I'm highly skeptical of anti-GMO claims. Usually they come from the same family of pseudoscience as anti-nuclear and anti-vaccine
There are very valid arguments against GMOs even if they're safe from a strictly scientific point of view. Those mainly pertain to control over seeds by corporations that will allow them to exploit poor farmers. This is happening to a huge extent in India where many farmers have committed suicide because of these practices.
There are very valid arguments against GMOs
All “valid arguments against GMOs” are ultimately arguments against capitalistic profit-at-all-costs practises.
When you take the profit margin out of the process, there end up being no valid arguments against GMOs, as all such profit-free GMOs that end up moving to production are there purely to benefit humanity as a whole, and not to restrict said benefit to a rarefied group of obscenely wealthy people. It’s the GMOs with capitalistic roots which are problematic for capitalistic, Parasite-Class-greed related reasons.
Yeah, that's basically what I said.
Yep, exactly. I'm against Monsanto suing farmers for cross-pollination when the wind blows.
Seed patents are dumb. Once something has been planted it belongs to the ground now, if it spreads that's too bad for giant corpo.
EDIT: the link above is the the wrong case. I found this link which breaks things down better.. I'm still of the opinion that seed patents are dumb, and that if farmers harvest seeds from crops on their fields they should be allowed to replant them.
You're link isn't even about the "cross pollination" situation (which was also done intentionally by the farmer) but about someone buying the seeds from a third party and then claiming that they are allowed to replant the seeds because they aren't bound by the licensing agreement.
We can argue whether or not this farmer should be allowed to replant the seeds in this case, but trying to paint it as if the seeds flew into his property and then he was sued for it is a disgusting misrepresentation of what actually. It was done very intentionally by the farmer. They aren't some innocent victim, but one who thought he could get the ip without paying for it. We're talking about capitalists fighting each other.
Thank you! Sorry I had gone done a rabbit hole and copied the wrong link. There's a lot of Monsanto lawsuits it turns out.
This was the one I was thinking of, but its not as readable. Also, it's not 100% whether it was solely because of the wind, although that's the claim. https://www.ielrc.org/content/n0407.htm
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto_Canada_Inc_v_Schmeiser
If you don't want to read the link, it wasn't accidental. Some glyphosate resistant crop flew into his property. The farmer killed off all of the other crops with glyphosate and then harvested the seeds from the surviving plants, knowing they were Monsantos ip, and replanted them.
The farmer did not argue in court that it was accidental, but that because it was his private property and he had no agreement with Monsanto that he had the right to do this.
Again we can argue whether or not he had the right to do this. But this whole "poor farmer did nothing and got sued!" Is just straight up blatantly misleading anti GMO propaganda. I don't believe you are intentionally spreading it, but you are none-the-less.
Thank you. I wasn't aware that he was aware it was Monsanto's. I also know that farmers aren't automatically in the right (look at the dairy industry practices and political lobbying for instance). It's relieving to know that it wasn't the original seeds that resulted in the lawsuit, though I think I do lean towards the idea of once seeds are planted the plants and anything they produce belong to the one who planted them.
Do you have any more info about seed patents? I mean I understand it takes a lot of research to develop the pesticide-resistant crops (and also know that an organic label means nothing) but am having a really hard time reconciling the idea of needing a license to plant seeds that you harvested yourself.
Your 'argument against GMOs' is an argument against seed patents, not GMOs. That's the same as saying there's an 'argument against insulin' because big companies own the patents and charge lots of money. The product is absolutely irrelevant to the conversation.
That's not an argument against GMOs, just a specific kind of GMOs.
It's an argument against commercial use of GMOs in agriculture by monopolistic megacorporations.
It's an argument against seed patents and capitalism.
GMOs aren’t inherently bad but many crops are genetically modified to be resistant to glyphosate and other herbicides so they can douse the fields with the stuff.
Even in that case it's not the modified plant itself that's harmful but the remains of roundup left in it after being sprayed.
left in it? I wish. More like left everywhere
This article is pretty close to pure clip bait and possible just media spin from Greenpeace, other more reputable articles don't even mention Greenpeace and highlight a lot of local support against the rice. https://www.isaaa.org/blog/entry/default.asp?BlogDate=5/8/2024
The author didn't address it in the least, which is troubling, but how exactly did they prove to the court that the rice hadn't been shown to be safe? They seem to have made a convincing argument and I'd rather like to know what it was. Seems like an important part of the story to me.
According to the Greenpeace website:
But behind the hype, GE ‘Golden’ rice is environmentally irresponsible, poses risks to human health and could compromise food, nutrition and financial security.
My take from this: It may be that they targeted more than the safety, but also the possibility of gene flow (to other rice crops including wild rice), possible effects on biodiversity, and the ever-present patent issues that come up with GMO's.
Scanning down the page though, they don't specifically say why it poses risks to human health other than some hand-wavey stuff about how it would make people rely on rice instead of providing other sources of vitamin A in their diets.
They also brought up that at least one experiment with the rice on children in China wasn't done ethically, and also that this could be imposed against people's religious beliefs.
It mentions the cross-contamination gene flow stuff, but I thought because rice was self pollinating that that wasnt as big an issue with GM rice. (I'm not an expert by any means.)
Their general argument seems to be "new way bad, old way good" without any scientic evidence. They didn't have to convince scientists though.
Way to go greenpiss. Anti-scietific fear mongering that will only hurt.
That tracks for Greenpeace. They've been fighting nuclear power since their inception.
I mean with nuclear power there are atleast some things objectively problematic like the high costs of the energy produced and the garbage that is left off. I would not have a beef with thrm protesting GMO's either, where they are used to essentially make the farmers dependent on the seller of the crops. It is this black and white aproach thats really got me grinding my gears because at this point its more of a well known cult than a group for the environment.
If we had gone nuclear 60 years ago climate change would be nothing more than an interesting theory. Greenpeace has as much share of the blame for the current state of the world as Exxon mobil does.
This is just obviously untrue. Not least because we did build lots of nuclear power plants. One significant reason why we didn't build more was their high price compared to ... coal and gas plants. But sure, it's Greenpeace's fault and not Exxon Mobil.
To add to this: The great majority of nuclear plant operators are companies with a majority stake in fossil fuels. Apparently fossil fuel is more profitable for them than nuclear. Additionally, it is much, much more cheaper (like a 1:3 cost ratio) to produce renewable energy via solar and wind than to do it via nuclear energy. Also, fissile material is non-renewable and mining sites are mostly situated in non-western regions, making us yet again dependent on energy imports. Further, nuclear energy is just not as quickly scalable as renewables, as the construction of nuclear plants usually takes around 10 years, at minimum, whilst wind and solar parks with the same output as nuclear reactors only require a couple if years. Every pro-nuclear advocate therefore effectively supports the centralized fossil fuel industry (as opposed to decentralized energy production of renewables) and fosters dependence on increasingly expensive fissle fuel imports. The cognitive dissonance by proponents towards nuclear energy simply is as deep as the money pockets of our fossil fuel overlords who are desperate to keep control of the narrative and ownership of the energy production.
Another significant reason we didn't invest more in nuclear was hysteria spread by fear mongering groups like Greenpeace.
But sure, it's Greenpeace's fault and not Exxon Mobil.
They're both to blame. They both put significant money and effort into keeping us on petroleum long after a viable alternative was available.
Classic brainwashed nuclear take presenting it as black & white like if all energy used in the world was from nuclear there would have been no issue on uranium ressource.
Well, let's see. We have a century's worth of uranium left, and only 50 years of petroleum. Also, resource scarcity isn't really the problem with petrochemicals. It's the environmental impact. Nuclear doesn't have that problem. Classic brainwashed tree hugger poser rambling on incoherently while ignoring any and all inconvenient facts. You should join Greenpeace.
Especially with the technological advances in solar energy we have a much cheaper and easier method of generating energy. My parents neighbor installed one and he told me his electricity bill is basically 3 dollar per month now. Although it costed him around 10k to install.
My friend got her doctorate engineering rice to grow in high salinity areas. The goal was to aid farmers near brackish water and without access to good farmland. Greenpeace would definitely not like that.
What a terrible article. A polarized solution: either the dangerous rice or nothing... As if no other possible food sources could exist or could ever have been considered. And nobody saw this coming, and nobody had any backup plans.
The backup plan was to blame Greenpeace and throw their hands in the air, magically absolved of any responsibility. Jesus.
What evidence do you have that it's dangerous? We've got decades of testing that shows it's safe and effective, and the experts all agree that there is no evidence that it's dangerous.
I feel like I'm debating against the anti-vaxxers of the COVID pandemic all over again: ignorant fear over the opinion of experts.
it seems to be the nature of the political situation. If you check the news section of the greenpeace/phillipines website this story is in line with their own stated position. relevant link
Basically, the issue is that this Golden Rice is a foreign species in Philippines. That comes with a lot of complications.
Most importantly, local farmers don't have the knowledge how to deal with this new type of rice. They are worried that their native species are being replaced and could go extinct, which would be difficult to revert. It would lead to yet another platform lock-in.
It's important to save and continue to grow heirloom species, sure. But almost no cultivated species are native to where they're grown.
Patent bullshit aside.
full take: this is a complex topic involving sociology, agricultural science, economics, culture, ethics, and more and deserves serious discourse
meme take: THAT RICE IS PRETTY I WANT IT
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