A reader's comment led me to a very human picture of a scientist conflicted with the research he had done on GMOs. I ran across a whole different approach to debunking, specifically Netflix's "What the Health." And finally, an article describing how our foods have changed so dramatically. Not from "industrialization" but the gentle nudges of farmers for millennia who've domesticated our crops.
Monsanto
If you're a scientist and public communicator, you are putting yourself in professional and personal danger. And as Kevin Folta's case shows, things are only getting worse.
Jurors in California awarded $289 million to a man who claimed that his cancer was due to Monsanto’s herbicide glyphosate – even though that's biologically impossible. Even the judge acknowledged that there was no evidence of harm. Yet trial lawyers manipulated a jury’s emotions and the public’s misunderstanding of science to score another jackpot verdict.
A website that's purportedly focused on rigorous science journalism has published a conspiratorial anti-glyphosate rant, written by an environmental activist with no relevant academic credentials.
Mergers may be a great business decision, but they may not be great for society. If the European Union is not distracted by politics and anti-GMO activists – and if it's able to focus solely on the economic pros and cons of a merger – it is engaging in appropriate regulatory oversight. (But that's a big "if.")
RT is Russia's propaganda outlet in the U.S. and around the world, which broadcasts "news" that advances the agenda of President Vladimir Putin. Ruskin heads U.S. Right to Know, which insists on GMO labeling as a way of scaring Americans about food safety. And USRTK gets a ton of dough from a group which is known to propagandize for RT.
Of the many lies spread about Monsanto, perhaps none is so malevolent as the claim that the seed giant is to blame for farmer suicides in India. This falsehood, spread by anti-biotechnology activists like Vandana Shiva but debunked years ago, is still parroted by credulous left-wing outlets.
The international protest "March Against Monsanto" was never based on truth. The movement perpetuated myths about GMOs to demonize a company that has a really bad PR department. But now that Bayer is buying out Monsanto, what is MAM to do? It's now promoting everything from anti-vaxxer propaganda to historical conspiracy theories.
A well-written and illustrative article in the Washington Post explains a great deal about the U.N.'s International Agency for Research on Cancer, and Monsanto's herbicide glyphosate, Roundup. It should be required reading for Americans concerned about the chemical, as well as GMO food. We'll explain.
What excuse to be anti-science will environmental groups use now that they can no longer claim it's about corporations? Monsanto's early patents on GMOs have started to expire.
Another critique of the recent misguided (at best) IARC evaluation of glyphosate agrees with our dissection of the numerous, ideologically-driven failures of science leading to their assessment that the widely-used herbicide is a likely carcinogen, ignoring new data.
The debate swirling around genetically modified foods was literally on display last night in New York City, in a terrifically enlightening and well-produced event held by intelligence2 debates, where the high-profile proceedings swayed an engaged packed house that embracing GMO foods --and the