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Title: Judge Rules that Really Stupid Vermont Law May Be Able to Force GMO-Labels on Food Companies
Source:
Reason Magazine
URL Source: http://reason.com/blog/2015/04/28/j ... es-that-vermont-may-be-able-to
Published: Apr 28, 2015
Author: Ronald Bailey
Post Date: 2015-04-29 04:03:28 by A Pole
Keywords: GMO, food, Monsanto
Views: 23148
Comments: 115
In 2013, the idiots, uh, distinguished solons of the Vermont legislature passed a law requiring food companies to label their products containing ingredients derived from modern biotech crops. The "findings" used to justify the legislation is simply the litany of scientific disinformation that has been peddled by anti-biotechnology extremists for years now. [...] The food manufacturers oppose the legislation arguing, among other things, that it violates their First Amendment rights by forcing them to engage in speech. In point of fact, the anti-biotech activists are not consumer advocates at all. What they are really aiming at is to confuse consumers so that they will misunderstand and treat labels identifying products as containing ingredients from biotech crops as warning labels. [...] As I pointed out in my article, The Top 5 Lies About Biotech Crops, every independent scientific body that has evaluated biotech crops has found them safe for people and the environment. ... As I have already shown above, the real purpose of GMO-labels is to deceive consumers. ... Is picking and choosing between producers really what you want your government to do? ... Finally, folks seeking kosher and halal foods are already well accomodated in the market, but I suppose some folks treat organic foods as a kind of sacrament. Of course, consumers who are bamboozled by the activist disinformation campaign against biotech crops have the perfect way to avoid foods of which they disapprove: Buy anything labeled organic. [...] However, the fight is not over. The case will now go to trial, where, let us hope, scientific evidence not activist lies will prevail. Or better yet, as the Washington Post editorial board has suggested, why not adopt the bill introduced in the House of Representatives that would establish a voluntary labeling system and prevent states and localities from going any further to indulge the GM labeling crowd.
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 67.
#2. To: A Pole (#0)
Genetically modified foods, are they safe? The American Academy of Environmental Medicine (AAEM) doesn’t think so. Former Pro-GMO Scientist Speaks Out On The Real Dangers of Genetically Engineered Food
The question is the public's right to know. The public has a right to know what is in the food being sold to them. It is difficult to see any purported competing right of purveyors of food to keep the contents of their product secret from the public, such that it outweighs the right of the public to know. The public has a right to choose whether or not to put Frankenfood in their body. Labeling of food products is a matter of the public's right to know. Considering the list of things that have been provided for years, it is difficult to see any justification for secrecy regarding whether a product contains something that does not occur in nature but which has been artificially created. Just because one or more studies hold something is safe to eat does not justify inserting it into the food stream in a manner to make it's presence unidentifiable to the public.
Like 330 insect parts in a jar of Skippy peanut butter?
Whatever they are selling, the buying public's right to know outweighs their lust for secrecy.
By "the public" you mean those opposed to GMO food. Well, they can kiss my ass. They give a FF about the buying public's right to know. It's their intent to force food producers to label the food in the hopes of scaring an ignorant and uninformed public away from GMO food in order to stop the practice of gene modification. It has nothing to do with the buying public's right to know and if you believe that I've got a bridge to sell. Both they and you are hiding behind that phrase because misinformation is your only hope at stopping this practice. You're no different than Algore.
By the public I mean the general public. They have the right to know what is in the food offered for sale. They have a right to know if it contains pink slime, they have a right to know if it contains GMO, and they have right to be provided enough information to make an informed choice about what they choose to purchase and consume. The public has a right to know if smoking tobacco may endanger their health. They then have the right to smoke 'em if they've got 'em. Those opposed to GMO food have a right to know if the food offered to their purchase contains GMO. They have a right to choose whether to purchase it. Congress has the power to pass laws requiring such labeling of food for sale to the public, and to enforce the law with criminal statutes.
If GMO food is dangerous it should be taken off the market. Do you agree? Why f**k around with labels? The answer is that it's NOT dangerous, so you can't go that route. Your only hope is to scare the public into thinking it's dangerous by putting a label on food similar to that found on cigarettes. "Gosh", the public would say, "If it's safe, why are they labeling it?" I've had it with you fearmongers and your "scare of the week" -- be it red meat, egg yolks, alar, fluoride, arsenic in water, chlorine, carcinogenic bacon, hot dogs, or well-done hamburgers on the grill. Go ahead. Keep crying "wolf".
Right - fed.gov says it is safe so by golly it must be. The Revolving Door: FDA and the Monsanto Company Monsanto Controls both the White House and the US Congress
Studies, testing, and trials showed it to be safe. Where are your studies, testing, and trials showing that it's not? Don't bother looking. There aren't any.
Plenty of studies have shown the dangers associated with GMO foods. 10 Scientific Studies Proving GMOs Can Be Harmful To Human Health Are they safe? The American Academy of Environmental Medicine (AAEM) Myth: Independent studies confirm that GM foods and crops are safe A review of scientific studies on the health risks of GM crops and foods that did investigate funding sources found that either financial or professional conflict of interest (author affiliation to industry) was strongly associated with study outcomes that cast GM products in a favourable light. Conclusions of safety were also found to be associated with studies in which source of funding was not declared. Furthermore, there was a strong connection between undeclared funding and author affiliation to industry.2 Genuinely independent studies on GM foods and crops are rare, for two reasons: because independent research on GM crop risks is not supported financially; and because industry uses its patent-based control of GM crops to restrict independent research. Research that has been suppressed includes assessments of health and environmental safety and agronomic performance of GM crops. Permission to study GM crops is withheld or made so difficult to obtain that research is effectively blocked. For example, researchers are often denied access to commercialized GM seed and the non-GM isogenic seed.3,4 Even if permission to carry out research is given, GM companies typically retain the right to block publication.3,4An editorial in Scientific American reported, “Only studies that the seed companies have approved ever see the light of a peer-reviewed journal. In a number of cases, experiments that had the implicit go-ahead from the seed company were later blocked from publication because the results were not flattering.”5 So your claims of GMOs being "safe" is a bunch of typical misterwhite bullshit.
#73. To: Deckard (#67)
Let's just look at the first "scientific study" -- Multiple Toxins From GMOs Detected In Maternal and Fetal Blood. A) The authors of the study claim to have detected the Cry1Ab protein in the blood of pregnant and nonpregnant Canadian women, and in umbilical cord blood of fetuses. B) The Cry1Ab protein is produced by some Bt corn (e.g., MON810). C) Therefore, GM food is bad. HOWEVER, "no information was gathered on the diet of any individual in the study, so the assertion that the detection of Cry1Ab is linked to ingested GM food is, at best, speculative.” Secondly, "the authors do not consider that the origin of Cry1Ab could be food from organic farming (which sprays Cry1Ab, or bacteria producing it, on fruit or vegetable crops) or from its use in gardening (CryA1b is part of available “natural insecticide” formulations). Third, given that the level of Cry1Ab in Bt corn is so low, the women would have to eat 10 pounds of Bt corn every day to arrive at the blood concentration levels shown in the study. I see no need to go any farther. Buncha bullshit "scientific" studies.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest...every independent scientific body that has evaluated biotech crops has found them safe for people and the environment. ...
#46. To: Deckard, A Pole (#2)
Genetically modified foods, are they safe?
#48. To: nolu chan (#46)
"The public has a right to know what is in the food being sold to them."
#49. To: misterwhite (#48)
Like 330 insect parts in a jar of Skippy peanut butter?
#50. To: nolu chan (#49)
(Edited)
"Whatever they are selling, the buying public's right to know outweighs their lust for secrecy."
#55. To: misterwhite (#50)
By "the public" you mean those opposed to GMO food.
#58. To: nolu chan (#55)
(Edited)
"They have the right to know what is in the food offered for sale."
#63. To: misterwhite (#58)
The answer is that it's NOT dangerous, so you can't go that route.
#65. To: Deckard (#63)
"Right - fed.gov says it is safe so by golly it must be."
#67. To: misterwhite (#65)
Where are your studies, testing, and trials showing that it's not?
Replies to Comment # 67. "Plenty of studies have shown the dangers associated with GMO foods."
"10 Scientific Studies Proving GMOs Can Be Harmful To Human Health"
End Trace Mode for Comment # 67.
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