A heartfelt plea to re-evaluate the antiSCIENCE tendencies of the antiGMO movement

antiGMO_is_like_antiVAX

First of all, thank you for letting me say my piece.  Unless directly addressed 
after this, I will leave your page in peace and not disturb you further.  
However, I feel I need to bring some things to light that many of you may not 
have considered in depth.  Again, I thank you for your civility and open 
mindedness and hope that you believe me when I tell you that my actions stem 
only from a place of deep deep frustration and the desire to help those who need 
it.  The same place, I dare say that many of you will be coming from.  I ask 
only that you read me out and DO try to avoid the reflex of writing what I say 
off bc it goes against what you have read or heard or feel.  My intentions are 
as far from offense as is possible.  After all, my self-professed cause is to 
attempt to change some of your minds.  I am familiar enough with human nature to 
know that the fastest way to fail in that goal is to yell and insult.  You 
probably WILL detect a degree of sarcasm from time to time in my words.  Please 
know that it is not directed at the people in this group but at a situation that 
is preventing dying people from getting help.  And worst of all it is being done 
by people who I believe are trying to do good by the world.


 As for Kevin's statement: "Jenny McCarthy doesn't sue you out of existence when 
you don't opt in to her crazy." I used to hold this position as well.  And to be 
truthful, I still have problems with many of Monsanto's business practices, but 
no more so than I do with Apple, Google, Samsung, and many other patent trolls.  
But where is the rage and boycotting of your smartphones or internet use?  And 
arguably the benefit of GMOs FAR FAR FAR out strips being able to check your 
email on the bus or at your dinner table.  Second: it is a myth that Monsanto 
"sues [hundreds of farmers] out of existence".  The number of cases brought is 
less than 10 if I remember correctly and it is under MUCH less black and white 
circumstances than works like "Food Inc" would lead you to believe. 

Specifically, if you are referring to Monsanto vs Bowman which I believe is the 
case highlighted in "Food Inc" and used over and over to give the impression 
that tons of farmers are being brought to court in similar ways, you need to 
actually read more than what Natural News and Greenpeace are telling you. Bowman 
WAS brought to court AND HE SHOULD HAVE BEEN.  This is NOT a case of "oops, some 
pollen from the next field found its way into my plants and now through no 
intention of my own am I growing patented plants".  The dude bought seed 
destined to be FEED and planted it with the intention TO RECOVER THE ROUNDUP 
RESISTANT PLANTS that contained the gene Monsanto has a patent for.  He 
selectively replanted only those plants that were able to survive roundup that 
he applied directly.  HE MEANT TO STEAL THAT PRODUCT.  That is NOT what most 
antiGMO groups write about but look it up.  In fact you dont even have to.  I 
just did for you: http://goo.gl/6LtqwL.  The realization of this shook my idea 
of Monsanto that I had taken from so many activist groups and basically agreed 
with to the bone.  I had to look it up more and when I did... well I just 
couldn't shake the fact that the groups that I had been listening to claim that 
the corporations were spreading disinformation were actually participating in 
disinformation campaigns themselves.  It tweaked my skeptical "spidey sense" and 
as I continued to look I found more and more of it.  In fact the more I looked 
at the tactics used by antiGMO groups, the more I saw parallels with antiVACCINE 
group tactics.

Here are some examples (forgive me if I quote others through out some of this):

"Perhaps the most prominent similarity is philosophical. Both groups fetishize 
the naturalistic fallacy, otherwise known as the belief that if it’s “natural” 
it must be good (or at least better than anything man-made or “artificial”). In 
the case of antivaccine activists, the immune response caused by vaccines is 
somehow “unnatural” and therefore harmful and evil, even though the mechanisms 
by which the immune system responds to vaccines are the same or similar to how 
it responds to “natural” antigens. That’s the whole idea, to stimulate the 
immune system to think that you’ve had the disease without actually giving you 
the disease, thus stimulating long term immunity to the actual disease! In the 
case of anti-GMO activists, the same idea appears to prevail, namely that, 
because GMOS are somehow “unnatural,” they must be harmful and evil. That’s not 
to say that they might not have problems and issues that need to be dealt with, 
but the apocalyptic language used by many of the anti-GMO activists like Mike 
Adams and Joe Mercola is so far over-the-top that it is very much like the 
language of the antivaccine movement." http://goo.gl/e7BRX9

Both movements rely on horrendous science (it may be worth noting that my trade 
is reading and assessing scientific work -- I am a molecular biologist).  
AntiVAXers have their studies by Andrew Wakefield and others, that many of you 
will rightfully recognize as flawed and downright fraudulent at times.  
AntiGMOers have work like this by Gilles-Eric Séralini: 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%A9ralini_affair#Scientific_evaluation.  The 
bottom line is this from that paper: it sucks.  They fed rats lots of Monsanto 
corn and found that they got tumors as a result.  THAT is damn scary.  If I 
heard that on the news, I would crap myself and swear off of corn all together 
since ~80/90% of corn in the US is GMO.  So why havent I?  Because I read the 
study and looked up which kinds of rats they used.  They SPECIFICALLY CHOSE a 
strain of rat that has very specific dietary needs.  In fact, these rats are so 
sensitive to what they eat that if you screw with their diet at all.... they 
develop tumors.  Do you see why this is an issue.  They chose rats that they 
KNEW they would be able to make develop tumors by doing almost ANYTHING to their 
diet for this study.  Are you F***ing kidding me?!  You will be forgiven if your 
next thought is "I wonder if the point of this study was to be able to have a 
paper in the literature that says GMOs cause cancer rather than to find out IF 
GMOs ARE SAFE OR NOT".  Because thats exactly what the rest of the scientific 
community thought as well.  It turns out that this group has been publishing 
papers that say the same basic thing for years but no one had paid so much 
attention.  After the paper above the EU (not friendly to GMOs) went back and 
looked at the groups past papers and you know what? It turns out they ALL kinda 
sucked. Seemingly very stupid mistakes regarding which statistical approach was 
used were found that paint the picture that this group had been changing their 
analysis of the data to fit their conclusion for years and that when THE EU went 
back and analyzed the data correctly, levels between the GMO fed animals all 
fell within the confidence intervals set by the control animals.  This group is 
only ONE example of the quality of science that antiGMO folks use to support 
their claims.  I KNOW you can see the parallels.  But JUST in case you can't.  
Remember how Wakefield had competing interests in ANOTHER MMR vaccine that would 
have benefited greatly when his first study showed the correlation of the first 
MMR vax with autism?  Well it turns out this french guy has this going on:
"Séralini held a press conference on the day the study was released that also 
included an announcement of the release of a book and film about the study; 
selected journalists were given access to the paper prior to the press 
conference, and each writer was required to sign a confidentiality agreement 
that prevented them from discussing the paper with other scientists before the 
embargo expired. The agreement included a penalty for non-compliance: “A refund 
of the cost of the study of several million euros would be considered damages if 
the premature disclosure questioned the release of the study.”[34] This was done 
in contrast to embargo guidelines such as published by Nature.[35]" [wikipedia]

SKETCHY.

OK this is getting too long and I still have stuff I want to say. I am happy to 
go into more parallels if requested.

Secondly, I object to any claims that this is simple against monsanto.  Quoted 
from the even description: "Please join us downtown at the Arches to show 
Monsanto and the world what Athens thinks about **GMOs**!" AntiGMO folks 
frequently hide be hind the "Monsanto is the devil" argument but fail to provide 
evidence that it is just Monsanto that they want banned.  The two subjects are 
frequently if not almost completely conflated.

Further: do you know what AntiGMO groups DO do?  They go into countries with 
massive fatalities due to vitamin A deficiency and first convince the 
governments of these countries to impose unreasonable extra test after extra 
test on Golden Rice in hopes that the company trying to suply these life-saving 
seeds to the people who dreadfully need it will give up due to the pain in the 
ass that they have imposed on them.  They move the goalpost every time IRRI and 
PhilRice manage to pass another hurtle. Coincidently, there is NO way to paint 
this fundamentally anti-SCIENCE stance as anti-BIG-farming. IRRI and PhilRice 
went to GREAT lengths to work out the patents for this product so that they 
could GIVE THIS PRODUCT TO FARMERS FOR FREE.  Thats right, a product that could 
prevent 1.9 to 2.8 million preventable deaths annually, mostly of children under 
5 years old and women, is condemned by Greenpeace and other groups (similar to 
this one) merely bc rice doest naturally have betacarotene in it.

But IRRI and PhilRice calmly submitted to round after round of extra, frivilous, 
testing thrown at them by Greenpeace. And do you know what GP does when it is 
clear that the extra testing isn't going to prevent IRRI and PhilRice from 
giving up?  Well let me start telling the story from IRRI and PhilRice's point 
of view:

Officials and staff of IRRI and PhilRice had gathered for a peaceful dialogue 
with a group of farmers when protesters invaded the compound, **overwhelmed 
police and village security**, and trampled the rice.  GP and local 
antiGMO/antiSCIENCE groups had trucked in loads of people to meet a peaceful 
dialog session with violence and destruction of a product that would save 
LITERALLY millions of lives.

I can tell you for sure that Jenny McCarthy and her fear mongering has cause at 
least SOME children to die.  No question.  But I can actually put a number on 
the deaths that this antiGMO fear mongering will have caused in the next few 
years and it numbers in the MILLIONS.


If you don't want to listen to me about this (a molecular biologist remember who 
has taken the time to look at this in-depth and understands the technology VERY 
well), PLEASE listen to these prominent leading academic scientists who drafted 
a condemnation not only of GP and this SINGLE (yes there have been many other 
vandalisms) but of the superstition and antiSCIENCE rife among the antiGMO 
movement in general as well.  They published this in the world's second highest 
impac factor journal, Science.  Here is the link for you to read yourself 
http://goo.gl/nnic9f.

Here are some excerpts:

"The global scientific community has condemned the wanton destruction of these 
field trials, gathering thousands of supporting signatures in a matter of days.* 
If ever there was a clear-cut cause for outrage, it is the concerted campaign by 
Greenpeace and other nongovernmental organizations, as well as by individuals, 
against Golden Rice. Golden Rice is a strain that is genetically modified by 
molecular techniques (and therefore labeled a genetically modified organism or 
GMO) to produce β-carotene, a precursor of vitamin A. Vitamin A is an essential 
component of the light-absorbing molecule rhodopsin in the eye. Severe vitamin A 
deficiency results in blindness, and half of the roughly half-million children 
who are blinded by it die within a year. Vitamin A deficiency also compromises 
immune system function, exacerbating many kinds of illnesses. It is a disease of 
poverty and poor diet, responsible for 1.9 to 2.8 million preventable deaths 
annually, mostly of children under 5 years old and women.†"

"The rice has been ready for farmers to use since the turn of the 21st century, 
yet it is still not available to them. Escalating requirements for testing have 
stalled its release for more than a decade. IRRI and PhilRice continue to 
patiently conduct the required field tests with Golden Rice, despite the fact 
that these tests are driven by fears of “potential” hazards, with no evidence of 
actual hazards. Introduced into commercial production over 17 years ago, GM 
crops have had an exemplary safety record. And precisely because they benefit 
farmers, the environment, and consumers, GM crops have been adopted faster than 
any other agricultural advance in the history of humanity."

"New technologies often evoke rumors of hazard. These generally fade with time 
when, as in this case, no real hazards emerge. But the anti-GMO fever still 
burns brightly, fanned by electronic gossip and well-organized fear-mongering 
that profits some individuals and organizations. We, and the thousands of other 
scientists who have signed the statement of protest, stand together in staunch 
opposition to the violent destruction of required tests on valuable advances 
such as Golden Rice that have the potential to save millions of impoverished 
fellow humans from needless suffering and death."

[below is me talking again]

For too long rich, well fed people in the west have deprived people in the 
developing world of life saving technology simply because they thought that 
they -- without relevant certifications, degrees, experience or knowledge -- were 
better suited to decide for these people what was best for them.  EXACTLY the 
paternalistic, imperialistic behavior that I am sure most of you would rightly find 
disgusting in ANY other guise.  PLEASE.  I implore and beseech you, stand aside 
and stop participating if even in a symbolic way in preventing access to 
lifesaving technologies to the poorest of our species; the most likely to go 
hungry; the most likely to die from malaria (controllable in many places by 
pesticides that we rich malaria-free people in the west forbid them to use).

Please just think about what I have written.  I hope you can see the antiSCIENCE 
parallels that are absolutely shared with the antiVAX movement.  

Then ask  yourself if it JUST might be possible that I am right.

Thank you. Namaste and peace and productivity be with you all.