Santa’s Naughty List 2013

Santa just happened to let me know that some notable people made it on his naughty list, and he wanted me to share the names with you (to help you avoid their bad ways, of course). So, let me introduce Santa’s Top 10 on the Naughty List. 

(Hint: To learn more or see my original post, click on each entries’ name!)

1. Dr. Oz 

Dr. Oz is supposed to be everybody’s favorite television doctor, especially because he seems to have a new idea for losing weight every single week. But, unfortunately, his methods and shows are the epitome of unethical. The “doctor” has used his shows to repeatedly scare consumers about everything from biotech to pesticides with absolute lies. But what he doesn’t tell his beloved fans is that he’s lining his pocketbook with all of those anti-GMO stories. For lying and making money from it, Santa has placed “Dr.” Oz at the top of his Naughty List. 

2. Panera Bread

Panera Bread made this the year the attack farmers and deceive consumers through terrible marketing and advertising. The company launched a series of commercials and web ads telling consumers that if they didn’t buy chicken at the restaurant, they were probably ingesting a bunch of antibiotics. Oh, and they called farmers that took care of sick birds with medicine lazy.What the chain forgot to mention was that chicken cannot be sold in the United States with trace levels of antibiotics above strict safety limits. Before a chicken is sent to market, the antibiotics the bird must go through a withdrawal period. Not to mention, allowing a sick bird to go untreated is unethical and cruel. But when Panera got caught, they didn’t care. Panera should have realized that Santa isn’t a fan of lies, deception, and cruelty to animals.

3. Chipotle 

Chipotle thought they would be creative by making a completely animated video showing the evils of modern farming. Unfortunately, they forgot to make sure it told the truth (or, maybe that was their point). The video was a blatant attempt to scare farmers into thinking all farms are big, evil corporate farms, farm animals are mistreated, and meat from those farms and animals are full of hormones and antibiotics. The chain restaurant has also shamelessly advocated against biotechnology. Santa’s not a big fan of lying, especially when it comes to farming. Chipotle was put squarely on the Naughty List.

4. Carrie Underwood 

Carrie Underwood – country music star and former rancher’s daughter decided to abandon her roots and betray her fans. In 2009, Carrie donated a whopping $200,000 to the Humane Society of the United States, an organization with the goal of ending animal agriculture (see below on the list). More recently, she’s taken to advocating against so-called “ag-gag” laws, which protect a farmer’s right to privacy and protect farm animals from exploitation. So while Carrie rakes in the dough from her fans, many of whom come from rural areas, she’s using that money to attack their way of life. For her bait and switch scheme, Carrie has been placed on the Naught List. 

5. Humane Society of the United States

HSUS has a lot of reasons to be on the Naughty List. Their late night commercials are tearjerkers – showing poor and mistreated cats and dogs while asking for a donation. The problem is, HSUS only gives less than 1% of their annual budget to help local pet shelters. Instead, most of their money goes toward funding ballot initiatives aimed at stopping animal agriculture, lobbying, and lawsuits against farmers. So while consumers think they’re donating to help shelter pets, they’re actually helping an organization that’s actively trying to end family farms. For the bait and switch tactics, and an agenda meant to stop animal agriculture, Santa has got HSUS toward the top of his Naughty List.

Roseanne Barr may not be the paradigm of healthy living and common sense, but she’s willing to tell you all about her ill-informed opinions and conspiracies about biotech. Roseanne uses her twitter page and platform as former presidential candidate for the Green Party to tell everyone her opinion on technology in farming and, especially, her hatred for Monsanto (who she lovingly dubbed MonSATAN). Although biotech saved the papaya industry in Hawaii, Roseanne is convinced Monsanto actually created the virus so they could then sell Hawaiian farmers the GMO varieties that are resistant to it. Thankfully, like her presidential bid, her accusation aren’t gaining much ground among the more sane population. However, her mindless banter earned her a spot on Santa’s Naughty List.

7. Ryan Gossling

Ryan’s pitfall was falling in love with the wrong girl. Once he started hanging out too much with Eva Mendes, a spokeswoman for PETA, it was only a matter of time. Before we knew it, Ryan was spewing talking points right from the animal rights organization’s playbook. Ryan sent out a press release condemning the practice of dehorning calves as cruel unnecessary. Unfortunately, Ryan forgot to mention that dehorning is necessary to protect the calves as the grow and the farmers who care for them. And while he advocated for using cows that are genetically bred to not grow long horns, he didn’t understand the gene pool isn’t big enough yet. For not doing his research (or not caring if he did), Ryan should look for coal in his stocking this December.

8. The Punks That Vandalized the Butter Cow

The Butter Cow is a time honored tradition at the Iowa State Fair dating back all the way to 1911. This summer, however, some animal rights eco-terrorists sought to bring publicity to their cause by vandalizing it. Thankfully, fair crews had the cow cleaned up before fair goers arrived in the morning and the story generated publicity for the fair and the tradition. However, destroying other people’s artwork isn’t looked at too kindly by Santa. 

9. Oprah

Oprah has routinely used her celebrity to blasts modern farm practices, including the use of biotech and any sort of animal agriculture. Upon her “retirement,” Oprah moved down to Hawaii and started farming and wanted to donate the food to local island natives. While her efforts sound nice, unfortunately, she started an organic farm. Since organic can only produce 66% the yields of conventional farming, Oprah could actually be feeding a whole lot more people. Not to mention that she’s using the opportunity to blast conventional farmers for their production methods. Too bad Santa doesn’t like it when you bite the hand that feeds and when wasting precious resources. 

10. Congress

This one may stand without explanation, but Santa’s biggest pet peeve is that Congress has failed to pass a Farm Bill…for the second year in a row.