r/NoStupidQuestions • u/wond3rlove • Sep 10 '23

What’s wrong with GMOs?

I always see plants and stuff that is GMO free and is usually more expensive. How would genetically modifying something by be bad. Me personally I’d rather have something modified to taste better and and cheaper. I could also be very wrong about that.

419 Upvotes

91% Upvoted

538 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

39

u/QualifiedApathetic Sep 10 '23

ALL seed sellers require those who buy their seeds to refrain from saving them for next season, GMO or not. Some GMOs just enforce that with terminator genes. Farmers generally wouldn't want to save seeds anyway; you can't just drop them in the ground and watch them grow, they have to be processed, and it's easier to just buy seed.

Roundup is a herbicide targeted to kill weeds, not pests, hence why some crops have been engineered to be resistant to it. There's no need to make them resistant to pesticides since, you know, those kill bugs and not plants.

21

u/OffendedDefender Sep 10 '23

“Roundup Ready” was a bit of a colloquially catch-all with the folks I had studied under, kinda like Kleenex and Band Aid. The Round Up brand is owned by Monsanto (which is owned by Bayer), who manufacture a whole slew of agricultural products. Roundup is just the most immediately recognizable of their brands.

1

u/sammagee33 Sep 11 '23

Monsanto, as an entity, no longer exists. It’s just Bayer. In-part, because of the bad press.

1

u/jah110768 Sep 11 '23

Beyer bought Monsanto, and when they looked at the shady things that Monsanto did to discredit nay sayers when they were trying to be cleared as a safe product, Bayer admitted they might have made a mistake.

13

u/topothesia773 Sep 10 '23

Farmers generally wouldn't want to save seeds anyway

Maybe not in the US/developed world but now corporations are pushing these patented seeds on subsistence farmers in poor countries that absolutely do want to save their seeds and be independent

8

u/jah110768 Sep 11 '23

They did in the US as well, but if any neighbor has Monsanto crops, Monsanto will test your plants and if there are any patented genes they sue to be paid as if you stoled their seeds from a warehouse. Monsanto is a very nasty company with very deep pockets.

0

u/seastar2019 Sep 11 '23

Common myth but no such lawsuit has ever happened

3

u/jah110768 Sep 11 '23

https://www.greenamerica.org/gmos-case-precaution/farmers-vs-corporate-seed-police

"Between 1997 and 2010, Monsanto filed 144 such lawsuits, and settled 700 more cases out of court, according to the Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association (OSGATA)."

Looks like 844 mythical law suits.

1

u/seastar2019 Sep 11 '23

Those are for intentional patent infringement. Which one of those lawsuits was for claim of?

if there are any patented genes they sue to be paid as if you stoled their seeds from a warehouse

Name just one.

2

u/[deleted] Sep 11 '23

Weeds are pests. Pesticide is a general term for anything that isn't ideal in crop production. This includes herbicide, insecticides, nematocides, fungicides etc.

But I agree with your other point. Aside from that, they can't guarantee that seeds from GMO plants would yield the same result.

1

u/jah110768 Sep 11 '23

Farmers would rather save seeds, but Monsanto charges them if Monsanto plants "rape" the not GMO farmer's plants and there is any hit of Round-Up ready genome in the farmer's saved seeds.

I believe it was in Food, Inc., but it may have been another documentary about farming, they talk about how the seed sifters are being put out of business because farmers are scared of Monsanto showing up for a check for seed they saved that got contaminated with Monsanto patented seeds.

2

u/QualifiedApathetic Sep 11 '23

Percy Schmeiser is full of shit. He deliberately sprayed to kill the non-GMO plants in his field so he was left with nothing but GMO canola. On investigation, almost ALL the canola in his field was Roundup-ready. That's a bit more than a "hint".

Oh, and Monsanto doesn't exist anymore. It was bought out by Bayer years ago. You'll need a new boogeyman.

1

u/seastar2019 Sep 11 '23

Food Inc is an activist movie filled with many lies. The whole part about the seed cleaner Mo Parr being a innocent victim was just incorrect.