Domain: organicconsumers.org
Stories and comments across the archive that link to organicconsumers.org.
Comments · 118
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Re:Hm, interesting...
What is obvious to us is obvious to the europeans.
Do not buy american products.
Pepsi, MacDonalds, Coca-cola, Marlboro, etc, are all international companies, who have local factories in Europe. A mass boycott of these products would be more an act of symbolism against Capitalism than anything useful; in fact, this would hurt the local economies, not the North American.
However, there is an increasing preference of national/european products over american ones.
Do not go to american movies.
Do not listen to american music.
Do not wear american clothing.
etc.
And what change would any of this make in Europe? You're talking about AMERICAN CULTURE. American products+movies+music+clothing+games don't sell enough to sustain the USA economy. It's WEAPONS and TECHNOLOGY that matter here, and the European Union is already seeking independence in these sectors.
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Re:why the hating on Monsanto? You Bet!
The problem is that Companies have tried to patent genes, if not whole cells. While a year old, they are the top hits on google (so they must be right!) you should look at Organic Consumers Association and The Detroit News
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Monsanto is Evil Incarnate
SCO never killed people nor caused children to be born with birth defects. Monsanto is far, far more irresponsible with their power. They created Agent Orange, Bovine Growth Hormone, and PCBs and have covered up known health problems caused by them for decades until exposed by whisteblowers. They created Terminator Seeds which destroy the ability of developing nations to maintain sustainable crops, and they've created a whole slew of "Roundup Ready" crops that are genetically engineered to withstand having pesticides dumped all over them (which are suspected to cause cancer). The sue small farmers whose crops are contaminated by pollen containing their patented seeds and financially ruin them.
I don't like to toss the word Evil around casually like some people, but Monsanto is Satan's Flaming, Spike-Studded Cockring.
One of my favorite quotes:
"Monsanto should not have to vouchsafe the safety of biotech food. Our interest is in selling as much of it as possible. Assuring its safety is the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) job."
-- Phil Angell, Director of Corporate Communications, Monsanto -
Don't forget after harvest
There have been documented problems that can occur after harvest as well.
I personally don't have anything against generically engineered organisms, only that you have to be very careful managing them. While they shouldn't be able to compete as well as "natural" varieties, all it takes are a few big screw-ups to destroy the industry.
Indoor growing helps, as do a number of other controls that can be put in place. Moderate regulation is a good thing, in my opinion. -
Re:How long before this gets into the food chain?
I'd like it if I had a choice other than becoming a vegetarian. I for one would pay a premium for range fed beef or even beef from certified humane feed lots, if my supermarket would carry it.
Try natural food stores or specialty grocery stores like the Fresh Market or EarthFare? They usually sell range-fed beef and free range chicken.
Earlier in this thread, someone suggested that if consumers didn't want hormone-grown, genetically-modified, antibiotic-laden meat, they'd stop buying it, and when it became unprofitable, producers would stop producing and selling it. While that's true in principle, it depends on informed consumers. The nasty thing is that agribusiness is spending a lot of money on lawsuits and lobbying to prevent customers from becoming informed. For example, Monsanto has sued a Maine dairy to prevent them from marketing their milk as free of bovine growth hormone. Likewise, agribusiness lobbying has prevented every effort in Congress to require labelling of genetically modified produce -- information that would allow customers to make informed decisions about the produce they buy.
Now, I am not an opponent of genetically-modified foods; I prefer to make my decisions on a case by case basis. For example, given the information to make the choice, I would not buy Roundup-Ready(tm) produce, since the genetic modifications are of no benefit to me as the consumer, but help the industrial farmers practice environmentally-damaging and unsustainable pesticide-drenched monocropping. On the other hand, I would love to buy Flavr-Savr(tm) tomatoes, because the modifications actually benefit the consumer -- they mean that I can buy tomatoes that are actually ripe rather than green tomatoes that have been ethylene-ripened on the shelf. But unless GM crops are labelled, I have no way of knowing what kind of modifications my tomatoes or soybeans contain. Informed consumers are a basic requirement of a free market, and if the necessary information is withheld, it's not realistic to expect market forces to reflect what consumers actually want.
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End Of The World Is Nigh! DOOM! DOOM! DOOM!
<sarcasm>
The sun is angry; we are doomed. These flares are just the beginning, they will increase in magnitude until they are so big, they penetrate the Earth's magnetic field, destroy the entire ozone layer and sanitize the surface of the Earth with UV rays - just like an autoclave. Not even bacteria will survive except underground and deep in the Ocean.
The signs are showing, this is the END OF THE WORLD! The sun has been showing more activity since 1940 than it has for the last 1000 years put together. Doom is imminent!
Scientists don't act worried, they think they understand the sun and how it works, but science it just guesses. Maybe the sun is made of iron instead of hydrogen where would all the theories that say we are safe be then, if such a basic 'fact' about the sun turned out to be wrong?
As the flares grow in size and number you will all see that my theory is correct! "What is my theory?" you ask. It is that since the END OF THE WORLD makes a good movie plot point, that it must be happening NOW! These are going to be interesting times... We should all start storing canned food and porno mags in bomb shelters now before it's too late and we get cooked by the MASSIVE RADIATION STORM!
And what if the sun should stop flaring, and I should get proven wrong. WE ARE STILL DOOMED! In the same way that load from a light socket makes the generators in a power plant harder to turn, so geomagnetic storms transfer the kinetic energy of megatons of speeding charged particles directly to the magmatic dynamo at our planet's core. Small purturbations can affect this chaotic fluid flow in unpredictable ways but the most worrying is that the shock from the kinetic energy of all those particles will cause avalanches at the core/mantle boundary this will cause massive vulcanism that will cover the earth with lava!
If that doesn't get us, terrorists wielding viruses will.
Get out your sandwich board and whisky! Walk the streets and warn! THE END OF THE WORLD IS NIGH!!!!
<sarcasm>
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Re:Hmmm.Gosh, I only have a few minutes so:
...for starters.-- MarkusQ
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Who are the real pirates?
Just a few examples of the stupid US patents on other countries' products:
Bio-Piracy Campaign Exposes Holes in U.S Patent Laws
http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/tur-cn.htm
http://www.rediff.com/news/1996/3011am.htm
The US Patent System Legalizes Theft and Biopiracy
Absurd patent laws -
Re:not complicated
They need EPA's superfund to clean up after their toxic waste.
They need huge government subsidies to keep their huge hog farms running.
The government pays unemployment benefits to jobs lost from gross corporate mismanagement
The government pays dearly when defrauded out of billions of dollars.
In fact, it sounds like the worst thing our economy has suffered through is the rich.
Easy Peasy Japanesey. -
Cargill/Dow--From Frankencorn to FrankenfleeceWhile doing some more research on this I found a very interesting article talking about the background of Cargill Dow. According to it they are trying to push genetically engineered products.
Corn based plastics sound good, but this article certainly is a good counter hype.
regards,
Heiko
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Re:Wager your privacy
Heh, that one is easy.
:)
From the Law Firm filing suit (or whatever it is called, obviously IANAL)
and yes, they were found guilty;
link
another link
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Supermarket discount cards.My supermarket gives me discounts in exchange for knowing what I buy regularly.
No, they don't. They just charge more to people who don't have the discount cards. Depending on the options available to you (I have not a clue where you come from), there are numerous grocery options that don't have "discount cards". Compare prices. Wal-Mart (while evil) has lower prices than the grocery store with a discount card. HEB (a regional chain that's spreading like wildfire) does, too.
Now, I live in the most competitive grocery market (the article is from Fortune, not this hippie rag
:) ) in the US, the Dallas/Ft. Worth market, so options are everywhere. I don't like Wal-Mart any more than the next person. But I shop there. Why?They don't want my shopping information, and they have lower prices.
The normal grocer's notion that I should be willing to give them something valuable, for no better prices than I can get somewhere else, is laughable and irritating. Can't beat Wal-Mart without it? Fine. Go away. And you know who to blame for my attitude (you knew this was coming)? You and your corporate brethren. Change the way you deal with me, and I'll consider changing the way I think about you.
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Re:IMHO
You mean Wal*Merde , don't you? The lines are too long, the help is surly[1], other shoppers are clueless and the pricing isn't all that competitive when you look at the quality of some of the crap on their shelves.
[1]From being forced to work unpaid overtime.
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Also found in "distraction"Smart mobs with a closer connection to realtity are also mentioned in "DISTRACTION"
In that case they are mentioning how an unkown org was able to get a group of people to distroy a bank. (they were using a system of mod points) I believe we will see a lot of tech from that book in real life.
nomad phones for one need to be built. I am looking into it.(contact mph at home . nyc . ny in the US domain. )
building physical things by location would be neat does not sound to unreasonable.
A lab storing genetic materials sounds like what passed over my desk years ago by the name of Seeds of Change but looks like many more organizations are doing that now in the organic communities -
Re:Deers?Actually, the epidemic (if that's what it is) may have started in domestic livestock and spread to wild herds via contact along fencelines.
I've been following this for a while. I hunt with a camera instead of a rifle, but it's just as important to me even if I don't eat much venison. I've read that overcrowding and mismanagement of domestic herds may have played a big part in the disease getting its foothold. It would be a tragedy if this turns out to be yet another example of mankind's careless destruction of nature.
Here's another interesting article.
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Re:are you sure that...
That same bullshit also in Canada.
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Re:I saw one of these at the weekend
I am a troll so I won't attempt to give you some clues on the mother's health or even the fact that these docs actually suggest but don't force the mothers to act in any way that would actually shock them.
I am sure they have some good reasons for such suggestions. Nestle doesn't gain a significant part of its revenue, there.
Maybe some fame at all.
But I like the fact you expect somebody to change your mind.
Now, if you want to be scared of something, just try this or this.
Now tell me, are Nestle *that* evil ???
FUCK THE MODERATORS !!!
DO NOT MOD ME UP OR I'LL FLAMEBAIT UNTIL I GET TO -1 AGAIN!!! -
Re:There's only one solution.Unfortunately, writing to government officials about Monsanto's crimes is likely to be particularly ineffective - a list of people involved in regulation shows how close Government links are with Monsanto: to quote one example (out of 12):
Linda J. Fisher
I'm sure writing will have some influence, but not as much as a stack of stock options. The best way to make progress is to reduce the amount of apathy and ignorance on these matters - if you care about corporate crime then be sure to tell your friends, family and colleagues why. ... former Assistant Administrator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency's Office of Pollution Prevention, Pesticides, and Toxic Substances, ... then became Vice President of Government and Public Affairs for Monsanto Corporation and now (2001) is Deputy Director of the Environmental Protection Agency.Of course I do agree with the original post, if I understand the intent correctly - if an individual caused the same degree of harm then prosecution would be a certainty. So why then, in a civilised country, should criminal corporations be allowed to do business?