Posted on 05/18/2022 6:47:44 AM PDT by SJackson
As a result, poor parents feel guilty if"/>
"Inside Every Progressive Is A Totalitarian Screaming To Get Out" @Horowitz39, David Horowitz
The science just doesn't add up.Wed May 18, 2022
Activists have convinced Americans that "organic" food is better — healthier, better-tasting, life-extending.
As a result, poor parents feel guilty if they can't afford to pay $7 for organic eggs.
This misinformation is spread by people like Alexis Baden-Mayer, political director of the Organic Consumers Association. She says organic food is clearly better: "The nutrition is a huge difference."
But it isn't. Studies find little difference.
If you still want to pay more for what's called "organic," that's your right. But what's outrageous is that this group of scientifically illiterate people convinced the government to force all of us to pay more.
Congress has ruled that GMOs (genetically modified food) must be labeled. Busybodies from both parties supported the idea.
Politicians like Rep. Jim McGovern, D-Mass., said, "It doesn't cost any more. This idea that ... this ... will raise food prices is ridiculous."
It's McGovern who is ridiculous. The U.S. Department of Agriculture says the GMO labelling will cost from $598 million to $3.5 billion.
"But the public wants GMOs labelled," say advocates. "Surveys show that."
Of course they do.
Ask people if DNA in food should be labelled, and most say yes. Yet DNA is in everything.
Polling is a stupid way to make policy.
The idea of modifying a plant's DNA may sound creepy, but people have cross-bred plants and animals for years.
"The corn we have today, there's nothing natural about that," I say to Baden-Mayer in my new video. "What native people ate, we'd find inedible."
Baden-Mayer laughs at that.
"You're saying indigenous corn is somehow inferior because you've seen it dried and it has tiny little kernels?" she asks.
"Yes," I reply. I've tried to eat it.
"That's another myth of the industry," she responds. "People like you believe that."
I sure do. I also believe it's good that genetic modification lets us alter nature more precisely, gene by gene. That's better and safer than the more haphazard crossbreeding that's been done for years.
This new precision lets scientists make plants that save lives.
In poor parts of the world, half a million people per year go blind due to lack of vitamin A in their diets. Many die.
Scientists have created a new genetically modified rice that contains vitamin A. This "golden rice" could save those people.
"I've heard of golden rice," sneers Baden-Mayer. "That was a project that all of the chemical companies invested in."
I sneer right back.
"Golden rice hasn't succeeded partly because scientifically ignorant fools like you convinced the world that it's harmful!"
"I knew at a certain point you would resort to name-calling," she replies. "But it doesn't change the science on this."
Sadly, in some countries, people listen to advocates like her and believe that Americans want to poison them. One group of GMO fearful protesters invaded a golden rice field in the Philippines, ripping up all the plants.
Thousands will die or go blind, needlessly, because the organic cult spreads misinformation.
At least educated skeptics now understand that they were wrong about GMOs.
The New York Times points out that many "quietly walked back their opposition" to GMOs. "The science is clear," says a former opponent in The Wall Street Journal. "They're perfectly safe."
The Philippines recently approved golden rice.
But the hardcore zealots will never be convinced.
Baden-Mayer claims GMOs cause cancer.
"We're using more GMOs than ever," I point out. "There's less cancer now. Life spans keep increasing."
"Compared to when, 100 years ago?" she scoffs.
Absolutely, yes. We live about 25 years longer than Americans did 100 years ago. Even compared to 10 or 20 years ago, we live longer.
The National Academy of Sciences calls GMOs safe. So do the World Health Organization, the American Medical Association, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration and the USDA.
But no amount of science will convince people like Baden-Mayer. "The GMO issue just has not been investigated enough," she says.
Organic promoters are wrong on the costs and wrong on the science.
Sadly, they've won the battle of public opinion.
You’re right, he’s addressing the straw man. Pesticides should have been mentioned.
Perfect example. There are many crops that are similar.
I am okay with most GMO foods but stop when my vegetables have flippers or my steak has feathers. Making a crop more tolerant to drought and insects is what allows us to support a growing population with higher yields.
From the article: The idea of modifying a plant’s DNA may sound creepy, but people have cross-bred plants and animals for years.
Seems to me there is a difference between directly the natural breeding process and messing around with the actual genes, so to me this is not a good argument.
Although my main problem with GMO foods is when Monsanto sues owners of fields next to its corn and that sort of thing.
They use pesticides on organic crops also, nasty things like nicotine.
The current pesticides/herbicides do their thing, then break down into benign substances, unlike DDT and TEP.
The debate over organic food is more complex than it seems. I will just say that I prefer organic. I notice a subtle but distinct difference in how I feel when eating organic v. non-organic.
Some foods are so doped up with additives, you can’t help but feel off from some of them.
Chicory
It seems that there is some misunderstanding of the terms used.
Natural selection is just that. No outside means used to modify the outcome of an agricultural product. This is called “open pollinated”, or in older varieties “heirloom varieties”.
“Hybrid” varieties are those of the same kind, but the best of the crop is selected to pollinate in order to improve the variety. This pollination is done by hand, over a period of years, until the desired quality is produced and a seed crop can be grown for sale.
“Certified Organic” means that it is produced following a long list of strict requirements stated by the USDA. Basically that there has been no artificial fertilizer or insecticide used on the soil for the previous three years or upon the present crop.
“GMO” is the altering of a plant or animal gene, in a laboratory, by introducing a gene from a different species in order to change the original in a way that would not occur naturally. For example putting an insecticide gene into a corn plant so that when the insect bites into the corn plant the insect will be killed by the insecticide within the corn plant
WE are told that the insecticide that kills the insects is not harmful to humans.
The danger in GMO is that the company (Monsanto) that produces the GMO seed has the patent for that seed and no one else can produce or sell that seed.
So, the Agribusiness companies have a monopoly on food production world-wide.
Food production as a weapon anyone?
It is here now!!
Eat up. I don’t bother with grains, organic or otherwise.
I thought hybrid was when they pollinated one plant with the pollen of a different type, in the hopes of getting the best features of each type?
Like a story I heard: scientists were trying to hybridize minks and ferrets, hoping to get an animal with great fur and a nice disposition. When they did, they called the offspring a merit.
When they got an offspring with a bad disposition and bad fur, they called it a fink.
I assume in the example you give, the animals are closely related species. horses of different breeds can mate and produce offspring. I believe that horse and donkey mating can produce the mule. Goats can breed with other breeds of goat but not with a pig.
Tomatos can be cross pollenated with a different variety of tomato, for example. Different varieties within a species. But You can not cross a tomato with an okra or eggplant because it is of a different species.
I may not be explaining this very well but I think you can figure it out.
That was one of the options listed.
Well, it was a story I heard, maybe more for the fun value of the names.
Apparently some polecats can mate with some minks and some polecats can mate with some ferrets. I only see allusions to mink-ferret hybrids, so may not be possible.
Yes, hybrids have to be closely related, and it usually doesn’t happen in the wild.
Most cornfields are doused in Round-up weed killer. I prefer that my corn is not.
Is this an unscientific concern?
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Yes it is. Unless you are a plant or have plant genes and have received a dose within the past week. In that case, your roots will begin to die, and your body will wither away.
But not to worry, your seeds will sprout because the glyphosate has dissipated and is breaking down into simple compounds.
If, I say if, you are human your biggest risk would be drinking the commercial 46% concentrate (not the 3-4% in stores). That would be guaranteed to give you a very bad stomach ache, and in the only known instance of drinking that concentrate, kill you.
You can have my share.
So you have plant genes? Interesting. Even though there is no more chemical left when it gets to you? Live life, or live in fear.
There is no reason I should live by your assertions of safety.
I assigned nothing you are misreading, but that would be typical of a glyphosate fearing plant.
I agree with your view.
There are too many liars out there in the large institutions and corporations.
Trust no one.
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