Only bite-sized information nuggets are available under these constraints. It is within this fast food framework that PETA thrives, selling absolution to well-meaning people through simplistic maxims and sloganeering that offers blanket answers to a cardboard version of the animal welfare issue. PETA's success is based upon encouraging people to think as little as possible. The problem is guns, says one side. No, it's video games says another.
Different corners assert the culpability of other single causes.
The international situation is no better, as President Clinton receives 20 seconds of airtime to explain US policy toward pacifying 800 years of multi-ethnic strife. The time available for evaluating information decreases as the flow of data increases and acceptance relies upon cursory evaluation of a notion's most vulgar surface features. There is no time for substance, which is the coin in which all scientists trade, and such a climate favors extremists with emotional appeals based on irrationality where reason is presumed to have no value in weighing the matter. Host Bill Maher is himself a board member of PETA, although this fact was not disclosed to viewers. There followed 23 program minutes of impractical maxims for the well-meaning to consume on topics including hunting, the comparative value of animal and human life, pets and animal use in medicine.