Anti-gmo websites are biased too

Read these articles and come back:

http://www.youcouldsavetheworld.com/fight_for_natural_food.html
http://www.naturalnews.com/037289_monsanto_corporations_ethics.html
http://www.infowars.com/brand-new-gmo-food-can-rewire-your-body-more-evil-coming/
http://nstarzone.com/MONSANTO.html

These were among the first few articles that came up then the search term "dangers of GMO's" was searched using google. Keep in mind that you may not get the same results if you do a Google search now, the internet changes rapidly. However, at the time this post was made if someone was to search it on google, these would be the first few sites that they would see and read. That is why these sites were selected for this post.


Ok, then. lets list the major points.

The American Academy of Environmental Medicine (AAEM) says gmos are evil
GMOs cause cancer
everybody hates them
More pesticides and water and poisins
cause death
Patenting is evil
crops contaminated
GMOs should be banned
monsanto is keeping everything to itself with patents, should be shared
biodiversity is threatened

And more. The first source has a nice, scary sounding paragraph at the end that (exaggerates) the dangers of GMOs. Lets look at the major points.

First of all, let me make something clear. Personally, I am against GMOs, as evidenced from my previous post. However, there are some people that are simply saying the wrong things or biased things in an attempt to make GMOs worse than they seem. I think this is wrong, and will avoid putting any of my bias into this post, and will stick to the truth.

First, we have the AAEM. A quick google search reveals that they are not truly a reliable source of information, and they have been challenged over and over again about their authencity. Many of the docters in the program do not have a higher level degree and have proffesions such as allergists, etc., instead of researchers.

These sites always try to insists that the whole world hates GMOs, and that nobody wants them except for Americans. However, I believe that I can safely say there are at least a few farmers that have truly benifited from GMOs, the most notable being the hawaiian papaya farmers. After the ringspot infection wiped out over half the plantations, GMOs were able to prevent the disease and save the farmers livelihoods.

We also have the relationship between GMOs and cancer. the results of the recent rat study, where GMO's caused caused cancer in rats, has been misinterpreted by both sides of this issue. The rat study did nothing more than suggest that GMO's may increase the risk of cancer in cancer-prone animals. The rats used were of a breed created to get cancer for cancer research. However, the rates of cancer were increased in the rats. This should be interpreted as a need for further testing, and no conclusions should be drawn from this study except that more testing is needed. Both sides, however, have tried to interpret this in their own favor, the pro-gmo trying to entirely descredit it, which is wrong, and the anti-gmo trying to draw false conclusions, which is also wrong.


People also claim that there are more poisins used in the growth of GMOs. while this is actually the case, some, like Bt cotton, lower the need for chemicals. However, it does require more water. A more moderate view should be taken on this stance.

Now, we have the strange relationship betwween patenting and crop comtamination. Most of these sites claim that it is wrong to patent the crops or insert the terminator gene (prevents ability to reproduce) into the crops. However, they then claim that GMOs are evil because they can cause crop contamination and can spread their genes to other fields. However, it is the patenting that is keeping contamination from getting too out of control, and the terminator gene prevents the contamination of other crops. Really, some could say that the terminator gene could protect the small farmer from contamination.

So it is clear that the majority of these websites are not truly legitamate sites that provide unbiased, factrual information. The majority of these sites area filled with inaccuracies and misconceptions. IT is really something to keep in mind when searching this topic, read a lot of sites and come to your own conclusions. Remember, if anything seems biased, especially in this topic, it probably is.