Conspiracy #6: GMOS

Welcome to our conspiracies library. Every month we will upload a new conspiracy for debate where we will objectively present you the evidence and let you weigh in on the case.

CONSPIRACY #1:

HOLLOW EARTH

CONSPIRACY #2:

FAKE MOON

CONSPIRACY #3:

TIME TRAVEL

CONSPIRACY #4:

SIMULATION THEORY

CONSPIRACY #5:

SCI-FI PREDICTIONS

CONSPIRACY #7:

CLONING

CONSPIRACY #9:

MYTHS VS MODERN TECH

Conspiracy #6: GMOs

GMO’s have been around four thousands of years through the process of selective breeding in agriculture. “GMO” (genetically modified organism) has become the common term consumers and popular media use to describe foods that have been created through genetic engineering. Genetic engineering is a process that involves:

  • Identifying the genetic information—or “gene”—that gives an organism (plant, animal, or microorganism) a desired trait
  • Copying that information from the organism that has the trait
  • Inserting that information into the DNA of another organism
  • Then growing the new organism

There is currently no scientific consensus on the safety of GMOs.

According to a 2015 statement signed by 300 scientists, physicians and scholars, the claim of scientific consensus on GMOs frequently repeated in the media is “an artificial construct that has been falsely perpetuated.”

example #1: strong chinese resistance of gmos

https://allianceforscience.cornell.edu/blog/2018/06/crazy-conspiracy-theory-believed-190-million-chinese/

In this study if scaled to the entire population 190 million people in China believe that Monsanto with the help of the pentagon is used to give cancer to people in China. The likelihood of why they are more likely to push a position like this is China has had many food safety issues in the past, and Internationally speaking has had issues with United States imports in the past.

The researchers report that 13.8 percent of respondents agreed with a widely-circulated rumor in China that GMOs have been created by the United States as a form of “bioterrorism” against China, and that all patriots should therefore oppose them.

“GM food is not merely a cause of cancer and a source of infertility. It is also a grand Western scheme… a monumental, supremely devious plot to annihilate the Chinese and other people of colour… created by Monsanto… with the backing of the Pentagon and leading private foundations in the US, to control the global food chain”, he stated.

China has suffered several recent bona fide food scandals, involving adulterated milk, pesticide residues and other serious safety issues. In 2008. for example, hundreds of thousands of infants were affected by adulterated baby milk.

Conspiracy theorist Peng Guangqian

example #2: russian and european resistance of gmos

https://www.rt.com/news/russia-import-gmo-products-621/#Monsanto

Russian Stance: Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said, adding that the nation has enough space and resources to produce organic food.

Moscow has no reason to encourage the production of genetically modified products or import them into the country, Medvedev told a congress of deputies from rural settlements on Saturday.

“If the Americans like to eat GMO products, let them eat it then. We don’t need to do that; we have enough space and opportunities to produce organic food,” he said.

The prime minister said he ordered widespread monitoring of the agricultural sector. He added that despite rather strict restrictions, a certain amount of GMO products and seeds have made it to the Russian market.

European Stance: Several European countries have chosen a total ban on GMO foods. France, Germany, Austria, Greece, Hungary, the Netherlands, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Bulgaria, Poland, Denmark, Malta, Slovenia, Italy and Croatia have chosen a total ban. Wallonia, the French-speaking region of Belgium has opted out, as well as Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Credit: http://familywellnesshq.com/what-do-us-canada-and-most-of-the-third-world-countries-have-in-common-gmo-food/

Example #3: gmo rat studies

https://www.elpasobackclinic.com/health-risks-genetically-modified-foods/

This article goes into GMO diets are unhealthy, can cause damage to the digestive tract, can cause liver damage, issues with reproduction.

Mice fed potatoes engineered to produce the Bt-toxin developed abnormal and damaged cells, as well as proliferative cell growth in the lower part of their small intestines (ileum).25 Rats fed potatoes engineered to produce a different type of insecticide (GNA lectin from the snowdrop plant) also showed proliferative cell growth in both the stomach and intestinal walls (see photos).26 Although the guts of rats fed GM peas were not examined for cell growth, the intestines were mysteriously heavier; possibly as a result of such growth.27 Cell proliferation can be a precursor to cancer and is of special concern.

The state of the liver—a main detoxifier for the body—is another indicator of toxins.

  • Rats fed the GNA lectin potatoes described above had smaller and partially atrophied livers.28
  • Rats fed Monsanto’s Mon 863 corn, engineered to produce Bt-toxin, had liver lesions and other indications of toxicity.29
  • Rabbits fed GM soy showed altered enzyme production in their livers as well as higher metabolic activity.30
  • The livers of rats fed Roundup Ready canola were 12%–16% heavier, possibly due to liver disease or inflammation.31
  • Microscopic analysis of the livers of mice fed Roundup Ready soybeans revealed altered gene expression and structural and functional changes (see photos).32 Many of these changes reversed after the mice diet was switched to non-GM soy, indicating that GM soy was the culprit. The findings, according to molecular geneticist Michael Antoniou, PhD, “are not random and must reflect some ‘insult’ on the liver by the GM soy.” Antoniou, who does human gene therapy research in King’s College London, said that although the long-term consequences of the GM soy diet are not known, it “could lead to liver damage and consequently general toxemia.”33
  • Rats fed Roundup Ready soybeans also showed structural changes in their livers. 34

The testicles of both mice and rats fed Roundup Ready soybeans showed dramatic changes. In rats, the organs were dark blue instead of pink (see photos on next page).45 In mice, young sperm cells were altered.46 Embryos of GM soy-fed mice also showed temporary changes in their DNA function, compared to those whose parents were fed non-GM soy.47 Female rats fed GM soy showed changes in their uterus, ovaries, and hormonal balance.48 By the third generation, most hamsters fed GM soy were unable to have babies. The infant mortality was 4-5 times greater than controls, and many of the GMO-fed third generation had hair growing in their mouths.49

example #4: new cannabis gmo market

https://www.gq.com/story/the-great-pot-monopoly-mystery

Can new markets such as the Cannabis market be cornered by big biotech companies? Could someone really become the new Monsanto of the Cannabis world?

According to Holmes, a secretive company called BioTech Institute LLC had begun registering patents on the cannabis plant. Three have already been granted, and several more are in the pipeline, both in the U.S. and internationally. And these are not narrow patents on individual strains like Sour Diesel. These are utility patents, the strongest intellectual-property protection available for crops. Utility patents are so strict that almost everyone who comes in contact with the plant could be hit with a licensing fee: growers and shops, of course, but also anyone looking to breed new varieties or conduct research. Even after someone pays a royalty, they can’t use the seeds produced by the plants they grow. They can only buy more patented seeds.

Credit: Leafly

example #5: golden rice

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2013/03/07/173611461/in-a-grain-of-golden-rice-a-world-of-controversy-over-gmo-foods

Golden Rice is the poster child for the GMO movement as it has allowed access to Vitamin A in populations who normally are not able to access it in their normal diet or purchase supplements. The ability for Vitamin A to be produced in Rice one of the cheapest commercial foods in the world can give credit to the Science behind producing GMO’s. 

They came to a breeder named Peter Jennings, a legendary figure in these circles. He’d created perhaps the most famous variety of rice in history, called IR 8, which launched the so-called Green Revolution in rice-growing countries of Asia in the 1960s.

“Yellow endosperm,” said Jennings. (The endosperm of a grain of rice or wheat is the main part that’s eaten.) “That kind of took everybody by surprise. It certainly took me by surprise. So I said, ‘Why?’ ” Toenniessen recalls.

Jennings explained that the color yellow signals the presence of beta-carotene — the source of vitamin A. Yellow kinds of corn or sorghum exist naturally, and for years, Jennings said, he had been looking for similar varieties of rice. Regular white rice doesn’t provide this vital nutrient, and it’s a big problem.

“When children are weaned, they’re often weaned on a rice gruel. And if they don’t get any beta-carotene or vitamin A during that period, they can be harmed for the rest of their lives,” says Toenniessen.

Toenniessen was persuaded, and the Rockefeller Foundation started a program aimed at creating, through technology, what Jennings had not been able to find in nature.

example #6: monsantos round-up lawsuits

The largest producer of genetically modified seeds is Monsanto (USA) which currently dominates between 70% and 100% of the global market for genetically modified seeds. In 2006, the comapny saw a global revenue of $7.344 (£3.672) billion. The giant also produces the popular weedkiller RoundUp, that is currently one of the widest used herbicides in the world.

Many plants naturally can’t tolerate RoundUp, so many farmers use GMO crops to be RoundUp resistant. The top crop industries in the US (cotton, corn, soy etc.) are genetically modified to tolerate RoundUp and are called RoundUp ready crops.

There is a massive controversy around RoundUp currently, as lawsuits started pouring in of people claiming the popular herbicide caused their cancer. The settlement covers an estimated 95,000 cases and includes $1.25 billion for potential future claims from Roundup customers who may develop the form of cancer known as non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Fletch Trammell, a Houston-based lawyer who said he represented 5,000 claimants who declined to join, disagreed. “This is nothing like the closure they’re trying to imply,” he said. “It’s like putting out part of a house fire.”

“The pandemic worked to the advantage of settlement because the threat of a scheduled trial was unavailable,” Mr. Feinberg said.

Glyphosate was introduced in 1974, but its journey to becoming the world’s No. 1 weedkiller gained momentum in 1996 after Monsanto developed genetically modified seeds that could survive Roundup’s concentrated attacks on weeds.

But long-simmering anxieties over possible hazards exploded in 2015 when the International Agency for Research on Cancer, an arm of the World Health Organization, announced that glyphosate could “probably” cause cancer.

Monsanto denounced the findings, arguing that years of research in laboratories and in the field had proved glyphosate’s safety. Regulators in a string of countries in Asia, Australia, Europe and North America have mostly backed Monsanto’s — and now Bayer’s — position.

The longest and most thorough study of American agricultural workers by the National Institutes of Health, for example, found no association between glyphosate and overall cancer risk, though it did acknowledge that the evidence was more ambiguous at the highest levels of exposure.

The Environmental Protection Agency ruled last year that it was a “false claim” to say on product labels that glyphosate caused cancer. The federal government offered further support by filing a legal brief on the chemical manufacturer’s behalf in its appeal of the Hardeman verdict. It said the cancer risk “does not exist” according to the E.P.A.’s assessment.

To date, there have been no epidemiological studies investigating potential effects of GMO food on human health.

Most of the research used to claim that GMOs are safe has been performed by biotechnology companies. A comprehensive review of peer-reviewed animal feeding studies of GMOs found roughly an equal number of research groups raising concerns about genetically engineered foods and those suggesting GMOs were as safe and nutritious as conventional foods. The review also found that most studies finding GMOs foods the same as conventional foods were performed by biotechnology companies or their associates.

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