Oh no! GMOs!

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BananaHands

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Okay. So I'm a tad bummed.

I stick to a (mostly)* vegan diet. Which is great. I enjoy it. It keeps me in check. Forces me to check ingredients and watch what I eat. Hell, I feel great.

But I've been looking more and more at GMOs. I mean, come on. Call me a skeptic, but a corn that produces its own pesticide and the fact that most GMO proteins stay in your system left me with a bad taste in my mouth.

But hey. I'm a vegan right? I don't have to worry about that. Right?

Wrong. Especially when you look at the companies that poured money into defeating Proposition 37.


Pepsico – this is a huge company who owns tons of brands like Izze Sparkling Juice, Naked Juice, SoBe, Near East and Mother’s. They also own Pepsi cola drinks, Sun Chips, Frito Lay, Quaker, Tropicana, Gatoreade and MANY others. See all the Pepsico brands here.

Coca-Cola owns Honest Tea, Odwalla, Simply Orange, Coca-cola also owns BACARDI, Schweppes, Dannon, Fuze, Minute Maid, Poms, Powerade and many others. See all their brands.

ConAgra – owns Lightlife, Alexia, Egg Beaters, Marie Calenders, Wesson, Orville Redenbacher, Hunts, Healthy Choice, Jiffy Pop, Swiss Miss and many others.

General Mills – owns brands such as Cascadian Farm, Good Earth, Muir Glen, LaraBar, Yoplait, Nature Valley, Pillsbury, Bisquick, Häagen-Dazs, Mountain High, Green Giant, Fiber One, Betty Crocker, Old El Paso and many more.

Dean Foods – owns Horizon Organic, Silk, Land O Lakes and many others.

Kraft Foods – owns Boca, Back to Nature, Knudsen, Capri Sun, Claussen, Stove Top, Baker’s (chocolates), Jell-O, Planter’s and more.

Kellogg’s – owns Kashi, Gardenburger, Morning Star, Bear Naked, Eggo and more.

Rich owns FarmRich, French Meadow Bakery and a few others.

Abbott Nutrition owns a slew of formula brands and nutritional supplements.

Unilever – owns Ben & Jerry’s, Dove, Axe, Lipton, Vaseline, Knorr, Ponds, St. Ives, Heartbrand and more.

Tree Top owns various drinks and fruit products.

S&W makers of canned produce.

Goya offers many products.

Welch’s makes juices, jellies, fruit snacks and more.

Which just bums me out. So, yeah. I don't know. What do YOU all think about GMOs and all this nonsense?
 
If GMOs were only being used to do the same things traditional plant breeding did I wouldn't have much of a problem.

But what they're really focussing on right now is this: make the plants resistant to an herbicide so powerful it kills everything but this one plant. Then plant them, and spray the fields with this herbicide throughout the growing season so they don't have to deal with weeds. Or soil management.

They're finding the herbicide proteins in the food that comes from these plants.

And this worries me. Not enough to do anything about, but monitor the situation, but the reality is that almost all farm food mass overproduced in the US, including wheat, corn and soybeans, is modified. We don't get this as much with the smaller crops, but they are making inroads to this area with the same technique.[DOUBLEPOST=1369248664][/DOUBLEPOST]It's one of the reasons, though, that we have chickens and a garden. Not enough to support my whole families food intake, but supplementing it with known good fresh food is comforting to some degree.
 
What the f... That first link of yours completely reversed the conclusions of the study they themselves linked to. *headslap* Be very careful about seeking out confirmatory evidence for your existing beliefs. That is the way of the conspiracy theorist. Try to learn about the many facets of an issue, not just the supposed horror stories.
 
What the f... That first link of yours completely reversed the conclusions of the study they themselves linked to. *headslap* Be very careful about seeking out confirmatory evidence for your existing beliefs. That is the way of the conspiracy theorist. Try to learn about the many facets of an issue, not just the supposed horror stories.
I have a few ardent anti GMO friends on Facebook and the stuff they post is so terrible in terms of scientific value that its really turned me off from paying any attention to them. The studies so far are pretty cautious with limited immediately actionable information, but they get blown so out of proportion.
 

BananaHands

Staff member
What the f... That first link of yours completely reversed the conclusions of the study they themselves linked to. *headslap* Be very careful about seeking out confirmatory evidence for your existing beliefs. That is the way of the conspiracy theorist. Try to learn about the many facets of an issue, not just the supposed horror stories.
I'm asking for people's opinions on the subject, I figured I'd make it easier by linking some articles about what I was talking about. I'll admit it was a bit of a rush job linking the first one, I just didn't want to use the same source (the second) for both.
 
That's also inaccurate, and Bt (Bacillus thuringensis) is not harmful to us, nor are its proteins. It has no reason to express the gene in question in our gut. I'm not saying that it never would, but Bacteria do not waste energy expressing genes that do not help them in some way. I'll see if I can track down the studies.

Genetically goofing around with foods is a scary idea, but if it means that folks in Africa can have drought tolerant corn or wheat then I am all for it.

Edit: If you want to avoid GMOs and you can then why not? It would be great to know exactly what is in your food. I would rather eat foods with the least amount of processing for sure.
 
They day I hear about a study that indicates definitive causation between GMO foods and harm to human health is the day I start to worry. Until then, I keep in mind that pretty much every substance we come into contact with, including our food, drink, and air, is polluted enough to slowly kill us. GMO foods aren't high on my list of things to worry about yet.
 
Monsanto Hires Infamous Mercenary Group to Infiltrate/Track Anti-GMO groups.

Yeah, remember that unprovoked attack in Iraq by Blackwater in 2007? These are the guys being offered up to 500,000 dollars to infiltrate anti-GMO groups.
Boy what a reasonable and unbiased article.

The spokesperson told Scahill he was told Total Intelligence was completely separate from Blackwater.
The news that Monsanto hired a Blackwater company for intelligence reports is rocketing around the world via anti-GMO activists. Blogger Rady Ananda summed up the relationship between Monsanto and Blackwater as
"... A death-tech firm weds a hit squad."
See the part where they mention that the people actually hired by Monsanto is Total Intelligence, a private intelligence company (part owned by one of Blackwater's founders), not Blackwater, the private mercenary group? And then how they ignore that and keep repeating "Monsanto and Blackwater" over and over and over and over.

The truth is still alarming: but not as sensational as MONSANTO AND BLACKWATER.

Honesty is overrated when there's an agenda to be sold!
 

BananaHands

Staff member
Boy what a reasonable and unbiased article.


See the part where they mention that the people actually hired by Monsanto is Total Intelligence, a private intelligence company (part owned by one of Blackwater's founders), not Blackwater, the private mercenary group? And then how they ignore that and keep repeating "Monsanto and Blackwater" over and over and over and over.

The truth is still alarming: but not as sensational as MONSANTO AND BLACKWATER.

Honesty is overrated when there's an agenda to be sold!
I could understand the confusion when both Blackwater and TIS were both founded Erik Prince and both Blackwater and TIS have(had in the case of Blackwater, as he was forced to resign before Blackwater 'rebranded'.) the same co-chairman Coffer Black.
 
I could understand the confusion when both Blackwater and TIS were both founded Erik Prince and both Blackwater and TIS have(had in the case of Blackwater, as he was forced to resign before Blackwater 'rebranded'.) the same co-chairman Coffer Black.
If it was confusion, sure, but they acknowledge in the article that it's actually TIS being hired, and then keep saying Blackwater. They're not confused. They are lying at worst and obfuscating at best. I'm not pleased either way; don't get me wrong. But you know. Mote, rod, eye, and all that. You can't go around accusing people of being unscrupulous and then act like it's okay if you're unscrupulous.
 

BananaHands

Staff member
If it was confusion, sure, but they acknowledge in the article that it's actually TIS being hired, and then keep saying Blackwater. They're not confused. They are lying at worst and obfuscating at best. I'm not pleased either way; don't get me wrong. But you know. Mote, rod, eye, and all that. You can't go around accusing people of being unscrupulous and then act like it's okay if you're unscrupulous.
Okay, yeah. I understand where you're coming from. They did obviously keep Blackwater in the article as shock-value. But the point does still stand.
 
TIS offers physical security services as well as their more clandestine operations.

Blackwater has been defunct for a while now... the company is now known as Academi.
 
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