Why dumb people should not vote - Washington votes no to GMO labeling

[Texashiker]

With the possibility of cross pollination how can you be sure your food doesn't contain a certain percentage of GMO origin?

What do you mean?

Are you talking about gmo crops being planted close enough that cross pollination occurs between non-gmo and gmo crops?

 

[xBiffx]

If you plant your squash and your zucchini close together, they will cross pollinate and produce a hybrid.

If you splice the genes of a mold into the genes of a squash, you have a GMO.

GMO can have genes in it that do not occur naturally.

Hybrids carry the genes of the parent plants, or parent animals.

A lot of the plants and farm animals we use today are hybrids. Meaning they have been selectively bred over centuries. But they are still true animals or true plants.

If you breed a donkey and a horse, you get a hybrid called a mule.

My barred rock chicken does not have plant genes spliced in with its genes. But it was selectively bred several hundred years ago for certain traits.

I'll let you in on a little secret. The majority of GMO production is exactly what you described for creating hybrids. That is, many generations of plants are created until a desired event is formed.

Please, tell me more about how you think GMO's, more specifically "gene splicing" occurs? I'm starting to understand why you have your attitude towards GMO's. For the most part, it seems rooted in ignorance.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Is the genetic altering really dangerous to humans?

No, but that is not the problem.

The problem is that biotechnology companies force farmers to sign exclusivity contracts when purchasing their genetically engineered seeds and crops. These grower's contracts prevent farmers from being able to store seeds from year to year, which the biotech companies claim would be a patent infringement. But the farmers can't compete without GMO seed, so basically these biotech companies control the food supply.

Personally when I vote with my own dollar I buy non-GMO not for health reasons, but to not support this sort of business model. I want labeling to facilitate that choice and to bring attention to the way these businesses are ruining the GMO brand with their business practices.

 

[nehalem256]

You are thinking about hybrids, which is different than gmo.

And what exactly is the difference that you find important?

In both cases humans are creating new plants genetics that previously did not exist. I would imagine that in both cases there is a certain about of risk that you might end up with a genetic combination that is harmful to humans.

So could you please why the process which humans have greater control over the result is more dangerous?

 

[Linux23]

This Thread.

Proudly sponsored by Monsanto.

 

[glenn1]

I'll let you in on a little secret. The majority of GMO production is exactly what you described for creating hybrids. That is, many generations of plants are created until a desired event is formed.

Please, tell me more about how you think GMO's, more specifically "gene splicing" occurs? I'm starting to understand why you have your attitude towards GMO's. For the most part, it seems rooted in ignorance.

Yep, just wait until he finds out gene splicing and GMOs are used to produce not only food, but medicines, detergents, fermented alcoholic beverages, and a host of other things. The same "no to GMO' people are probably the same ones who are big fans of expanding federal funding for alternative energy. OMG there's GMOs in my biofuels, EVERYBODY PANIC WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!

 

[Texashiker]

Please, tell me more about how you think GMO's, more specifically "gene splicing" occurs? I'm starting to understand why you have your attitude towards GMO's. For the most part, it seems rooted in ignorance.

As I have said before, I am not anti-gmo.

And what exactly is the difference that you find important?

In both cases humans are creating new plants genetics that previously did not exist.

As far as I know, strawberries and cold water fish will never crossbreed.

GMO strawberries have been created from cold water fish genes so the strawberries create their own natural anti-freeze.

 

[Londo_Jowo]

What do you mean?

Are you talking about gmo crops being planted close enough that cross pollination occurs between non-gmo and gmo crops?

Guess you've never heard of wind or insects that aid in the pollination of plants.

 

[Brainonska511]

GMO strawberries have been created from cold water fish genes so the strawberries create their own natural anti-freeze.

That's so terrible. Strawberries that can express one of many naturally occurring antifreeze proteins to protect against frost-damage.

Did you know there is an effort to treat human organs with those same proteins to protect and preserve organs used for transplants? The horror!

It doesn't matter that something would never 'cross-breed'. These types of changes can occur naturally on a long-enough time scale and arise via independent mechanisms. Take anti-freeze proteins: they are found in organisms that live in cold environments, yet across different species, they (the proteins) have arisen independently (and are structurally distinct from one-another). We can simply jump-start the process by inserting the desired trait instead of taking the long approach and forcing the mutation through directed-evolution of plants, which could be done, but would take a much, much longer time and could easily have unintended consequences (like now you get the desired anti-freeze trait, but the fruit tastes like shit or is small in size).

 

[glenn1]

As I have said before, I am not anti-gmo.

As far as I know, strawberries and cold water fish will never crossbreed.

GMO strawberries have been created from cold water fish genes so the strawberries create their own natural anti-freeze.

You do understand there's this wacky theory called "evolution" which holds that includes something called common descent? And that genetics has demonstrated this other wacky phenomenon called gene transfer that's uses basically the same methods as GMO food? BTW, fish and strawberries both share a vast majority of the same DNA. Gene splicing isn't creating anything new, it's simply rearranging things which are already there.

 

[Texashiker]

Why is this thread turning into an anti or pro-gmo thread?

This is about truth in labeling.

Guess you've never heard of wind or insects that aid in the pollination of plants.

<sarcasm>

No, I have never grown beans, peas, squash, okra,,,, and have no idea how pollination works.

</sarcasm>

 

[Brainonska511]

This is about truth in labeling.

It's not truth in labeling. Its fear-mongering through ignorance because the well has been poisoned. Companies are already labeling things as "GMO-Free" to take advantage of the rampant ignorance and make a quick buck.

 

[glenn1]

Why is this thread turning into an anti or pro-gmo thread?

This is about truth in labeling.

"Truth in labelling" involves putting some warning sticker on stuff for people like you who believe in pseudoscience and non-existent risks? Again, we don't cater to people who fear the Easter Bunny, or fan death, or falling off the edge of a flat Earth and provide warning labels on things for those concerns.

 

[Texashiker]

It's not truth in labeling. Its fear-mongering through ignorance because the well has been poisoned.

Labeling made in china is fear mongering?

"Truth in labelling" involves putting some warning sticker on stuff for people like you who believe in pseudoscience and non-existent risks?

See above.

How about mexico? Is putting a label of "made in mexico" fear mongering?

Guess you've never heard of wind or insects that aid in the pollination of plants.

Picture of my truck tailgate from a few years ago. That is squash and zucchini. See the corn growing to the left?

 

[momeNt]

There will be truth in labeling when market forces bring it about naturally. Simple as that.

 

[poofyhairguy]

It's not truth in labeling. Its fear-mongering through ignorance because the well has been poisoned.

The only reason the well has been poisoned is because the industry has been a poor steward of the brand. If luddite hippies can beat you at message delivery you are doing it wrong.

The right way is to beat them is in the war of messages so people look at anti-GMO activists like they current look at PETA- out of touch extremists. But when these companies have shitty business practices tied to copyright extortion and they pay to keep the GMO brand hidden it makes it seem like they have a lot to hide which only feeds the other side.

If you want the ignorance, suspicion and pseudo-science to go away the fastest method would be forcing the companies into the light of day and make it so it would cost less to pay marketers to fix the GMO brand than pay lobbyists to hide it.

Or this can be Evolution or Nuclear power all over again and people hundred years from now will still fear GMO food.

 

[Moonbeam]

The application of intellect devoid of the sense of the sacred can never happen. Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and the ovens of Hitler were just a bad dreams, solutions to technical problems, necessary things, not omens to remind anybody of anything. Such imaginary stories are there only to scare children and to make them imagine further terrors like Soylent Green. We need to trust in the solutions the mind can come up with to fatten the wallets of our corporate masters. We need to trust and dive head first off the profit cliff. Nothing ever goes wrong in the mind of an engineer. The answers are all technical, the spirit is dead. Time to take agriculture out of the picture entirely. We can turn shit and urine and dead bodies directly into tasty nutritious broth to support a hundred billion people, better living through chemistry. And once into orbit, when the problem of the need for sleep is solved we can turn our skin into leaves that make sugar and coffee and work 24 hours a day in little glass pods. It will be a glorious time for the spiritually dead hive called the human race.

And it's what our children deserve to have done to them. Soulless self contempt builds character, just as it has for us. It won't be long till the last person to have had a real experience the beauty of the world has passed, and we can all sleep soundly as mindless ants. And if you are very, very good and eat your meat, you can have pudding delivered by electrode directly to the pleasure center of your brain. Won't that be nice..... The planet can die and nobody will notice. Plug me in, plug me in. Turn off the fear mongering machine. Trust the Architect.

Mommy, why do people have bad dreams?

 

[Moonbeam]

There will be truth in labeling when market forces bring it about naturally. Simple as that.

You mean like when Monsanto buys the vote?

 

[xBiffx]

As I have said before, I am not anti-gmo

Why is this thread turning into an anti or pro-gmo thread?

This is about truth in labeling.

You aren't fooling anyone.

 

[Texashiker]

You aren't fooling anyone.

You are blinded by your own bigotry.

If someone brings up the gmo topic, then they must be anti-gmo, and it just aint so.

 

[xBiffx]

You are blinded by your own bigotry.

If someone brings up the gmo topic, then they must be anti-gmo, and it just aint so.

Bigotry?

Who's the intolerant one here who doesn't want to listen to science and reason? You've been told by multiple people why a label of food will do nothing and why, yet you still keep on with this ridiculous charge. You are the one who chooses to ignore fact in factor of opinions based on absolute ignorance.

 

[Texashiker]

Who's the intolerant one here who doesn't want to listen to science and reason? You are the one who chooses to ignore fact in factor of opinions based on absolute ignorance.

I have not said a single word against gmo foods.

If anything, you are the intolerant one for not wanting truth in labeling.

 

[momeNt]

You mean like when Monsanto buys the vote?

I mean like when a company who doesn't use GMO begins to advertise, and consumers educate themselves on any sort of perceived risks of using GMOs, and begin to buy that product.

Then when GMO producers begin to advertise that they DON'T use GMO in order to falsely gain market share, get caught by educated and concerned consumers. The word gets out, and their advertising loses all traction.

You don't need laws to ban the sale of snake oil or any similarly false claims, you just need time.

Let the market do its work, instead of sending lots of money to politicians so concerned with our well-being that they are willing to launch an agency aimed solely at verifying manufacturer's claims. Let the market work.

 

[hal2kilo]

No, but that is not the problem.

The problem is that biotechnology companies force farmers to sign exclusivity contracts when purchasing their genetically engineered seeds and crops. These grower's contracts prevent farmers from being able to store seeds from year to year, which the biotech companies claim would be a patent infringement. But the farmers can't compete without GMO seed, so basically these biotech companies control the food supply.

Personally when I vote with my own dollar I buy non-GMO not for health reasons, but to not support this sort of business model. I want labeling to facilitate that choice and to bring attention to the way these businesses are ruining the GMO brand with their business practices.

Ding, ding. Yep, that's my problem with GMO. It's the business model. Not the genetically altered plants.

 

[xBiffx]

I have not said a single word against gmo foods.

If anything, you are the intolerant one for not wanting truth in labeling.

You wanting to force a label on GMO foods after being told the uselessness of it and how much it would cripple that market isn't against it?

Okay, wow.