tagged w/ Intimidation
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Prominent MIT researcher Kerry Emanuel has been receiving an unprecedented "frenzy of hate" after a video featuring an interview with him was published recently by Climate Desk.
Emails contained "veiled threats against my wife," and other "tangible threats," Emanuel, a highly-regarded atmospheric scientist and director of MIT's Atmospheres, Oceans, and Climate program, said in an interview. "They were vile, these emails. They were the kind of emails nobody would like to receive."
"What was a little bit new about it was dragging family members into it and feeling that my family might be under threat, so naturally I didn't feel very good about that at all," Emanuel said. "I thought it was low to drag somebody's spouse into arguments like this."
Climate Desk has seen a sample of the emails and can confirm they are laced with menacing language and expletives, and contain personal threats of violence.
Emanuel began receiving emails "almost immediately" after the video was posted on Jan. 5, and the volume peaked at four or five emails a day. The threats have now petered off.
Threats are nothing new in the world of climate science. But Emanuel was surprised by the viciousness of the emails. "I think most of my colleagues and I have received a fair bit of email here and there that you might classify as ‘hate mail,' but nothing like what I've got in the last few days."
"This was a little more orchestrated this time," he said.
The video -- "New Hampshire's GOP Voters Speak Out About Climate Change" -- documented a climate change conference run by a group of Republican voters upset by their party's anti-science rhetoric. Emanuel was a keynote speaker, along with former Rep. Bob Inglis (R-S.C.), who, incidentally, has not received any threats since the video.
In one clip, Emanuel says, "It makes me feel to some extent disgusted with politics and to some extent ashamed to be an American."
The comments were seized upon, Emanuel suspects, by "bloggers bent on distorting that message and amplifying it." One website, Climate Depot, posted Emanuel's email address.
Emanuel notes that in the full video, he went on to explain that the Republican candidates "have either been misled, in which case it's not great to be part of the political system where candidates for the president of the United States could be so misled on such an important issue, or they were dishonest, which [is] equally bad in my view: How could we live in a country where candidates are being dishonest about an issue of such importance?"
Another website, Junk Science, raised questions about his wife's anti-war feelings in the 1960s.
"Somebody came to the conclusion that back in the '60s she was a Marxist -- which she was back then," Emanuel said. He notes that "conservative heroes of today like Norman Podhoretz [and] Jeane Kirkpatrick" were also socialists in the '60s. "So I don't quite know what the problem was there!"
More at the linkProminent MIT researcher Kerry Emanuel has been receiving an unprecedented... more
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http://news.yahoo.com/cops-ready-war-094500010.html
All protest can now be aggressively destroyed by paramilitary "police" forces nationwide. Nonviolent passive resistance, including boycotts, strikes, and corporate shutdowns will force them to come into our homes to drag us to jail. Until that time, we must be nonviolent and persistent.http://news.yahoo.com/cops-ready-war-094500010.html
All protest can now be... more
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"The presence of Talisman here is causing divisions between those who have accepted the company and those who won't... We are on the verge of genocide."
In Achuar territory in the remote Peruvian Amazon, an already tense situation has taken a turn for the worse over recent months. According to the urgent testimony of two Catholic priests, who have been living in the region for more than 60 years combined, Canadian-based oil company Talisman Energy is fomenting severe divisions between indigenous communities, heightening the risk of imminent bloodshed between neighboring families.
Talisman is drilling exploratory oil wells in Oil Block 64 in a remote area of the Peruvian Amazon near the Ecuador border. The oil block overlaps the territory of the Achuar people, and wells are being drilled in the heart of Achuar ancestral territory, in the middle of critical hunting and fishing grounds in a flooded wetlands ecosystem that drains into Lake Rimachi, the largest lake in the Peruvian Amazon, and the Pastaza River Wetland Complex, a site acknowledged under the Ramsar Convention as one of the most productive aquatic ecosystems in the Amazon rainforest.
Achuar leader Peas Peas Ayui, President of the National Achuar Federation of Peru (FENAP) has just returned from Calgary, Canada where he met with Talisman CEO John Manzoni to demand that the company respect the Achuar people, withdraw from their territory and cease insistent attempts to convince communities to sign agreements. The Achuar previously delivered the same message to Mr. Manzoni in 2008 and 2010, but despite the Achuar people's steadfast opposition to oil drilling, Talisman Energy continues its relentless search for oil, resorting to dangerous industry practices: divided and conquer.
Recent testimony from Padre Diego and Padre Bola highlights signs of oil company bribery, ecological disruption, threats of bloodshed between indigenous communities, and even the first cases of sexually transmitted diseases are part and parcel of a deteriorating situation along the Pastaza and Morona rivers, where Talisman is currently exploring for oil.
The Peruvian government first created Block 64 in 1995 during the Fujimori dictatorship without consultation or consent from the Achuar people who live there. The oil block and Talisman's operations span two river basins: the Pastaza and the Morona. The block directly affects Achuar territory; Shuar-Wampisa and Shapra people downriver on the Morona are also affected.
The Achuar were united and opposed to oil operations since the creation of the oil block and forced successive companies to leave, but since Talisman's arrival in the region in 2004, two new Achuar organizations representing a minority group of eight out of the 50 Achuar communities have broken off and signed agreements with Talisman. The Achuar accuse Talisman of ignoring communities who oppose their operations and creating divisions and conflict through offering high financial incentives to any community or family who signs up with the company.
The testimony from Father Diego underlines the seriousness of this situation, and calls attention to the spread of this conflict downriver in Shuar-Wampisa communities where a peaceful protest in September 2011 almost ended in bloodshed after a group of pro-Talisman Achuar confronted protestors with guns. This was almost an exact repeat of a similar incident in May 2009 when 300-400 Achuar marched in protest to a Talisman well and were confronted by armed pro-Talisman Achuar standing with the company. Talisman is subject to ongoing litigation in Peru over its involvement in provoking this dangerous conflict.
More at the link
Click on double bars to stop video if you wish."The presence of Talisman here is causing divisions between those who have... more
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The Brazilian Senate voted 59-7 Tuesday to approve new environmental legislation that would loosen restrictions on deforestation in the Amazon and give amnesty to those who illegally cleared land before July 2008.
At least 70 amendments were tacked onto the bill and must still be voted on. But sponsors of the legislation swore to knock down anything that changes the text's main points, and they have the support to make good on the threat.
The bill now goes back to the lower house, which already passed one version of the measure.
President Dilma Rousseff must also sign any legislation approved by the Congress. She pledged during her campaign for the presidency last year to veto any portion of an environmental bill that provides amnesty for those who illegally cleared land in the past. She now faces a tough political battle dealing with a strong agriculture lobby.
Brazil is the world's second-largest agricultural producer behind the U.S., and farmers say Brazil could easily be first if it weren't for the legal hurdles imposed by environmental legislation.
"This is the first time we're ending the monopoly, that we're ending the environmental dictatorship, where half a dozen (non-governmental organizations) controlled the Environmental Ministry," said Sen. Katia Abreu, who is also president of Brazil's National Agriculture and Livestock Federation.
But Marcio Astrini, a spokesman for Greenpeace's Amazon campaign, said the measure would "reduce the area required for conservation, and actually allow new deforestation."
"It's based on the concept that the forest gets in the way, on the argument that developed countries cut their forests, so we need to do the same. That thinking is centuries old now," he said.
The Senate vote comes a day after Brazil's government reported its lowest recorded annual level of Amazon deforestation. From August 2010 through July 2011, about 2,410 square miles (6,240 square kilometers) were destroyed, according to the National Institute for Space Research.
The government credited stepped-up enforcement against illegal cutting for the success. But some environmentalists warn it was likely due less to the government's crackdown and more to the global economic downturn, as demand lessened for products linked to deforestation, such as soy, timber and beef.
Environmentalists and agricultural interests have both pushed for a refurbishing of Brazil's current environmental law, initially passed in 1965 and toughened in the 1990s.
The law requires landowners to keep a certain percentage of their land forested, an amount that varies between 20 percent in some areas to 80 percent for states within the Amazon.
Farmers have long argued the current law's gradual tightening pushed them out of compliance and hobbled production. Staying on top of the law proved expensive, farmers say, and the government has offered no incentives to comply.
Environmental advocates agreed with the need for a new, updated law, but say the code as approved by the Senate sends a message that deforestation will be forgiven, and encourages further flouting of the law by illegal loggers and land grabbers. They argue the bill as it stands would lead to cutting down virgin forests, erosion of hillsides and riverbeds, and extensive, irreversible environmental damage to the rain forest, an area the size of the U.S. west of the Mississippi River that absorbs the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.
About 20 percent of the Brazilian rain forest already has been cut down. Burning and rotting trees account for 75 percent of Brazil's greenhouse gas emissions.
The base text approved by the Senate would reduce the preservation requirement to 50 percent in states where 65 percent of the land is already included in indigenous reservations or conservation units. Just one state, Amapa, falls under that category. Two others, Amazonia and Roraima, are close to reaching it.
The new law would also allow agriculture and cattle grazing closer to environmentally fragile areas: riversides, the tops and flanks of hills, and the land around springs. Currently, hillsides can't be cleared to prevent erosion, and a minimum of 98 feet (30 meters) must be kept forested around rivers.
The new code allows logging on slopes of up to 45 degrees, and reduces the preservation area around rivers by half.
It also redefines riverbeds as areas covered by water most of the year, instead of during peak flow times, shrinking the amount of protected area around them. In vast, flat forests like the Amazon, the water level of a river can rise 32 feet (10 meters) during the wet season. Each year, flooding covers 154,441 square miles (400,000 square kilometers) in the Amazon, said Maria Tereza Piedade, head of the ecology, monitoring and sustainable use group within the National Institute for Amazon Research.
This new definition would open vast untouched tracts of forest to deforestation, she said.
More at the linkThe Brazilian Senate voted 59-7 Tuesday to approve new environmental legislation that... more
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More than 250 people of different race and culture, including foreigner joins holding placards and banners demanding answers, representing Nepalese farmers in solidarity. Police stopped them from standing in front of the American embassy, which was there initial program.
"The ultimate goal of the protest is to put pressure on the Government of Nepal to
cancel their agreement with USAID and Monsanto Inc. and stop the proposed
hybrid maize pilot project from going ahead", on of the participant said.They also add "The introduction of Monsanto seed products into Nepal will have
disastrous consequences for the people of Nepal. Nepali farmers will
be forced into a relationship of dependancy with Monsanto Company.
Farmers will be worse off economically, soil and land will be
irreversibly damaged with the need for increased use of fertilizers.
thus decreasing chances of future livelihoods in farming and food
production. Nepal's international trade will also suffer.
http://www.demotix.com/sites/default/files/imagecache/large_610x456_scaled/photos/939565.jpgMore than 250 people of different race and culture, including foreigner joins holding... more
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NOTE: For more on the terrible human and environmental devastation wreaked by GM soy monocultures, see our Latin America videos: http://www.gmwatch.org/gm-videosb/26-gm-in-latin-america
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SOYA WARS CLAIM CASUALTIES IN ARGENTINA
Nick Caistor, LAB
Latin America Bureau, 22 November 2011
http://www.lab.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1138:argentina-death-in-soya-war&catid=65:news&Itemid=39
*A peasant leader has been killed in Santiago del Estero, apparently by gunmen sent in by a local landowner.
The death in mid-November of Cristian Ferreyra, a member of a peasant farmer organization in the north of Argentina has focused attention on a struggle between small farmers and their families and large landowners anxious to clear their land to plant profitable soy-bean crops for export.
Ferreyra, aged 23, was shot and killed at home in San Antonio, in the province of Santiago del Estero. Another man was seriously wounded in the incident.
Two men alleged to have been hired by a local landowner have been arrested for the shooting, which came after repeated threats against the Santiago del Estero Peasant Movement (MOCASE). His death led to large protest marches in the capital of the province and in Buenos Aires.
'They come in a car with papers for us to sign,' says Gloria, a MOCASE member. 'They say they're the legal owners of the land. But we own it, we live on it, and we farm it.'
And, says Gloria, the pressure does not stop there. 'If we don't sign, the paramilitaries and the police come. They threaten to kill us.'
MOCASE has been campaigning for more than 20 years against the expropriation of land in the dry region of the north of Argentina, and for small-scale farming to be promoted rather than large scale properties usually planted with soya grown for export.
'Many families live in the wooded areas remaining in Santiago del Estero, and they help sustain peasant farming communities. So to authorise clearing of the woods implies, in practice, the eviction of the peasants. It is to be regretted that the provincial government encourages deforestation and the violation of the rights of rural inhabitants,' said Hernán Giardini, head of Greenpeace Argentina.
According to Greenpeace, some 70% of native forests in Argentina have been lost in recent years, as the frontier of land for intensive agriculture has rapidly advanced through the central and northern provinces.
Santiago del Estero, together with neighbouring Salta and Chaco, have lost the greatest amount of forests, which according to data from the Department of National Environmental and Sustainable Development were cleared at the rate of 280,000 hectares per year between 1998 and 2006.
In recent months, Santiago del Estero landowners have stepped up attempts to evict families from land they have farmed for years. The businessmen claim to have legal titles to the properties, and have often hired former policemen and other security staff to remove the peasant farmers.
More than a hundred of these producers have formed the group Santiago Justo y Productivo; according to Argentine press reports, the group claims the violence began with members of MOCASE, who they say destroyed machinery, tore down barbed wire, and attacked their workers.
MOCASE, which is supported by some 8,000 peasant families in the province, has organised resistance to these land grabs and the clearing of forests in the north of the province. MOCASE claims that the big landowners acquired the titles to the land during the last military dictatorship (1976-1983) but that peasant farmers have been farming them for subsistence in the years since then.
Ferreyra was one of those who guarded the land claimed by the peasant farmers, and had been a member of MOCASE for several years.
The provincial governor Gerardo Zamora, of the governing Kirchnerist tendency within Peronism, has set up a 'mesa de diálogos' to try to get both sides to sit down and discuss the problem. So far, without much success.
Argentina's soya production has grown enormously in the past twenty years, increasing by more than 200% since 1995. According to a report by the Worldwatch Institute, a US-based environmental NGO, more than 98% of that production is of GM soya.
MOCASE, however, insists on 'food sovereignty'. It says that priority should be given to making Argentina and its population self-sufficient in food rather than growing crops for export. The local farmers grow cotton and maize, as well as keeping herds of goats and cattle to produce meat, milk and cheeses.
In October 2011 MOCASE and other peasant organizations from nine provinces held the first national congress of the Movimiento Nacional Campesino Indigena (National Indigenous Peasant Movement).
Among other demands, the participants called for an end to land evictions, and stressed that food sustainability should be the government's priority. 'Food should not be treated as a commodity. The land is there to feed the people,' said Cristina Loaiza, a member of MOCASE who attended the Congress.
In a statement, the National Indigenous Peasant Movement (MNCI) declared: 'this violence comes from the agro-business model. The dead, the wounded, the evictions are all from the peasant communities. The State creates the conditions enabling the power of money to impose its logic of destruction and death.'
'These models of production are being questioned, and as Argentine men and women we need to understand that on the one side is life, on the other death. One side signifies work and dignity, the other profits for the few. One side means national food sovereignty, the other, domination by transnational companies.'
http://racismandnationalconsciousnessnews.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/foto8.jpgNOTE: For more on the terrible human and environmental devastation wreaked by GM soy... more
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Sister Valsa John wanted to go home. Living in self-imposed exile hundreds of kilometres away, she pined for the hut in an aboriginal village where she had built a life. She talked about the people she loved there, and the quiet of the nights. Then she added, in a voice both wistful and matter-of-fact: “If I go home, most probably they will kill me.”
They did kill her. In the early hours of Wednesday morning, a mob of 25 or 30 men carrying spears, clubs and axes burst into her house in Pachuwara, a remote village in the eastern Indian state of Jharkhand. They beat and hacked her to death, a week after she went home.
The “they” Sister Valsa feared were “goons” hired by the mining companies she had helped the community of Pachuwara fight. The “coal mafia” told her on more than one occasion to get out of Pachuwara or they would kill her. She had repeatedly appealed to police for protection after threats on her life.
Sister Valsa, 52, was from Kerala in south India, and 24 years ago took her vows as a member of the Sisters of Charity of Jesus and Mary. She was one of the remarkable breed of Indian religious figures who are grassroots social activists, who immerse themselves in the most marginalized and impoverished communities and work on literacy, basic health care and human rights. Sister Valsa said she did Jesus’s work by teaching the aboriginal people – known in India as adivasi or “tribals” – about their rights to their land.
The Santhal community with whom she lived for nearly two decades were pushed off their land seven years ago by a private coal company. It was a familiar story here. Across the tribal heartland of India there are hundreds of these battles being waged, between communities with little education and even fewer resources, and huge mining and industrial corporations whose investments are eagerly sought by India’s state and central governments for the jobs they create, the taxes they pay – and the opportunities for graft they offer.
Sister Valsa helped organize the Santhal to demand compensation for their land; she was arrested at a protest in 2007. The company, Panem Coal Ltd., was eventually forced into a compensation agreement, and began to dig an open-cast coal mine, but didn’t meet all the terms of the deal. So when it moved to expand on to new Santhal land this year, Sister Valsa and her Santhal supporters dug in to stop them – and that is when the threats turned really ugly.
This past summer, Sister Valsa reluctantly left Pachuwara and took refuge with a friend, a fellow activist nun, at a school for low-caste girls in Bihar where I have been spending time on a project for the Globe. She fit easily into life there, gently shepherding the girls through their day, but she spent hours talking to me about “my people” and the war for land and resources going on in the tribal belt.
A few of these stories have attracted considerable attention, in India and beyond its borders, such as efforts by Vedanta Resources to build a bauxite mine on a mountain considered a god by the Dongri tribal people in the state of Orissa. But most of these fights go on, as Sister Valsa’s did, almost entirely unremarked.
snip
Inspector R. K. Mallick, the senior police official in the region, told The Globe and Mail it was too soon to discuss the investigation, but that police would soon have “the clear picture.” No arrests had yet been made. He would not entertain the question of whether police could have done more to protect Sister Valsa while she was alive. Three years ago, she filed a formal notice with police about the death threats.
Sister Sudha, who attended the funeral Thursday, said most who knew Sister Valsa believe it was people from the Santhal community, in the pay of the mining company, who killed her. “This is what the companies do: they divide people. When people are this poor, when someone gives them a little money, they can do anything,” she said. “Valsa knew it, and so many times we asked her to leave. But she said, ‘These are my people and I cannot leave them.’ ”
More at the linkSister Valsa John wanted to go home. Living in self-imposed exile hundreds of... more
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A fight to maintain consumer choice and farm independence has landed Maine farmer Jim Gerritsen on Utne Reader's list of "25 Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World," published in the November/December edition of the magazine on newsstands now.
Organic seed potato farmer Jim Gerritsen heads a trade association that is suing chemical giant Monsanto. (photo: Charlotte Hedley ) Gerritsen, wife Megan, and their four children run the Wood Prairie Farm in Bridgewater, which produces and sells organic seed potatoes to kitchen gardeners and market farmers in all 50 states. Gerritsen is also president of the Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association, and it was that role that led to the Utne recognition.
The nonprofit organization created a stir in food and farming communities when, with legal backing from the Public Patent Foundation, it filed a lawsuit in March against the chemical and biotechnology giant Monsanto. OSGATA has since been joined in the lawsuit by 82 other seed businesses, trade organizations and family farmers, which together represent more than 270,000 people.
The lawsuit questions the validity of Monsanto's patents on genetically modified seeds, and seeks protection from patent-infringement lawsuits for the plaintiffs should their crops become contaminated with Monsanto's transgenic crops.
"The viewpoint of Monsanto is that (in such a situation) we have their technology, even though we don't want it and it has zero value in the organic market," Gerritsen said. "We think they should keep their pollution on their side of the fence."
Laws prohibit certified organic crops from containing genetically modified ingredients, and Monsanto's patents prohibit farmers from growing its seeds unless purchased from the company. Yet pollen doesn't heed certification or patent laws, and regularly drifts from transgenic crops to contaminate nearby non-genetically altered ones.
To add insult to injury, Monsanto has a reputation for suing or threatening to sue farmers for patent infringement in cases involving its genetically altered seeds, action reported in numerous media outlets as wide ranging as the Columbia Daily Tribune, CBS News and the New York Times.
Despite this well documented legal tactic, Monsanto spokesperson Thomas Helscher stated in an email: "Monsanto has never sued and has publicly committed to not sue farmers over the inadvertent presence of biotechnology traits in their fields. The company does not and will not pursue legal action against a farmer where patented seed or traits are found in that farmer's field as a result of unintentional means."
"Inadvertent" and "unintentional" are the key words here, but for farmers to prove that Monsanto's transgenic seeds are unwanted invaders in a court of law is an expensive and time-consuming endeavor. A 2005 report from the Center for Food Safety, an organic-food and sustainable agriculture advocacy group, contends that Monsanto had at that time filed 90 lawsuits against American farmers. The report also contends that the corporation employed 75 people armed with a budget of $10 million devoted "solely to investigating and prosecuting farmers."
Pre-trial motions are still being filed in the lawsuit brought by OSGATA, with the most recent from Monsanto asking that the lawsuit be dismissed.
Helscher said the motion to dismiss results from the corporation's pledge to not sue farmers "where patented seed or traits are found in that farmer's field as a result of inadvertent means. Accordingly, there is no real controversy between parties and the OSGATA case should be dismissed."
Gerritsen views Monsanto's statements as part of a disinformation campaign designed to prolong the lawsuit.
"What they typically try to do is drag out lawsuits as long as they can, hoping the plaintiffs will run out of funding," Gerritsen said. He is confident OSGATA has the resources necessary to pursue this lawsuit for years, if necessary.
Unlike open pollinated crops such as corn and canola, which have suffered from widespread contamination by genetically modified seeds, potatoes remain relatively safe, Gerritsen said.
Monsanto developed multiple strains of transgenic potatoes in the 1990s under the name New Leaf. However, when major food companies such as McCain, which operates a french fry processing plant in Easton, and McDonald's rejected genetically-modified potatoes, Monsanto was forced to pull its transgenic strains off the market.
Gerritsen said the lawsuit will also seek to clarify what he sees as Monsanto's contradictory stance on its genetically modified seeds.
When arguing against labeling of transgenic food, Monsanto and other biotech companies claim that genetically modified seeds are substantially equivalent to traditional seeds. However, when seeking patents, the same companies claim the insertion of foreign genes creates unique seeds deserving of patent protection.
"Which is it?" Gerritsen asked. "It's one or other, but it can't be both. Is it the same? Or is it different?"
All genetically modified seeds are designed to do something different from the original seed. This can mean the modified seed will produce increased quantities of a particular substance inherent to the plant, manufacture chemicals foreign to the original plant, or withstand heavy applications of herbicides and pesticides manufactured by the same corporation seeking the seed patent.
snip
Citing the revolving door between corporations (including Monsanto) and the government agencies which purport to regulate them, Gerritsen said, "we basically have a dysfunctional government. The Occupy Wall Street concept is to try to give power back to the people."
In the same vein, the lawsuit against Monsanto seeks to restore the power of citizens and farmers to choose food free from genetically modified organisms.A fight to maintain consumer choice and farm independence has landed Maine farmer Jim... more
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Far from being "alarmist," predictions from climate scientists in many cases are proving to be more conservative than observed climate-induced impacts.
The warnings were dire: 188 predictions showing that climate-induced changes to the environment would put 7 percent of all plant and animal species on the globe - one out of every 14 critters - at risk of extinction.
Scientists have been quite conservative in a lot of important and different areas. - Naomi Oreskes, University of California, San Diego
Predictions like these have earned climate scientists the obloquy from critics for being "alarmist" - dismissed for using inflated descriptions of doom and destruction to push for action, more grant money or a global government.
But as the impacts of climate change become apparent, many predictions are proving to underplay the actual impacts. Reality, in many instances, is proving to be far worse than most scientists expected.
"We're seeing mounting evidence now that the scientific community, rather than overstating the claim or being alarmist, is the opposite," said Naomi Oreskes, a science historian with the University of California, San Diego. "Scientists have been quite conservative ... in a lot of important and different areas."
Biased science
A decade ago scientists predicted the Arctic wouldn't be ice-free in summer until 2100. But the extent of summer ice in the North has rapidly shrunk and today covers 70 percent of the area it did in 1979. Now some scientists think the Arctic could be naught but open water within 25 years.
In August, a team lead by University of York researcher Chris Thomas published a study showing that plants and animals are moving to higher elevations twice as fast as predicted in response to rising temperatures. They're migrating north three times faster than expected, they found
As for extinctions, earlier this year two scientists at the University of Exeter paired predicted versus observed annihilation rates. The real-world rates are more than double what the best computer modeling showed: While the studies, on average, warned of a 7 percent extinction rate, field observations suggested the rate was closer to 15 percent.
Oreskes has spent a career studying climate science. She finds ample evidence that climate scientists are indeed biased - just not in the way portrayed by politicians such as Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who claimed scientists paint a bleak picture to secure more research funding.
In reality, Oreskes said, scientists skew their results away from worst-case, doomsday scenarios. "Many people in the scientific community have felt that it's important to be conservative - that it protects your credibility," she said. "There's a low-end bias. It has led scientists to understate, rather than overstate, the impacts."
Media's fault, too
Not all scientists agree that they and their colleagues have deliberately downplayed impacts, of course.
But other scholars have noted the misperception - and argued the fault lies not just with scientists, but also with journalists reporting those findings.
In a notable 2010 study, the late William Freudenberg, a University of California, Santa Barbara, researcher who studied science and the media, found that new scientific findings are more than 20 times likely to show that global climate disruption is "worse than previously expected" rather than "not as bad as previously expected."
He drew two conclusions from the assessment, one for scientists and one for journalists:
Scientists should be more skeptical toward supposed "good news" on global warming. And reporters, he warned, "need to learn that, if they wish to discuss 'both sides' of the climate issue, the scientifically legitimate 'other side' is that, if anything, global climate disruption is likely to be significantly worse than has been suggested in scientific consensus estimates to date."
Inherent challenges
Of course, the science of climate modeling itself could be inherently biased. Predicting the future impact of emissions remains a difficult task, despite advances in the field over recent decades. Disparate elements can interact in surprising and additive ways that belie scientists' best assumptions.
That may be the case with the discrepancy between predicted and observed extinction rates, said Ilya Maclean, a researcher at the University of Exeter and lead author of the study, published in July in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Many studies he examined tie predicted extinction rates to just one factor - rising temperatures, say, or loss of habitat due to sea-level rise. But a changing climate can impact habitats and species in diverse and unexpected ways, he said.
"That's not to say there are always additive effects," Maclean said. "But that might be one of the reasons why predictions tend to be quite conservative."
More at the linkFar from being "alarmist," predictions from climate scientists in many cases... more
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The powerful biotechnology giant, which dominates Brazil's soya industry, has got a brochure on organic produce removed from the Ministry of Agriculture's website
http://www.lab.org.uk/index.php/news/65-news/989-brazil-monsanto-lays-down-the-law
Monsanto, the US-based biotechnology multinational, has had a brochure removed from website of the Ministry of Agriculture. The brochure, which can be accessed here, is a delightful and entirely innocuous publication, aimed at the general public. With illustrations by the renowned cartoonist and writer Ziraldo, it has been produced to publicise the new SISORG certification that has been produced by the Brazilian government for organic produce.
Although Monsanto has not explained the motives for its action, one can assume that it objects to the one and only mention of GMOs in the 32 pages of the brochure. The brochure states: "O agricultor organico nao cultiva transgenicos porque nao quer colocar em risco a diversidade de variedades que existem na natureza" (The organic farmer does not cultivate GMOs because he/she does not want to put at risk the diversity of the varieties that exist in nature).
It is difficult to think of other countries where such a statement, which is only reflecting what many organic farmers and anti-GMO activists believe, would be sufficient to have a publication taken off a government website. Monsanto has gone to court to have the publication banned, but the action by the Ministry of Agriculture has been taken before the court has made a ruling.
That Monsanto has the political clout to achieve this is a reflection of the expanding influence exercised by Monsanto since environmentalists and consumers lost a long legal battle and GMO soya was finally authorised in Brazil in 2003. Brazil is now one of the leading world producers of GMOThe powerful biotechnology giant, which dominates Brazil's soya industry, has got... more
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Excerpt:
"According to the scientists interviewed, roughly 95 percent of the published research involving GMOs has been conducted and paid for by the biotechnology industry. This means that only five percent of the available research on the subject has been conducted by independent research firms that are much more likely to have an honest, unbiased approach."
Continued at the linkExcerpt:
"According to the scientists interviewed, roughly 95 percent of the... more
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In 1967 Gowan’s brief was to offer the union’s members (in those days there were 180,000 of them) advice on legal and financial issues relating to environmental concerns – an increasingly hot topic at the time – when he got the call from the Glanmorgan NFU.
Farmers in the area around Brofiscin and Marndy quarries near Pontypridd were reporting mysterious deaths and abortions among their livestock. Arriving at Brofiscin Farm to investigate, the owner Gwilym Miles took him into a field where he was shown a stricken cow – one of a prize winning herd of 60. The cow was listless, flaccid, and unable to stand. Gowan was then taken to a barn where he was shown an aborted calf – it had no ears, no tail and one leg was a stump.
The local vet confirmed to Gowan that it was one of several similar deaths among the herd and that an autopsy had shown that the dead cattle all had lethargy, an inflammation of the stomach lining and liver. This was confirmed by the ministry vet and led to the local abattoir in Cardiff monitoring cattle from the farm, with a view to condemning those showing such symptoms.
At nearby Maendy Quarry similar deaths and abortions had been occurring in sheep, having also initially shown a loss of muscle control. All were baffled as to what was causing the deaths – it was beyond their experience. While reported symptoms were the same, there was no clear pattern of deaths to indicate disease or mass fatality to suggest one-off poisoning.
Shocked by what he had seen, something else struck Gown – the sickly, sweet smell in the air. He was also alarmed by the foaming yellow and purple liquid he could see streaming from he quarry into the ditches and streams across the land. After consultations at the NFU he was given the go-ahead by the Union to investigate further. He was to concentrate on Brofiscin Quarry and the surrounding area due to the regular cattle deaths, abortions and reproductive problems being experienced on Miles’ farm.
The quarries at Brofiscin and Maendy had become landfill sites in 1965 and 1966 respectively. Planning permission for Brofiscin had been granted against the advice of the local Llantrisant council’s planners, Gowan was to learn, and the go-ahead was only given with a series of conditions to preclude the dumping of wastes that could interfere with the watercourses or groundwater, or the environment. Throughout the Fifties, protection of the increasingly absurd waterways has been an increasingly political hot potato, which led, in 1963, to the passing of The Rivers (Prevention of Pollution) Act 1961.
Monsanto fell foul of this new legislation. The company’s Newpoty plant had been routinely dumping chemical wastes into the River Severn and public waterways and sewers. Internal memos from Monsanto record that at least 3.4lb of PCB wastes were daily being dumped into the sewers. Criticised in the press, and beset by a parallel situation looming large at its now infamous US plant in Anniston, Alabama, Monsanto looked for a new way to deal with its burgeoning waste problem. This was a case of swings and roundabouts for the global company; as its problems at home intensified it ramped up production of PCBs in the UK.
It sought out and employed a local Bridgend haulage company Industrial Waste Disposal South Wales Ltd (IWD) to clear its wastes. IWD, with Monsanto’s assistance, identified the sites at Brofiscin and Maendy, secured planning permission and swung into operation. Despite both quarries being permeable – Brofiscin is limestone and Maendy sandstone – neither was lined nor capped against rainfall. Problems soon materialised.
Within months, the owner of Brofiscin, a reclusive spinster known only as Miss Morgan, told Gowan that she started to receive complaints from villagers in nearby Grosfaen about the strong phenolic smell coming from the quarry. In 1967, when the cattle deaths began to occur, Gwilym Miles had also complained to her of fiery coloured liquids entering the stream on his land. Gowan ascertained that the fresh water shrimp in the stream were dead or dying.
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This goes into more detail and the threats against Mr. Gowan's life. Unbelievable.In 1967 Gowan’s brief was to offer the union’s members (in those days... more
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The former United States ambassador to France suggested "moving to retaliation" against France and the European Union (EU) in late 2007 to fight a French ban on Monsanto's genetically modified (GM) corn and changes in European policy toward biotech crops, according to a cable released by WikiLeaks on Sunday.
Former Ambassador Craig Stapleton was concerned about France's decision to suspend cultivation of Monsanto's MON-810 corn and warned that a new French environmental review standard could spread anti-biotech policy across the EU.
"Country team Paris recommends that we calibrate a target retaliation list that causes some pain across the EU since this is a collective responsibility, but that also focuses in part on the worst culprits," Stapleton wrote to diplomatic colleagues.
President George W. Bush appointed Stapleton as ambassador to France in 2005, and in 2009, Stapleton left the office and became an owner of the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team. Bush and Stapleton co-owned the Texas Rangers during the 1990s.
Monsanto is based in St. Louis.
The EU's 1998 approval of MON-810 corn has since expired. In recent years, several European countries joined France in banning MON-810 and similar biotech crops while the products are reassessed in light of research showing they could harm the environment and human health.
It is not clear if Stapleton's retaliation scheme was ever implemented.
"In our view, Europe is moving backwards not forwards on this issue with France playing a leading role, along with Austria, Italy and even the Commission ... Moving to retaliation will make clear that the current path has real costs to EU interests and could help strengthen European pro-biotech voices," Stapleton wrote.
MON-810 is engineered to excrete the Bt toxin, which is poisonous to some insect pests. A stacked version of MON-810 is also engineered to be resistant to glyphosate, a herbicide first popularized by Monsanto under the brand name Roundup.
The debate in France over Monsanto's GM products has grown ugly in recent years.
A recent Truthout report detailed the story of Dr. Gilles-Eric Seralini, a scientist at the University of Caen in France. Seralini's supporters claim the scientist has faced intimidation from within the French scientific community after he published several studies showing Monsanto GM corn and glyphosate posed risks to human health.The former United States ambassador to France suggested "moving to... more
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Almost overnight, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has gone from national joke to national nightmare. Passengers used to laugh when screeners so inept they missed 60-75% of the fake bombs undercover investigators smuggled past them nonetheless proclaimed themselves gods. No one's laughing now, though, as the TSA ogles us with carcinogenic technology and sexually assaults anyone who objects.
Over 300 of the agency's "naked" scanners lurk in 60-some airports nationwide, with more on the way; eventually, the agency will irradiate every passenger on every flight. These gizmos peer through clothing to photograph bodies in graphic detail. The TSA makes much of offering a "choice": if you dislike posing nude for the government, its perverts will grope you instead -- "prob[ing]," "prodding" and pushing "up your thighs and between your legs until we meet resistance" (and they don't mean a slap in the face). You also suffer this indignity, even if you submit to the scan, should it reveal "anomalies" such as piercings or prostheses.
Are you still flying? Why? For your own protection and that of your children, for liberty's sake, stay on the ground until Congress abolishes the TSA. No destination on earth or convenience in reaching it, no vacation, Thanksgiving dinner, meeting or sales trip, is worth the degradation the TSA is dishing out.
Its new "pat down procedures ... allow security officers to touch passengers of the same gender in sensitive areas such as the breasts and genitals..." These attacks have been "likened to ‘foreplay' pat-downs ... [screeners are] using the new front-of-the-hand, slide-down screening technique for ... over-the-clothes searches of passengers' breast and genital areas."
Such mass mauling is unprecedented. No regime anywhere at any time, however totalitarian or brutal, has ever routinely denuded and molested citizens.
Don't underestimate the trauma of such aggression nor succumb to the TSA's bland assurances that a screener "of the same gender" will paw you. We're talking sexual assault here, not a few moments of discomfort you'll quickly forget. Feelings of rage and helplessness, depression and worthlessness, can plague victims for months.
Most pilots are veterans of the Air Force; they're pretty tough cookies who may even have survived combat. Yet one of them "experienced a frisking [from the TSA] that has left him unable to function as a crewmember. Words used to describe the incident include ‘rape' and ‘sexual molestation,' and in the aftermath of trying to recover this pilot has literally vomited in his own driveway while contemplating going back to work and facing the possibility of a similar encounter with the TSA."
It's one thing for a predator to force your submission at gunpoint; it's another to voluntarily enter an airport and endure the TSA's onslaught. Knowing that you could have avoided it entirely but instead cooperated with your assailants and even paid them to violate you will cripple you with despair.
Meanwhile, a former cop points out that the TSA no longer inflicts "pat-downs" but something far worse: "A ‘pat-down' search by definition is ‘a frisk or external feeling of the outer garments of an individual for weapons only. ... anyone who watches cop shows knows what a pat-down search is. The words are part of the American lexicon, and the public's image of a pat-down search by police is something that isn't all that bad." Shame on us that we didn't consider it "all that bad" for the TSA to defy the Fourth Amendment's prohibition on "unreasonable," warrantless searches, though previously with the "backs of their hands." The cop continues: "... In police work, [the TSA's current method is] called a custody search [and] includes everything short of a cavity search. The TSA needs to be honest about what they're doing. It's not nice to lie to the American people."
Ah, but lying is the TSA's forte. Despite the hundreds of passengers wailing about molestation, despite the videotapes popping up on the internet to document their stories, despite infuriated pilots' unions and flight attendants' lawsuits, the agency blithely denies what millions have witnessed: "there is no fondling, squeezing, groping, or any sort of sexual assault taking place at airports," asserts its website. "You have a professional workforce carrying out procedures they were trained to perform to keep aviation security safe." Imagine if they trying to keep aviation security dangerous.
The TSA lies about everything, all the time. But it surpasses even its own astounding record of deception when it comes to naked scanners. For starters, it implies it foisted them on us to counteract the Underwear Bomber. Yet it was already testing them years before Umar Farouk Abdullmutallab oh-so-conveniently emasculated himself. Indeed, as long ago as 2006, the agency was touting porno-scanners as "likely future replacements for the metal detectors now in use." Nor will these contraptions stay in airports. Cops may already be peering through your curtains and bathrobe with portable versions.
But perhaps the TSA's biggest whoppers whitewash the hazards to our health from the two technologies with which it strips us. Experts in medicine, biochemistry, and biophysics warn that one, backscatter X-ray, concentrates in the skin rather than diffusing through the body as medical radiation does; therefore, the dose you receive is shockingly high -- far higher than the government admits. Dr. Jeff Zervas, a surgeon in Montevideo, Minnesota, told me, "As far as living tissue is concerned, the less exposure to ionizing radiation, the better. Zero is best." Dr. Zervas also worried about the TSA's legendary incompetence: "What happens, for example, if some clown leaves the machine on, and a passenger's standing in the field? And who calibrates these things? I wouldn't trust a bureaucrat or anyone else without a stake in its safety to do it properly."
Dr. David Caskey, a cardiologist who was also teaching at the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center in New Orleans when we spoke, seconded that: "In the medical industry we try as hard as possible to avoid even the smallest dose of radiation. Here you will be subjected to a rather significant amount. The result can and will be an increase in cataract formation, thyroid cancer, bone marrow suppression, etc." He was especially concerned for female passengers. "Even low level radiation can adversely affect a woman's ovaries. There's the potential for later birth defects. That risk increases if the woman is pregnant in the first trimester when she would likely be unaware of the pregnancy."
READ MORE: http://globalpoliticalawakening.blogspot.com/2010/11/standing-up-to-tsa.htmlAlmost overnight, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) has gone from... more
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URGENT: YOUR SUPPORT NEEDED for Professor G-E Séralini and colleagues
Court case coming up in Paris, 23 November 2010
GMWatch is joining French activists in appealing for your support for Professor G-E Séralini and his research colleagues, who are based at Criigen, la Fondation Sciences Citoyennes (FSC) and ENSSER (European Network of Scientists for Social and Environmental Responsibility). The public interest research of Séralini and colleagues on GMOs and pesticide/glyphosate toxicity has international significance, especially in India, where it helped in achieving the moratorium for the Bt brinjal, but also in Canada, Europe and the USA.
Now, Séralini and colleagues find themselves under concerted attack from GM promoters, who have resorted to defamation and flawed logic in an attempt to discredit the scientists. Séralini and colleagues have decided that the only way forward is to go to court to defend their professional reputations and their ability to continue to do public interest research.
Please voice your support for Séralini and colleagues and for the cause of open scientific discourse by signing this on-line petition:
http://sciencescitoyennes.org/spip.php?article1807
Background about Séralini and colleagues' work
Séralini and his colleagues have undertaken reviews of data provided by Monsanto in order to justify the commercialization of three of its GM maize lines (MON 863, MON 810, NK603). The re-analyses by Professor Seralini and colleagues question the reliability of Monsanto's data to formally prove the safety of these three GM maize lines (inadequacies in methodology, lack of robustness in statistical analysis). Unlike the research performed by the company, the work of Professor Séralini and colleagues has been subject to rigorous evaluation by peers before being published in the scientific literature in 2007 and 2009.
The findings by Professor Seralini’s research team question the validity of approvals granted by the European Commission, given on the advice of the European Food Safety Agency (EFSA) for human and animal consumption of these three maize varieties.
Professor Gilles-Eric Séralini and his team have repeatedly been subjected to defamatory attacks extending far beyond any scientific discourse and without any scientifically supported justification or merit. Such attacks fundamentally undermine the principles of due scientific discourse and the fairness of an open society and need to be robustly repulsed once and for all.
The professor of molecular biology based at Caen University has been able to identify the person attempting to destroy his good name as a scientist: namely Professor Marc Fellous and indirectly the AFBV (French Association of Plant Biotechnology), chaired by Marc Fellous, Professor of Genetics and former president of the Biomolecular Engineering Commission (a governmental commission to assess agricultural GMOs, of which Professor Séralini was a member from 1998 to 2007). He therefore feels morally obliged to go to court to defend his team's professional reputation against threats to the livelihood of all scientists who seek funding for public interest research.
PLEASE SIGN THE PETITION in defence of the principles of respectful scientific criticism and the use of diverse expertise on issues as sensitive, complex and potentially irreversible as the effects of growing GM crops.
The petition condemns the approach of researchers, who use defamation and flawed/biased logic rather than credible scientific grounds, to unfairly and unjustly argue their case. The petition calls for open and transparent scientific discourse, subject to assessment by peers.
http://sciencescitoyennes.org/spip.php?article1807URGENT: YOUR SUPPORT NEEDED for Professor G-E Séralini and colleagues
Court... more
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KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) -- The front-page newspaper story featured a list of Uganda's 100 "top" homosexuals, with a bright yellow banner across it that read: "Hang Them." Alongside their photos were the men's names and addresses.
In the days since it was published, at least four gay Ugandans on the list have been attacked and many others are in hiding, according to rights activist Julian Onziema. One person named in the story had stones thrown at his house by neighbors.
A lawmaker in this conservative African country introduced a bill a year ago that would have imposed the death penalty for some homosexual acts and life in prison for others. An international uproar ensued, and the bill was quietly shelved.
But gays in Uganda say they have faced a year of harassment and attacks since the bill's introduction.
The legislation was drawn up following a visit by leaders of U.S. conservative Christian ministries that promote therapy they say allows gays to become heterosexual.
"Before the introduction of the bill in parliament most people did not mind about our activities. But since then, we are harassed by many people who hate homosexuality," said Patrick Ndede, 27. "The publicity the bill got made many people come to know about us and they started mistreating us."
More than 20 homosexuals have been attacked over the last year in Uganda, and an additional 17 have been arrested and are in prison, said Frank Mugisha, the chairman of Sexual Minorities Uganda. Those numbers are up from the same period two years ago, when about 10 homosexuals were attacked, he said.
The bill became political poison after the international condemnation. Many Christian leaders have denounced it, and Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni signaled to legislators that they should not take it up.
Four members of parliament contacted by The Associated Press for this article declined to comment, and instead referred queries to David Bahati, the parliamentarian who introduced the bill. Bahati did not answer repeated calls Tuesday.
Homophobia is rife in many African countries. Homosexuality is punishable by death or imprisonment in Nigeria. In South Africa, the only African nation to recognize gay marriage, gangs carry out so-called "corrective" rapes on lesbians.
Solomon Male, a pastor and the head of a group of clergy in Uganda, said he is glad the anti-homosexual bill has not yet passed, but said there needs to be an investigation to find out "why homosexuality is increasing in the country."
The Oct. 9 article in a Ugandan newspaper called Rolling Stone - not the American magazine - came out five days before the one-year anniversary of the controversial legislation. The article claimed that an unknown but deadly disease was attacking homosexuals in Uganda, and said that gays were recruiting 1 million children by raiding schools, a common smear used in Uganda.
After the newspaper hit the streets, the government Media Council ordered the newspaper to cease publishing - not because of the newspaper's content, but rather that the newspaper had not registered with the government. After it completes the paperwork, Rolling Stone will be free to publish again, said Paul Mukasa, secretary of the Media Council.
That decision has angered the gay community further. Onziema said a lawsuit against Rolling Stone is in the works, and that she believes the publication has submitted its registration and plans to publish again.
"Such kind of media should not be allowed in Uganda. It is creating violence and calling for genocide of sex minorities," said Mugisha. "The law enforcers and government should come out and protect sex minorities from such media."
Rolling Stone does not have a large following in Uganda, a country of 32 million where about 85 percent of people are Christian and 12 percent are Muslim. The newspaper published its first edition on Aug. 23. It publishes about 2,000 copies, but a single newspaper in Uganda is often read by 10 more people.
The paper's managing editor, Giles Muhame, said the article was "in the public interest."
"We felt there was need for society to know that such characters exist amongst them. Some of them recruit young children into homosexuality, which is bad and need to be exposed," he said. "They take advantage of poverty to recruit Ugandans. In brief we did so because homosexuality is illegal, unacceptable and insults our traditional lifestyle.'
Members of the gay community named in the article faced harassment from friends and neighbors. Onziema said the proposed bill already has led to evictions from apartments, intimidation on the street, unlawful arrests and physical assault.
"We are an endangered species within our country," said Nelly Kabali, 31. "We are looked at as if we are outcasts. One time I was in a night club with a friend when someone who knew me pointed at me shouting 'There is a gay!' People wanted to beat me up but I was saved by a bouncer who led me out."KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) -- The front-page newspaper story featured a list of... more
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Billed as "a political thriller on GMOs and freedom of speech", this film by the German film-maker Bertram Verhaag tells the stories of two scientists, Dr Arpad Pusztai and Dr Ignacio Chapela, whose research showed negative findings on GM foods and crops. Both suffered the fate of those who challenge the powerful vested interests that dominate agribusiness and scientific research. They were vilified and intimidated, attempts were made to suppress and discredit their research, and their careers were derailed.
Pusztai found that the internal organs of rats fed GM insecticidal potatoes either increased in size or did not develop properly compared with controls. His experiments turned up no less than 36 significant differences between GM-fed and non-GM-fed animals. Pusztai, encouraged by his research institute, gave a 150-second interview on British TV in which he summarised his findings and said it was unfair to use our fellow citizens as guinea pigs for GM foods.
For two days, Pusztai was treated as a hero by his institute. But following a phone call from UK prime minister Tony Blair to the institute's head, Pusztai was fired and gagged under threat of a lawsuit. His research team was disbanded and his data were confiscated. Lies were circulated about his research that he could not counter due to the gagging order, lifted only later when he was due to appear before a Parliamentary Committee. For Pusztai’s co-researchers, the gagging order remains in place for life.
Pusztai's results threatened the GM industry because they showed that it wasn't the insecticide engineered into the potatoes that damaged the rats, but the genetic engineering process itself. So the problem wasn't just with these GM potatoes but potentially with all GM foods on the market. The only solution for the industry and its friends in government was to shoot the messenger.
Traumatic though this was for Pusztai, it wasn't the biggest shock he had to face regarding GM foods. That came when he was asked to review safety submissions from the GM industry for crops we were already eating – and found that they were scientifically flimsy. "That was a turning point in my life," said Pusztai. "I was doing safety studies; they were doing as little as possible [in terms of safety testing] to get their foods on the market as quickly as they could."
Another scientist whose run-in with the GM industry is featured in the film is Ignacio Chapela, a molecular geneticist at UC Berkeley. His research, co-authored with David Quist and published in the journal Nature, revealed that Mexican maize had been contaminated with GM genes. The finding was explosive because Mexico is the centre of origin for maize and the planting of GM maize there was illegal.
Chapela found himself the target of a vicious internet campaign condemning him as more of an activist than a scientist and claiming that his paper was false. Nature's editor published a partial retraction of the paper. As Chapela points out in the film, the editor's action flew in the face of scientific method. In the normal way of things, a journal editor publishes a study that he and peer reviewers judge to be sound. It is for subsequent published studies to confirm or correct the findings. It is not for the editor to state that he would not have published a study had he known then what he knows now – without the benefit of further peer reviewed scientific input. The editor's move showed how the GM industry is rewriting the rules of science for its own ends.
To add insult to injury, the internet campaign against Chapela turned out not to have been initiated and fuelled not by his scientific peers but by fake citizens, "sockpuppets" invented by the Bivings Group, a public relations firm contracted by Monsanto.
Scientists Under Attack goes on to show how the GM industry has blocked the evolution of scientific knowledge. When Russian scientist Irina Ermakova's study found high mortality rates and low body weight in rats fed GM soy, and when Austrian government research found that decreased fertility in mice fed GM maize, the industry carried out its usual campaign of vilification. If the industry were interested in scientific truth, it would push for studies to be repeated with the alleged "flaws" corrected. But this never happens. Instead, GM companies use their patent-based ownership of GM crops to deny scientists access to research materials – the GM crop and the non-GM parent line control. So the original research showing problems with GM crops is buried under a deluge of smears and follow up studies are not done. For the public, the difficulty and expense involved in accessing full research papers makes it hard to find where the truth lies.
The film also highlights an extreme example of the corporate takeover of science – at University of California, Berkeley (UCB), where Chapela is a professor. In 1998, UCB entered into a $25 million research partnership with biotech company Novartis (now Syngenta). The deal provoked angry debate on campus and was criticized by a number of faculty members, including Chapela. Then in 2007, UCB entered into a $500 million research deal with oil giant BP. The partnership was negotiated in secret, without consultation even within the university. In return for its money, BP gained access to UCB’s researchers, control over the research agenda, and co-ownership of commercial rights over inventions. Chapela says of BP, "They decide what is called science."Billed as "a political thriller on GMOs and freedom of speech", this film by... more
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After protests in Cairo, Alexandria and London over the death of Khaled Mohammed Said, this webclip highlights the Police culture of torture and intimidation in Egypt.
Amnesty International urges the Egyptian authorities to immediately put in place measures to protect witnesses of the death of Khaled and suspend the officers believed to be responsible, pending a comprehensive investigation into their conduct.After protests in Cairo, Alexandria and London over the death of Khaled Mohammed Said,... more
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Whether he's threatening prison guards or terrifying Antonio Banderas, Danny Trejo has always been the guy to call when you want to strike fear in a character. The Rotten Tomatoes Show gives him the Lifetime Achievement Award in Intimidation for being so dang good at scaring people into submission.
The Rotten Tomatoes Show is a movie review show that airs on Thursday nights at 10:30 e/p on Current TV. From reviews of the newest releases to commentary on cult favorites and movie trends, each episode of The Rotten Tomatoes Show is a fast-paced, comedic journey through the week in cinema.
For more from the Rotten Tomatoes Show: http://rottentomatoesshow.comWhether he's threatening prison guards or terrifying Antonio Banderas, Danny... more
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