There is so much for a vegan blogger to say about this that it actually renders you speechless.
Here's a news story on this new menu item from the L.A. Times. That should cover the basics for you. Additionally, I'll let all the other vegan and diet bloggers do the ranting.
Here's my main thought right now - in 2010, when you're talking about the primary problems facing N. America, you're talking about climate change and health issues. And by health issues the big topics are the diabetes and obesity epidemics hitting both the U.S. and Canada.
Other companies are starting to see the light on the health front. Pepsi for example has recently dedicated itself to making all of its snack foods less "junky". The CEO has flat out said that they feel a certain amount of corporate responsibility for N. American health problems, and want to be part of the solution.
So this kind of thought is percolating in some company's head offices, but KFC? Well, KFC has suddenly decided upon a "What would Homer Simpson do" approach to menu planning.
A funny side-story to all this is that about a year or two ago, KFC in Canada succumbed to pressure from some animal rights groups, and started offering something close to a veggie-burger. The Double-Down must be their little "f*^k you!" to the forces that put a non-meat item on their menu.
5 comments:
hard to believe this isn't an april fools joke!
As a lover of vegan fried foods, I commend their creativity but this has just plain gone too far.
I came across this because I was looking for an image but I bet you like public health care and welfare... this is a product offered in the same alcohol and tobacco is. The companies exist to make money. We exist to make decisions for ourselves that's it. So if you make the choice to eat it then it's up to you. Not the company for offering the product... fucking tool shed...
Tool shed? Is that some southern republican slang word/phrase?
the right of private industry to offer destructive products has to be curbed somehow.
Regarding the double down, the carbon costs associated with the red meat and the cheese, and to a lesser extent the chicken, has to make this one of the most polluting meal items you can think of.... and then you add in the fact that it will be contributing to the obesity and diabetes epidemics in the U.S. and Canada, both of which are staggering economic burdens within health care.
this is a classic example of a product's hidden costs (in this case environmental pollution & health care) being paid by the "commons"... by us (and the planet). Not by the company.
At some point companies' right to offload costs to us has to end.
"At some point companies' right to offload costs to us has to end."
I think that point needs to come sooner rather than later. Personal responsibility is great in an ideal society, but in this one it often doesn't work. And the cost of the obesity epidemic and all other obesity-related diseases isn't covered by only those affected - it's covered by all of us (the lucky ones with health insurance, anyway) in the form of increased health care premiums.
As for the post by "Anonymous", I sure hope you feel better now that you've gotten that off your chest. Must be a heavy burden you carry
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