V.P. ignores:

A major United Nations study determined that the meat industry generates 40 percent more greenhouse-gas emissions than all the cars, trucks, SUVs, ships, and planes in the world combined.

Researchers at the University of Chicago concluded that going vegan is 50 percent more effective in combating the climate crisis than switching to a hybrid car.

The official handbook of the Live Earth concerts that Gore helped organize acknowledges that not eating meat is "the single most effective thing" you can do to reduce your climate change impact (emphasis in original).

Since Gore's addiction to meat is apparently stronger than his desire to secure a better future for our planet, we're asking those who recognize that actions speak louder than words to help offset Gore's greenhouse-gas emissions by pledging to go vegetarian for 30 days.

http://getactive.peta.org/campaign/offset_gore


Play semantics all you want, but what they say is pretty clear. He talks the talk, but doesn't walk the walk - that's a hypocrite.

 

[Fifty]

Ecofarm,

Then they don't know what it means.

Cleo

How so? Doesn't Gore think we should be doing something about global warming in general? I mean sure, he isn't a hypocrite if you narrow the scope down to "meat eating" and then argue that Gore only cares about car emissions and not global warming in general, but that seems like a weasly way of doing things, unless Gore has specifically said that he only cares about emissions from cars and such. Or is there some statement I'm missing here (I've never read any of Gore's stuff on climate change)?


Wouldn't it be more productive to have a discussion about the extent to which meat-eating is more of a problem than car-driving, than it would be to just harp on technical definitions and who used what word first?

 

[brennan]

Then you didn't look closely. Each contained the word hypocrite and the first came from the peta.org blog

Now i've no idea what level of credibility any blog has, given that they are just opinion pieces, but perhaps you'd like to highlight the word hypocrite in it for me?

Spoiler :

For all the good he's done for the environment—which, to be fair, is an awful lot—Al’s leaving out a huge piece of the puzzle by ignoring the fact that the devastation caused by the meat industry is among the worst environmental disasters ever to happen to the world. As we told him in our letter, sent earlier this week:

While the steps that you urge people to take in An Inconvenient Truth are inarguably important, the quickest and most effective way to fight climate change will come through diet change.​

An inconvenient truth for him, maybe, but it’s the truth nonetheless. Since he might not have seen the recent U.N. reports on the subject, we pointed out to him that animals raised for food generate more greenhouse gases than all cars and trucks combined, and that (according to a recent University of Chicago study), switching to a vegan diet is more effective in countering global warming than switching from a standard American car to a Prius. We've also offered to cook him some faux "fried chicken" as an introduction to meat-free meals, since, however many documentaries you make, you just can't be a meat-eating environmentalist. I'll let you know if he gets back to us.

 

[Fifty]

Now i've no idea what level of credibility any blog has, given that they are just opinion pieces, but perhaps you'd like to highlight the word hypocrite in it for me?

They're saying that you can't be a meat-eating environmentalist. Gore is advocating environmentalism, yet he eats meat. That seems like it falls under the realm of hypocrisy. Why not talk about the issue instead of just harping on a word. If a source called someone an "unmarried young adult male" and then Fox called him a "bachelor" would you be similarly upset?

 

[Ecofarm]

Now i've no idea what level of credibility any blog has, given that they are just opinion pieces, but perhaps you'd like to highlight the word hypocrite in it for me?

Sure:

you just can't be a meat-eating environmentalist

Thus, if he claims to be an environmentalist...

Doesn't take a genius to see this.

Later in that link, a poster uses the word specifically, if that REALLY matters to you.

Perhaps you would prefer this CNN link, that has a ton of articles of various organizations, including peta, "calling Gore a hypocrite":

http://search.cnn.com/search?query=gore hypocrite&type=web&sortBy=date&intl=false

Breitbart, NYTimes, Washington Post, etc, etc, etc