No, don't stop reading, this will still be interesting - I promise. :)
Recently, it has come to my attention that many many people have been coming to my site looking for information on the Yellow Ribbon Campaign.
I'm sorry, this page is in no way connected with the Yellow Ribbon Campaign nor does it contain information on it. I'm sorry you have wasted your time coming to this page.
This page used to be a joke Ribbon campaign against the "Spam" e-mails being named such. So as I sat here writing this apology, I thought to myself, "You could use the large number of people that are visiting your site to your advantage. You could express your views on something equally, if not moreso, important - The Environment.
Okay, by now, you probably have left, saying, "What a lunatic..." But my reasons are valid and I would just like to be heard out. Please?
For those of you still reading this, I would like to express my disdain and contempt for McDonalds and Burger King for their use of Rainforest beef. Everyone knows that the rainforest is a wonderful place that must be preserved. These fast food restaurants are ignoring this fact so that they can make a buck and they don't care who or what they step on to get it.
You see, there are two ways that McDonalds destroys the environment.
1) They get beef raised in the rainforest to be delivered directly to your BigMac. You may be thinking to yourself, "Well, why is that bad? They only take away part of the rainforest and then that's it." Incorrect. They use parts of the rainforest for only 2 years at the maximum because the soil quality is so poor there that they clear-cut another area once the soil cannot sustain the grass and grain that the cows eat. So what's so wrong about that, won't the forest regrow? Wrong again. The moisture in a rainforest is what makes it a RAINforest, and since about 70% of all moisture comes from transpiration from the trees - No more trees, no more rainforest. It will not regrow, even if it is replanted.
2) The other way has to do with just the grain being shipped from the rainforest to the US or other countries to feed cows that will eventually end up on your BigMac. Put simply, for every pound of beef you eat, 55 acres of rainforest were destroyed.
So if you're not convinced that the rainforests are not worth saving, let me throw some facts at you.
Forests offer stimulants, tranquilizers, contraceptives (like "the pill", which gets its active ingredient from the Mexican forest yam), and perhaps someday soon, a cure for AIDS. (In 1987, researchers found a tree compound from the Malaysian rain forest that was 100% effective against the HIV-1 virus. Sadly, scientists were never able to find that tree again.)
780 tree species have been found in a 25 acre plot of Malaysian rain forest -- more than the total number of tree species native to the US and Canada.
We're losing 33.8 million acres of tropical forest per year -- More than the total area of New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New Jersey and Delaware combined -- 2.8 million acres lost per month...93,000 acres/day...3,800 acres/hour...64 acres/minute. You do the math.
Of the 3,000 plants that have anti-cancer properties, 70% grow in rain forests.
This one is interactive. Get a calculator out...
Now, every hour, six species are lost forever. Just humor me here... First, find out how many hours since you were born. (# of years times (365 days in a year + 1 day for every leap year since you were born + every day since your last birthday) times 24 hours in a day + the # of hours it's been since midnight= ... Then multiply this number by 6.
Example: This is me - {[(17 years)x(365 days)+(5 leap days + 169 days since my last b-day)]x(24 hours in a day) + (19.5 hours since midnight)}x(six species lost an hour) = 918,693. I don't know what you got, but I'm even taken aback by this huge number. It just makes me sad that I'm only 17 and over 900 thousand species have already gone extinct.
One more fact: Out of those 144 species gone extinct everyday, one of them is from Hawaii. (Just to make it seem a little closer to home.)
That's all. I hope that you now understand the consequences of using rainforest beef and the impact it can have on the environment. I hope you leave here being a more educated, environmentally sound person.
Here's where you can give me feedback. Anything from the amount of animals gone extinct from your birth to comments, critiques, or criticisms - I reply to all. Please take the time to do this. :)
