Well this weekend has comes to its glorius ending. Hands are manicured, face is clean shaven...now to work on that haircut and I'll be more presentable than ever before! I would like to acknowledge that American Airlines has the most room in any of its classes (except for some of those non-stop across the Pacific first classes) than any other airline I know of.
Something I realized this weekend is that the American media system is a huge disservice to anyone who relies upon it. This weekend I got a lot of BBC love and when you watch BBC reporting it just hits you like a 100 ton of bricks that the US news services are like soccer announcers. Everything has to be either sensational or it is sensationalized. Very rarely will anyone come across a piece of just straight up journalism, unless you go digging in a specific journal or a indie-publication. Everything in the news is setup to "thrill and entertain". Sadly life is not enterntainment in most cases and everyone cannot be made to watch the news. However in the free market everyone has to report to the bottomline and therein lines the quandry. You don't make money unless you get people to watch and you can't get people to watch unless it interests them. I don't think state sponsored news services are the answer, because I don't want the government telling us what the government is doing. The answer lies squarely in the hands of the public. Media organizations can really truly hide behind the statement, "We give them what they want." There is real truth to that. However, there has to be a balance I'm sure that can be reached. In the mean time theres the BBC! BBC 1, BBC 2...!!!
Also there is this okay piece on vegetarianism over at TIME. All in all it lays out the facts rather clearly but fails to mention that there are world class athletes who are entirely vegan, namely Carl Lewis. He was vegan throughout his glory days and continues to be so. It was also scary to see how it glossed over so many key points in the argument like efficiency of meat production, waste management with meat production, grain distribution systems, and the many many health risks of meat eating. It was also rather intersting that this article just "threw out" anti-vegetarian arguments like the "problem" of calcium absorption in low protein diets. My paternal great-grandmother was vegetarian, both my grandmothers and my mom are vegetarian and none of them have ever had any issues with osteporosis or bone density nor have I ever heard of a vegetarian indian woman complain of osteoporosis like issues. My great-grandmother was 102 when she passed and she was still able to walk without any problems other than the common age related isses. I really hate it when articles like this throw out "facts" without nary a hint as to the research that points to that "fact."
Also as part of the vegetarian coverage a certain Mattew Cooper did this piece on veganism. I think he should be dragged out into the streets and stoned and then he should be made to watch his SUV burn while I dance around it in a raw pagan ritual. Pieces like that do nothing but spread FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt). He must have really done some huge, not to mention nasty, sexual favours to get that particular piece of garbage published.
On the informative side they also did a nice little breakdown on the various different vegetarian styles. Now thats useful.
Okay now its time for me to head to bed. Its really been quite the weekend.
Posted by Mr. Keyur at July 15, 2002 02:44 AM