MOBeef Update

A number of media outlets have recently featured individuals or organizations that blame the cattle industry for global warming. Among others, “Supreme Master Television” issued a Public Service Announcement (PSA) claiming a connection between beef consumption and global warming, which has been airing on a number of television outlets, including FOX News affiliate stations and on the Discovery Channel. PSAs are non-paid forms of publicity, but these stations have chosen to run this editorialized piece promoting veganism charging the organization nor offering counterpoint, for some reason.

You need to be aware of this piece and of the extremist organization that created it so you can respond to people who may have seen it and choose to pass its messages along. Supreme Master Television is a free-to-air satellite broadcasting channel run by a self-described spiritual teacher, Ching Hai, who claims to be “God’s Direct Contact.” The group, which also maintains Web sites at www.letsActNow.org and www.AskMoreNow.com to spread their word, maintains that the “single most effective tool to fight global warming” is vegetarianism and that a hamburger is “more responsible for global warming” than a “gas-guzzling SUV.”

Supreme Master Television engaged in a similar campaign in Australia late last year with the same call to action to become vegetarian. Your checkoff-funded issues management team has engaged with beef counterparts in Australia to get more information about the activist group’s tactics and has alerted our partners at the Center for Consumer Freedom, whose leadership has responded to these claims.

If you see any airings of this PSA or similar information in television or print, we encourage you to respond. For some talking points about the beef industry and the environment, including emissions, you might want to refer back to Beef’s Long Shadow; or to discuss the attributes of animal vs. plant protein, click here. Click here for more appropriate talking points regarding the Supreme Master Television PSA.