Mr. Graham, wow, this is rather disappointing to hear. You wish to frame a discussion through ad hominem instead of on the merits. For what it's worth I am apolitical, and have little interest in provoking controversy, but that doesn't mean I wish to see the promotion of a company which pushes injustice across the world.
Previously, I had looked up to you as a bit of a hero, now my opinion of you has dived quite low. I would not have minded if you disagreed with the merits of what Monsanto and Monsanto's customers choose to do. However, referring to people as dumb, for upvoting what is essentially a very well held and defensible position is a very weak thing to do. There are lots of arguments to be made against Monsanto, not the least of which is its Superfund environmental disaster sites.
The point is, I am informed, I know exactly what I am against, and have every reason to be outraged at the injustice perpetrated by Monsanto. This is furthered by needing to make the same arguments against Monsanto at my own company. If we've gotten to the point where we can't be outraged against injustice, then we may as well be heartless automatons.
To summarily dismiss them in this way and at the same time attack the intelligence of your readers is, well, reprehensible. Call me dumb if you will, I won't make arguments to the level of my own intelligence, but know that you have invalidated every reason to see you as a role model.
If you were apolitical, you wouldn't see monsanto as "a company which pushes injustice across the world".
Notice that this thread is full of such disparaging assertions, but no actual details, no citations, and the closest anyone gets is to pointing to people who have a very clear political agenda who make accusations against monsanto.
"what is essentially a very well held and defensible position"
I think this is what he's referring to as "dumb". This is not a "defensible" position because it isn't a fact, it is merely a dislike. As for "very well held" its unclear what you mean, except maybe you mean "widely held". I think it is dumb to assume that just because a lot of people say the same thing about something, that means they are right, especially when they cannot go into details, and what they are saying is just broad political assertions.
"The point is, I am informed, I know exactly what I am against, and have every reason to be outraged at the injustice perpetrated by Monsanto."
If you're informed, why aren't you specific? Even when describing what you're outraged, the best you can say is "injustice". Such a weak word, and what does it really mean anyway? They did something you don't like?
Wendy's screwed up my order the other day, giving me someone else's food, and they didn't give me a coupon to compensate. Oh, the injustice! Sure, that's silly, but at least I described specifically what they did wrong!
You're "outraged" at something you can't even describe. Yet you're "apolitical". Really?
Personally, I'm so tired of people going around repeating things they heard from other people, without doing any investigation or applying a legitimate moral compass to the issue.
This leads to "heartless automatons"... people who are easily controlled by media outlets. "Hate walmart!" (but don't hate Target, they're just the same, only they're unionized, and therefore they're not evil.) "Blame Wall Street!" (But ignore the government that, via regulation, forced banks to make loans to people who couldn't repaying them, claiming that to do otherwise was "racist".) etc. etc. etc.
I would have agreed with you except you ignored that I did indicate a specific incidence, the fact they hold a Superfund site. I didn't want to get back and forth on points, as I knew pg would not wish to debate them.
I did a full research study on Monsanto as part of TA'ing for a Professor who taught "International Political Economy" of Food & Hunger. I'm about as informed on the subject as I'm going to get short of doing a graduate thesis.
Regardless of how you count the numbers, Monsanto has at least one super fund site, a public externality that we have to deal with. See here for a discussion of reasons you can count many more to be under their guise: http://projects.publicintegrity.org/superfund/report.aspx?ai...
Actually, if you don't mind spending a few minutes to go on a bit further, I think it would be useful to have it all archived here for future reference.
one of my favorites, can you see the parallels between Monsanto and the RIAA? You could point this one in favor of Monsanto, but if you are like me and think that pushing terminator seeds to small farmers is a terrible thing then you will see it a different light. Often times they give out the seeds free the first year then have you stuck on them, comparisons could be made to drug pushers: http://www.utdallas.edu/~liebowit/knowledge_goods/monsanto.h...
Excerpt:
"Monsanto entered India in 2002 with some very compelling advertising. They claimed their engineered seeds would produce yields up to five times that of conventional cotton – 20 quintals per acre (equivalent to approximately 4.5 bales) compared to the 4 quintals (less than 1 bale) farmers were struggling to pull from their fields at the time. At the time, Monsanto admitted that their seeds costed more but insisted that investment would pay dividends.
Unfortunately the average yield of Monsanto’s GE cotton turned out to be nowhere near the advertised 20 quintals per acre. In reality the average output of the crop turned out to be 1.2 quintals per acre. Nowhere in India did it exceed 4 quintals per acre at the end of the harvest. To add insult to injury, farmers soon found out that the fibers produced by the Monsanto GE cotton plants were of lower quality. Instead of getting the usual $86 per quintal, they were only able to sell their crops for around $36 per quintal.
On average since 2002, of the farmers in India, many of whom fell into the Monsanto trap, one is committing suicide every 30 minutes. Many end their lives by drinking RoundUp."
The list goes on, if you've read this far and want more, I'll be glad to dig up some more of the material.
Previously, I had looked up to you as a bit of a hero, now my opinion of you has dived quite low. I would not have minded if you disagreed with the merits of what Monsanto and Monsanto's customers choose to do. However, referring to people as dumb, for upvoting what is essentially a very well held and defensible position is a very weak thing to do. There are lots of arguments to be made against Monsanto, not the least of which is its Superfund environmental disaster sites.
The point is, I am informed, I know exactly what I am against, and have every reason to be outraged at the injustice perpetrated by Monsanto. This is furthered by needing to make the same arguments against Monsanto at my own company. If we've gotten to the point where we can't be outraged against injustice, then we may as well be heartless automatons.
To summarily dismiss them in this way and at the same time attack the intelligence of your readers is, well, reprehensible. Call me dumb if you will, I won't make arguments to the level of my own intelligence, but know that you have invalidated every reason to see you as a role model.