Music by The Refusers

Tuesday, November 6, 2012

VIDEO: A Conversation with Vandana Shiva on Prop 37 - Part 1 & 2



5 November 2012

"I think Proposition 37 is an opportunity for both the US citizens -- and I put the US citizens first -- and the US government to catch up with the rest of the world. Europe has had mandatory labeling of genetically engineered food from the early part of 2003. India has just announced mandatory labeling beginning first of January 2013. And this is out of a case we filed in 2006 saying every citizen has a right to know what they are eating and a right to choose. ...why should the government and the industry be scared of just putting there, 'This has GMOs,' if they are not worried about what GMOs do and they are not worried about how much facts they are suppressing in the process of pushing GMOs on unwilling consumers, not getting the full information.

"What is the science of genetic engineering? It is really not a science; it's a technology of shooting a gene that doesn't belong to a plant through two means. One is a gene gun and one is an agro bacterium, a plant cancer. You don't know where it's landing; you don't have the science of prediction. You don't know what it is doing. You don't know if it is getting absorbed, that was why you add anti-biotic resistance markers. You know the plant is not expressing it so you add super virulent viruses to pump up the expression. They're called promoters. So, you have a bundle of toxic risky genes. All of the real science tells us there is a phenomena called horizontal gene transfer in nature, when vertical is where your genes are taken from your parents, it's offspring to offspring. Horizontal is when it moves across species. We know the bacteria in our food hybridize with the bacteria in our gut. We know the viruses in our food hybridize with the viruses in our gut. We know, in spite of them saying the BT toxin doesn't last, new studies in Canada show it has been found in the blood of pregnant women and in the fetuses they've given birth to.

"A new study in France, a two year feeding study shows high levels of mammalian cancer. A similar study had similar results, in Russia in the Academy of Sciences. These are independent scientists with absolutely no involvement in any business industry interest. They are what we call public scientists. UK government asked Arpad Putzai, one of the most eminent scientists to do a study on GM foods, way back around 98' and he did it. He was actually a promoter of genetic engineering, but when he did the study, he found the results; the rats he had fed had shrunken brains, enlarged pancreas and a collapse of immunity. He went to his director and said if this has happened with three months of feeding rats, what will happen to a lifetime of feeding human beings, we should inform the public. They did, went all over BBC immediately, this is what we've been told, a call from Monsanto to Tony Blair to get rid of the top scientist who had left Hungary for freedom. And he said I had more freedom in Hungary than in corporate ruled England. That freedom is what the US is losing and US citizens are losing as corporations take over our science, our decision making, our food systems and our seed. So Proposition 37 is not an insignificant proposition. It is in a way a reflection of the larger debate in this election. Will money run it or will the people's democratic votes run it? Will democracy in America be of the people, by the people, for the people or is it going to be reduced to of the corporations, by the corporations, for the corporations? In which case, you have corporate rule and corporate rule means corporate dictatorship and corporate dictatorship as Mussolini said is Fascism, the convergence of political power with economic power. Very dangerous moment, but also a moment that pushes us to take action for freedom."

Yes on 37!      http://www.carighttoknow.org

Source:

http://www.causes.com/causes/79697-say-no-to-monsanto/actions/1700058?causes_ref=email&recruiter_id=344643&template=activity_mailer%2Fnew_activity&utm_campaign=action_email&utm_medium=email&utm_source=causes


Part 2 of  This Interview:


Youtube link to Part 2:     http://youtu.be/RxER8c3tjA0


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