Chipotle's "vegan" ad - is it deceptive?

[Second Summer]

As a piece of buzz-worthy art, Chipotle’s new three-minute ad (and attendant smartphone game) is no doubt a masterpiece. It is everything that all the worshipful articles about it say it is — beautiful, inspiring and politically significant for how it openly derides factory farming. What most of those articles don’t say, however, is that it is either a deliberate endorsement of a plant-based diet or it is a deceptive attempt to appropriate the morality of vegetarianism and ascribe it to meat-based business.

Watch the ad here, and in particular, look for the subtle shift in food groups between the scenes in the city and the scenes back at the scarecrow’s farm:

Full article: Chipotle’s self-serving deception: A “vegetarian” bait-and-switch - Salon.com (Salon.com, 19. Sept. 2014)

On the one hand it's amazing that a major fast-food chain is running an anti factory farming ad with a song by Fiona Apple who is a vegan and an animal rights activist. On the other hand ... well, that article explains it better!

 

[Blobbenstein]

well, I don't like the demonising of crows, anyway.

But yes it is dishonest. But it has to be. The obvious truth about slaughter is usually swept under the carpet in advertising.

 

[Dedalus]

well, I don't like the demonising of crows, anyway.

Hear, hear!!

On the one hand it's amazing that a major fast-food chain is running an anti factory farming ad with a song by Fiona Apple who is a vegan and an animal rights activist. On the other hand ... well, that article explains it better!

It certainly is a tough spot for the veg*n community to take a stand on. It took me a long time to understand this sort of deception. It's a great article.

Personally, I'm hoping a company like Native Foods comes out with something along these lines - but fully integrating all the factors that come from meat consumption. Perhaps with a touch more content on the graphic side - though I do like the implied horror and suffering that this piece illustrates nicely. It's just a bit too clean for live animals to go into a meat grinder and have a well-wrapped package come out the other end. That's pretty much catering (sorry about that) to the blissfully ignorant meat eating community. Showing what happens on the killing floor would be a lot less disturbing in a still-motion creation like this than the actual footage often used, while still cxposing the brutality.

 

[PTree15]

Hear, hear!!



It certainly is a tough spot for the veg*n community to take a stand on. It took me a long time to understand this sort of deception. It's a great article.

Personally, I'm hoping a company like Native Foods comes out with something along these lines - but fully integrating all the factors that come from meat consumption. Perhaps with a touch more content on the graphic side - though I do like the implied horror and suffering that this piece illustrates nicely. It's just a bit too clean for live animals to go into a meat grinder and have a well-wrapped package come out the other end. That's pretty much catering (sorry about that) to the blissfully ignorant meat eating community. Showing what happens on the killing floor would be a lot less disturbing in a still-motion creation like this than the actual footage often used, while still cxposing the brutality.

I agree wholeheartedly about showing the brutality. I think that if I had actually seen the horror of what happens during slaughter, vegetarianism would have clicked for me a lot earlier. Many years ago, I was one of those people who didn't want to hear about the slaughter of chickens, despite a veggie friend telling me so. There is a huge difference between hearing about what happens and actually seeing it . Deep down, in my soul, I knew then that I should have stopped eating flesh. The disconnect in our society regarding the path of dead flesh to the supermarket or the plate is immense. I have not seen the video, as I'm at work at the moment, but the article was insightful nonetheless. What boggles my mind in any discussion about "humane" slaughter is that people completely gloss over the fact that the animal is being killed for our consumption, regardless of the method. How can that ever be humane?