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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: 26733
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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#23. To: Vicomte13 (#1)
Given that the truth is that GMO food is safe and, according to you, there should be nothing to fear from the truth, why would labeling make any difference?
Farmers have been known to illegally make their own seeds from GMO crops, thereby bypassing the manufacturer. Slightly changing the genetic makeup allows the manufacturer to catch the cheaters.
They're desperate to avoid any GMO labeling because of the ignorant and unsubstantiated fear being generated around this product. They don't want another Alar scare.
So you're against grafting fruit trees to get a more nutritious product? That's the original GMO.
So for a 40 ounce jar (1120 grams), the label would say "Contains 330 Insect Parts -- But They're Edible." OK with you?
Yep.
That's right. Or rather, Europe is right: Frankefoods: bad. Unpasteurized cheese: good. The Americans, unfortunately, have to live with both Frankenfoods AND bad cheese, because of the power of lobbies. In short, we end up eating shit because it's profitable for Kraft and Monsanto, and they own Congress. Meanwhile people keel over from pancreatic cancer, and allergies and autism are exploding, here. The French get to eat better beef, good cheese, good food, and get to not die of pancreatic cancer and diabetes and peanut allergies and have autistic kids. So they win and we lose, across the board. We're idiots for putting up with it.
Nope. That's traditional. GMO is done in a lab, fiddling directly with the genes, inserting alleles. There's a fundamental difference that everybody sees. You sound like a lobbyist for Monsanto. Traditional agriculture is not the issue. Frankenfood is the issue, and it should be fully disclosed...if we're going to allow it at all. I like the French solution: don't LABEL it - BAN IT OUTRIGHT. That's better. Lower yields, healthier food, more farmers, more employment. Good all around.
The foods are not safe and not necessary. We don't need them and they should be banned outright. Since they won't be, they should be fully disclosed, so that people know, so they won't buy the products, so the companies that produce that shit will go bankrupt, fail and stop producing it.
Is that "the truth" you were referring to earlier?
Yep. And with the same results as grafting. "Lower yields, healthier food, more farmers, more employment. Good all around." Yeah, you know how we strive for those lower yields coupled with lower productivity. Oh, you left out higher prices. Just an oversight, I'm sure.
If most Americans could pull their attention away from the likes of Bruce Jenner or their iPhones made with slave labor long enough to look around the world they might be surprised that they know less about what they stuff into their pie holes than people in Kazakhstan, for example. Below is a full list of countries that require labeling of GMO foods (courtesy of The Center for Food Safety) And a thank you to all of those who are guinea pigging this brand new tech that hasn't been tested for long term effects. Oh- and if something goes wrong one day and you start losing your guts or something, don't bother asking for help. Ok? Thanks.
Exactlty! You stole my thunder. Let us label it.
A lie!
In other words, all of Europe, the entire industrialized world EXCEPT America and Canada, and most of the population of the world in general - even the hinterlands. Khazahkstan. Chad. People in Chad have the right to know if the food they're buying has GMOs in it. But Americans (and Canadians and Mexicans - the people in our local imperial orbit) don't. It's quite and indictment of us, really.
And other results too, that are unforseeable, and risky, and uneccessary. Ban GMOs. If you don't ban them outright, make their presence a label requirement.
See, I'm looking at that list of countries, and I'm noticing something. In a great many of those countries, people have average life spans longer than ours. And they have less incidence of all sorts of illnesses. There is something particularly toxic about the way we do things.
I don't care. If people want it let it be labelled. Either way, bugs are not GMO and we inhale living beings with every breath and have trillions of them in our bodies. Just keep GMO and Monsanto away from me.
Yeah, but they're uglier.
People in Chad have the right to know if the food they're buying has GMOs in it. But Americans (and Canadians and Mexicans - the people in our local imperial orbit) don't. It's quite and indictment of us, really. Indeed it is. And it's happened on our watch. How? Here's an observation from Vinny Eastwood in New Zealand: Greed, arrogance and a bit of lazy = the decline of the American Empire. Tick Tock
No they're not. I used an analogy. Placing a label on a jar of peanut butter saying that it contains 330 insect parts -- which are not harmful -- would result in fewer peanut butter sales. Placing a label on food saying that it has been genetically modified -- which is not harmful -- would also result in fewer sales. See the analogy?
Vinny Eastwood can ESAD.
So many fear monger groups out there... they could give Mother Theresa a bad name. Do you blame them? Hell, fear mongering works so well, if Stone did a study of 100 random people to just view this forum a minimum of 4 hours a day for 6 months, at least 15 of the Guinea pigs would shoot a cop or bomb a government building by the end of the study.
Every society gets the kind of criminal it deserves. What is equally true is that every community gets the kind of law enforcement it insists on. Robert Kennedy
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.
People have a right to organize and use the democratic process to inflict their will on the gooberment, on Frankenfood or Big Pharma corporate entities, or on themselves. If the only issue is accurate labeling, we already have food labeling and grading of foods by FDA and we disclose nutritional content and calories and food origin by label. So this is nothing new in any way. It's merely the vast pushback from Monsanto and its army of lobbyists and lawyers that make this a controversy at all. Bosh. Members of this forum aren't exactly spring chickens. You and redleghunter are the youngest judging by your posts. You're pushing or just past fifty, I think red is early fortyish. Average age of LF forum posters is > 70, IMO.
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.
Let's just forget labeling food altogether. How does that sound? Allergies? Too bad, Mr. misterwhite doesn't care. You're lugging around 2 tons of BS in a one ton sack along with that bridge. I won't be eating Monsanto's freak corn crossed with glowing eels or whatever they are peddling next. NO SALE- NO WAY.
Truth cuts like a knife. Any idea who's going to fix the infrastructure that has been let go so the New Kings can continue their wars? Just the other day a chunk of concrete fell off a bridge in WA and squashed some poor useless eater. It's falling apart in front of you. Keep looking towards Ukraine though- we're told that's important.
No they're not. I used an analogy. Placing a label on a jar of peanut butter saying that it contains 330 insect parts -- which are not harmful -- would result in fewer peanut butter sales. Placing a label on food saying that it has been genetically modified -- which is not harmful -- would also result in fewer sales. See the analogy? I do, but you missed the point. You care what would result in fewer sales. I care what people eat. You put corporate profits before people's lives. Do you have vested interests in this or is it simply a severe case limbaughitis and rush syndrome?
Like 330 insect parts in a jar of Skippy peanut butter? We have a right to know what you put in our food. Speaking about wishes as opposed to rights - I want to know if GMO is served on my plate, but I do not want to know how many remain of smaller living creatures are in it (bigger living creature is the centerpiece). I want to be warned how much arsenic is in my hotdog, but I do not want to know what body parts are in it.
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.
You missed the point again. GMO label will work impartially - It will reduce sales to the health freaks and INCREASE sales to the sober business minded people like you who love progress, inventions and modern things. People who love the bomb, bikinis, hula hoop and Thalidomide.
The ignorant health freaks are already shopping in the natural foods section of the market. You simply want to scare people into your way of thinking since you couldn't do it scientifically.
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".
Oh really? So tell what GMO is scientifically about? I will not hold by breath, bwahaha.
Only because you know the FDA has determined the food safe. But you won't accept the FDA approval of GMO foods as safe. I'd ask you to explain your f**ked up logic, but I don't want your head to explode.
We are not for the prohibition. If you want to eat GMO and hormones, do not restrain yourself. Labels will help you to pick your favored crap.
Only because you know the FDA has determined the food safe. I do not eat hotdogs, unless the content is listed and acceptable.
Comments (63 - 115) not displayed.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest"People have a right to know if their food has been genetically modified, so they can decide whether they want to buy that or not."
#24. To: TooConservative (#22)
"and that constantly change in their makeup, seemingly a deliberate attempt by seed developers to obfuscate their actual content?"
#25. To: TooConservative (#20)
"The fact that GMO companies are so desperate to avoid any GMO labeling tends to make me think we should have GMO labeling."
#26. To: Vicomte13 (#18)
"I don't want to eat GMO food because it wasn't designed by God for me."
#27. To: A Pole (#16)
Peanut butter is allowed up to an average of 30 or more insect fragments per 100 grams.
Insects can be edible.
#28. To: TooConservative (#20)
The fact that GMO companies are so desperate to avoid any GMO labeling tends to make me think we should have GMO labeling.
#29. To: TooConservative (#22)
Conversely, I've read that all the best brie cheeses from France cannot be imported to America because USDA demands all imported cheeses be pasteurized. And a real brie cheese in France by definition is not pasteurized. So all the American yuppies who love their brie are eating a Velveeta-type brie, not the real thing.
#30. To: misterwhite (#26)
So you're against grafting fruit trees to get a more nutritious product? That's the original GMO.
#31. To: misterwhite (#23)
Given that the truth is that GMO food is safe and, according to you, there should be nothing to fear from the truth, why would labeling make any difference?
#32. To: Vicomte13 (#31)
"The foods are not safe ..."
#33. To: Vicomte13 (#30)
"GMO is done in a lab, fiddling directly with the genes"
#34. To: A Pole (#0)
Australia
Austria
Belarus
Belgium
Bolivia
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Brazil
Bulgaria
Cameroon
China
Croatia
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Denmark
Ecuador
El Salvador
Estonia
Ethiopia
Finland
France
Germany
Greece
Hungary
Iceland
India
Indonesia
Ireland
Italy
Japan
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Kenya
Latvia
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Malaysia
Mali
Malta
Mauritius
Netherlands
New Zealand
Norway
Peru
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Russia
Saudi Arabia
Senegal
Slovakia
Slovenia
South Africa
South Korea
Spain
Sri Lanka
Sweden
Switzerland
Taiwan
Thailand
Tunisia
Turkey
Ukraine
United Kingdom
Vietnam
http://www.justlabelit.org/right-to-know-center/labeling-around-the-world/
#35. To: misterwhite (#23)
(Edited)
Given that the truth is that GMO food is safe and, according to you, there should be nothing to fear from the truth, why would labeling make any difference?
#36. To: misterwhite (#26)
So you're against grafting fruit trees to get a more nutritious product? That's the original GMO
#37. To: Operation 40 (#34)
#38. To: misterwhite (#33)
Yep. And with the same results as grafting.
#39. To: misterwhite (#33)
#40. To: misterwhite (#27)
(Edited)
So for a 40 ounce jar (1120 grams), the label would say "Contains 330 Insect Parts -- But They're Edible."
#41. To: Vicomte13 (#39)
"In a great many of those countries, people have average life spans longer than ours."
#42. To: Vicomte13 (#37)
In other words, all of Europe, the entire industrialized world EXCEPT America and Canada, and most of the population of the world in general - even the hinterlands. Khazahkstan. Chad.
"You've gone from being the most intelligent, literate, morally back-boned citizenry in the history of the world to the laziest, dumbest, most capitulating human trash that has ever existed"- Vinny Eastwood, New Zealand
#43. To: A Pole (#40)
"Either way, bugs are not GMO"
#44. To: Operation 40 (#42)
#45. To: TooConservative (#20)
The fact that GMO companies are so desperate to avoid any GMO labeling...
#46. To: Deckard, A Pole (#2)
Genetically modified foods, are they safe?
#47. To: GrandIsland (#45)
So many fear monger groups out there... they could give Mother Theresa a bad name. Do you blame them?
Hell, fear mongering works so well, if Stone did a study of 100 random people to just view this forum a minimum of 4 hours a day for 6 months, at least 15 of the Guinea pigs would shoot a cop or bomb a government building by the end of the study.
#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."
#51. To: misterwhite (#50)
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.
#52. To: misterwhite (#44)
Vinny Eastwood can ESAD.
#53. To: misterwhite (#43)
"Either way, bugs are not GMO"
#54. To: misterwhite (#48)
"The public has a right to know what is in the food being sold to them."
#55. To: misterwhite (#50)
By "the public" you mean those opposed to GMO food.
#56. To: misterwhite (#50)
(Edited)
By "the public" you mean those opposed to GMO food.
#57. To: A Pole (#56)
"It will reduce sales to the health freaks"
#58. To: nolu chan (#55)
(Edited)
"They have the right to know what is in the food offered for sale."
#59. To: misterwhite (#57)
(Edited)
You simply want to scare people into your way of thinking since you couldn't do it scientifically.
#60. To: A Pole (#54)
"but I do not want to know what body parts are in it."
#61. To: misterwhite (#58)
If GMO food is dangerous it should be taken off the market. Do you agree? Why f**k around with labels?
#62. To: misterwhite (#60)
(Edited)
"but I do not want to know what body parts are in it."
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