They came into Washington, D.C., from 10 states and three countries. They painted their faces with the greens and blues that Nature gave us and donned bandanas of Satan’s black and red. They hoisted signs accented by the prettiest rainbows. They let their Movember beard growth continue unabated, their greasy dirty blonde hair remain unwashed. They amassed before the steps of Congress. Wednesday December 10, 2014 will go down in history as the day that rich white people finally had their voices heard on Capitol Hill.
The demonstration was ostensibly aimed at the Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act, a bipartisan House proposal that would solidify the FDA’s role as the ultimate authority on food safety. The bill was written to trump state laws requiring companies to identify products that use genetically modified crops (GMOs). The professional protesters, demonstrating their knack for acronyms, dubbed the bill the "Deny Americans the Right to Know" (DARK) Act.
"Stop the DARK Act, turn on the lights, GMO labels are state’s rights," the crazed foodies sang.
Over the course of three hours, the protesters listened to well-reasoned arguments about state sovereignty, federal overreach, and cronyism. Speakers introduced poll figures that showed overwhelming support for ingredient transparency, as well as the lobbying expenditures of GMO seed giant Monsanto. The presentations would have pleased both John C. Calhoun and William Jennings Bryan.
"People have a right to choose truly organic food," thundered D.C. attorney Jonathan Emord, who represents nutritional supplement interests. "I’m being made an experimental subject against my will … because of this veil of ignorance."
It had me fired up. Of course Americans have a right to know what they’re putting in their bodies. Of course it’s the government’s job to hold corporations accountable. Of course misleading advertising about "organic food" and "grass-fed cattle" is fraud. It all sounds so sensible, so convincing and obvious.
And then you speak to the protesters and the organizers who bused them in and realize that this is all a Trojan horse to ban the seeds that are responsible for more than 90 percent of all U.S. corn, cotton, and soy beans. The chatter may have been about the importance of federalism, but the real message could be seen on the signs: "Who can change what Nature made perfect?," "Gradually Mutating Organs," and several blaming the villainous anti-cancer Koch Brothers.
If the Kochs are behind the GMO lobby they have won over some unusual bedfellows. Rep. Henry Waxman (D., Cal), the House’s most ardent environmentalist, an outgoing representative with nothing to lose, the man who once hauled the Kochs to Congress to discredit the Keystone pipeline, isn’t even buying the anti-GMO story. While the protesters chanted their slogans, Waxman attended the House Subcommittee on Health hearing on the dreaded DARK Act.
"I'm concerned that mandatory labeling could be inherently misleading,"Waxman said.
Adding the GMO tag to food products could give consumers the impression that the products are unsafe.Michael Landa, director of the FDA’s Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, told the committeethat is not the case. Study after study has shown GMO foods to be just as safe for consumption as regular food. The agency has long contended that there is no need for GMO labeling since every GMO food that comes to market is required to meet the same safety standards as any other food.
"Based on our evaluations, we are confident that the [GMO] foods in the U.S. marketplace today are as safe as their conventional counterparts," Landa said. "[The FDA] found no basis to conclude that foods derived from new plant varieties using genetic engineering techniques, as a class, differ from other foods in any meaningful or uniform way or pose any different or greater safety concern than foods developed by traditional plant breeding."
The crowd universally supported the theory of climate change because the "science was settled." But when faced with the overwhelming evidence from the FDA and others, they embraced the rhetoric of conspiracy theorists. Politicians have been bought off by Monsanto. So has the FDA. And university researchers. And corporate media. I asked Detroit protester Alqn Erlikh (Correct spelling Pronounced Alan Urlich) if he was skeptical of the FDA’s evaluations on GMO safety.
"Yes, I doubt it. I also doubt what the government tells us about 9/11. There's a lot of slight of hand with government," he said.
The anti-GMO crowd can believe the FDA at its own peril. If they accept the agency’s ruling on GMOs, they may have to come to terms with the fact that the FDA sanctioned protest organizer Dr. Mercola three times for making "unfounded claims" about the health benefits of his all-natural products.
Food labeling isn’t just a matter of changing the glossy package that your food comes in. The proposals touted by activists will have real consequences for everyday Americans. A Cornell University study found that a New York GMO labeling proposal would force the average family of four to spend between $200 and $800 more per year on groceries.
Cost is of little concern to the organic true believer. The movement has attracted the support of some of America’s top gourmet chefs. Celebrity restaurateur Tom Colicchio of Top Chef fame wrote a petition signed by more than 700 foodies urging congress to mandate GMO labeling.
"As chefs, we know that choosing the right ingredients is an absolutely critical part of cooking," the petition says. "But when it comes to whether our ingredients contain genetically modified organisms, we're in the dark. It’s time for Congress to move us forward, not backward, when it comes to our right to know what’s in our food."
Colicchio would know something about fine ingredients. Those who visit his flagship restaurant Colicchio & Sons can eat three course meals of Warm Burrata, Brussels Sprouts & White Truffle, White Truffle Lasagna, and Milk-Fed Porchetta, and Quince, Kale & Orange Blossom for $178 per person. That may sound steep to the average consumer, but that’s what it takes to build a menu that exclusively offers "ANTIBIOTIC-FREE INGREDIENTS."
If ever there was a time to tell someone to "check his privilege," this was it. The Western world no longer has to worry about the hunt for food, so we fret over the ingredients instead. That’s the root of the quest to ban and label everything from trans fats to gluten and now GMOs. Many African countries followed Europe’s lead in rejecting GM crops when they were first introduced because of health concerns. Increased research pointing to the safety of GMO foods has not swayed European foodies to lift the bans, but Africa is rolling them back across the continent to address starvation.
"There is growing recognition that African countries will need to use a range of modern technologies, including biotechnology, to adapt crops to new ecological conditions," Kenyan-born Harvard Prof. Calestous Juma told Reuters in 2013.
Third world countries have been burned by the naturalist crowd before. Anti-mosquito insecticide DDT became an essential component in the fight against malaria in the mid-twentieth century until the revelation that it hurt birds led to a wholesale ban in the United States and other prosperous nations. Mosquito-born malaria killed nearly 600,000 people in 2013, according to the World Health Organization. Nine out of ten victims are African, the majority children under 5. DDT may be off the table, but our environmentalist celebrities are sending over all-natural mosquito nets to solve the problem.
Researchers in the United States are developing GMOs to increase crop yield, resist drought, and fight pests in the third world. Protesters had no qualms with hindering that progress. Ian Lancaster, a junior at Michigan-based Oakland University who plans to move to Paris after graduation to study existentialist philosophy, said that starvation in Africa isn’t our problem if we have to resort to GMOs.
"Let’s be honest, we’re going to exploit Africa. It’s what we do," he said. "It shouldn’t be the Bourgeoisie [that works to alleviate starvation]. It should be natural selection."
"Natural hierarchy," a Detroit EMT with a pierced tongue and corn stalks painted on his face added.
"I don’t think there is a scientific solution because science is self-defeating. It doesn’t recognize mistakes brought on by science," the self-assured existentialist said.
Like all silly ideas this one eventually made its way to the Capitol Hill Presbyterian Church where protestors sat down for an authentic organic lunch. Demonstrators dined on dried fruit chutney, chana masala with chickpeas, potatoes, red sauce, and raisin chutney, Tuscan beans and greens with the option of grass-fed Italian sausage, and Caldo verde with brown basmati rice, grass-fed chorizo, cabbage, and potatoes. They were also welcome to sample Dr. Mercola’s premium chocolate and almonds Whey Bar, which was generous enough given the fact that a 36-pack costs $136. Each bar is constructed with "only the finest quality ingredients," has the texture of candlewax, and tastes like expired baby food.
Kit Wood, proprietor of Green Plate Catering, prepared the bounty of all organic, locally grown fare using donations from Whole Foods and Natures Valley. Wood’s company offered customers vegan and gluten-free recipes before it was cool to be either. After 31 years in business she is finally getting her due with a "fresh, locally sourced, seasonal" menu.
"We’re seeing a comeback in local, organic food because people are more aware that it matters what they put in their body … we’re growing leaps and bounds," she said. "I definitely want no GMOs."
She acknowledged that organic produce and goods are more expensive, but only because of the increased labor required to harvest organically and slaughter humanely. That won’t be an issue if America bans the GMOs and fertilizers that are used in mass produced foods. Once everyone is farming organically, the reasoning goes, then organic food won’t be more expensive than the rest of the food market because the entire food market will be organic. She supports the anti-GMO movement out of her concern for the well-being of her fellow man. I asked her what she thought about the inability of universal organic farming to feed the earth’s growing population.
"We live in a very creative society," she said.
We do. That’s probably why we invented GMOs.