In this final (hopefully) installment of the Pork Week experiment, Ms. Hepola again reminds us that "pork is a polarizing meat, and it raises complicated issues -- not just about religion and carnivore culture, but also about animal treatment." She quotes two reader emails. And then launches into a series of chef interviews extolling pork.

This is the failure of this series of articles. Superficially acknowledging that someone out there might find that there is something not quite right about pork, but failing to engage these views at all. We hear from the same voices again and again in a series of identical articles, on all the delicious ways of eating pork, on how universally appealing it is (in fact, it's not), and on how you can get the best, most elite pork money can buy.

Never was the pen handed to someone with an environmental or animal rights view on the subject. Never was it even suggested that pork should be indulged in rarely, for these or even health reasons. Instead we had a series of 'bacon porn' articles lusting after the meat and advocating its consumption in new forms.

Never once, for that matter, was the Semitic food taboo discussed--one I don't share, but that over a billion Muslims, Jews, and others around the world have in common.

To have an entire week of articles on this vacuous topic, when, as others have noted, so much else is going on in the world that is actually relevant, and then to do it so badly in a way that alienates a huge segment of your readers who are conscientious about animals, the environment, health, or even "just" religious reasons--this just shows a total lack of editorial judgment. I don't know about these other readers, but Salon has dropped several notches in my esteem. This isn't the only recent incident but this tone-deafness is probably going to drive me to find another online publication to go to first for newsmagazine content.

most unforgivably, there was never any real discussion of the pig as an animal in its own right, not as an ends to meat. You could easily, if you wanted, spend an entire week of articles on pig behavior, pig stories, pig sociology, pig-human relations, pig anatomy and contributions to medicine, and so on.

But like all the other issues, this was relegated to at most a sentence or two in a series of bacon porn articles.

What else can we look forward to at Salon? Would you run, say, a "Tits Week" series of articles about how sexy boobs are and how fun they are to play with? We all know all men love tits and the ladies love to show them off (har har). Throw in a few Homer Simpsons quotes, label it controversial, and don't have a single article on the objectification of women, breast cancer, sexual harassment, etc. Do I get a prize for that idea?

I can't speak for Vegetarian Times, I don't read it, but I didn't realize--until this week, I guess--that Salon was equivalent to Porkivore Times. I thought it was a general-interest, left-leaning "breaking news, opinion, politics, entertainment, sports, and culture" magazine.

My bad.

Of course you wouldn't expect evenhandedness on the topic of vegetarianism in the Vegetarian Times, whose very title takes a position. You might expect it from a publication like Salon, especially when it decides to spend a whole week devoted to an issue in which it is taking one side only--and the side that might instead be expected from by the likes of the Free Republic.

so I don't really see how you're in such a position to criticize the "MSM".

How about responding to your own critics?

because it is breaking the link.

kthxbye.

It's nice to see a country actually using rational tests for citizenship.

And for those who say it's a double standard for the husband or what about French citizens who radicalize, you are missing the point. You can't strip citizenship away; otherwise it would have little value and most people would be stateless and without rights. The permanence of citizenship is all the more reason to be careful about who it is granted to.

Someone who has no concept of French values and civil society or human rights is not prepared to contribute to a free and somewhat more enlightened society. France has a right to defend itself from backwards and totalitarian regimes.

To be fair, they ought to keep out the fundy Christians too. But I am willing to bet France would not have a double standard when it comes to FLDS or Scientologist weirdos. They probably wouldn't get citizenship either.

Romm talks about reducing "electricity consumption per capita" and increasing efficiency but ignores the most important component of this equation, the "capita." On the "per" side, there is a limit to energy efficiency--100%, to which we can only approach in increasingly small increments. Likewise there is a lower limit to the amount of energy required to maintain an acceptable lifestyle.

On the other hand, on the "capita" side, population is continuing to grow rapidly in the United States, if less rapidly than in most developing nations. Of what use is it to reduce individual consumption when this reduction is swamped by the increasing number of consumers denuding the earth of every resource needed for life?