MUST See Film - The Future of Food

[NashVegas]

Tonight I attended a showing of Deborah Koonz Garcia's The Future of Food, an almost 90-minute documentary on the creep of GM/GE foods and the market forces that are pushing it on us.

The most compelling reason to see this and to get as many people as you can to view it is that Garcia (Jerry's widow) wastes very little time on the "Frankenfood" arguments - that get so easily ridiculed by the John Stossel types - and devotes the bulk of it to the issue of patents and corporations controlling the means of our food supply.

Early on, it also raises a point I've not seen made anywhere else: the fertilizers and pest control chemicals that came into agriculture in the 20th century were chemicals that were originally produced for the purpose of chemical warfare.

</climbs off soapbox>

http://thefutureoffood.com/

Sidenote: there was a panel discussion & Q & A after the showing, with Garcia, two local organic farmers, and a bio-chem type. Someone asking a question mentioned an incredible irony: in Tennessee, our Republican representatives are far more responsive to organic farming issues than Democrats. I've seen evidence of this, myself. It's bizarre.

[mike_c]

1. I agree with your main point about GM foods...

...but I think pushing the "chemical warfare" button is a bit much. Organochlorine and organophosphate pesticides are cholinesterase inhibitors. Yes, they were originally researched in the context of weapons development during WWII, but many were found to be very effective pesticides. The story of pesticide misuse and its ecological consequences is more complex than most people understand, IMO, and it does little good to simply push emotional buttons like they "were chemicals that were originally produced for the purpose of chemical warfare." In fact, that statement itself goes a bit too far-- the classes of compounds to which those insecticides belong were originally researched as potential nerve agents because they're cholinesterase inhibitors, but to my knowledge none of the compounds used as pesticides were ever "produced" for chemical warfare. Most are far more toxic to insects than to humans.

on edit: I don't mean for that last statement to minimize the risk of overexposure to pesticides, particularly the organophosphates which replaced organochlorines like DDT in the 1970s-- they're quite toxic, but at considerably higher doses than insecticidal applications.

[Dora]

2. I think I understand what you're saying, Mike...

I thank you for bringing it up, because it's a perspective that contributes to the framing of the issue of "good" foods vs. "bad" foods.

I can't imagine that the conceptualization and research of pesticides and fertizlizers was for any reason other than good - one reason being the increased production of crops to supply a nation that was growing exponentially. It's terribly unfortunate that these modern-day "potions" have turned out to have such damaging environmental consequences. The tragedy is agribusiness's inability (outright refusal, I'll say) to take responsibility for its ecological actions and discontinue the use of toxins and GM plants. And then, of course, there's our government's refusal to take responsibility for protecting its citizen's interests. And we have ourselves to blame too: we are the citizenry that continues to purchase food that is already prepared, genetically modified, artificially flavored and colored, nutrient-stripped, saturated with flavor enhancers and texture stabilizers, and laden with sugars our bodies can't process.

Failure to take responsibility is endemic, these days. I hate to blame this phenomenon on Republicans, but it's tempting. They sure do seem to have cornered the market on it these days.

Yet another development of factory farming and research that terrifies me is their growing control of the seed supply, and their manipulation of seeds to produce sterile fruit -- thereby eliminating our means of growing food for our own use or profit.

[NashVegas]

4. The Claim That Was Made

In fertilizers, reference to nitrogen (WW1). Pesticide was a WW2 chemical, can't remember which. It wasn't the main focus of the film, just an early "oh, and by the way ..."

[Dora]

3. I've heard of this movie. Thanks for sharing your experience.

"Our Republican representatives are far more responsive to organic farming issues than Democrats."

I've seen this in my very Republican father-in-law myself. It's quite interesting, and it just encourages me that we're not as different from each other after all.

Agribusiness's control of our seed supply and their judicial dominance over the small farmer terrifies me, and I'm not a farmer. I'm lucky that my husband grew up on a farm, and he knows what it's like to raise the food you eat (he said they were sometimes pretty hungry). I'm quite committed to the idea of Victory Gardens and their value as revolutionary and empowering, but I'll admit I'm a little slow to get my own garden going. We have a couple of potato plants and some tomatoes, and I hope to get some eggplant and beans in the ground soon.

I hope I can rent this movie somewhere.

[NashVegas]

5. Could It Be Idealism Gone Astray?

Of those who promote GM/GE, there is a segment of people with good intentions who think it's the best way of feeding all the world's starving.

[politicat]

6. The seed issue is the biggie, as far as I'm concerned.

Genetic manipulation has been going on since the birth of agriculture - the only real difference now is that it can be done faster when it's done under a microscope instead of in the fields. (And since we share 95% of our DNA with every other living thing on the planet...)

But this suicide seed thing is a very bad thing. We're still using the descendants of seeds that my great-great-grandfather used (for the corn) and I just had some tomato seeds that are older than my mother start coming up. (keep your fingers crossed.) There's a lot of genetic diversity that is going to just go poof if the DNA patterns of the seeds become someone's property. And if someone's patented DNA blows into our field, we're in trouble. These corporate raiders apparently never get outside, and don't realize that the wind blows and bees transport pollen. I'm scared to death that we're going to end up with suiciding DNA in our seed supply and it will destroy our productivity or get us sued or kill our organic certification or all three. We could quite literally be ruined if the farmer three miles away plants suiciding Round-up Ready corn.

There's a reason that the botany and ag researchers at Purdue and IU love the local Amish - the genetic diversity of their seeds.

As for the organophosphates and organochlorines... my biggest issue with fertilizers and pesticides are not the fact that they pollute and not the fact that they kill the good bugs as well as the bad bugs. As far as I'm concerned, every damn mosquito on the planet can die a horrible death and I'll cheer. The end of endemic malaria is a Very Good Thing, to my mind. But fertilizers and pesticides are made from oil. Thus, we're supporting a farming industry with a scarce resource that cannot be replicated without a switch to large scale agricultural production of oil-substitutes. And we can't build agricultural production of oil-substitutes on the scale we need without oil-based pesticides and fertilizers. Houston, we have a problem....

[NashVegas]

7. What Surprises Me

Is that there hasn't yet been a class action lawsuit by the nation's farmers - against the government - and that no one has come forward to provide legal support.

I wonder if the farmers are too afraid of losing their subsidies to try it.

[BamaGirl]

8. I will have to check this out

TMI ahead...My 9 year old...nine years old darnit!...started her period this weekend. I blame it on the chicken lol. All the stuff they do to all our food just can't be beneficial.

[Dora]

9. If you haven't switched to organic milk yet...

Perhaps you can switch to that. You'll find that it tastes better and keeps longer.

That must be kind of scary for your daughter to realize she's a "woman" at nine years old. Take good care of her; feed her well. :)

[jeanarrett]

10. If any of you have the time--please read this very interesting

article I found while researching my banana "allergy." I found it very informative and rather scary. I grew up on a "hobby" farm in which we grew most of our own food, including beef, pork and milking two cows. I attribute my good health today (in spite of other bad habits) to my first 21 years of eating "the good stuff."

http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:cd3LkrFuN_gJ:www.health-report.co.uk/allergies.html+Allergy+to+Bananas&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=57