This has been going around lately. Read more here: http://pikpakbum.multiply.com/journal/item/274?last_read=1&mark_read=pikpakbum:journal:274
Excerpt:
So, singer-songwriter-activist Gary Granada led a motorcade march up to the local McDonalds offices to seek a dialogue with them regarding cutting down the usage of styrofoam to package their food products. Sadly, they were met with rudeness, arrogance, and stupidity. And no, not just from the security guards, from whom such behavior is expected (almost mandatory), but rather, from the intelligent young managers, who COULD have averted this now-rising public relations NIGHTMARE by simply being COURTEOUS and CIVIL. Had they been hospitable, they would have continued being my all-time favorite cholesterol joint. Now, they are my enemy. And they should be yours too.
Gary Granda's website: http://garygranada.com
On his ordeal with the Mcdo managers: http://garygranada.com/5%20seconds.htm
The latest update wherein Mcdo sends him a letter via a PR agency: http://garygranada.com/Bonjin.htm
another case of a celebrity with his own version of a make up cause..."save the environment bs"...just write a song about the environment and a styrofoam free world gary...
ReplyDeletewell uneducated Mcdonald branch managers, yes...but not enough for me to boycott them...as you said..they provide juicy cholesterol burgers...gary is barking for the wrong dog...he should be lobbying these fastfood chains to limit the use of cholesterol rich ingredients...not freaking styrofoam...he's reading too much scientific studies...
Thank you for that, Marky.
ReplyDeleteFirst, I wasn't the one who said they provide juicy cholesterol burgers. That's an excerpt from the PPB site.
Having cleared that one out, let me proceed to say why I, myself, would freak out on the use of styrofoam first AND THEN at the cholesterol rich ingredients.
I know that if I eat at McDo, I'll be ingesting all these cholesterol and preservatives. I therefore can choose to eat somewhere else where my body can have the nourishment it deserves. I may, on occasion, eat at McDo when the need arises. It's a purely personal choice then. It's my body and I can do what I want with it.
As for the styro usage, whether or not I eat at McDo, McDo is continuously polluting the world that I live in. Therefore I am rendered helpless by this fastfood giant until somebody takes a stand and says let's do something about this because we are all affected. Damn, my unborn children are affected!
It is people like Gary Granada and his group Kaalagad who talk about the environment AND do something about it. It's about time the rest of us follow suit.
I do, however, respect your opinion that this is not enough reason for you to boycott McDo. As for me, I've already made my stand to boycott them until they find some other way to sell their cholesterol-rich food.
i'm so sorry miss, but i grew up loving McDo and it would be very hard for me to give up the best fries, cheeseburger, and sundae i've ever tasted.. eating healthy has never been part of my lifestyle anyway... as for polluting the environment, a lot of other companies are doing the same so i don't intend to cut my ties with mcdo just yet...
ReplyDeleteI respect your stand on the matter, Colleen. But please bear in mind that just because a lot of other companies are doing the same still does not make it ok. All the more is it essential for us to do something to change the norm. Maybe if McDo starts being more sensitive to the environment's needs other companies can follow its example. Then again maybe not. The point is we have to start somewhere.
ReplyDeletei have been out of the loop lately due to my schedule... but yes i also received an email from a friend asking if i could confirm with Gary if he really wrote it..
ReplyDeletei havent had the time to read his article....so ill reserve my comments first.. =)
We'd be glad to read those comments, Rachel. You might want to check out the links posted above.
ReplyDeleteI've thought about the issue more and I think I resent this line, Marky. What exactly do you mean by this? As someone who writes, I don't think anyone has the right to tell me to just stick to writing instead of fighting for the causes that I believe in. I, therefore, do not think it's fair to say the above line to Mr. Granada. One does not cease to be a person inhabiting this planet (and therefore being concerned with it) by being a songwriter/artist. In fact, one becomes even more sensitive to its (as well as one's co-inhabitants') needs because one IS an artist.
ReplyDeletei totally agree with nuni. (and since i am not as articulate as she is, i'm sticking to that one sentence. :p)
ReplyDeleteMABUHAY ANG BABASAGIN NA PLATO NG CHOWKING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDelete(mahirap lang i-take out un)
If I read this thread a few years ago, I would have easily dismissed gary as someone who's just trying to grandstand at the expense of, well, a capitalist. (Forgive me for this statement... grandstanding is very prevalent here in our country... from the lowest branch of the government to the top echelons)
ReplyDeleteFast forward to now, I try to look at the issues objectively.
On Mcdonald's rudeness, maybe it wasn't totally out of arrogance, it might have been a case of ignorance and unpreparedness. Corporates usually have strict guidelines when it comes to sensitive issues especially when it somewhat involves the media. They should have prepared for this when they received the first letter from Kaalagad. The PR guys should also have been fast to get off their butts to address the group in a professional manner.
Good thing my favorite is the Chicken Mcnuggets... they come in carboard boxes right? ;)
"What exactly do you mean by this?"
ReplyDeleteokay that might be uncalled for...my point is, its not enough grounds to boycott McDonalds...these people with "leftists" leanings should know that?...always at the battle front against corporations...McDonald's that provides employment to our youth ( i spent 6 months in college working at Mcdonalds...helps me make ends meet )..
now what would a styrofoam free world do to me?...extend my life by 2 years, while people around me smoke themselves to death?...
Gary is fighting a lost cause, he needs to be realistic...that's why stunts like these makes it obvious as a mere gimmick....oh the model in thailand protesting naked along the streets of bangkok against the use of animal skin...
who among us have never bought a product made of animal skin?...a paper not made from trees...a house with no wood?
its admirable for Gary to spend his time at the behest of "styrofoam" endagering our environment...
but calling for a boycott of Mcdonald's just because of some dumb, atrocious branch managers?...it doesn't merit a justification...
what he can do is, laid out the facts about "styrofoam" and the possible alternatives...
That's just my few cents worth of wisdom and i'm the first one to agree that i'm NOT an INTELLECTUAL PERSON...( that's why i dont read scientific studies, although i know too much use of cell phones and watching TV causes brain tumors, hence we should boycott Nokia and Sony also )
******
hope you wont get mad at me...haha i notice here in multiply, its either you agree to them ( they'll say you suck up to them too much ) you disagree with them ( they'll say what do you know? )...but i know you differently so there....*peace*...
hey i like Gary Granada's music...
tamaaaa! chowking na lang tayo. at max's. babasagin din plato nila diba? :p
ReplyDeleteMarky, the use of cellphones and watching of TV are again, personal choices. Just as smoking. Just as lapping up cholesterol. I might have not made myself clear enough in my earlier posts but that is the very reason why it's not "boycott McDonald's because it serves unhealthy food". If you've read Mr. Granada's account, the reasons for the boycott are (and I'm going to quote so as not to confuse the matter any further):
ReplyDelete"1. McDonald's is arrogant - don't make them more arrogant.
2. McDonald's uses styrofoam - don't encourage them further."
To which he eagerly wants to be discredited and proven wrong.
"Gary is fighting a lost cause, he needs to be realistic..." Tell that to the women who fought for their right to vote when the odds were completely against them. Tell that to the Blacks who had to sit at the back of the bus. Who is to say a cause is lost if it hasn't been fought yet? How is it to be realistic? Does being realistic mean sitting back and reading Classical Lit and having coffee while the world crumbles to dust just because "it's a lost cause"? Marky, as someone who reads a lot, I expect more from you.
"who among us have never bought a product made of animal skin?...a paper not made from trees...a house with no wood?" It's true that there are some things that we cannot avoid using. Each one of us have had our share of abusing the environment. The question is always how to make things better. For example, I gave extra credit to my students who submitted their term papers using recycled paper. I've stopped using straws as much as possible. Baby steps, I admit, but that would be one less straw clogging the drainage system, won't it? Going back to McDo, some people have pointed out (Chowking doesn't use styro! Max's doesn't use styro!), that there are alternatives! Why isn't McDo open enough to even discuss these issues?
I do not want to sound all self-righteous here. That was not the intention when I posted this. This is just something that I feel strongly about. And I'm not mad. This is just a taste of how passionate I can be about certain things.
You pretty know very well where you are coming from. I agree with this.
ReplyDeleteMainly because an idea at first may sound like it has no impact to anyone in this planet. But once proven otherwise, starting at the very core of the fact that all big change comes from the small ones, the pathetic and unreal turn out to be the rule and the reality.
My point? Gary's just an ant in his fight against the elephants of capitalism using styro in killing the rest of the nation, but we have to join the colony to put an end to that evil.
that's oliver and me! ... um, oliver and i? ... anyway, that's us! :p
ReplyDeletesee what being on opposite sides can do...im hurt at this ( haha hindi nga, that means ??? ouch ), honestly..im not contradicting you or your stand..im just over with celebrities making or using "causes" like it is to gain mileage...the african-american and the women fight's for suffrage those are different, one look at their cause, any human being can sense the importance of it...but "styrofoam" "boycott mcdonalds"...that's just too much for such a mundane cause...
ReplyDeletei read lot and probably because of that i realized what's wishful thinking from not, what's dream world from reality...now we're talking about Mcdonald's as an evil empire...yeah every corporation that makes money are evil, socialists people would agree to that...but we're in a world that needs that..who are we to say whose evil or not...
there are a lot of major issues that needs to be tackled, that Filipinos needs to understand than "styrofoam", i bet Gary Granada and his group have put out a checklist like
*animal rights - check
*piracy - check
*under age workers - check
*corruption - check
so they decided on styrofoam just to be different...and for what?...for media mileage..so that their group can accept donations from where...from the so called "evil corporations" again...i will not be surprised if Jollibee is included...
they need to do more than that to make a believer out of me...you can say i just sit around and do nothing, at least im not faking it like those leftist so called revolutionaries out there...who thinks just because they are from UP, they are God's gift to humanity...im tired of the causes that they are fighting for...
well dont expect from me...my mom gave up on me long time ago, i wont be working in a call center if im an over achiever person...im not made out to be a yuppie...ok im stupid nevermind me...got lots of time to comment on mults hehehehe...
I can't believe that anyone actually eats fast food crap anymore. Gross.
ReplyDeleteLiving in utopia, activism is all about altruism. Its about your conviction towards something. Yes, compared to the other problems and troubles of this world, the issue here of styro usage is small compared to global warming, resources getting scarce, land-mines, child labor, battered women, corruption, immorality and the list goes on.... lets face it, we live in a fucked up world, basically fucked up by our ancestors and us. But does that mean we shouldn't think about the little things? Your guess is as good as mine.
ReplyDeleteOn Gary Granada, personally, I have reservations on him. Lets just say I have prejudices on him as an activist based on what I heard about him from my parents.
(My parents were both activists in the Marcos era, that's where they met. my dad, a Filipino studying in FEATI and my mom a pure Chinese studying at UP. They got married the communist way, that is, with a bible and a gun. My dad was a step away from becoming a guerrilla for the NPA if not for the pregnancy of my mom with my oldest brother. They were puled out of the front lines due to the impracticality of lugging someone, well, pregnant. Marcos' goons finally caught up with dad and eventually got imprisoned and spent the early years of my brother's life incarcerated.)
My point? I don't like him (too strong a phrase to use, really). Its more of "Hindi ako bilib sa kanya". But does that make whatever he's fighting for insignificant? Again referring to my earlier post, if a had read this thread a couple of years ago, I'd slam this down as a grandstanding galore media hype. But maturity gave me objectivity. If that's his conviction, so be it.
What if Mother Theresa (God rest her soul) was the one who went out and lobbied against the use of styro's? Would we react differently?
These are merely my two cents worth and in no way am I contesting anyone's opinions. Hey, its a free world.
On boycotting Mcdonalds... I can try lowering my consumption, but I just can't totally bring myself to a total boycott Joni, so you'll have to forgive me.... (just being honest)
I just can't resist their fat-dripping-quarter-pounders! And their nuggets? Mmmmmmmm.... :)
I admit I might have been a teeny weeny bit too hard on you, Marky, and I apologize for hurting your feelings. I still stand by everything else that I wrote though. And it's fine with me even if you're "contradicting [me] or [my] stand" although you categorically said you're not. Fora like this ARE meant for discussions after all and it would be boring to have just one opinion being echoed countless times. Plus, it's harder to argue in Chinese and so far, the only arguments I've had for some time are in Chinese.
ReplyDeleteSo now, at the risk of repeating myself, I would like to say that I believe that every little thing still counts. If not now, when do we start caring for the environment then? And why why why is caring for the environment considered to be so trivial? Why is seeking alternative ways to the use of styro so unrealistic?
Erwin, that's a VERY interesting and personal post. I had my tibak days too. I was actually pretty active in Gabriela some years ago. And I forgive you. A partial boycott is better than no boycott at all. :p Again, every little thing counts and I appreciate that.
And because I've already said so much more than I even thought I would want to say, I will restrain myself from posting here as much as possible. Believe me when I say that that's going to be really hard.
One last hirit before I go off to lunch though: I wish that I'll never be too disillusioned and jaded to think that there's nothing that can be done, however small and seemingly insignificant. And that's just for me.