Throwing Food

New at Reason: Ron Bailey maces the Pure Food demonstrators.

Comments

[Sir Real]

Russ- you might have point if vegetables were addictive. You also might have a point if you could prove that ciggarette options like filterless and low-tar didn't have an impact on the choices people make. Finally, the idea that labels failed because people still smoke is utterly asinine- labels are there to let people who do choose to smoke know exactly what they're doing.

As it is, it sounds as though you resent the idea people have a right to informed consent. If this magazine IS in fact about freedom, that freedom includes the right to make informed choices. Unless your idea of freedom is "Ignorance for their own good".

[Sean]

I think all food grown, produced, processed, manufactured, packaged, transported, stored or sold within 1 mile of a power plant should also be labelled as such. Sure, the evidence might look good that this Power Plant Proximity (PPP) doesn't cause any harm, but given the lack of long term studies on this subject, saying that it will remain safe and not cause any problems in the long term is just a hypothesis, nay, a prediction. Don't we have a right to know? To make a reasoned decision with our free minds. Why don't the manufacturers see this. The govt. should force them to label their products PPPpositive or PPPnegative. Why wouldn't they want to, what are they trying to hide. We the consumer need to make an informed choice. It would be too hard to actually contact the companies we purchase from and ask questions about the food, or look up a website where some one else has done just that, then make our informed choice based on this. Think of all the lazy people who don't care, we must let them know that there is a problem, or will be a problem, or could be a problem, or...you know, problems.

[Kevin Carson]

Bailey's argument is, in a word, CRAP:

"As for labeling, it is true that the United States does not require foods made with genetically ehnanced ingredients to be identified as such. That's because our food and drug laws *require* [emphasis mine] that a product be labeled only if the information is relevant to human health or safety. Sadly, there is one exception to this *reasonable rule*? [emphasis mine] organically produced foods. Organic farmers managed to bamboozle the feds into *allowing* [emphasis mine] special labeling requirements for their products. Thus, if some consumers get spooked by unfounded activist claims that biotech foods are harmful, they may be lured into buying labeled organic products."

This last sentence is profoundly condescending to consumers. Do you, or do you not, favor statist laws prohibiting food packagers or retailers from including product label information on whether food contains GM material? If you do, you can not under any conceivable circumstances legitimately call yourself a libertarian. You should start calling yourself a Republican corporate apologist who supports legalizing pot.

If your beloved GM foods cannot survive in a free market, without FDA labelling restrictions or statist patent monopolies, then they should die. Are you AFRAID of ALLOWING consumers to know what they are buying? If you appoint yourself philosopher-king to allow consumers to know only what YOU think matters or is good for them, how exactly are you any different from paternalistic, condescending slime like Hillary, Rosie and Barbra? How any different from the Public Health Nazis who have suppressed information on the effects of mercury in childhood vaccines?

News flash: a libertarian is someone who supports the right of free people to use their own judgement in the free market in all cases, not someone who is compelled to apologize for big business under any circumstances.

Plutark is right on: we don't need ANY regulations or prohibitions. Just allow a total free market in information, and caveat emptor!

[Jough]

A non-GM food label amounts to a health claim, which is (right or wrong) regulated. Kinda like "antibacterial" dish soap where one company labeled their product as such after laboratory testing and a competitor (thinking it was solely a cheap marketing gimick?) did the same only to have their hand slapped by the FDA. (I think I have that story right...)

[B.P.]

k e and Sir Real:

If you're the worrywort, you should bear the extra costs of purchasing foods labelled non-GMO and not foist costs on those who don't give a crap about your worries. Kosher foods are labelled and marketed to a certain religious minority. This religious minority is not (to my mind) trying to foist additional costs on the majority community by lobbying Congress to require all other foods to be labelled "non-Kosher". And k e, to suggest that demand for labelling is "widespread" is way off the mark.

[erf]

Supporting genetically modified food makes sense, but why is labelling it such a bad thing? Labelling is almost the sole option for easily determining information on a food product.

[Plutarck]

Those who oppose genetic engineering want labeling because otherwise no one would notice or care whether or not their food had GE stuff in it; just isn't enough FUD flying to get people into a panic.

Companies and pro-GE folks don't want it because it would give the anti-GE people enough foothold to bitch and moan and lie and FUD all over.

I just prefer a voluntary labeling system, with only the requirement that you not claim that something is not GE if it actually IS GE. If you really are so against GE products, then just buy the stuff that advertises how it contains no GE products.

So what's the big deal? All you have to do is assume, if it really bother you, that everything contains GE stuff unless it says otherwise. So what's the problem, then, other than wanting to add yet more regulation and useless waste-of-time labels to stuff that no one will read or care about anyway?

What I personally dislike is I end up having to buy stupid organic no-GE crap just because I'm a vegetarian. So personally I've just added pesticides to all my salt shakers to pick up the slack; now to figure out how to effectively genetically modify the junk to make it better...

[Plutarck]

Oh, boiling that down into two bullet points:

Anti-GE folks want labeling because it will make their job of opposition easier.

Pro-GE folks don't want labeling because it will make their job of production and sales harder.

[Madog]

I just assume that everything that's not labeled organic has some ammount of geneticly modified ingredients in it. Labeling seems a little pointless, since pretty much everything would need to be labeled. I supposed a "No-GM Ingredient" label would work, for those things that aren't organic but aren't GM either. Pretty soon though it's going to be either GM or Organic only judging from the way the ideologies fall...

[twistedmerkin]

Is there a technical definition of genetically modified? I mean, wasn't Mendel genetically modifying his peas? Isn't there a lot of our crops, like corn, that are very different from the original, "wild" variety. Has my Doberman been genetically modified?

[Madog]

The splicing genes carrying the exact desired trait from one organism into another under carefully controlled lab conditions is the new, evil and dangerous form of Genetic Modification that must be stopped.

Radom crossbreeding and inbreeding or random mutation by mutagenic chemicals and radiation is the old, traditional, and safe way of creating new crops that is OK.

Heritige strains are older breeds of crops (and animals) that most people have stopped using. However, peasant farmers and aboriginals still use them. They're the best of all and should be brought back because our crops are sorely lacking in diversity.

So remember Diversity is Good. However, you can only get diversity by using older almost forgotten strains of crops or by randomly mutating crops with dangerous substances. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SHOULD YOU CAREFULLY SELECT ONLY THE GOOD TRAITS AND REMOVE THE BAD!!!!!

[Anonymous]

My doberman has GMO branded into his ass. Not sure where it came from, it was there when I got him as a puppy. He's always growling and snapping at hippies. Good dog.

[Russ]

Obviously labeling is a pancea. Look how effective it was in getting everyone to stop smoking cigarettes. Of course it didn't work. And the presence of the label didn't even make one bit of difference in the defense of the cigarette makers, either. So labeling is just a symbolic gesture which costs everyone money since it would be something the government would have to enforce, yet has already been proven to have zero effectiveness for anyone. If you want government to accelerate symbolism, have them fund the arts.

[ke]

Bailey's argument against labeling is bogus. He bases it on the "fact" that genetic modifications are not relevant to human health or safety. The problem is, it's not a fact, it's a hypothesis, or a prediction, even, and one on which there is plenty of room for credible disagreement. I hope he's right. I even suspect he's right. But the evidence he cites - from a source who, as quoted, sounds hostile to GM opponents - is not as persuasive as it first seems, either.

First, it barely seems plausible - so many "traditional" foods are genetically modified in this country that unless one is going far out of one's way to avoid them, one is consuming them, probably lots of them. Where would all these non-GMO cases come from "in the meantime"? How were the cases separated? How were the causes so definitively reached? Is he arguing GM soy will not provoke an allergic reaction in a person allergic to soy? Nobody in all this time has discovered a soy allergy eating a GM soy product? That seems unlikely. I'd like to know more about the methodology before just swallowing Bailey's argument from authority.

But more critically, so what? Bailey's conclusion doesn't follow, even if Crawford, as presented, is exactly right. Biotech agriculture can produce massive changes to organisms, which argues against broad generalizations across different foods and quick conclusions about safety and the sufficiency of safety testing. Even if every innovation created and passed through the FDA so far has ended up being perfectly safe, it doesn't mean that there can't be long term effects, and it certainly doesn't mean the next innovation will be perfectly safe. It doesn't even mean conclusively that the testing is working. It may only mean we've been lucky, or a hole in the testing regimes hasn't been found, or an effect of long-term exposure hasn't shown up yet.

So. Many experts agree with Bailey and some don't. The data so far seems encouraging and justifies selling the foods, but it's incomplete and not necessarily predictive of what happens tomorrow, leaving room for ongoing skepticism. People with concerns have plenty of ground to defend those concerns and ask for information on a product label so they can make informed individual purchasing decisions.

It's amazing. The industry behaves secretively and defies widespread demand that it inform customers about what's GM and what's not. Then its apologists ridicule people who worry about genetic modifications. Which way is it? Is it no big deal for consumers to worry about? If so, why not just put it on the label? Or is it some state secret no customer should ever know about - and if so, why shouldn't we worry?

Reason's motto involves free markets AND free minds. Perhaps customers are qualified to examine the issue themselves with their free minds and choose for themselves between GM and non-GM foods in the free market.

But then, that would require labels.

[dhex]

but wouldn't it be in the interests of the "organic" food producers and those companies to make sure they have no GM labels because it suits their client base? don't they do this already?

i'm missing something here...

[patricia]

great point we are now studying gmos in school and we eather have to defend of oprove

[MIKE]

GMO, GMO, GMO, GMO!!!

QUOTE: "the price of peace is eternal vigilance"
(Queen Mother)

QUOTE: "Look before you leap"
(UNKNOWN)

All the positive contributions of GMO's are fantastic for increasing human performance. Change must take place for the positive evolution of mankind. Let?s just keep stead of our development and maintain what works well now and use what is better when we are sure of its contribution.

Example:

Parachuting

It is possible for humans to jump out of a plane!
This is common knowledge to many...
It is safest to jump when harnessed into a parachute.
This is common knowledge to many...

A long time ago...
When testing the first parachute they harnessed in a "DUMMY" that weighed and had the same dimensions as a human to test the parachutes capability.
A long time ago...
The "DUMMY" safely landed on the ground. Once they had the perfect parachute that had been tested on tens of "DUMMY'S" they optioned the experience to humans.
A long time ago...
A human landed on the ground safely

Thus, jumping out of a plane seemed crazy to humans at first and until it was tested. When the tests results were positive and the results were optioned to the first human parachuter?s they could then experience parachuting.

Similarly, GMO's seem crazy to humans at first until they are tested. When the test results are positive and the results are optioned to the first human participants we can then safely experience human evolution.

In conclusion,

It is only right to option people the life benefit of choice. If you choose to be a "DUMMY" then that is your choice. If you choose to be a participant then that is your choice. Most importantly, Stay vigilant and enjoy the leap into the genetically modified future.

[Levine Carol]

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DATE: 01/20/2004 11:34:22
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