By Dr. Mercola
Many in the alternative media have long warned against genetically engineered (GE) crops and other genetically altered foods, pointing out the blatant lies presented by the chemical technology and junk food industry, led by Monsanto.
I have long designated Monsanto the most dangerous corporation on the planet, and clearly this is a growing sentiment.
Two years ago, the Natural Society named Monsanto the worst company of 20111—a distinction earned for "threatening both human health and the environment." And, as reported by Forbes2 that same year:
"Monsanto is so despised by environmentalists that Google's first suggested search term for the St. Louis company is 'Monsanto evil.' Readers... voted Monsanto the world's most evil corporation in a January poll, giving the corporation a whopping 51 percent of the vote."
Speaking of Forbes, after naming Monsanto Company of the Year in 2009, the magazine published an article3 the following year stating they were "wrong on Monsanto… really wrong," citing problems with resistant superweeds and investigations over antitrust issues and a potential flop in an expensive new variety of GE corn seed.
Most recently, Politico4, 5 wrote about Monsanto’s attempts at addressing and cleaning up its image as the devil incarnate—albeit in company form.
Monsanto Confronts Its Public Image Problem
Recognizing the industry has a serious image problem, the chemical technology giant is hard at work devising a makeover with the aid of one of America’s largest public relations firms, FleishmanHillard.
In a recent “charm offensive,” to use Politico’s term, Monsanto’s executive vice president and chief technology officer, Robert Fraley, told reporters:6
“There are loud voices on one end that don’t like the technology and there are people like myself on the other side that are advocates, and fortunately most of the people are in the middle.
If you talk to the average consumer, biotech is not on the top 10 list of food safety issues, once you get through sugar and salt and all of those other issues. So I think there is an opportunity to reframe that conversation.”
Whether or not Monsanto might be able to rehabilitate its devilish reputation remains to be seen. Quite frankly, I’m skeptical, considering the fact that their entire business model is based on flawed science that threatens the entire food supply.
Sooner or later, such realities become self evident. I can only hope they won’t be permitted to take us beyond the point of no return... As stated by Alexis Baden-Mayer, political director of the Organic Consumers Association:7
“Monsanto patents seeds and enforces those patents by suing farmers; we support farmers’ right to save seeds. Monsanto sells agricultural chemicals and genetically engineered seeds designed to increase the use of pesticides; we support pesticide- and GMO-free organic farming.
Monsanto has focused on the seeds that are primarily used to grow animal feed for factory farms; we support farms that raise grass-fed animals on pasture. We know, as many experts have proven, that organic and pasture-based agriculture is the only way to feed the world and turn back climate change, so, we aren’t optimistic about the promises Monsanto has made about the potential benefits of GMOs.”
Connecticut Paves Way for GMO Labeling
As mentioned in the featured article, the stakes are high. So far, 26 US states have considered legislation to label foods containing genetically modified organisms (GMOs).
While two ballot initiatives have failed to bring about such labeling laws, in California and Washington State respectively, Connecticut just became the first state to sign a GMO labeling law on December 11.8 Connecticut Governor Daniel Malloy issued the following statement, praising the law’s passing:
“I am proud that leaders from each of the legislative caucuses can come together to make our state the first in the nation to require the labeling of genetically modified organisms. The end result is a law that shows our commitment to consumers’ right to know while catalyzing other states to take similar action.”
In California, the 2012 labeling initiative lost by a 2.82 percent. In Washington State, the people’s ballot lost by a 2.16 percent margin. Such narrow victories for the chemical technology industry came at the expense of tens of millions of dollars for campaign ads designed to misdirect voters with false claims and misrepresentations. In Washington State, the Grocery Manufacturers Association even ended up being sued for money laundering as they tried to hide the identities of anti-labeling campaign donors.
In each campaign, the anti-labeling side—which included many of the biggest processed food purveyors in the US—FAR outspent the pro-labeling campaigns. The silver lining here is that these two initiatives have brought genetically engineered foods to the forefront of people’s minds.
Millions of people across the US have now started to learn the truth about this unnatural adulteration of our food supply. And when you consider the amount of money they had to spend to keep GMO legislation from being passed, it’s clear that it’s only a matter of time before their ability to outspend us will be of little use.
Many states are poised to address GMO labeling legislation in 2014. And while Connecticut did pass its GMO labeling law, it will not take effect until or unless four other north-eastern states pass similar bills.
Beware of False Messengers
As mentioned in the featured article, public distrust in corporations has led the industry to adopt “scientific experts” and academia to do the talking for them. It’s important to realize that such “experts,” while (usually) having decent-enough credentials, are by no means acting independently. On the contrary, they typically have strong financial ties to the industry they defend, while failing to admit or disclose such conflicts of interest to the public.
Moreover, a multitude of organizations, associations and foundations have been created for the sole purpose of disseminating industry propaganda while maintaining the appearance of being independent and for the public’s best interest. Many of these groups even masquerade as grassroots citizens groups. The website “ Find Our Common Ground”9 is one such example. In a thinly veiled attempt, the group tries to give the appearance of working for small farmers, gardeners, and health-conscious Americans. According to their website:
"Consumers aren't getting the real story about American agriculture and all that goes into growing and raising their food. We're a group of volunteer farm women and we plan to change that by doing something extraordinary. Our program is called CommonGround and it's all about starting a conversation between women who grow food, and the women who buy it. It's a conversation based on our personal experience as farmers, but also on science and research. Our first goal is to help consumers understand that their food is not grown by a factory. It's grown by people and it's important to us that you understand and trust the process. We hope you'll join in the conversation."
But who’s really crafting the message? A quick search on Wois.com reveals that Osborn Barr Communications,10 a PR company with ties to—who else?—Monsanto, owns the domain name. Osborn Barr specializes in agriculture and rural communities and is used to create front groups for their clients.11 In 2006, Monsanto hired Osborn Barr to work on the controversial recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone issue, so Osborn Barr set up American Farmers for Advancement and Conservation of Technology (AFACT), a pro-rbGH farmer front group.12
Both of these tactics (the use of industry experts and front groups) must be seen for what they are—hidden forms of advertising, NOT independent and unbiased sources of evidence-based science... You can bet that as Monsanto’s revamp goes into full swing, there will be no lack of creativity and certainly no lack of money spent to mislead you using such strategies.
Rehabilitating Monsanto Image Will Require Rehabilitation of Science
I will say this though—in an ironic twist, science as a whole is now inching ever closer to the edge of a precipice that threatens the entire evidence-based paradigm we’re currently working with. Numerous papers have alerted us to the fact that scientific fraud is rampant, and climbing. And while most of these papers have focused on scientific shortfalls within the field of medicine, there are plenty of indications suggesting that the evidence-based paradigm across sciences is built on quicksand, having been largely bought and paid for by corporations.
Hence, making “scientific experts” the face of the chemical technology industry may not work out quite as well as planned in the long run. Because as increasing numbers of scientists start speaking out about the cancer that is scientific misconduct, the public will sooner or later lose trust in scientists as well as the corporations that pay them.
The industry is facing major blow-back over unethical science conduct as we speak. In September of last year, the first-ever lifetime feeding study assessing the health risks of genetically engineered (GE) Roundup Ready corn (NK603) was published in Reed Elsevier’s peer-reviewed journal, Food and Chemical Toxicology. The two-year long study13 led by Gilles-Eric Séralini revealed shocking health effects, including massive tumors and early death.
Last month, the publisher retracted the study saying it “did not meet scientific standards.” However, despite what the publisher called “an intense year-long review” (in addition to being reviewed by twice the typical number of referees prior to publication), the study was not retracted due to errors, fraud, or even the slightest misrepresentation of data.
It was retracted because the publisher deemed the findings inconclusive. But since when are studies retracted for showing inconclusive findings? The fact of the matter is, inconclusiveness of findings is not a valid ground for retraction.14 According to the guidelines for scientific retractions set out by the Committee on Publication Ethics (COPE), the only grounds for a retraction are either clear evidence that the findings are unreliable due to misconduct (data fabrication) or honest error; plagiarism or redundant publication; and/or unethical research.
The retraction came on the heels of the installation of Richard E. Goodman,15 a former Monsanto employee, on the publisher’s editorial staff. Goodman was a Monsanto scientist for seven years and is an affiliate of the GMO industry-funded group, the International Life Sciences Institute.
How Long Before Decision-Based Evidence-Making Implodes?
It’s become quite clear that instead of evidence-based decision making, we now have decision-based evidence making... Scientific evidence appears to be largely concocted to support an already established corporate agenda, and any scientific investigation that refutes or questions it is squelched by virtually any means. Scientists have slowly begun speaking out about the abuse and intimidation they suffer simply for publishing findings that point to problems relating to genetically engineered foods, for example. Some of them are addressed in Emily Waltz’s 2009 report “GM crops: Battlefield,” published in Nature.16
This is creating a tremendous mistrust of science, and rightfully so. Surely, any scientist with integrity is bound to sit up and take notice when their field is being so grossly undermined by the corporations footing the bills. Many academics fed up with Elsevier’s business practices have already signed a boycott against the publisher, pledging not to publish, referee, or do editorial work for them. Now, a group of scientists have drafted an open letter requesting Elsevier reverse its unethical retraction of the Séralini paper or face a similar boycott. The letter may be signed by scientists and non-scientists alike, so please take a moment to sign the letter, and forward it as widely as possible.
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Other scientists are boycotting journals for other reasons. Earlier this month, Nobel Prize winner Randy Schekman declared a boycott against the journals Nature, Cell, and Science, accusing them of distorting the scientific process. According to The Guardian:17
“...Schekman raises serious concerns over the journals' practices and calls on others in the scientific community to take action... Schekman criticises Nature, Cell and Science for artificially restricting the number of papers they accept, a policy he says stokes demand ‘like fashion designers who create limited-edition handbags.’ He also attacks a widespread metric called an ‘impact factor,’ used by many top-tier journals in their marketing.
A journal's impact factor is a measure of how often its papers are cited, and is used as a proxy for quality. But Schekman said it was ‘toxic influence’ on science that ‘introduced a distortion..’ He writes: ‘A paper can become highly cited because it is good science - or because it is eye-catching, provocative, or wrong.’"