Archives for February 2016

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Connect with Rachel at www.gmo-news.com
Follow her Journey at www.facebook.com/KidsRightToKnow

Help Rachel and awesome Youth Leaders like her empower and equip their generation through CHANGE GENERATION RISING, a free, action-oriented support and training program for young activists and school students at www.YOUTH-LEADER.org

14 year old Rachel Parent is a passionate advocate of food transparency, the health and safety of our foods, environment and ecosystems for today and our future. As she learned about emerging evidence showing hazards of GMOs on health, the environment and economies around the globe, and that more than 60 countries around the globe require mandatory GMO food labelling – so consumers like you and me have the Right To Know and Choose what Foods we Eat, she started speaking out for KIDS RIGHT TO KNOW also in Canada.

On the Global March Against Monsanto, Rachel publicly challenged O’Leary for his remark on television: “Only stupid people protest against Monsanto.” Monsanto should be considered a hero for researching for feeding humanity in the future. “I have an answer to those people. Stop eating. Then we can get rid of them.”

Well. Shocking. Intolerable and incongruent with basic, agreed human behaviour in a good, peaceful, libertarian and democratic society. And a twist for diverting attention from the matter.

CBC accepted the challenge, but not without a month’s delay.

Takie little ride with us, exploring the realm of corporate myth, the media of an unsustainable society, and seeing the pure spirit of Youth Leadership at work.

As you watch the show, pay attention to
– how many questions are open (for Rachel to talk about the issue she stands for)
– how many address facts about GMO benefits (not MYTHS, that Rachel instantly deconstructs)
– how many go off-topic in addressing Rachel as a person (a teen), thus undermining the credibility of her as a person and everything she stands for and says
– how many assumptions are made about her position (that are off topic, and also shift away from the core (and only) cause she represents)

These 12 min and 14 seconds are a powerful lesson about many things.

And it shows a 14 year old, passionate about the good cause of transparency, health, a safe environment, clean and ethical science, independent testing fit of democratic societies …

As you will quickly notice, this is not an open dialogue (as any reasonable, civilized debate ought to be, especially when in public) respecting the top level expertise that Rachel represents, … everything she says is solid evidence, facts and truth presented by unquestionable, multi-award winning global experts, independent organizations, courts and even governments.

This is a boxing fight. A nonstop attack, a few open, the majority hidden and low, trying from every angle, supposed merits, egoist guilt trip, anti-science, immaturity, shill, …

… and she elegantly blocks and returns every punch thrown at her,
returning every Off-Topic attack to the clear stance: Study properly. Label it.

… to the point that O’Leary’s line of attack breaks down and HE says:
OK, I GIVE YOU THE LABELLING

and as Rachel in a whiffy deconstructs his allegation that the government was doing proper testing (- watch out for that part!! – ) even says out of the blue: “we are in a long-term study. We have been eating GMOs for years” and thereby commits multiple self-destruction of his position, since
(a) the secret feeding of hundreds of millionds of Canadians with supposedly, but not at all properly tested GMOs is not a study (where is his strond advocacy of science, now?)
(b) hwy did he say there had been reliable studies?
(c) a proper study is done under verifiable conditions in laboraties and clear test groups, not on an entire population in chaotic environments and without access to data and materials (since Monsanto and others have criminalized independent testing by saying it’s “their” seeds)
(d) and how can O’Leary support that, given that he is so concerned about the health of children in far away Asia?

There are many more points, especially that GMOs have nowhere delivered the promised higher yields, long term (as Rachel mentions) AND that his repeated attack that Rachel’s position meant a death sentence for hundreds of thousands of children each year is absolutely ridiculous, since … aren’t there other ways for

(1) delivering Vitamin A (and entire countries have solved it, including Nobel Peace laureate Muhammad Yunus, by a simple campaign informing poor country people to tend their own little gardens with a hanfdul of veggies; since no more night blindness in Bangladesh.)

(2) other ways for raising yields in people-, nature-, consumer and economy friendly ways?
YES THERE ARE. Simple ways are already raising yields by 3-7 times in widespread regions of Asia and Africa. On large scale! Even promoted by governments.

Stay tuned for Youth-LeadeR.org’s special issue on SOIL, FOOD & FARMING.

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whirlwind full of tumbleweeds in outback queensland

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There are so many benefits to growing this beautiful crop. Not only is sorghum higher in antioxidants than blueberries, it is a highly land-efficient crop and is thrives in drought conditions.

Hampton Creek uses sorghum as the main ingredient in their Just Cookies. Delicious!