Pacific Free Press was launched in March 2007 by Dutch-Canadian Richard
Kastelein of V.O.F. Expathos, in the Netherlands along with Chris Cook- CFUV radio journalist and Editor in Chief of Pacific Free Press. Cook is based in , Victoria, British Columbia.
The site is a sister to Atlantic Free Press and Brick Ogden an American Expatriate in Amsterdam has been a key supporter of this project.
The mission of Pacific Free Press is simple: to dig out nuggets of truth from
the slag-heap of lies, ignorance and witless diversion that has buried
public discourse today. Pacific Free Press provides a new venue for
disseminating hard news and insightful, fact-based analysis of the
harsh realities too often ignored or distorted by the mainstream press.
In almost every movie ever made, at some point, a character will consume
animal products: a cheeseburger, a steak, a tuna sandwich, an omelet, a
slice of pizza, a milk shake...whatever. Often, the script will even have
characters specifically voice their love for such fare.
In the reviews of
these films, of course, you will see no mention of this. No film reviewer
would ever condemn a movie simply because the protagonist ate and enjoyed,
say, a grilled cheese sandwich.
However, if you were to release a movie that
directly addressed the standard American diet and animal consumption, every
wiseass writer would be poised and ready to get glib and trivialize the
message. It's all part of the subtle, daily conditioning we endure. If you
don't believe me, check out some of the headlines for "Fast Food Nation"
reviews:
'Fast Food' serves a lot to chew on" (San Jose Mercury News)
"It's a whopper!" (Edmonton Sun)
"Beefing Up 'Fast Food Nation' (Washington Post)
"Mistake on a bun" (Toronto Star)
'Fast Food Nation' bites off too little as a drama" (Seattle Post
Intelligencer)
'Fast Food Nation' serves up revolting food for thought" (Los Angeles
Daily)
"Order of 'Fast Food' difficult to stomach" (Boston Herald)
Then we have A.O. Scott, film reviewer for the newspaper of record, the New
York Times. Scott's review ("Will 'Fast Food Nation' spoil your appetite?")
wastes no time in mocking the movie's mission. In the first sentence, Scott
broaches "the subject of spinach." To Scott, "Fast Food Nation" "dwells on
conditions in the feed lots and slaughterhouses" where cows are "future
hamburgers." Thus, he says, one cannot help but indulge the "impulse to
point out that contaminated leafy greens have recently sickened more people
than dirty meat." Scott evens add: "So there."
Following that, this polemic disguised as a review still doesn't talk about
the film itself. Instead, Scott gleefully points out that, at Cannes,
"American journalists bragged (or at least joked) about heading for the
local McDonald's after the "Fast Food Nation" screening, as if to prove they
had resisted its lessons." Did Scott finally discuss the movie after this?
Nope. He chose instead to quote Bruce Willis (who appears in the film) as
saying, "Most people don't like to be told what's best for them."
Eventually, Scott gets around to saying a few positive things about "Fast
Food Nation," but how many folks were still reading the review at that
point? It isn't until the last paragraph that he mentions the "mute,
helpless suffering of the cows," and calls the film "necessary and
nourishing."
If I was a pithy headline writer, I might say: "New York Times: Junk Food
Journalism."