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> GMO crops are safe My objections to GMO crops are more around an aversion to industrial scale farming, monocultures, corporate-controlled seed stocks, and ul

> GMO crops are safe My objections to GMO crops are more around an aversion to industrial scale farming, monocultures, corporate-controlled seed stocks, and ultimately authenticity in the food I eat - not the health effects of the food itself. So I'll vote to oppose GMO crops, and I think it's right for politicians to reflect that opinion. Little to do with science, much more to do with the kind of life I want to live and the world I want to live in.

dragonwriter 9y ago
> My objections to GMO crops are more around an aversion to industrial scale farming, monocultures, corporate-controlled seed stocks, and ultimately authenticity in the food I eat - not the health effects of the food itself. Those are also (except maybe “authenticity”, since it's not clear what that concretely means; but I suspect it still applies with any coherent operationalization) at least as much of an issue with modern non-GMO crop development, including modern corporate industrial-scale organic agriculture “GMO” is a distraction.
- barrkel 9y ago
  It's revealing to notice how many replies don't understand authenticity. One way to put it: do you know the name of the farmer who grew or raised your food? Have you met them or their family personally? What's your judgement of their character?
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > It's revealing to notice how many replies don't understand authenticity Only revealing of the fact that you are using a word that doesn't have a single well-established definition applicable to the context in which you've used it. Nor have you actually articulated a definition, only examples (none of which correspond to any usual sense of “authenticity”.) In any case, the examples you've given all seem to be applicable to industrial farming, to which GMOs are an orthogonal concern.
euyyn 9y ago
Industrial scale farming and monocultures don't need GMOs to happen already. Not sure what food authenticity means... that it's not a cheap Chinese copy?
goialoq 9y ago
"authenticity in food" is a massive myth. The foods you eat have been genetically modified for centuries via breeding techniques. "monocultures" and "industrial scale farming" are separate from GMO, and will exist without GMO, as they existed before GMO. DRMed seeds and health precaution are they only relevant aspects of GMO.
- colemannugent 9y ago
  >The foods you eat have been genetically modified for centuries via breeding techniques This is my go-to whenever people start talking about organic products. This article does a good job showing what crops used to look like: http://www.businessinsider.com/what-foods-looked-like-before-genetic-modification-2016-1/#wild-watermelon-1 http://www.businessinsider.com/what-foods-looked-like-before...
  - eecc 9y ago
    That’s disingenuous and straw-man’y. Selective breeding consists of favoring individuals with desirable naturally occurring variations in characteristics. Outright genetic engineering consists of cobbling together genes of totally unrelated species - if not kingdoms - to make something invulnerable to otherwise toxic amounts of poisons to increase production yield. I’ll keep my breeding any time thank you..
    - euyyn 9y ago
      Artificial selection has already made plenty sure that our surviving crops are invulnerable to what otherwise used to be toxic amounts of poisons. Our own DNA has genes of ancient virus cobbled together, and those aren't even a kingdom. "Naturally occurring variations" can also be phrased as "random genetic mutations we have no control over and aren't sure if they're safe".
    - colemannugent 9y ago
      >...favoring individuals with desirable naturally occurring variations in characteristics... >...cobbling together genes of totally unrelated species... Both of these statements describe genetic engineering. But you're right, there is a big difference between them: one is basically just throwing things at the wall to see what sticks and the other is a scientific process backed by hundreds of years of research. The reason why people assign a lower risk to selective breeding is that the amount of physiological change present in one or a few generations is small. You don't worry that the rice you eat had a trascription error and may be genetically altered because it is invisible to you. But when you look at genetic engineering you see the big changes in a short amount of time and you feel it is more unsafe even though those alterations are being performed by some of the most intelligent minds of our generation. You talk of scientists "cobbling together genes of totally unrelated species" as if they were nice modular pieces that you can rearrange in any order. Just the mechanism by which genes are edited is a choreographed sequence of tools that make the steady hands of the worlds best surgeon look bad. I am not nessesarily 100% pro-GMO though, I just dislike the FUD that people use to demonize it as something radically different that what humans have been doing for millenia. The only thing different is that now we have a clue what we are doing. Will some people abuse it to benefit themselves? Yes, of course, but that is independent of the methods by which they screw people over.

dragonwriter 9y ago

> My objections to GMO crops are more around an aversion to industrial scale farming, monocultures, corporate-controlled seed stocks, and ultimately authenticity in the food I eat - not the health effects of the food itself. Those are also (except maybe “authenticity”, since it's not clear what that concretely means; but I suspect it still applies with any coherent operationalization) at least as much of an issue with modern non-GMO crop development, including modern corporate industrial-scale organic agriculture “GMO” is a distraction.

barrkel 9y ago
It's revealing to notice how many replies don't understand authenticity. One way to put it: do you know the name of the farmer who grew or raised your food? Have you met them or their family personally? What's your judgement of their character?
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > It's revealing to notice how many replies don't understand authenticity Only revealing of the fact that you are using a word that doesn't have a single well-established definition applicable to the context in which you've used it. Nor have you actually articulated a definition, only examples (none of which correspond to any usual sense of “authenticity”.) In any case, the examples you've given all seem to be applicable to industrial farming, to which GMOs are an orthogonal concern.

euyyn 9y ago

Industrial scale farming and monocultures don't need GMOs to happen already. Not sure what food authenticity means... that it's not a cheap Chinese copy?

goialoq 9y ago

"authenticity in food" is a massive myth. The foods you eat have been genetically modified for centuries via breeding techniques. "monocultures" and "industrial scale farming" are separate from GMO, and will exist without GMO, as they existed before GMO. DRMed seeds and health precaution are they only relevant aspects of GMO.

colemannugent 9y ago
>The foods you eat have been genetically modified for centuries via breeding techniques This is my go-to whenever people start talking about organic products. This article does a good job showing what crops used to look like: http://www.businessinsider.com/what-foods-looked-like-before-genetic-modification-2016-1/#wild-watermelon-1 http://www.businessinsider.com/what-foods-looked-like-before...
- eecc 9y ago
  That’s disingenuous and straw-man’y. Selective breeding consists of favoring individuals with desirable naturally occurring variations in characteristics. Outright genetic engineering consists of cobbling together genes of totally unrelated species - if not kingdoms - to make something invulnerable to otherwise toxic amounts of poisons to increase production yield. I’ll keep my breeding any time thank you..
  - euyyn 9y ago
    Artificial selection has already made plenty sure that our surviving crops are invulnerable to what otherwise used to be toxic amounts of poisons. Our own DNA has genes of ancient virus cobbled together, and those aren't even a kingdom. "Naturally occurring variations" can also be phrased as "random genetic mutations we have no control over and aren't sure if they're safe".
  - colemannugent 9y ago
    >...favoring individuals with desirable naturally occurring variations in characteristics... >...cobbling together genes of totally unrelated species... Both of these statements describe genetic engineering. But you're right, there is a big difference between them: one is basically just throwing things at the wall to see what sticks and the other is a scientific process backed by hundreds of years of research. The reason why people assign a lower risk to selective breeding is that the amount of physiological change present in one or a few generations is small. You don't worry that the rice you eat had a trascription error and may be genetically altered because it is invisible to you. But when you look at genetic engineering you see the big changes in a short amount of time and you feel it is more unsafe even though those alterations are being performed by some of the most intelligent minds of our generation. You talk of scientists "cobbling together genes of totally unrelated species" as if they were nice modular pieces that you can rearrange in any order. Just the mechanism by which genes are edited is a choreographed sequence of tools that make the steady hands of the worlds best surgeon look bad. I am not nessesarily 100% pro-GMO though, I just dislike the FUD that people use to demonize it as something radically different that what humans have been doing for millenia. The only thing different is that now we have a clue what we are doing. Will some people abuse it to benefit themselves? Yes, of course, but that is independent of the methods by which they screw people over.