US Outlawing organic farming

[Captain_Caveman]

There is basically the same risk eating organic as inorganically grown foods, albeit for different reasons. Organic foods are not, contrary to popular belief, healthier then normally organic foods. Its a tradeoff, you can have foods free of insecticides, or food free of bacteria that the chemicals on the plants prevent.

I choose the cheaper one.

You can wash off pesticides. You cant wash off GMO

 

[Alleged_Alec]

Basically, people...
Organic food is a crock of shit, a health craze as misguided and futile as all the rest. Pesticides and agricultural chemicals aren't some boogyman to be afraid of, they are highly regulated and tested products that are deemed safe for human consumption. What they give us, crop yields eight to ten times that of an "organic" crop. No insects or parasites inside the food, bigger and healthier produce and grains, all around a good thing. The two biggest lies about Organic foods are that they are healthier for you and better for the environment. Both are total lies.

Actually, it is a lot better for the environment. Only 2 to 5 percent of the pesticides used reach the target species. And most of these pesticides are persistent. This means they accumulate as they make their way up the food chain, killing other animals because of the high(er) concentrations. Accidentally, this can even lead to a huge increase in the population of whatever the pesticide was supposed to kill.

Not only that, but pesticides also pollute the soil, water and air.

Be it genetically modified crops, or just state-of-the-art farming on natural seed, "regular" retail produce have more vitamins and minerals than organic. There is no poison on your tomato, and if the pesticides were some horrible disease-causing thing, we'd have known by now, because we have been using the same farming methods since before any of us were born. In fact, the pesticides and fertilizers are much improved today over what our parents had. We have taken the chemical essentials of fertilizer and concentrated them... Do you know what was used before our sterile fertilizer concentrate? Shit. Literal shit. Horse, cow, pig, whatever shit you could find, it became manure, which was what they used. Imagine, eating a potato grown from pig shit, a pig with diarrhea from bad Mexican food. Progress IS wonderful.

Oookay... Firstly, pesticide = poison. It's why those things work. Secondly, your shit argument is, pardon the pun, complete bullshit. The manure is first composted, which, by the way, kills just about all of the harmful stuff in the faeces.
The organic food industry still uses non-organic fertilizers, by the way.

As to organic being better for the environment... It takes four to ten times the amount of land to grow a truckload of organic carrots compared to normal ones. Four to ten times the fertilizer (and the pig-shit kind, not the good stuff), four to ten times the power, water, pesticides, and gasoline for all the machinery. Organic is waste, plain and simple.

False as well. On average, organic production is only 8 percent lower then conventional production. Not only that, but they use less energy and less waste as well.

So banning organic foods, to me, is a good thing. The only thing worse than destroying the environment, is destroying the environment while thinking you're saving it, and being a pretentious dick about it to everyone you see.

I think I have proven you false.

And no, I don't think that organic farming is the way to go. I think we should find a intermediate; the lower use of pesticides (for example using biological pest control), the of organic farming and the genetically modified crops of the other.

 

[Aardvark Soup]

Except that this is simply not true, it actually wouldn´t be such a bad thing. It's just a waste of space and rescources. The only difference with organic food and normal food is that it is far more expensive. And there is no scientific evidence that it would be more healthy. Even then, people should be able to grow their crops however they want, so organic farming shouldn't actually be illegal.

 

[Booze Zombie]

Only in America. Enjoy your cancer enducing food.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

This makes no sense at all. Are we sure that is what this does?

It makes perfect sense. Monsanto want money, this is a way they can improve their bottom line, and the US government is in complete thrall to big business and corporate bosses.

So much for Obamas administration being different from all the others.

 

[dlano]

So banning organic foods, to me, is a good thing. The only thing worse than destroying the environment, is destroying the environment while thinking you're saving it, and being a pretentious dick about it to everyone you see.

I completely, and totally agree with all your post. When I see people buying the pricier, organic food at the grocery store all I can think is that he/she is contributing to the waste of our natural resources and the starvation of the poor for his/her own vanity and ignorance.

Ok, there's one part I don't agree with. Organic farming shouldn't be banned. It should be boycotted and people should be taught the evils of it, but government involvement is a no-no. Ok, I'm a classical liberal.

 

[Meta Like That]

And this is good because....?

 

[Rottweiler]

Having known a number of actual Farmers, here's the problem with 'organic'.

First, it's about 1,000 times less efficient.
Second, it actually encourages certain pests because (and 'organic activists' don't mention this) no 'organic' method works on them.
Third, the 'organic' fertilizer is extremely limited and does indeed have health risks that again, few are willing to mention.

Another issue is that 'organic' is being touted for far more than it actually is. It costs more and is being hailed as some kind of utterly healthy food when it's actually about as easy to be hurt by as 'inorganic' (and that's a joke right there) food production.

 

[smallharmlesskitten]

How will I explain my illegal tomatoes to the neighbors?
Seriously, WTF?!

We obviously aren't even vaguely a democracy at this point.
That's it, I'm getting out of here!

...Hey, Tess, do you have a spare sofa?
I can cook...

I have a spare sofa...... and lots of farms.... somewhere

 

[Rottweiler]

I would ask what methods you imply when you say organic farming is only such a small percent less efficient, honestly. Also how less energy is used.

As for composting?

"Oookay... Firstly, pesticide = poison. It's why those things work."

Antibiotics = poison. Many medicines you use = poison. Pesticides are tailored to be poison to a *specific pest*. In fact, many common pests have no 'organic' control as yet, which means that said pests can ruin organic crops much more easily, which lowers productivity and actually makes for *more* waste.


"Secondly, your shit argument is, pardon the pun, complete bullshit. The manure is first composted, which, by the way, kills just about all of the harmful stuff in the faeces."

And no offense, but composting does not do that. You refer to what is called 'de-biological treatment'. And also no offense, calling bullshit and then saying 'just about' isn't very scientific either. Manufactured fertilizers have *no* harmful biologicals, period. That's why professionals use it. They don't take a chance on 'maybe'.

I agree with a more balanced version, but let's be honest here. The 'sides' of this argument don't *want* a balance. They want 'the way it's been done' or 'organic is better', which means there's no real middle ground.

 

[pffh]

Eight percent of the E. coli cases in the U.S. come from organic foods.

And the other ninety-two percent?

Biologists accidentally eating their bacterial farms, you know what they say E. Coli is the biologists best friend.

 

[johnman]

If this gets passed (which i hope it wont) it really showeds how fucked up polictics have became. Last I heard they we elect them to serve us, not the other way round.
I dont live in America but this still gets on my tits, stuff like this si fuckign retarded, and if it happens over there it we wil try to copy them over here in England.

 

[Tanario]

I'm for organic food and i think it's more healthy or atleast nature has had around 3000 years to test it as opposed to barely 10 years on the side of Genetically modified food, but then again it migth just be as healthy but for now i'll let time tell.
The real problem however is the organic farming or non-genetically modified farming is already suffering heavily in the USA as montesanto can sue the farmers if they have there gene modified grain on their fields (something which will naturally happen as wind pass seeds from one field to another).

Should this bill pass however, it would almost be inevetiable for montesanto not to gain complete control over most of the grain market in the entire USA especially using new techniques such as suicide grain, where the seeds cannot become a new plant more than once.

The real problem with these bills are not really what they say on paper, which is mostly rather harmless but instead how coporate lawyers can interpret it.

I suggest for people to watch the movie "The Coporation" and "Patenting the Pig"

 

[cuddly_tomato]

The bill was introduced by Rosa Delauro, if you're looking for someone to blame. She and the other supporters are mainly old-guard northern democrats of the Ted Kennedy stripe.

Yes it was...

Her husband, Stanley Greenberg, works for Monsanto. Monsanto is the world?s biggest producer of herbicides and genetically engineered seeds

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_DeLauro

She should be removed from congress.

 

[TechNoFear]

I think you should at least check the actual text of the bill before posting...

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-875&tab=summary

and if the pesticides were some horrible disease-causing thing, we'd have known by now, because we have been using the same farming methods since before any of us were born.

Not anywhere near true.

The US banned DDT in 1972 (but I am not young enough to know everything...).

DDT was used since 1939, over 30 years before we realized it was extremely harmful and had a very long half life.

Please post a link proving organic foods have less nutrients then mass production / GM (with scientifically based research).

 

[Loge]

Here, how about everyone actually reads the current draft... [http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h875/text]
Most of what has been said is speculative. The main thrust of the bill is to generate a new wasteful bureaucracy duplicating many functions extant in the FDA already. The part that's tricky is that the new FSA would have the authority to make things up on their own regarding what is food safety and to enforce it: this coupled with the requirement of all packing, manufacturing, serving, etc. establishments to be registered technically means they could if unopposed. As to fertilizer restrictions, seed restrictions, and control of home growers, most of that is either speculative based on what they could do, or made up out of whole cloth.

I agree that the control of home growers is speculative at best.
Without putting much time in it doesn't Sec. (13) and (14) in the definitions section exclude ranchers, farmers and whatnot from having to register with this agency? How would anybody be able to control them if they don't have to register. Same for restaurants apparantly.

In my opinion there are always two sides of every law, what the law demands and what demands are viable enough to actually be enforced. I can't fathom who would be able to forbid and control every little backyard garden especially in a country like the US. The costs would far outweigh the benefits. So even IF there would be such a draconic law nobody would probably care about it, like copyright laws :x

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

Even though organic fods possess absolutely no nutritional value over non-organic foods, it doesn't seem fair to force people to only eat/produce non-organic food. And how are they going to force people in their gardens to not be organic?

 

[Zombie_Fish]

What's the point of banning organic farming? It makes no profit over the government and just exploits the hard working organic farmers, turning the food industry into a monopoly. Also, GM foods, although being healthier nutritionally, is just a sign of companies demanding perfectionism for their product.

 

[cuddly_tomato]

Good points. We need to move away from vitalism and other scientific ideas which are very much rooted in the late 19th century. At the same time, home-grown foods should be maintained in order that we don't end up with oligopolies regarding agriculture.

Being something of a vitalist myself I disagree.

Basically, people...
Organic food is a crock of shit, a health craze as misguided and futile as all the rest. Pesticides and agricultural chemicals aren't some boogyman to be afraid of, they are highly regulated and tested products that are deemed safe for human consumption. What they give us, crop yields eight to ten times that of an "organic" crop. No insects or parasites inside the food, bigger and healthier produce and grains, all around a good thing. The two biggest lies about Organic foods are that they are healthier for you and better for the environment. Both are total lies...

So banning organic foods, to me, is a good thing. The only thing worse than destroying the environment, is destroying the environment while thinking you're saving it, and being a pretentious dick about it to everyone you see.

Khell - the biggest lies are that pesticides are a good thing and that GM foods are an answer to all the problems of world hunger.

First of all, pesticide = poison. Spraying it on food you eat is not generally considered a good idea by people who are actually eating the stuff.

Secondly, GM food has been shown to cause immune system deficiencies and smaller kidneys in rats. No, this isn't some conspiracy by the soil association of tree huggers anonymous, this is a scientific finding, carried out by Monsanto themselves [http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/revealed-health-fears-over-secret-study-into-gm-food-491657.html].

Thirdly, people should have the fucking choice, Khell. You want to eat that shit? Fine with me. I am not going to tell you that you can't. But let me eat stuff that has been grown in the ground, not in a petri dish.