Oscar-winning director James Cameron said people need to “wake the fuck up” on the issue of climate change, likening the state of the planet to Thelma and Louise “driving straight toward the canyon at 90 miles per hour with the radio cranked up and the top down,” according to an interview published in Variety Tuesday.
“People need to wake the fuck up,” the Avatar director said. “We’re going the wrong direction as fast as possible. I like to say that we’re like Thelma and Louise. We’re driving straight toward the canyon at 90 miles per hour with the radio cranked up and the top down.”
Both Cameron and his wife Suzy Amis Cameron — longtime environmentalists — told the outlet about the mission behind their backing of the plant-based company Verdient Foods and explained the importance of addressing food consumption and the resources behind it. It is one of the “least well served, least understood, and biggest, most important ways” they could make a difference and help people “change” the way they live their lives.
The company, Cameron suggests, aims to reduce the carbon footprint caused by mass beef consumption — something some Democrat presidential candidates have expressed interest in tackling.
“We tried to find something that was less well understood and was a major lever that could effect change,” Cameron said, according to Variety. “Food is a good one. It’s probably the second-biggest one. Well ahead is transportation. We all drive around in our Teslas and our Priuses and think we are doing a great job, but really we’re all assuaging our liberal guilt. The real solution is: change the way you live.”
Amis echoed her husband’s claims, noting that the world is naturally “going” in a meatless direction.
“Look at the amazing success of Beyond meat and the stock market. I mean, it’s not a trend — it’s actually the way the world is going. If you look at what the beef industry is investing in and what the dairy industry is investing in: They’re investing in plant-based milk and cheeses and yogurt and meat products,” she said, adding that climate change-conscious individuals are “not helping” by driving their eco-friendly cars to fast food joints like McDonald’s.
The Terminator director’s call to action is not new. He said it was “actually psychotic” and “delusional” for President Trump to pull the U.S. out of the Paris Climate Accord in 2017.
Cameron and his wife are far from the first celebrities to voice a sense of urgency on climate change. Rolling Stones frontman Mick Jagger slammed Trump while presenting his film The Burnt Orange Heresy at the Venice Film Festival over the weekend, decrying the administration for causing the U.S. to turn its back on leading the global effort to combat what Democrats say is the imminent climate change “crisis.”
“We are in a very difficult situation at the moment, especially in the U.S., where all the environmental controls that were put in place — that were just about adequate — have been rolled back by the current administration so much that they are being wiped out,” the “Paint It Black” rocker said, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
“The U.S. should be the world leader in environmental control but now it has decided to go the other way,” he added.
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