FoodBanter.com - View Single Post

On Mon, 14 Feb 2005 23:22:36 -0000
(Alex Rast) wrote:

> at Mon, 14 Feb 2005 02:05:01 GMT in <20050213190501.631df422@wafer>,
> (Eric Jorgensen) wrote :
>
> ...
> >
> > While you're at it can somebody explain their objection to
> > high-fructose
> >corn syrup without using any dieting buzzwords? I'm all ears.
>
> There is a valid objection to high-fructose corn syrup - GMOs. A large
> percentage of the nation's corn crop these days is grown with genetically
> modified organisms (GMOs), whose genetic code has been artificially
> manipulated.
>
> Research on potential health consequences of GMO's is spotty at best, and
> since it's a new technology, there's no research on long term effects,
> for the incontrovertible reason that these crops haven't been on the
> market long enough for a study of long-term effects to be made.

You're talking about Starlink, and I know a thing or three about
Starlink Corn.

True, the FDA has confirmed that Starlink corn is being used to
manufacture corn syrup, and furthermore that there is no technology
available to prevent the further spread of the Starlink genes.

However, you're talking out your ass, because you know not of what you
speak.

Starlink corn is corn that has been genetically manipulated to create
it's own supply of a pesticide known as Cry9c. This means that there is
pesticide *in the corn, which sounds pretty alarming, at first.

Let me break it down for you.

1: We didn't invent Cry9c. Cry9c is a protein that is generated by a
natural soil bacterium found basically everywhere that there is dirt.

2: Cry9c is not toxic. You heard me, non-toxic. The pesticide action of
Cry9c is very specific - it binds to the interior of the digestive tract of
caterpillars, which starves them by preventing them from ingesting
nutrients from what they eat. Caterpillar physiology is very different from
mammalian physiology, our digestive tracts lack the structures that Cry9c
binds to.

3: Cry9c is not a new contaminant in our food supply. Cry9c and similar
proteins derived from the same bacterium have been widely used as a
pesticide for more than 20 years. You've been eating food dusted with the
stuff for decades.

4: There is no Cry9c in corn syrup. None. At all. Ever. The FDA
confirms that there is no Cry9c found in corn syrup even when made
exclusively from Starlink corn. Why?

a. Cry9c breaks down in the presence of water

b. Cry9c breaks down in the presence of heat

c. Cry9c breaks down in the presence of light

d. All three of the above are required to produce corn syrup.

e. Indeed, were you for some reason interested in eating fresh dent corn
- something you have never done and will likely never do because it doesn't
taste very good and has an odd texture - by the time it got to the grocery
store, nearly all of the Cry9c in a freshly harvested ear of corn has
already broken down purely due to the presence of water in the kernels. The
starlink nacho debacle notwithstanding, because tortillas are not HFCS.

5: There have been no reported cases of human sensitivity to Cry9c and
similar proteins. Ever. Even during FDA studies designed specifically to
ferret them out. Even when they had a group of people eat nothing but
starlink corn for several weeks.

You are at no risk from starlink corn, least of all from corn syrup, you
ignorant ninny.

If you want to complain about the affect it has on much needed insect
populations, I'm right there with you, but don't come crying to me about
the monarch butterfly - why is it we need a cute mascot to believe in
something?

> More disturbing are the ethical consequences. It would be one thing if
> genetic modification were being done solely for what one might take to be
> socially beneficial reasons like increased crop yields or higher nutrient
> values, but this is not the case. In fact, many of the GMOs currently
> being raised have been created for things like herbicide/pesticide
> resistance. It's bad enough that such crops encourage even more
> widespread use of pesticides with known toxic properties and which
> definitely cause environmental damage, but in fact typically the
> pesticides they're created to resist are ones manufactured by the same
> company selling the seed (most seed companies are owned by companies who
> manufacturer pesticides and herbicides). Thus the company is actually
> trying to manufacture a market for its own product.
>
> Again, that in itself is ethically questionable, but in addition such
> companies are creating GMOs with even more insidious properties. They're
> designed to die out in one generation, so a farmer can't replant seeds
> saved from the crop he just made - he's dependent on buying more from a
> seed supplier. And these GMOs can also require an activator - another
> chemical, usually manufactured by the same company, in order to produce a
> crop at all. But even that's not the worst of it. Some of them are
> designed so as to kill off any crops not of that GMO stock grown on the
> same land. So the farmer is literally made a captive - he has to use the
> seed from the company, he has to apply the chemical from the company, he
> can't back out and revert to non-GMO production.
>
> It's also impossible to contain GMOs, in the sense that a farmer adjacent
> to the one growing GMOs can't prevent some seed from blowing over or
> spilling over or in some other way migrating into the next field,
> contaminating his crops in unpredictable ways. And, like the StarLink
> corn episode a few years back, trying to control where GMO's end up in
> the marketplace is fraught with difficulties. The government doesn't
> require any sort of labelling for GMO crops, so the customer can't make
> an informed decision even if they want to. It's for this reason that
> some people stay away from corn syrup in any form - you can't know
> whether it contains GMOs, and either you're unwilling to subject
> yourself to unknown health consequences or you don't want to be a part
> of supporting very questionable business practices.

I wholeheartedly agree that that herbicide and pesticide -resistant
crops are six kinds of bad idea, but this doesn't directly affect the
wholesomeness of HFCS.

The rest of this is so self-contradictory i don't really want to respond
to it but i guess i will.

You're concerned about the uncontrollable spread of GMO crops, yet you
vilify Monsanto when they render them sterile so that they can't spread?
Pick a cause and stick with it.

I'm editing my challenge - can anyone explain to me what makes high
fructose corn syrup objectionable, without dieting buzzwords or fear
mongering?