Check this out!!!

[Jared]

there is no way this can be good, if it happens Terminator seeds

http://www.organicconsumers.org/un.htm

[Calamity Jane]

WOW this is really frightening stuff. one can feel so powerless in the face of such evil, souless, greedy corporations. How is it that real human beings, at some level, are the ones making the decisions to fcuk with the "stuff of life"? Do they really see themselves as immune from the catastrope WHEN (not if) it all goes so horribly wrong? I filled in the on-line petition, but it's cold comfort -- the only thing that would make me feel better is, to quote Cockburn, a rocket launcher!

I'm going to bed now...i'm sad.

[Kaidy Mae]

Oh Deb! I hear ya sister. It certainly is cold comfort. However, putting good energy into the world by remaining positive and proactively boycotting such companies is the best you can do. I work at a health food store part-time and heard a rumour that Monsanto owns Swiss Vitamins. I haven't found any concrete evidence of this, but apparently they purchased the vitamin company under one of their other handles (Searle, Pharmacia, etc) to clean up their tarnished image. Yeah, good luck with that...tossers!

Do they expect us to forget that they created Agent Orange? This is obviously a company that doesn't think in terms of catastrophe. They only think in dollar signs and quarter profits. I read in Time Magazine that Agent Orange is to blame for "150,000 cases of birth defects and about 1 million cases of other maladies". ::

The most any of us can do is buy organic, ask questions whenever and to whomever we can. Try to encourage others not only to learn about these issues, but to have the desire to learn themselves and inform others.

Teach your parents well.

[onthejourney]

Does anybody else feel like sh!t is starting to get out of hand? Like all the bad stuff is happening really fast and there is so much of it that you feel helpless to do anything? I subscribe to environmental and political emails and I used to get involved in everything but there is just so much. Sometimes I just feel like these megamonster companies with tonnes o' moola are going to do whatever they want, whenever they want no matter what. Don't get me wrong, I still sign the petitions and try to inform when I can but sometimes it is hard not to get down and feel like there is nothing you can do...really, it makes me very sad and angry....so many people have no idea and when you tell them, alot of them don't care or try to create change within themselves and around them. meh...i could rant forever but i won't..sorry to vent

jroc---i signed it already before and thanks for postin it up...now i will send it off to more people

[Calamity Jane]

Kaidy Mae, thanks for reminding me that we do have some power with our money/choices on where to spend it. Because last night I was really down, as clearly Onthejourney is today. Actively fighting against these huge corporations can feel so overwhelming, but surrounding yourself with like-minded, proactive people can take the loneliness out of the hopelessness.

However, putting good energy into the world by remaining positive and proactively boycotting such companies is the best you can do. I work at a health food store part-time and heard a rumour that Monsanto owns Swiss Vitamins. I haven't found any concrete evidence of this, but apparently they purchased the vitamin company under one of their other handles (Searle, Pharmacia, etc) to clean up their tarnished image.

let me know if you discover more...because these 'green-washing' ploys are often hard to uncover. I'm reminded of two quotes:

the first is something like "It's easier to change the PERCEPTION of reality than change reality itself", meaning, it's easier (and cheaper) to engage in greenwash than to actually change the culture/goals/behaviour of a corporation. Seen any of those horrendous glossy mag ads Shell Oil puts out about all the "environmentalists" working for them?

the other quote, lyrics from Roger Waters' album Amused to Death has been free-floating in my brain all week: "It all makes perfect sense, expressed in dollars and cents, pounds, shilling and pence. Can't you see? It all makes perfect sense."

[thatpatguy]

I just want to add this to the pot of depression.. Ya know.. for everything the Canadian government does right, they go and do something stupid like this:

Canada's Government Backs Terminator Seeds

www.guardian.co.uk/gmdebate/Story/0,2763,1408821,00.html

Canada backs terminator seeds

John Vidal

Wednesday February 9, 2005

The Guardian (UK)

An international moratorium on the use of one of the world's most

controversial GM food technologies may be broken today if the Canadian

government gets seed sterilisation backed at a UN meeting.

Leaked documents seen by the Guardian show that Canada wants all governments

to accept the testing and commercialisation of "terminator" crop varieties.

These are genetically engineered to produce only infertile seeds which

farmers cannot replant.

Jointly patented by the GM company Monsanto and the US government, the

technology was condemned in the late 1990s by many African and Asian

governments who called for a permanent ban.

Monsanto and other GM companies which were developing similar technologies

voluntarily pulled out of research after concerns were also raised about the

"terminator" genes spreading to non-GM crops, and international outrage that

poor farmers would not be able to use seeds from their crops, as they have

always done.

But leaked instructions to Canadian government negotiators at the Bangkok

meeting of the Subsidiary Body on Scientific, Technical and Technological

Advice, a group which advises the UN's Convention on Biological Diversity,

show that Canada will request today that all countries open their doors to

the technology.

The papers, leaked to the environment group ETC, also show that the Canadian

government will attack an official UN report critical of the potential

impact of "terminator" seeds on small farmers and indigenous peoples. The report

recommends that governments prohibit the technology.

The Canadian government team in Bangkok was last night unavailable for

comment.

http://www.organicconsumers.org/ge/terminator20905.cfm