Frankenfood To Label or Not To Label, That Is The Question

Just like the Pink Slime debate. Do you want to know? 

Hey folks,

In today's Health and Science Segment, I want to talk about something I really have a problem with. Frankenfood. I have been talking about Frankenfood, AKA, Genetically Modified Food, for years. We have covered a lot of ground. If you want all the info we went over, you'll have to clink the link and it will take you all the way back to 2006. 

I do not like Frankenfood. I'm pretty sure you don't either. For those that claim it's safe and has no effect on those that eat it? I have to disagree. Just by observations, one can SEE a major difference. Doubt me? Go stand at any School Bus Stop. Tell me what you see. 

I've talked about this before as well. I'm really not that old. I grew up in the 70's and 80's. When I went to school, little boys looked like little boys. Little girls looked like little girls. Oh we had one or two that were, shall we say, early bloomers? Those were the girls that got all the attention. "Hey Johnny, she got boobs." "Yeah I know Timmy. She is going to be my girlfriend, you know, after we ride bikes." 

Kids were kids. Girls thought about girly things. Boys played boy things. Boys and girls played together. AS KIDS. School dances meant standing around hoping that if the pretty girl dances with you, that your nervous sweat did not rub off on her shirt. ETC. 

Stand at a bus stop now. Tell me what you see. Girls as young as 10, getting off the bus looking like they are 16. 12 to 13 year old boys looking like they are  getting ready to be in a movie. Signs of facial hair, taller then average. They look like they are about 16 to 18. 

Now our kids go through the change, LONG before they have the mental ability to deal with it. They get all the hormones and all the tools, so school dances are far more different. Remember all the stories of oral sex parties and competitions as early as 7the grade? Remember the bracelets? 

So why the change? My honest opinion is the hormones and other stuff that they have been putting in our foods. They give Cows, Chickens, Fish, and other animals, growth hormones, to grow, produce, fatten, all kinds of stuff. Then when the process the product, they fill that with even more garbage. Then we eat it. 

I'm not kidding here folks. I remember one day just recently, I was in a Mini-Mart getting, of course, a coffee. When this girl came in. She was wearing painted on jeans and a little tank top. Which also looked painted on. No bra. Trust me, that was obvious. She was a sweet little thing. She really was. She came up and just started talking to me. She asked me what I thought of Energy Drinks. I told her that they, all but one, tasted like cough medicine to me. The only one I really found I liked was the Mocha Coffee Flavored one. I pointed out the one I was talking about. She thanked me and took it up to the counter. 

I got my coffee and I went up to the counter. She paid for her energy drink, turned and placed her hand on my chest and said "Thanks" with a big smile, and walked out. The guy at the counter said, "That really is a shame ain't it?" I asked what he meant. "She is 13." Of course, you are now thinking, why is a 13 year old buying an energy drink. Because she can. There is no restriction on them. As long as they do not have alcohol, anyone can buy them. Which is a whole other post. So is the erosion of modesty and personal space. {Smile}

But why does a 13 year old look 20? What changed? Seriously? The only thing that could be possibly linked, to these major physical changes in people, is what we consume. The air is not doing it. Culture is not doing it. Evolution? For what reason? We mature physically much sooner and live much longer. So? The only thing that makes sense IS what we consume. Food. Genetically Modified Food. 

Now the debate has also been brewing for years about labeling. The simple question is this. Do you want to know? Seriously. Just like the Pink Slime debate. Do you want to know? Will it change the way you shop? The way you eat. Will it change your thinking about what you are putting in your body? Or would you rather not know, just continue to eat whatever you want, as long as it tastes good? 

Many have had enough. I love this story. It was in the New York Times -Battle Brewing Over Labeling of Genetically Modified Food 

GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass. — On a recent sunny morning at the Big Y grocery here, Cynthia LaPier parked her cart in the cereal aisle. With a glance over her shoulder and a quick check of the ingredients, she plastered several boxes with hand-designed stickers from a roll in her purse. “Warning,” they read. “May Contain GMO’s (Genetically Modified Organisms).”

{Laughing} Got give her credit. She truly believes in something, and she is doing something about it. Not sure the Store would see it this way though.

For more than a decade, almost all processed foods in the United States — cereals, snack foods, salad dressings — have contained ingredients from plants whose DNA was manipulated in a laboratory. 

Regulators and many scientists say these pose no danger. But as Americans ask more pointed questions about what they are eating, popular suspicions about the health and environmental effects of biotechnology are fueling a movement to require that food from genetically modified crops be labeled, if not eliminated.

Labeling bills have been proposed in more than a dozen states over the last year, and an appeal to the Food and Drug Administration last fall to mandate labels nationally drew more than a million signatures. There is an iPhone app: ShopNoGMO.

Of course there is an App. There is a always an App. 

The most closely watched labeling effort is a proposed ballot initiative in California that cleared a crucial hurdle this month, setting the stage for a probable November vote that could influence not just food packaging but the future of American agriculture.

Tens of millions of dollars are expected to be spent on the election showdown. It pits consumer groups and the organic food industry, both of which support mandatory labeling, against more conventional farmers, agricultural biotechnology companies like Monsanto and many of the nation’s best-known food brands like Kellogg’s and Kraft.

Now before you get thinking I've jumped to the dark side, this is NOT about Liberals vs the Free Market. It really isn't. Liberals, Conservatives, Republicans, Democrats, Christians, Atheists, EVERYONE, eat. We all consume these products. I have no problem labeling what you are consuming. That includes Organic and "Free Range." I want to know. I want the freedom to make an informed decision. If we find that we do not like something, like Pink Slime, we simply do not buy it. If YOU do not care, do not read the label. Just buy whatever you want, eat, and enjoy. 

The heightened stakes have added fuel to a long-simmering debate over the merits of genetically engineered crops, which many scientists and farmers believe could be useful in meeting the world’s rapidly expanding food needs.

Supporters of labeling argue that consumers have a right to know when food has been modified with genes from another species, which they say is fundamentally different from the selective breeding process used in nearly all crops.

Almost all the corn and soybeans grown in the United States now contain DNA derived from bacteria. The foreign gene makes the soybeans resistant to an herbicide used in weed control, and causes the corn to produce its own insecticide.

“It just makes me nervous when you take genetic matter from something else that wouldn’t have been done in nature and put it into food,” said Ms. LaPier, 44, a mental health counselor whose guerrilla labeling was inspired by the group Label It Yourself. She worries that her daughter, 5, could one day suffer ill effects like allergies.

Or she goes through puberty at 10. Not to mention all the other health problems in later life that may or may not be linked to consumption of all the garbage we consume. No one is saying that YOU should not eat whatever you want. What I am saying, and many others, is that we want the choice. THAT seems to be the sticking point. 

Farmers, food and biotech companies and scientists say that labels might lead consumers to reject genetically modified food — and the technology that created it — without understanding its environmental and economic benefits. A national science advisory organization in 2010 termed those benefits “substantial,” noting that existing biotech crops have for years let farmers spray fewer or less harmful chemicals, though the emergence of resistant weeds and insects threatens to blunt that effect.

So? We have labels now. Pork, beef, chicken. If I do not like pork, I read the label, I see pork, I do not buy it. However, many others do buy it. Now imagine no labels. Of course, you can see the obvious. A chicken leg pretty much looks like a chicken leg. But if you want a little whole chicken, maybe your buying a duck. Labels are not evil. They are informative.  

It goes on a bit, however, the argument is really simple. Do you want to know? Do you feel you have a right to know? I say yes. Again, may things out there are produced in ways that you most likely would not appreciate. So if you like something, buy it. Eat it. Whatever. Do not get curious. Do not ask questions. Just enjoy. However, If you care, you should have a right to make an informed decision. 

Peter

Sources: 

New York Times -Battle Brewing Over Labeling of Genetically Modified Food