GM or Not to GM, Which?

Some of the younger folk may not remember the taste of tamper free
foods. With genetically modified foods, what are we really eating and
is it clean foods? Already cattle in feedlots are being fed seafood
which is unclean for us. Now some sea creatures have had their genes
spliced into food animals.
What does GM vegs do to us?
Finally I've found a source of non-GM foods in Colorado Springs and
will go there soon.
Here's a site to read about GM foods and what they might mean in
addition to bad tasting food, there may be real health ramifications.

www.responsibletechnology.org...
e/index.cfm

Much of what I've read at tise site is worrying but the direct experiece I've had with GM is foods don't taste as good as they used to nor are as satisfying. When was the last time you had a baked potato with flavor that gave you a real sensation of pysical satisfaction? Its been a long time. All you can get now is "sweet" corn with the texture of styrofoam.
Thousands of years of selective harvesting gave us what we grew up on same as our parents in the early 1900s. Now its all gone. Tomatoes that stay hard and have a rind when cut open in addition to being mealy. We are losing many fine natural varieties as aggribusiness tries to take control by creating plants that produce sterile seed, it will not sprout. This will lead to a monopoly that is worldwide with one variety per crop and if you want to grow you have to get your seed from Monsanto and like concerns. This is not a good thing for the ecosystem or human diets and in many instances dangerous to animals and humans, some biased companies skew the tests on by being allowed to test their own creations, genetically modified foods and animals and real food value is unknow. Read the newletter, "Seeds of deception" back issues articles and see what's going on in truth.

[edit on 8-11-2006 by Alikospah]

The enormous rise in the amounts of serious medical conditions like cancers and Diabetes has me all but convinced that its directly related to modern day foods, GM foods, sprays, pesticides etc.

A couple years ago my girlfriend got me eating some organic foods. I most notice a taste difference with milk and fruit.

I am kinda split on this whole issue. I feel that we should explore these issues to the benefit of mankind. Yet, I also know that the human character is deeply flawed and cannot always be counted on making the right decisions.

When profits and investment returns have higher priority than peoples health and wellbeing, then there is a serious problem.

GM products have the promise of growing more food on less land, using less water, less fertilizer, and less pesticides. This means less natural land cover converted to crops and more land left in natural preserves. This means less non-point runoff from ag lands. This means small family farmers can make a living and not be forced by economics to sell to agri-business factory farms.

GM is an environmental win-win all the way around.

The only ones that oppose GM technology are the organic food industries that stand to lose millions of dollars in profits. They are more concerned about money than the environment.

Do you honestly belive that Monsanto, McDonalds or ConAgra are at all concerned with peoples health?

I will agree that there are many potential benefits to GM foods, but I have a hard time giving any trust to the above mentioned.

Its funny you mention the environment. With organic and natural farming we know the risks of those foods. Yet with GM we cannot always safely predict what will happen if modified strains get out of controlled areas. Or how processed products will affect the body.

The only ones that oppose GM technology are the organic food industries that stand to lose millions of dollars in profits. They are more concerned about money than the environment.

Really? They've had Anti-GMO riots in Europe & Mass Boycotts in South America. In fact, the tide has become so fervent in their beliefs that I am starting to worry that they are starting to overcompensate.

There is only one safe way to increase the amount of crop yield per acre, and that is to build vertically and not horizontally.

GM products have the promise of growing more food on less land, using less water, less fertilizer, and less pesticides.

While this may be true at surface value, it's still a misleading statement cuz it doesn't give me the entire perspective.

GMOs still uses fertilizer and pesticides as well adding in a HUGE unknown into the process, additional/different Genetic Information. GMO fields also promote the wasteful practices of Tilling, Mono cultural plantings, and Non-Seed procucing Annuals making the small farmers dependent on One seed supplier..

Organics don't do any of these things.

GM is an environmental win-win all the way around.

This is an outright lie as it implies that you have perfect knowledge of all the pros and cons of this issue. You cannot brand an entire industry like that. It's, dare I say, Intellectually Dishonest ( @ you know who you are ). The only GMO that I've read about that is literally Win-Win is a rice strain called NERICA. It's basically a mix of Drought resistant African rice with High Yield Asian rice. The results were unsurprisingly a strain that was both Drought resistant and High Yield.

Though this could have been achieved in a completely different way as well. Smart Breeding is like Genetic Modification except no direct Modifications are being done. It's basically cross-breeding plants that have been pegged as ideal "mates" through a genetic analysis. It's basically the way we've been doing it all along except with more information and a better idea of what the results will be.

[edit on 9-11-2006 by sardion2000]

Ok being a farmer I have a bit of insight on this subject.

1. back in the day foods tasted better...blah blah blah first of all sweet corn that you find is more often then not a hybrid not GM and actually that’s exactly what bread and butter is(yellow and white kernels)

2. i grow both gm and non-gm crops, and I tell you ide pick GM any day b/c you look at a “organic” and a gm farm and the organic is much sicker lacing the take-up of nitrogen, weeds run allover the place b/c you cant spray for them so your precious organic food is harvested along with poisonous plants such as black-eyed Susan’s and hemlock….o wait your rater have foods harvested with known things that will kill you rather than a unknown bitchin contest between tree huggers and big biz?

3. I am around, plant, touch, and eat gm corn out of the field. I am a organic chemist and I have found NOTHING wrong with gm foods. And if you want another side how about using GM to put vaccines in to your food so your mom doesn’t give birth to a brother with birth defects or giving your kids there shots for school to keep them safe without contamination from needles (and less crying 2!)

4. STOP QUOTING ANTI AND PRO GM SITES FOR ACTUAL SORSES, damit that like going on to the KKK website looking for minority’s rights, its just ignorant plz don’t do that crap

5. gm has been around for a generation and look at kids now ya a lot of them are ignorant (lol) but there just as smart if not more and just as healthy as any oter generation.

6. I don’t understand ppl if you don’t want GM food you better lone big biz b/c there is no way to grow a non-gm crop without having the backing of big biz……I swear I don’t want to get a reply you don’t know they could …look, I have 20,000 acres and with fuel prices new machinery, most costing upwards of $100,000 it is hard to get by letalone to make some profit

2. i grow both gm and non-gm crops, and I tell you ide pick GM any day b/c you look at a “organic” and a gm farm and the organic is much sicker lacing the take-up of nitrogen, weeds run allover the place b/c you cant spray for them so your precious organic food is harvested along with poisonous plants such as black-eyed Susan’s and hemlock….o wait your rater have foods harvested with known things that will kill you rather than a unknown bitchin contest between tree huggers and big biz?

You've obviously been exposed to some of the bad organic farms that are just in it to make a quick profit. There have been many successes in this area and frankly, if I have the choice between ingesting toxic chemicals to possible e coli and botulism from Organic, I'd take the latter thank you very much. At least our bodies have defense mechanisms against such things. We do not have such things against Toxic Chems. I've been to numerous urban organic farms in my neighborhood and the best products I've seen produced came from mixed plots rather then monocultures. The aesthetic quality is approaching Supermarket produce rather quickly actually. I also expect the older organic farms to be phased out eventually as more and more urban farms gets resurrected from the dustbin of history.

3. I am around, plant, touch, and eat gm corn out of the field. I am a organic chemist and I have found NOTHING wrong with gm foods. And if you want another side how about using GM to put vaccines in to your food so your mom doesn’t give birth to a brother with birth defects or giving your kids there shots for school to keep them safe without contamination from needles (and less crying 2!)

O rly? Okay Mr. Organic Chemist, why don't you go into details then. Show me the long term health studies done into GM foods.

Jumping before we look has gotten us into a fair bit of trouble before, why do people assume when a new technology comes out, that it will not have the hiccups and problems we've seen in other technologies. X-Ray detectors in Shoe Stores ring a bell?

5. gm has been around for a generation and look at kids now ya a lot of them are ignorant (lol) but there just as smart if not more and just as healthy as any oter generation.

Again, show me the studies. Anecdotal evidence isn't evidence, it's sheer speculation.

6. I don’t understand ppl if you don’t want GM food you better lone big biz b/c there is no way to grow a non-gm crop without having the backing of big biz……I swear I don’t want to get a reply you don’t know they could …look, I have 20,000 acres and with fuel prices new machinery, most costing upwards of $100,000 it is hard to get by letalone to make some profit

Cooperative Urban Farms have been gaining immense popularity in my city as of late. It works by leasing out space in people yards and businesses roofs. People often don't realize just how much unused space there is in the city.

The number of Organic Farmers Markets has boomed in recent weeks as the harvests have been coming in. The prices are usually 20% less the the Supermarket, the quality is fairly high. Their "aesthetics" isn't as nice as the supermarket kind, but the nutritional value is verifiably higher.

The next big push for this cooperative is to start to push for the development of perennial crops specifically tailored for our city. It will take quite a while though... they are looking into Smart Breeding technology. They don't seem to have much of a problem with that, funnily enough.

Also, the reason many people are against Vaccination(at least the sane educated people) is that over vaccination will cause Super-bugs to develop. They are stalking our hospitals as we speak.

Originally posted by dave_54
The only ones that oppose GM technology are the organic food industries that stand to lose millions of dollars in profits. They are more concerned about money than the environment.

Sorry, but this is a generalizing and factually incorrect statement.

take a look at the real-world effects of GM crops, their yield is sometimes less than that of conventional equivalents (f-ex. soy beans) weeds grow resitant to herbicides and the net result is that more and more toxic herbicides have to be used to save GM crop fields. in Argentina, vast swaths of land are already barren deserts, dead plants no longer rot there the land is DEAD, it's a nightmare.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

I find it disgusting that people are so completetly indifferent towards what's being done to people and nature just because it's easier to buy the PR line of big agribusiness. if you don't understand what i'm talking about or pretend not to



As If GM corps weren't out for the quick buck at your expense


needless to say, organic farming is usually done on a small scale, in a market niche, unlike GMOs. btw, animals are able to tell the difference www.i-sis.org.uk... , just fyi.

[edit on 11-11-2006 by Long Lance]

I see corporate brainwashing here and it makes me wonder if GM food is responsible for a decline in intelligence. A severe lack of brains would explain why some people readily accept the role of a subservient lab rat for the benefit of a profit driven company.

Dangers of Genetically Modified Food Confirmed

• Research by the Russian Academy of Sciences released in December 2005 found that more than half of the offspring of rats fed GM soy died within the first three weeks of life, six times as many as those born to mothers fed on non-modified soy. Six times as many offspring fed GM soy were also severely underweight.

• In November 2005, a private research institute in Australia, CSIRO Plant Industry, put a halt to further development of a GM pea cultivator when it was found to cause an immune response in laboratory mice.

• In the summer of 2005, an Italian research team led by a cellular biologist at the University of Urbino published confirmation that absorption of GM soy by mice causes development of misshapen liver cells, as well as other cellular anomalies.

• In May of 2005 the review of a highly confidential and controversial Monsanto report on test results of corn modified with Monsanto MON863 was published in The Independent/UK.

Consume, buy, obey and die young...retirement is overated

[edit on 11-11-2006 by Regenmacher]

Source

Milkweed samples were taken from within and at the edge of the Bt corn field and were used to assess mortality of first instar monarch, D. plexippus exposed to Bt and non-Bt corn pollen. Within 48 hours, there was 19% mortality in the Bt corn pollen treatment, compared to 0% on non Bt-corn pollen exposed plants and 3% in the no pollen controls. This second study counters all the spurious arguments that the Losey's study was a 'worse case scenario' that bears no relevance to field conditions. Besides which, when Losey conducted his experiments he did not spatula Bt pollen on to the leaves of milkweed, as was reported by industry, he dusted the leaves in accordance with levels observed in the field.

I hope you're aware that we need insects for pollination, randomly killing them will not just exterminate several plant species, it will upset the balance between insct species while exterminating their natural predators at the same time.

The result should be obvious: no or very few birds, tons of obnoxious insects that don't feed off plants (

the usual justification for using GM is it's alledgedly higher yield.

this is generally not the case, pure and simple, f-ex. RR soya yields are on average a few percent lower than normal. claims of high yields, complete with promise percentage figures are likely a scam, they have to be because different strains thrive under different conditions, meaningful numbers are not projections, they are derived from experience.


that said, technique greatly influences growth, resistance and yield of crops

Source#2
Last week, Nature magazine reported the results of one of the biggest agricultural experiments ever conducted (2). A team of Chinese scientists had tested the key principle of modern rice-growing - planting a single, high-tech variety across hundreds of hectares - against a much older technique: planting several breeds in one field. They found, to the astonishment of the farmers who had been drilled for years in the benefits of "monoculture", that reverting to the old method resulted in spectacular increases in yield. Rice blast - a devastating fungus which normally requires repeated applications of poison to control - decreased by 94 per cent. The farmers planting a mixture of strains were able to stop applying their poisons altogether, while producing 18 per cent more rice per acre than they were growing before.

this is a tangible benefit, not just an empty promise, GMOs have NOT lived up to the hype while they fullfilled every single doomsday prophecy, cross-contamination, toxic side effects on various lifeforms, dead soil and increased use of pesticides. it's time to stop the madness while we still have a chance to succeed.

[edit on 12-11-2006 by Long Lance]

I honestly don't have a problem with GM crops or products.
I realize that there may be some health issues with some of them,
but hey I'm willing to take the risk, and really I'm much more
healthy than most people.


As for taste, well I'm young, turned 18 in June, and I've tasted
organic food, and I have to say it does'nt taste that good to me,
I much more prefer the modified food in the stores.

Health Issues may just be the tip of the iceberg. Invasive GMO's are on the risk factor column. Bioaccumulation in the local biosphere is another thing to consider. Crosspolination, larger reliance on agribusiness, etc, etc. I'm not an extremist in my views but the way we are currently implementing this technology is very shortsighted and purely motivated by profits alone. A Temporary Moratorium on deployment of new GMO's as well as extensive assessments of GMO's currently in use is needed, like yesterday! This Moratorium should only last as long as it takes to develop a testing and certification regimen specifically tailored for Genetically modified organisms. labeling is also another big thing that needs to be forced upon corporations worldwide. If something is a GMO it should be tagged as such at harvest and that information should be plainly obvious to the consumer for both fresh produce and ingredients on the package.

a moratorium would only show one thing: it's next to impossible to get rid of these GMOs again, the genie is out of the bottle, so to speak and putting your head in the sand will do nothing for food security. this kind of agriculture is already failing in Argentina, it's only a matter of time until it fails globally, but at what cost !

This is a very important subject. I am completely and wholeheartedly against genetically modified foods. For one, it doesn't do what it was intended to do. Part of the reason for the development of GM was to lessen the usage of pesticides. Hell, from what I gather, they have had to increase the usage of pesticides since the implementation of GM!!

Here are a couple of links discussing the evils of genetically modified foods..

This site here,list fifty harmful effects of modified food

GM,not good

Health Hazards of GM



[edit on 14-11-2006 by SpeakerofTruth]

Does this even sound healthy to you?

There are several differences between the normal breeding process and the artificial genetic manipulation process. One key difference is the use of highly-infectious viruses for artificial genetic manipulation as a promoter to switch on the introduced gene. One commonly-used virus is a highly-infectious form of the Cauliflower Mosaic Virus (CaMV). (The form of CaMV virus found in normal foods is not highly-infectious and cannot be absorbed by mammals.) The dangers were described in detail by reknowed geneticist Dr. Mae-Wan Ho in a meeting on March 31st 1999 at the invitation of UK Environment Minister, Michael Meacher. Additional scientific information about the dangers presented by infectious promoter viruses such as CaMV are described by Dr. Mae-Wan Ho and Dr. Joe Cummins, Emeritus Professor of Genetics, Department of Plant Sciences, University of Western Ontario. Finally, a recent scientific report by Molecular Biologist, Angela Ryan provides further concerns regarding the use of the CaMV virus to create genetically-manipulated foods.


Another key difference between normal breeding and artificial genetic manipulation is that the genetic manipulation greatly increases the risk that the plant (e.g., soy) will develop toxic or allergy-causing compounds. Such unexpected changes have already been shown to occur in some genetically-manipulated crops.

The insertion of a new gene can sometimes alter the synthesis of chemicals in the plant. Such an alteration can lead to the change in existing chemical compounds in the plant (including a possible significant increase in existing levels of toxic compounds) or the development of new toxic or allergy-causing compounds. There would be no way to predict these effects in advance and it would be difficult to test for these effects without many years of careful, independent research on human test subjects. Gradual toxic effects could occur over weeks, months, years, or even decades and society would not be aware of the health damage until it was too late.

People think GM is healthy?

I don't know about anyone else,but that doesn't sound healthy at all to me.

thanks for the links SpeakerOfTruth,


let me quote the folowing paragraph from your url:

Source

Extinction of Seed Varieties A few years ago Time magazine referred to the massive trend by large corporations to buy up small seed companies,
destroying any competing stock, and replacing it with their patented or controlled brands as "the Death of Birth." Monsanto additionally has had farmers sign contracts not to save their seeds - forfeiting what has long been a farmer's birthright to remain guardians of the blueprints of successive life.

So, GM succeed due to cynic patent laws and their controllability (see terminator crops) their properties and yield are completely irrelevant

As an example of the feverish attempt to expand herbicide use, Monsanto's patent for Roundup was scheduled to expire. Not to lose their market share, Monsanto came up with the idea of creating "Roundup Ready" seeds. It bought out seed companies to monopolize the terrain - then licensing the seeds to farmers with the requirement that they continue buying Roundup past the expiration of the patent. These contracts had stiff financial penalties if farmers used any other herbicide.

if you are still pro-GM crops after reading a few of the links presented here, i'm speechless, because they mostly failed to deliver any sunstantial benefit (only for the corps living off these home-brewn patent laws), while numerous side effects are well documented and already catastrophic in nature.

experience >> empty promises

GM is not stable, the material biotechs "splice" into plant, or animal genes travel thru' all the genetic string.

I haven't tasted a good potato in years and recently bought a package of new red potatoes, in October yet. I boiled some of them and ate them, two hours later I was sick as a dog and like a dog it all came up. I could taste the solonacaea. That is poison, a little flavors but a lot can kill. I was dizzy for two days. I can still taste the solonacaea. I bought them at my trusted Safeway store. I thought maybe they were green so I scrubbed a potato to remove the outer peel, down to just under that where the green would be. Not a trace of green!. Those lil' red new potatoes were poisonous, no doubt a 3rd or 4th generation of genetically modified that "morphed".

I agree organic is somewhat bland so I'm going to set some russets aside and let "eyes" form and sprout, then I'll section them and grow my own russet potatoes in soil with added composted horse doo. That will give them flavor and its safe. I am very much against GM. I remember what food tasted like and it was wonderful, couldn't hold a match to the GM stuff. Fortunately I know gardening some and can get heirlooms from "seed savers" online. You bet I'll do it. Had a sickly child eaten those potatoes he probably would have died in his weakened condition and it would be blamed on his illness, not the poisonous food that is displayed in our groceries.

I like this, people who think waiting 20 minutes for food to arrive is a bad sign of things to come are telling starving people "Hey, you're not me, die."

CHina, Africa, and parts of Mexico are reliant on GM crops. Without them they wouldn't be able to grow enough food. So, if you want to get rid of GM foods be prepared to kill off about 1 billion or so people. Oh sure they're just blacks or asians or mexicans, as long as you can order a vegetarian pizza at 3am who cares? Right? Let those African villages starve to death since organic crops are raped by the insect and other wildlife and even if they weren't produce less then most GM crops of the same type. WHat? Have them buy the same herbicides and pesticides we use in America? If they had that kind of money they wouldn't be worried about growing enough food they'd buy it.

Hell, China wouldn't have the population it does now if it wasn't for GM foods. The GM rice produces, sometimes 10x, more rice then normal non-GM foods. So if you want to commit genocide on the Chinese go ahead, remove GM products.

Know what, are you the KKK? Neo Nazos? GOP? Hitler's plan called for troops to round people up and kill them, your way not only costs less it kills more! Good job people, committing genocide on a billion+ people so you can buy raw foods at the ConAgro store for 30 bucks a pound.