GM corn and our rights as consumers

If you're a regular reader, you probably know how I feel about corn.  And you might think that if Monsanto has developed a new GM corn that can resist even stronger doses of the pesticide Round Up, and resists at least two different corn-loving insects; well, since the corn itself attacks ME regardless, it won't matter to me if it's on the market or not.
You'd be wrong.
I won't be buying this GM corn because I don't buy corn.  But, I object to it on principal.  Frankly, it scares me to read that the federal regulators don't require any approval, and it doesn't need to be labeled.
It terrifies me to think that big corporations don't feel a need to label food with origins that they think I might object to.  As a consumer, I have the right to know what I'm purchasing.  What my purchase supports, what I'm putting into my and my children's bodies.
I have an obligation to make informed decisions regarding my kids' health.  That includes what I feed them.  There is a reason I try to buy organic.  But simply buying organic isn't good enough.  Regardless of my personal desires, I have to balance ideals with the cold hard facts of my checking account.  If I can't afford an organic certified label one week, I should be able to make an informed choice among the non-organically grown options.  Which means, GMO need to be labeled.
This isn't about whether or not there should be genetically modified organisms on the market.  I think most people agree that they don't want to ingest GMOs or feed them to their kids; but that's not the point either.  I may not want GMOs to be mass marketed, and I may be concerned about the possibility of GMO pollen contaminating organic fields, but that isn't the issue here either.
The real issue is that if GM corn is sold unlabeled, then we as consumers lose our right to choose.  We lose our right to make an informed decision about what we buy and what we eat.  As consumers, we shouldn't have to research every morsel that enters our mouth.  (Trust me, as a corn allergy sufferer I do have to research every product.  It's hard work and the company representatives aren't always happy about the research I ask them to do.)  I'm guessing that companies are assuming that as busy individuals, we don't have the time or inclination to make a phone call prior to every purchase ascertaining it's GMO status.  And I'm also guessing that they are assuming that once the reveal that GMO corn has been on the shelf and a pantry staple for a certain number of months or years, we as a society will be more open to embracing other GMOs.  And that, in turn, can lead to an easier approval process.  Which, of course, won't need to be labeled because as a society we will already have accepted the use of GMOs in our everyday lives.
This is what I object to.
I don't know the long term consequences of GMO.  And maybe there won't be any.
But maybe there are some unforeseen consequences.  As a consumer, as an American Citizen, I have the right to choose.  The right to protect my family, if it makes me happy and doesn't impede anyone else's rights.  As a city-girl (like most of America) I can't grow all my own food.  Which means I need to rely on grocery stores.  And I deserve to know what's in the foods I purchase.  I deserve to choose whether or not to support GMOs.  We all deserve the right to avoid ingredients we don't want whether it's for physical, spiritual, religious or ridiculous reasons.  And we deserve the right to seek out specific foods if we so desire.  (Like raw milk, or even GMO if you really wanted it)  In order to exercize our right to choose, we need information.  Which means, GMO should be labeled. 
While we work on that as individuals, companies can work on it as well. 
Trader Joes and General Mills have indicated that they won't purchase unlabeled GM sweet corn (the kind that's sold frozen and/or canned.)  Today I sent a message through the True Food website asking other food manufacturers to do the same.  If you want to maintain your right to choose, consider doing the same. 

Franken-food Revisited

We've long known that the unprocessed, unadorned food is most likely found on the outside aisles of the grocery store.  Produce, meats, bakery, deli, and refrigerated section are generally on the outside.  Work your way in to find cereals, snack bars, soda and the like. 

Dieticians caution their clients to stick to the outside aisles.  The slow food movement, overlaying a shift towards "real food" and "whole food" diets, encourages people to stick to the outside aisles, where "real" food is. 

But what you see isn't always what you get.  Pork, for instance, appears to be a slab of meat that was cut from the carcass of a pig.  Of course...most of us would rather not think of the logistics of how that slab of meat got from the field to our roasting pan, but we're pretty certain that we could trace it's journey if pressed to do so. 

Science is changing everything. 

With breaking new research, stem cells harvested from shoulder muscles can be used to grow pork.  No pig, no slaughter, no "Sooo-eeeey!"  required.  Excited researchers tell us that this technology will easily translate to other flesh foods, and potentially be used to design healthier meals.  Like burgers that unclog your arteries with "healthy" fish oil. 

The thing is...It's still frankenfood.  It's frankenfood taken to the limits of Mary Shelley (author of the original Frankenstein)'s wildest nightmares.  It stretches the margins of my nightmares.  And the worst part? 

Scientists are excited. 

The article claims that the environmental impact will be impressive.  Somehow, my gut tells me their vision isn't of the multitude of industrial waste involved in the chemical production of fake food.  Plastic petrie dishes (made either from biodegradable corn or chemical laden petroleum sources), latex gloves, masks, the building itself.  Too much can go wrong. 

I'm a life long animal lover.  A vegetarian who doesn't WANT to tumble.  (I'm eating ethically raised poultry but against my desires.)  I was once vegan, for the ethics surrounding the issues of animal consumption. 

But I say slaughter the poor creatures and be done with it.  We can't play G-d by creating new food out of cells and DNA and test tubes.  The idea that they're even contemplating it turns my stomach. 

Laboratory food is not the answer to world hunger.  World hunger is a political problem, causes of hunger are typically financially related rather than a lack of global calories.  It's cheaper to stick seeds in the ground, and anyone can do it, regardless of their educational status.  Besides, from what I understand the third world countries most in need of quick, convenient calories to save the masses would never accept some trumped up chemical soup.  They don't want to simply survive.  They want to thrive by their own hands, and they deserve that dignity. 

We need to get back in fields, we need to recreate the fields, and start supporting our local farmers.  Not just for produce, but for the meats and eggs and dairy products so many of us consume regularly.  Shop outside the box...at the farmer's market, or the local co-op.  We need to fight franken food before our other options vanish.  We've already seen GMO corn, soy and canola quietly infiltrate the food supply.  High Fructose corn syrup avoiders are starting to put up a ruckus as they discover how limiting their diet can be.  (Much to the amusement of us uncornies, who can't tolerate the corn in artificial sweeteners, let alone the rest of the derivatives.)  America dropped the ball on the food dye issue (the bandwagon comes back every now and then, but no one seems to want to jump on.  We'd rather follow at a distance.) 

With genetically modified seeds running rampant, and foreign genes in our produce, it's not surprising that the meat is the next to go.  the question is where are we, as a society, going to put our foot down?  Does it have to have an immediate threat to get our attention?  If GMO's made our skin turn purple and our spleens explode within 24 hours, they'd get banned.  But it doesn't.  Like lead and melamine, it takes awhile before the devastating effects can be seen. 

Unfortunately, when our entire food supply is at risk (not to mention the potential of our future food supply) one has to wonder just how much more vital it is to be safe rather than sorry.  We're already overmedicating mild conditions not suffered by poorer nations.  Digestive disturbances, behavioral problems, and childhood epidemics like the 4-As are skyrocketing.  Do we need conclusive proof to use our brains and say there's something unnatural about growing food in environmentally controlled petrie dishes instead of ouside in the sun, soil and elements?  After all, that's where it was designed to grow.  Fruit on trees, veggies on plants, grains as grasses, and meat on animals. 

Go Judge White!

Yeah!
This article came through my inbox. And I must say, I'm proud of my native San Francisco Bay Area heritage today, as apparently it is in the SF BA that common sense regarding genetically modified seeds seems to be actually happening.

I don't want GM sugar beets. Or alfalfa.
And I don't think anyone else does either. Remember that beets can be used to make white sugar. Which, although my husband is currently avoiding, is a very tasty part of our otherwise limited diet.

Genetic modifications have been linked to the rise in corn allergies in the 80's. (Think Starlink scandal.) It hasn't been mainstream long enough for true long term affects to be documented and studied. However, we do know that once it's out there, it's impossible to withdraw due to drift and pollination issues. Now that GM plants have been introduced to the world, they are infiltrating the rest of the crops.

It's like a bad science fiction movie. Except we're actually living the intro.

Avoiding GMOs

Handy trick I just learned from America's Test Kitchen : To find out how fresh produce was grown look at the sticker. The one that has little numbers on it (Penguin likes to decorate her lunchbox with them) It also happens to have a secret code.

In brief: 4 digits indicate conventional produce and usually start with a 3 or a 4. 5 letter digits beginning with a 9 are the sought after "organically grown" fruits and veggies. And 5 letter digits beginning with the number 8 should be avoided at all costs, since they stand for genetically modified organisms.

I suppose you can purchase number 8 if you like...but personally I find the concept of designer DNA disturbing. I'll stick to organics, thank you. Or conventional. Even if there is the very real potential of "drift" from GMO fields. I want my money to say NO to GMO. And support the farmers who are struggling to agree.

Corny Lessons

My mom used to have a little magnet up that read "You can never be too rich or too thin". I saw that phrase quoted in a lot of places while growing up in the 80's.

It's come to mind a lot lately. And I think that the corn industry has proved it wrong, on both counts. Although many people theorize that corn is one of the primary causes of the expanding waistbands of Americans in general, for those with severe intolerance it can have the opposite affect. You see, in order to form fat cells, food has to sit around in the body long enough to be absorbed and digested. Some forms of intolerance cause the body to attempt to rapidly rid itself of identified attackers...including corn.

The guru of genetic engineering, mastermind of maize has proven that one can be too rich, at least as part of a corporation. It boggles my mind how one corporation can grow large enough to dominate the food supply. Sometimes it seems that there are connections, interwoven webs with Monsanto and Corn vital strands. Genetic modification still seems very arrogant to me. How can we presume to know enough about DNA and intricate workings of nature to manipulate the gene pool of the food we rely upon to nourish us? With the knowledge that releasing these genes into the open air, they become impossible to contain should come the responsibility to hold on to that particular technology. There are too many questions left unanswered. Why would anyone gamble our future, our children's health and world, on an arrogant science when better options exist? It boils down to money. There's money in new products, new techniques, new patents. Old ways can't be patented, they can't earn residual income.
Where are the people who are supposed to look out for us? Who's in charge? Well, it looks like the guy who convinced the FDA to treat genetically modified food as "substantially equal" to naturally grown food is now a Senior Adviser to the FDA. And the choice for Under Secretary of Agriculture doesn't trust the American public to make our own decisions about what we do or don't want in products labeled "milk". Otherwise why would he have fought to make it illegal for companies that refuse to use rBGH to label their products rBGH free? (And isn't it a violation of our constitutional right to free speech to forbid a company to advertise the truth about their own product? They weren't bad mouthing rBGH. Just stating that their product was hormone free.)

I suppose since our household is predominantly dairy free, I shouldn't stress too much. But I want to know what's in my food. I think that the American people have a right to know. And I don't think that monetary compensation should have anything to do with what we can and can't know about our food.
The truth is that people don't want extra hormones. They don't trust pesticides or genetic modification. They know that general health has been declining over the past 100 years, even if life spans might increase and treatments for disease improve the odds. Our general health and well being has been steadily going downhill. And we know, instinctively, that it's in our diet and lifestyle.
We aren't suffering from a deficit in gym memberships. We aren't suffering from a deficit in food, nor are we GMO deficient and we certainly don't suffer from lack of rBGH in our dairy products (which we faithfully chug thanks to the dairy boards "Got Milk" campaign). There's something wrong with the packaged food lifestyle, and modifying crops to increase yield, decrease variety and monopolize the food chain is not the answer.
We want simplicity. We want truth. And we want to be trusted with the truth. Unless the government trusts us, how can we trust them?

Geneticall Modified Organisms

The very name sounds frightening. But it doesn't come close to the problem.

Why am I talking about Genetic Modifications, or GMOs? The subject has come up frequently since president elect Obama's choice for Secretary of Agriculture, Vilsack, was announced about a month ago. Vilsack is known as a proponent of bio-tech...in ither words, he is believed to strongly support research into genetic modification of crops and animal cloning etc.

GMOs have been the subject of hot debate for many years, and they don't appear to be falling off the docket any time soon. The "pro" side claims that genetic modification has gone on for centuries, and the current gene-splicing research is simply a modern, streamlined version of what orur forefathers did. The idea being that farmers of old would indeed try to cross breed varieties of wheat, corn, oats, etc to bring out the more desirable traits. Like breeding horses, sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't. And when it didn't, they probably lay in bed thinking that there had to be a better way.

Enter gene splicing. Now we don't have to rely on the whim of mother nature to get the exact traits we're looking for. In a nutshell, scientists find what they are seeking in DNA, then splice the DNA together and watch what happens.

It seems like a good plan. It's certainly more succinct than cross breeding, growing and then harvesting. It's much more scientific than finger crossing and silent prayer.

But the "con" side wants to know about potential pitfalls. Is it safe for human consumption? Is it safe for non-human consumption? Is it safe for the environment? The fact is that we don't know. There's a lot that we just don't know, and that ignorance cn prove fatal for the environment. (I think we're all well acquainted with DDT controversy of the 60's. Dr. Muller actually won a nobel prize for discovering that DDT could be used as an insecticidal. 20 years later, the Dept of Agriculture was phasing it out due to it's possible role in the dramatic decline of the Peregrine Falcon population.)

The threat of GMOs go much deeper than insecticides and pesticides and herbicides. The fear of GMOs comes with the realization that it is virtually impossible to experiment with GMOs and keep the genetically modified genes contained. Nature still does it's job, as it's been programmed to do year after year. Birds eat seed in the field, squirrels steal seed and they get transported. The pollen travels on the wind to another local (organic?) field. And, like time immemorial, the genetic alterations are preserved. Offspring shoot up along highways, and in the middle of other fields. Heirloom varieties of various produce and grain get tainted. These occurrences are impossible to contain, and are impossible to reverse. Even worse? It takes a professional with fancy lab equipment to tell the difference.

That may seem like a good thing. If the only difference between genetically altered crops and normal crops is under a microscope, what's the fuss? Right?

Right?

Wrong. Our bodies may not be able to interpret the difference with our five traditional senses, but over time the differences may reveal themselves.

There was a time when obstetricians reccomended that pregnant women take up smoking, since it made childbirth that much easier. They have turned tables on that advice since the realization that babies with smaller birthrates had a lower survival rate. And a glass of wine is no longer reccomended either, due to the affect alcohol has on a still forming fetus.

These correlations took years to make. And thousands, if not millions, of human beings paid the price. Our children benefit by learning from those mistakes, though.

Genetic Modification doesn't leave room for them to benefit if big companies like Monsanto are wrong. If GMOs are as dangerous to the environment (and the animal life ingesting them) as some people fear, the price will be a hefty one. Clean up efforts will take lifetimes. There will be no starting over from square one, because simply by growing these man-manipulated organisms, we are setting them free in the wild. And honestly...our knowledge is not yet deep enough to truly fathom the potential far reaching implications of those actions.

Through traditional modifications, the gluten content of grain has more than tripled since ancient times. As has the incidence of celiac disease. (Yes, wasting diseases that sound like Celiac were reported even in biblical times) In fact, areas where wheat was most recently introduced (such as southern Ireland) have the highest incidence of Celiac disease.

What does that have to do with GMOs? Well, by using natural resources, humans interfered with nature's plan, developing higher gluten content in wheat and then learned to regret it in certain poulations. Luckily...due to our forced limitations, we were able to identify and treat the problem (hence, 1 in 133 people "simply" avoid gluten containing grains.)

How do we track down reactions to a DNA variability embedded in "normal" food? When one potato chip doesn't attack, but the next one does?

What will happen when a full percent of the poulation needs to avoid GMOs for medical reasons? If that number rises? And those GMOs are rampant in our food supply, blowing unchecked through our prized amber waves of grain?

What if 3 generations down the road, a Nobel Peace prize is awarded to the woman who discovers that early or prenatal exposure to GMOs are linked with heart disease in later life, or infertility, or some new, unknown plague that will only become apparent in our offspring?

What if Genetic Modification isn't a legacy, but a curse?

Organic groups have playfully deemed Genetically Modified Organisms as "Frankenfood", citing the eerily apt connection between Mary Shelley's ignorant but brilliant protagonist and our own agricultural industry's ambitious vision. But just as in her dark fantasy, I fear that "Frankenfood" will come to haunt us for generations to come.

And that's why I signed a petition (I know, internet petitions get little recognition according to Snopes. But it's something.), and sent in letters through a link in this article. And why I prefer organic foods, even when allergies don't demand them.