Nestle, Hershey at odds with farmers over U.S. GMO labeling - Polidicks

I would think by your statements here that the obvious solution would be to end genetic patenting, not labeling things for ignorant consumers.

... Except everything I've already mentioned and you thoroughly ignored? Not every consumption concern is about health, and even then safety standards are bare minimum thresholds, tons of food items that respect those standards are pretty terrible for your health regardless. Who cares if some people have irrational fears about GMOs? If they want to dump more of their money in organic food instead, then just let them. Again, if companies that push GMO products are afraid that a small portion of people will have this reaction, why don't they work on educating the public instead of hiding their shit, raising more suspicion in the process? Do you really see no issue at all with essentially forcing people to ingest something they don't want? Not wanting to consume pork or meat that isn't produced according to certain religious rituals isn't any more rational than not wanting to eat GMO products, yet people don't make such a big fuss about the former.

I support labeling them. give power back to the consumers.

Obvious solution, but not a realistic one. Were that to somehow happen, I wouldn't personally have much of an interest in looking up those labels. (I would still want them to be enforced for the sake of others who may have different motivations.) Hit me up when that happens, if ever. In the meantime, I want that shit to be labeled like it currently is in the EU (and even then I think they should also label meats that were mostly fed with GMOs). By the way, are you implying I'm an ignorant consumer for wanting to be informed of my food's contents?

I agree let people vote with their wallet.

And why is it not? A pepsi bottle says in its ingredients that it contains potassium sorbate, sodium citrate, phenylaline, and acesulfame potassium. Just grabbing a bottle and reading that, no average joe is going to instantly know what the hell those are or whether they're good or bad for them. On top of that, a pepsi bottle contains twice as much sugar as the body needs in a day and the amount is listed, but that doesn't stop PepsiCo from going out of business.

In this case, the labeling applies to processed products like sugar that are far removed from the plant. Should we also put a label that says what vehical harvested the plant if people asked for that?

They really aren't bare minimum lol, the FDA often sets very conservative limits on potentially harmful contaminants. Whether food is healthy or not is an issue of nutrition, not safety, and we already have labelling for that. Could that be improved? Sure. Will labelling the source of every goddamn ingredient that goes into it help? Hell no. My issue is with the reasoning behind people wanting such labels in the first place. It's stupid and has no basis in science. Giving in to such demands will only give these idiots more power and extend their influence over more industries.

Whats with the Monsanto hate-boner? Is this because of the faux-Roundup scandal or Monsanto suing farmers who break their usage agreements?

Let's not forget that a lot of GMO stuff is simply strengthening genes the plants already have. If a plant has a moderate strength against a specific pest or drought, GMOs strengthen that to be great strength against those things. I would love something like Pepsi to be labeled as "NON ORGANIC" just to see what happens with the idiots that drink it.

You seriously believe it is realistic for that branch of legislation to reverse its course? What sizable opponents do those monopolies have on the international scene, exactly? Who could effectively lobby against them? Do you have anything to show me that indicates that your scenario is plausible? Nice dodging of my question, mate. I reiterate: As for your response itself, what exactly is the point of it? That the average Joe doesn't inherently understand what the various components are? Yeah, no shit? How's that an argument against labelling them, exactly? Do we refrain from specifying specs on smartphones and computer components because the average Joe doesn't know what they mean? Do we do away with listing a car's performances because they might be confusing to the uninitiated? The exact same thing is true for nutrition. The average Joe might not get scientific terms but those who actually care about the contents will educate themselves on what those terms mean. They're the people those labels are for. That's what consumer choice means. So what you're saying is that despite labels using scary sounding scientific verbiage and basically outright warning that the product is bad for your health, people go and buy them anyway? Why wouldn't that apply to GMO labels then? Wasn't that your sole argument against labelling? That it would drive down sales because people would be scared of it? What's the point of being against those labels then, other than denying individual liberties for the sake of feeling superior? There's being interested in advanced tech, and then there's shitting over people who so much as criticize the idea that technology automatically brings positive results for society. FP's GMO circlejerk is pretty disgusting to be frank, and doesn't exactly leave room for nuance.

How exactly is a label that says GMO or non-GMO nuanced? How do i know if something is modified to make it drought-resistent or a nicer colour or stores longer or resists-herbicides? Do I need more labels? I would argue that more labels makes it harder for consumers to make informed decisions. Too much information, especially lazily or deceptively delivered is antithetical to improved understanding. It can hide what is actually important or just plain mislead. Many people will get the impression that something is now healthier because it has a non-GMO label on it when all the evidence shows that that is not the case.

I seriously have no idea how the fuck hersheys makes a dime. There are a billion brands out there that are better. Pick anything not Hershit or Nastle, its 100% better.

Yes it will. I mean shit, isn't listing all ingredients already a requirement for you guys? Because it is over here, I really don't see how that's a big deal. I've already given you my reasoning which doesn't have anything to do with pseudoscience. You think it's worth it to fuck over people like me just because idiots exist? Neither. I already gave my reasoning, you only have to re-read the thread. It would actually be useful to know whether the beef I buy, which already has a pretty big ecological impact on its own, was fed not with grass but with corn which is grown in environments it's not suited to at all, using up tons of water, and given to cattle even though it's for for human consumption. Good for you if you don't care, but don't go and pretend that nobody has good reasons to be interested in those informations. The worst thing is, in any other context, you people would actually be supportive of transparency towards the consumers, but you don't in this case because it might hinder GMO technology which you admire. How would you feel if companies started clamping down on specifications for their products just because a bunch of loons started spreading unfounded rumors about them? Why should that be acceptable?

Ya haven't actually. You made a one off comment about Monsanto and never said anything about it again. Correct me if I'm wrong.

Alright, I guess I could have been clearer. The post where I mention Monsanto is in response to Scorpious' statement: So those two are part of the reasons why I dislike them. Patenting life seems like a pretty dangerous and baseless precedent to me, and the idea of enforcing what's basically DRM on something so pivotal for our survival as food production is simply reckless and ridiculous. Another reason is that Monsanto indirectly (or actively, depending on who you ask) contributes to the extinction of a diverse range of local strains. By virtue of being costly to produce, it's not profitable to design different GMO strains for every single region in the world. Instead, GMO companies opt for a "one size fits all" approach instead, which results in little variety (weakening our crops should an epidemic break out) and in the local strains being abandoned by farmers who opt for a GMO solution. Those local strains took centuries to develop, and have been tailored to their environment, with specifics that make them better suited for it than any other alternative. If GMO design were less costly and more open, the genes of those strains could be used to further adapt "craft" GMOs to their local environment. But those are being abandoned instead, which is akin to throwing away decades of R&D. It's simply not in the interests of companies like Monsanto to promote such open development. They seek monopoly, and letting independent farmers tamper with their crops goes against that philosophy. Monsanto customers can't even re-seed GMO crops, let alone operate artificial selection on them, and it's not like Monsanto is going to change that. I hope that's clear enough. I think I've made a solid enough case to justify wanting to be aware of whether my food contains GMO without being called a Luddite.

Like with nearly all technology, biotech is becoming cheaper and cheaper to do. It is not so difficult to be able to tinker with the DNA of organisms and to try to introduce desirable traits or to remove negative ones. However, the stigma of GMOs will likely turn off many investors and the regulatory requirements may mean that only megacorporations can afford to run the trials that can prove that their GMO products meet the standards set. The reason why a small selection of megacorporations control biotech is not because the research is hard or expensive. I mean, it still is, but the cost is peanuts compared to the actual development and proving the product is safe and effective to a standard that regulators ask for. The same holds true for Big Pharma, Agrochem, etc. Small startups almost never bring products to market by themselves. As a scientist that recently moved into agrochemistry, it's somewhat embarrassing to have to answer questions as to why I sold my soul to the devil, poisoning the populace, instead of trying to cure cancer; even from friends and family. I mean, they don't ask me in those exact words but I can tell what they're thinking. Driving away talent from an area is not a good method of democratising research. If you want to compete against companies like Monsanto then the best way is to convince MORE people to work in GMO and to ensure that talent has somewhere else to grow. Knowing that your product will be disadvantaged in the market due to a "GMO" label doesn't help either.

I really don't get why you people keep whining about labels supposedly driving off sales. Why the hell is that an issue to begin with? Are you planning on marketing GMOs to people who already shop at fucking Whole Foods? If GMOs are as advantageous as you claim, then surely they will be cheaper to produce, and thus cheaper to buy. That's more than enough to ensure that your company is viable, since the average Joe isn't even going to check those infamous labels, only the price tag. Someone in this thread already pointed out that people keep buying Pepsi even though they're basically marked as poison. Just let consumers make informed decisions, for fuck's sake.

This is exactly why it's a dumb idea. Health food companies already label their stuff GMO to attract sales, no need to make it a law to require some arbitrary thing, it's not even an allergen type label.

Let's not beat around the bush here, GMO labelling will not be there so that people can select the GMO option. If that's what enough people want then it should happen. As a democratic society, no real question about it. This doesn't change the fact that it's a mostly stupid thing to want that'll probably cause more harm than good. Furthermore, if we go back to the original article, this is companies like Hershey and Nestle lobbying for labelling. I'm going out on a limp here but I don't think it's because they want their customers to know how the sugar they used is sourced and produced.

So, there is a lot of misinformation out there. A lot of it being spread by some rather... interesting people. "GMO companies" don't go by a "one size fits all" approach, if you just look at the product page for one of Monsanto's products you'll see that there are tons of different options. These are just for corn, these for soybeans for example. Its more of a "Find the size that fits your farm/field" approach. Monsanto and other companies have ton of different brands for this reason. They're doing the same thing that we've been doing for hundreds of years except doing it faster. As for re-seeding crops and letting farmers breed their own crops with their fancy GMO seeds, most farmers wouldn't do that even if they were allowed to. Re-seeding as a practice went away a long time ago when hybrids came along. If you reuse the seeds from a hybrid not all of the offspring are going to exhibit the same traits. This means that some of your harvest might need more water or it might not live as well in your soil. It's just not worth the trouble to avoid new buying seeds. If you really really want to for some reason, there are plenty of GMO seeds that aren't patented and/or have expired patents. As for these companies trying to monopolize and people getting scared of them "controlling the food supply", people don't realize that the big companies (Monsanto , Dupont, Syngenta) only really have a big impact on soybeans, corn, and cotton. The major companies don't really pay any attention to wheat and most fruits and vegetables which are largely being developed by universities and a variety of smaller companies. I should also note Monsanto was recently bought by Bayer. So we'll see how much of what I said is subject to change in the future.

Why do you keep calling my preferences as a consumer, which I've extensively explained and justified, stupid? We're not in grade school anymore, merely calling something stupid does not make it so. I would have expected a proper discussion but I'm not holding my breath anymore now that I've seen most of this thread's user behaviour. That's, what, around a hundred strains total? Still relatively nothing compared to the amount of local strains in the world. That doesn't make them tailpred to specific local environments. It's more the equivalent of a retail clothing store than an actual tailor. This doesn't address the issue of the local strains being abandoned either. Did you actually read what I wrote? I specifically pointed out that GMO strains can't really be re-seeded for this exact reason. That's my point. The takeaway from that is that Monsanto has no interest in solving this issue and won't. They can still be a monopoly in their respective domain, so I'm not sure what your point is here. I haven't made the point that they will "control the food supply" or anything remotely related either. So yeah, I'm not so sure it's as much an issue of misinformation on my part as it is an issue of reading comprehension on yours. Not sure who you're referring to when mentioning "interesting people". Hope that's not an attempt at being haughty.

I don't really know what you mean by "local strains" so I'll just rephrase something. These are just for corn seeds in Minnesota, these for soybeans in Iowa. Heck, this even has a seed finder... to tailor them to your specific environment. I typed in my zip code and it told me there are 132 recommended different types of corn just that might work for me, and I live in the pacific northwest. Corn isn't really grown here. Monsanto is interested in solving that issue and it seems like they have. Imagine if every retail clothing store had different brand names for your specific state and sold different clothes under each respective brand. That's what this is. Your re-seeding point is interesting, sure. But organic crops have the same issue. Heck, any crop that is a hybrid has that issue. But not all GMO crops are hybrids and not all organic crops are hybrids. Farmers don't really care whether or not they are, they just want to have a consistent harvest. The amount of effort it takes to re-seed instead of buying new seeds is really not worth the effort, especially considering how cheap seeds are. The option is still there. Here are a few articles on this. (1, 2, 3) Also I was clearly not referring to you when i mentioned "interesting people" or people afraid of companies "controlling the food supply". I was literally referring to the shit ton of batshit (<- lol) crazy people spreading misinformation. I'd honestly be willing to blame social media for letting some of that garbage spread.

Monsanto is not the only seed manufacturer, Monsanto is not the only genetically modified seed manufacturer, and Monsanto doesn't have a patent on on GMO products, as far as I know anyway. Monsanto is not the only seed manufacturer and people buying unsuitable seeds for their region does not sound like it's the fault of Monsanto. Even if you were anywhere near correct that Monsanto only produces 3 different types of seeds all together, theres nothing coercing farmers to purchase Monsanto seeds over their local varieties, other than price. Why pay a cheaper price for a crop you know won't take? The local strains tailored for their environments, you described, is just long-term genetic alteration done in the field instead of a lab. Why wouldn't Monsanto offer a similar strain thats better suited? Oh wait they do. GMO design can't be done in a farmers quonset because it's far too complex for your typical agricultural degree holder. As I stated previously, farmers have been doing long-term genetic alteration with seeds and crops for centuries and theres nothing stopping them from continuing the trade. Monsanto simplifies that by offering a seed thats already tailored to the environment without the need for decades of failed crops for the poorest people in the world. Most farmers don't really practice reseeding to my knowledge anymore, and it's a far better idea to rotate crops so you don't drain the life out of the soil, so reseeding isn't a necessity anyways to begin with. A crisis is coming but it more has to do with subsidized corn production and Trump tariffs more than anything else. The American soybean export tariffs are going to absolutely trash the Midwest agriculture economy and force soybean farmers into growing more corn which is completely unneeded. That has nothing to do with Monsanto. You've developed a hateboner for them for no real reason. If you disliked Monsanto for their mislabeling and lack of proper R&D for Agent Orange and their handling of the lawsuits, I'd agree with you. But disliking Monsanto for selling GMO seeds under non-reuse contracts? Thats just silly.

Are those really exclusive to those states, rather than just similar versions of strains used in other states? Does their genetic makeup differ by a lot or are they just slight alterations of each other? Farmers aren't environment experts, they're just looking for the cheapest and more efficient methods. But a method being profitable doesn't mean that it's sustainable. Having no control over the re-seeding of plants and not being able to operate artificial selection on your own means that you're going to run into tricky issues once the climate changes and you need to adapt those seeds to a new environment. There are perks to this type of Independence. Good thing I'm not referring to any of them, then. They are irrelevant to this discussion. The only purpose bringing them up serves is to artificially discredit those who actually want more information and more power as a consumer for reasons that aren't stupid. That's the issue I have with this thread in the first place, you're quick to tar everybody with the same brush. It's a "fuck you got mine" attitude where you support consumers rights when your own are at stakes, but happily oppose instances of them as soon as you're not interested in what they have to offer. It's individualistic behavior that shows a dire lack of solidarity. My goal isn't even to convince you that GMOs are bad or even questionable, it's to show that one can have an actual reasoning - which you might agree with, or might not - for wanting such information to be displayed on their food that isn't based in pseudoscience or other forms of propaganda. Because portraying all opposition as lunatics is the basis of the anti-labeling argumentation here and it's a disgusting caricature. There isn't much point in opposing this type of initiative other than giving in to the superiority circlejerk.

I know you like to think that farmers are racist old out of touch hicks, but thats not the case. Most of them started training for their job as a child and have college degrees in agriculture and agronomy. Farmers are absolutely experts about their local environments. They know the long term solution is better than the cheap one. The cheap and poorly thought out solutions is what caused the dust bowl. If a farmer wants to reseed, for some reason, he doesnt have to buy Monsanto seeds dood. There is plenty of competition on the market so quit pretending like Monsanto decides the worlds future based on its seed profits. But the only reason you want this labeling isnt for consumers rights, its so you can feel good about yourself based on your incorrect and misguided beliefs. GMO labeling isnt a consumers rights issue bud. An apple doesnt tell you who picked it, where the water used to grow it came from, whose seeds it was grown from, name of the farm, ect. So why should trivial information like whether its sustainably grown or not be labeled on the package? The only reason you want it there is so you and other misguided people can give your money to unsustainable food providers.

frankencorn sounds a lot scarrier than Roided cows

Thanks for fucking putting words in my mouth. Really gives off a mature and fair vibe. It's not like I made the effort of arguing in good faith when you asked me to elaborate or anything. I suppose I shouldn't have expected any less from you given your track record. I won't even bother to address the strawmen you made of my points. Even though you gave reasons to dislike Monsanto yourself, and even though you grossly misrepresented half of my arguments and outright ignored the other half, you keep baselessly claiming that my preferences are stupid. Keep on claiming that consumers rights aren't rights as soon as you don't have a personal vested interest in supporting them. Keep on perpetrating the extreme American selfishness that is currently unraveling the fabric of your society. Keep on defending the interests of companies at the expense of the consumer's. At least I know the value of mutual support between groups that may not see I to eye on every issue. I suppose that's not an American one if that support doesn't concern rights that are written on a centuries old constitution.