# Monsanto- Is it really Teh Evil? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 22, 2012, 8:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500 "2012-10-22T08:37:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/21 "2012-10-22T15:14:35Z")
I haven’t checked recently, but as late as 2007 every single variety of corn and soybean seed that had a genetically modified trait in it was also available in a non-GMO version. Didn’t matter whether the GMO trait came from Monsanto, DuPont, Liberty or whoever – you could get it with or without. (I’m not familiar with other crops like cotton, canola, etc. so I can’t say.) That also means you wouldn’t have to sign technology agreements, worry about restrictions on exporting your grain to other countries, etc. Here’s a recent [blog post by NPR’s Dan Charles](http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2012/10/18/163034053/top-five-myths-of-genetically-modified-seeds-busted)(who would hardly be described as an apologist for Monsanto) that goes into some detail about this topic. ---
**Author:** ![Labrador\_Deceiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7c8e57/32.png) [@Labrador\_Deceiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labrador_Deceiver)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/22 "2012-10-22T15:21:11Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > No, I imagine I can use it for the purpose for which it was designed, namely making phone calls and accessing the internet. Likewise, if I were given pollen, I imagine I can use it for the purpose for which it was designed, namely pollinating plants. I don’t think anyone is denying him the ability to pollinate his plants. Rather than take his crop to market, though, he decided to use the pollinated plants as a way to infringe on Monsanto’s patent. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/23 "2012-10-22T15:29:05Z")
I’d just like to point out that “teh” has a specific connotation meaning roughly the embodiment or epitome of. So, while Monsanto may or may not be evil, I don’t think they’re evil enough to be Teh Evil. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/24 "2012-10-22T15:44:20Z")
> [@Labrador\_Deceiver](#): > > I don’t think anyone is denying him the ability to pollinate his plants. Rather than take his crop to market, though, he decided to use the pollinated plants as a way to infringe on Monsanto’s patent. But using plants for seed is something farmers do. If they were his plants, he could do with them as he wanted. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 3:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/25 "2012-10-22T15:50:57Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > If I give you an iPhone as a gift, do you imagine you can disassemble it, learn how it works, and begin making and selling duplicate iPhones? That’s the thing, he’s not disassembling it, or learning how it works, he’s just allowing the iPhone to boink his Samsung. Frankly, he could hardly prevent it if he wanted to, you know how randy those iPhones are. Then, when his phone gives birth to bunch of baby phones, he picks out the iPhones, breeds them, and gets sued. If some dude’s prize (patented) bull gets out of his corral and screws one of my cows, am I required to destroy the calf? ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/26 "2012-10-22T15:53:23Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > But using plants for seed is something farmers do. If they were his plants, he could do with them as he wanted. I think the court agreed with that. What he couldn’t do is manufacture more of them himself. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 3:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/27 "2012-10-22T15:53:27Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > But using plants for seed is something farmers do. If they were his plants, he could do with them as he wanted. And that’s the part of this milleniums-old equation that Monsanto is trying(and apparently succeeding) to change. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/28 "2012-10-22T15:55:34Z")
I can’t say I’m fond of the idea of Monsanto being in a position where we have to pay them money if we want to grow food. ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/29 "2012-10-22T15:59:27Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > That’s the difference I referred to between attacking the science and attacking the corporation. Creating a better seed is a good thing. Forcing people to buy it, isn’t. This issue is not new, nor is it unique to genetically modified seed. For many years now, seed companies have been selling hybridized seed, and the most productive crops come from these seeds. They’re produced without any gene-splicing technology, just old-fashioned cross-breeding of different varieties. These crops yield well, but the seeds you get from them are either sterile, or the next generation will be very poor-performing. So the farmer can’t collect the seeds and use them the next year, he has to buy more seed the next year. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/30 "2012-10-22T16:01:59Z")
> [@MOIDALIZE](#): > > I can’t say I’m fond of the idea of Monsanto being in a position where we have to pay them money if we want to grow food. Wasn’t that the very plot of one the _Omen_ movies?-the gigantic chemical conglomerate hatches a plot to control the worlds’ food supplies in just this manner. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/31 "2012-10-22T16:02:33Z")
nm ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/32 "2012-10-22T16:07:33Z")
> [@CurtC](#): > > This issue is not new, nor is it unique to genetically modified seed. > > For many years now, seed companies have been selling hybridized seed, and the most productive crops come from these seeds. They’re produced without any gene-splicing technology, just old-fashioned cross-breeding of different varieties. > > These crops yield well, but the seeds you get from them are either sterile, or the next generation will be very poor-performing. So the farmer can’t collect the seeds and use them the next year, he has to buy more seed the next year. Of course the farmer can collect the seeds from a hybrid and use them next year. He just doesn’t WANT to. That, to me, is the difference. Burpee isn’t telling me I’m not allowed to plant my tomato seeds next year - I just know I’ll get less than ideal tomato plants if I do it. I’ll get tomato plants, though. And I can sell those tomatoes if I want, and I can save and plant those seeds if I want to. Monsanto isn’t saying, “sure, plant 'em if you want, but your crop is gonna suck…” They’ve invented a plant which WON’T suck grown from offspring seed, and then said you can’t plant it without giving them money every year, even if it got on your land without you choosing it and contaminated the plants you had intended to grow for seed stock. And I don’t see them offering free non-patented seed in exchange for that lost to their legal claim. They’re not even offering to make the farmer whole after their pollen ruined the farmer’s plan. Hybrids aren’t trespassing and extortion. They’re choice. ---
**Author:** ![Honesty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f04885/32.png) [@Honesty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Honesty)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/33 "2012-10-22T16:18:53Z")
> [@FriarTed](#): > > Listening to Coast to Coast AM, opening my Facebook, checking the occasional Conspiracy Buff site- either Left or Right, I am hearing & seeing stuff about Monsanto corrupting the food supply, poisoning humanity, killing off competitor crops via terminator seeds (if I understand correctly), provoking farmer suicides in India, and generally controlling both main U.S. parties & various governments worldwide. > > So what’s the Straight Dope? Feeder of the World, The Great Beast, or something in-between? Well, sort of. Roundup is teratogenic and is linked to cancers in mice and rats. You can see what it does to rats, [here](http://gaia-health.com/gaia-blog/2012-09-20/study-of-gmo-pesticide-induced-tumors-reveals-the-fraud-of-industry-research/tumor-ridden-rats/). The results are slightly misleading because the tumors are likely due to the pesticide not the genetically modified food, but the point remains valid. Here’s my two beefs: 1. The company has the biotechnology to have the seeds self-destruct but refuse to do so. 2. Lawyers and judges know very little to nothing about biology. It shows because lawyers hold the belief that one can patent a sequence of nucleotides in a living, breathing, metabolically-active organism. This isn’t Mansanto’s fault, it’s the fault of lawyers who think two Constitutional Law classes equals a doctoral dissertation in molecular genetics. - Honesty ---
**Author:** ![bldysabba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecccb3/32.png) [@bldysabba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bldysabba)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/34 "2012-10-22T16:41:29Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > How does a company force people to buy its products? If Monsanto’s seed is better than it is in the farmer’s best interest to use Monsanto’s seeds. If the seeds are not better, how can Monsanto force people to use the seeds. Are they sending goons to beat people up who use other types of seeds? I have not heard of that. > It seems like Monsanto’s seeds are better than what is available elsewhere. Farmers obviously would like to pay less for those seeds, but providing a better product is not force. Apple is not forcing hipsters to purchase their products by making them shinier than the competition’s. I can give you one side of the argument for why Monsanto’s “BT cotton” has faced criticism in India. I don’t necessarily agree with all of it, mind you. The argument goes thus - Monsanto promised/promoted their product as having much higher yields at lower costs. They neglected to mention that the crops require higher inputs in terms of fertilisers, irrigation, what have you, that the native strains of cotton did not. However, by the time the farmers figured out that this wasn’t working out for them, which took a few growing cycles/years, the native strains were scarce and difficult to obtain, effectively “forcing” farmers to continue buying Monsanto products. I suspect that there is a lot of knee-jerk populism and mindless anti-corporatism going on in that narrative. ---
**Author:** ![CurtC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ce73a5/32.png) [@CurtC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CurtC)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/35 "2012-10-22T16:56:51Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > Of course the farmer can collect the seeds from a hybrid and use them next year. He just doesn’t WANT to. That, to me, is the difference. Well, the argument I thought someone was making was that poor farmers, if they buy these seeds, will have to buy them again the next year, forcing them into a cycle of dependence on some evil corporation. I was just pointing out that this specific issue has been with us for decades and GMO brings no new considerations to the economic conundrum. You seem to be looking at it from a liberties POV, which wasn’t what I meant to address. However now that you brought it up… > [@](#): > > Monsanto isn’t saying, “sure, plant 'em if you want, but your crop is gonna suck…” They’ve invented a plant which WON’T suck grown from offspring seed, and then said you can’t plant it without giving them money every year… I see this as an intellectual property issue. Monsanto developed the technology, and I think inventors should have the right to profit from their inventions for some limited time. A farmer who plants seeds that he knows are protected by patents is to me the same as someone manufacturing iPhones without the consent of Apple. > [@](#): > > …even if it got on your land without you choosing it and contaminated the plants you had intended to grow for seed stock. And I don’t see them offering free non-patented seed in exchange for that lost to their legal claim. They’re not even offering to make the farmer whole after their pollen ruined the farmer’s plan. If there ever is a case where a farmer’s crop is ruined, or even harmed, by contamination with another company’s patented product, then that farmer will have a very good case for a lawsuit and he would win. The case of Percy Schmeiser wasn’t anything like that. He went to a lot of trouble to specifically cultivate what he knew was the patented seed, the patent belonging to someone else, and chose to make new plants with that seed and sell them. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/36 "2012-10-22T17:05:46Z")
> [@Honesty](#): > > Well, sort of. Roundup is teratogenic and is linked to cancers in mice and rats. You can see what it does to rats, [here](http://gaia-health.com/gaia-blog/2012-09-20/study-of-gmo-pesticide-induced-tumors-reveals-the-fraud-of-industry-research/tumor-ridden-rats/). The results are slightly misleading because the tumors are likely due to the pesticide not the genetically modified food, but the point remains valid. Those claims are [questionable](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22683395), to say the least. _“Glyphosate is widely considered by regulatory authorities and scientific bodies to have no carcinogenic potential, based primarily on results of carcinogenicity studies of rats and mice. To examine potential cancer risks in humans, we reviewed the epidemiologic literature to evaluate whether exposure to glyphosate is associated causally with cancer risk in humans. We also reviewed relevant methodological and biomonitoring studies of glyphosate. Seven cohort studies and fourteen case-control studies examined the association between glyphosate and one or more cancer outcomes. Our review found no consistent pattern of positive associations indicating a causal relationship between total cancer (in adults or children) or any site-specific cancer and exposure to glyphosate.”_ There does [not](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10854122) seem to be convincing evidence of a link between Roundup and birth defects: _“it is concluded that the use of Roundup herbicide does not result in adverse effects on development, reproduction, or endocrine systems in humans and other mammals.”_ As for those linked pictures of rats with tumors, I don’t see where the site got them from (the widely discredited Seralini study, maybe?). That particular site (Gaia Health) is a major repository of woo, and without good additional documentation I’d be loathe to believe any claims made on it (among other things, the site is anti-vaccine, attempts to link sunscreen use with Alzheimer’s disease and makes a variety of other unfounded and conspiratorial claims). Roundup, while a relatively safe herbicide, is not completely innocuous. However, its environmental and health impact is far more benign than that of traditional herbicides used on non-GMO crops. ---
**Author:** ![Jragon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e19b73/32.png) [@Jragon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jragon)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/37 "2012-10-22T17:08:34Z")
> [@bldysabba](#): > > I’ll do you the courtesy of asking you for a cite, but I’m reasonably sure this is a load of bollocks. To be clear, I’d need cites for > > 1. There being “quite a bit of issues in India with them being unable to feed their populace with unaltered crops”. India is (and was, a long while before genetically altered seeds came along) [self sufficient](http://planningcommission.nic.in/reports/genrep/bkpap2020/16_bg2020.pdf) in the production of food > 2. That there are religious or cultural reasons behind India being unwilling to accept seeds. There definitely are massive protests against GM food seeds(which have not been allowed yet), but they are all economic (farmers unwilling to purchase seed each year instead of keeping part of their crop as seed for next season) or environmental (alleging that GM foods are insufficiently field tested in the wild for environmental impact) Like I said, it’s how documentaries presented the issues to me. I can’t really offer you more than it was a Discovery or PBS documentary on either rice or wheat that said it. It spend the last third on GE food. ---
**Author:** ![Honesty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f04885/32.png) [@Honesty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Honesty)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/38 "2012-10-22T17:15:32Z")
> [@SeaDragonTattoo](#): > > If you can go the Netflix Instant route, a couple of movies that might be eye-opening are “Food, Inc.,” and “King Corn.” Also, “Vanishing of the Bees” about colony collapse and how the industrialized crop industry/insecticide/vast single crop practice have a major hand in the collapse disorder. I found it fascinating as I had no idea about the trucking around of bees from state to state. It’s all connected, and I think things being uniformly “controlled” by only a tiny palmful of major corporations is a big problem. Excellent observation, although I doubt it’ll receive the response it merits here. Colony collapse disorder was due, in part, to gathering pollen from genetically modified plants. It’s a one-sided street, you see. Beekeepers who lost billions of bees and likely millions in dollars aren’t able to sue the biotech companies due to negligence. I mean, really: a pollinating plant that which exudes sublethal amounts of insecticide didn’t raise a flag that it could on palpable effect on pollinating animals? Do these agricultural biotech companies not afford to hire an ecologist? The government - or really, a group of Justices in the 1980’s - shouldn’t have considered this kind of technology a novel, copyrightable invention. - Honesty ---
**Author:** ![Honesty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f04885/32.png) [@Honesty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Honesty)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/39 "2012-10-22T17:24:36Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > Those claims are [questionable](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22683395), to say the least. > > _“Glyphosate is widely considered by regulatory authorities and scientific bodies to have no carcinogenic potential, based primarily on results of carcinogenicity studies of rats and mice. To examine potential cancer risks in humans, we reviewed the epidemiologic literature to evaluate whether exposure to glyphosate is associated causally with cancer risk in humans. We also reviewed relevant methodological and biomonitoring studies of glyphosate. Seven cohort studies and fourteen case-control studies examined the association between glyphosate and one or more cancer outcomes. Our review found no consistent pattern of positive associations indicating a causal relationship between total cancer (in adults or children) or any site-specific cancer and exposure to glyphosate.”_ > > There does [not](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10854122) seem to be convincing evidence of a link between Roundup and birth defects: > > _“it is concluded that the use of Roundup herbicide does not result in adverse effects on development, reproduction, or endocrine systems in humans and other mammals.”_ > > As for those linked pictures of rats with tumors, I don’t see where the site got them from (the widely discredited Seralini study, maybe?). That particular site (Gaia Health) is a major repository of woo, and without good additional documentation I’d be loathe to believe any claims made on it (among other things, the site is anti-vaccine, attempts to link sunscreen use with Alzheimer’s disease and makes a variety of other unfounded and conspiratorial claims). > > Roundup, while a relatively safe herbicide, is not completely innocuous. However, its environmental and health impact is far more benign than that of traditional herbicides used on non-GMO crops. The studies the website linked to are valid and peer-reviewed. It causes cancer in rats, the abstract of your cite (see the second sentence) corroborates that. The issue is whether it has the same potential in humans. The _in vitro_ data doesn’t look [too good](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23000283) - looks like it kills human cells. Too bad there aren’t any trials with chimps or humans to see whether this stuff is actually having an effect in the human body. - Honesty ---
**Author:** ![Gorsnak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gorsnak/32/7587_2.png) [@Gorsnak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorsnak)\ **Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500/40 "2012-10-22T18:55:49Z")
Just for the record, Percy Schmeiser was growing canola, not corn, and it wasn’t Roundup Ready™ pollen that blew onto his land but actual seeds - canola seeds are tiny and blow around easily. Carry on. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monsanto-is-it-really-teh-evil/638500.md?page=3)