Quotes & Sayings About Genetically Modified

At the Jets training facility in Florham Park, N.J., we have strength and conditioning staff but also a nutritionist, Glen Tobias, who helps to whip everyone into shape. There is a heavy emphasis on grass-fed meat and on foods that aren't genetically modified. — D'Brickashaw Ferguson

We need to demand that our food is labeled, especially genetically modified foods, and learn how it is produced, processed, and grown. — Daphne Oz

Practically every food you buy in a store for consumption by humans is genetically modified food. There are no wild, seedless watermelons. There's no wild cows. — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

The US and UK governments' relentless backing for the global spread of genetically modified seeds was in fact the implementation of a decades long policy of the Rockefeller Foundation since the 1930's, when it funded Nazi eugenics research - i.e. mass-scale population reduction, and control of darker-skinned races by an Anglo-Saxon white elite. As some of these circles saw it, war as a means of population reduction was costly and not that efficient. — F. William Engdahl

Simply because my people are hungry, that is no justification to give them poison, to give them genetically modified food that is intrinsically dangerous to their health. — Levy Mwanawasa

Europe will not accept genetically modified foods. It doesn't make any difference in the final analysis what Brussels does, what Washington does, or what the World Trade Organization does. — Jeremy Rifkin

In the newspapers the row about the prospect of genetically modified food raged on, and yet here were consumers effectively demanding lambs with four back legs. — Rose Prince

I'd sit at my kitchen table and start scanning help-wanted ads on my laptop, but then a browser tab would blink and I'd get distracted and follow a link to a long magazine article about genetically modified wine grapes. Too long, actually, so I'd add it to my reading list. Then I'd follow another link to a book review. I'd add the review to my reading list, too, then download the first chapter of the book - third in a series about vampire police. Then, help-wanted ads forgotten, I'd retreat to the living room, put my laptop on my belly, and read all day. I had a lot of free time. — Robin Sloan

GM [genetically modified] plants are virtually everywhere in the US food chain, but don't have to be labeled, and aren't. Industry lobbyists intend to keep it that way. — Barbara Kingsolver

Most of the plants grown to be fed to farm animals are heavily saturated with pesticides and herbicides and have been genetically modified, all of which contributes to the pollution and destruction of our environment, which harms us all. — Sharon Gannon

I think the dangers of the impact of GMOs on the environment are undebatable. Genetically modified crops are tied to the chemicals sprayed on them. — Zoe Lister-Jones

All the food we eat - every grain of rice and kernel of corn - has been genetically modified. None of it was here before mankind learned to cultivate crops. The question isn't whether our food has been modified, but how. — Michael Specter

One of the skills of a journalist, though, is to find people who can teach him what he needs to know. So instead of taking courses, I've been very lucky in that I found teachers - scientists, especially - who were willing to teach me what I needed to know, whether it was about genetically modified crops or how photosynthesis works, and so on. I just find my teachers and don't have to pay for my education. — Michael Pollan

since I know for a fact that her class had been in the physics labs when Mr. Fibs got attacked by the bees he thought he'd genetically modified to obey commands from a whistle. (Turns out they only respond to the voice of James Earl Jones.) — Ally Carter

I hate spinach," the President of the United States blurted out. "Not the least bit sorry to see it happen." He spoke these candid words in a hush-hush, closed-door meeting with a "special advisor" from agribusiness giant, AgriNu. "Hate it." The President went on, "You know what else I hate? Peas. Despise peas ... and there's so many of them." Edwin Edwards (why do parents do that?), otherwise known as Mr. Ed, leaned back with a sly smile. "What if I told you there was a way to get rid of spinach? And peas? And, at the same time, break open this damned European block to our special genetically modified seeds, allowing us to finally take control of the world market?" The President settled back in his seat, indicating for him to go on. Despite not liking vegetables, the President liked a man with a big appetite. — Sharon Weil

When you eat pure food that isn't genetically modified, your physical and mental state does improve and it's worth the effort to make that happen. — Laura Prepon

While the demand for organic food outstrips supply, we happen to know that 77 percent of consumers don't want genetically engineered crops grown in this country. Consumers can choose whether or not to buy organic produce. Genetically modified ingredients will deny us choice in the long run. — Prince Charles

Every new genetically engineered plant is a unique event in nature, bringing its own set of genetic contingencies. This means that the reliability or safety of one genetically modified plant doesn't necessarily guarantee the reliability or safety of the next. — Michael Pollan

If food is labeled, some people might choose to eat stuff that's genetically modified. They might decide they love it. But give us a choice. — Ziggy Marley

Your average chocolate bar now is full of genetically modified sugar, genetically modified soy bean lecithin, and dairy products (super allergenic for kids); not to mention the 'fake vanilla' - known as chemical vanillin, synthetic flavoring. — David Wolfe

According to Indian crop ecologist Vandana Shiva, humans have eaten some 80,000 plant species in our history. After recent precipitous changes, three-quarters of all human food now comes from just eight species, with the field quickly narrowing down to genetically modified corn, soy, and canola. If woodpeckers and pandas enjoy celebrity status on the endangered-species list (dubious though such fame may be), food crops are the forgotten commoners. We're losing them as fast as we're losing rain forests. An enormous factor in this loss has been the new idea of plant varieties as patentable properties, rather than God's gifts to humanity or whatever the arrangement was previously felt to be, for all of prior history. — Barbara Kingsolver

The battle over genetically modified crops is rife with business interests and political opportunism. When GMOs were first produced in laboratories around the world, they were rightly heralded as a tremendous leap forward in our ability to supplement nature by providing high-nutrient foods. — Richard J. Roberts

If the existence of Nuclear weapons has taught us anything it would simply be that just because we possess powerful technologies, it does not necessarily mean that we should use them. Unfortunately, we are currently on course to learn similarly grave lessons from other devastating technologies such Genetically Modified Foods, Chemtrails and HAARP. — Gary Hopkins

Genetically modified foods are really just better crops. They're more nutritious. They're more resistant to drought, pests, and that sort of thing. — Joseph Rago

We are eating hybridized and genetically modified (GMO) foods full of antibiotics, hormones, pesticides, and additives that were unknown to our immune systems just a generation or two ago. The result? Our immune system becomes unable to recognize friend or foe - to distinguish between foreign molecular invaders we truly need to protect against and the foods we eat or, in some cases, our own cells. In Third World countries where hygiene is poor and infections are common, allergy and autoimmunity are rare. — Mark Hyman, M.D.

California's Proposition 37, which would require that genetically modified (G.M.) foods carry a label, has the potential to do just that - to change the politics of food not just in California but nationally too. — Michael Pollan

About 90 percent of all soy is genetically modified (GMO). Soy is also one of the top seven allergens, and is widely known to cause immediate hypersensitivity reactions. While in the last forty years soy has occupied an important place in the transition from an unhealthy meat-based diet to vegetarian and vegan cuisine, it is time for us to upgrade our food choice to one having more benefits, and fewer negative possibilities. In 1986, Stuart Berger, MD, placed soy among the seven top allergens - one of the "sinister seven." At the time, most experts listed soy around tenth or eleventh. — Gabriel Cousens

There's almost no food that isn't genetically modified. Genetic modification is the basis of all evolution. Things change because our planet is subjected to a lot of radiation, which causes DNA damage, which gets repaired, but results in mutations, which create a ready mixture of plants that people can choose from to improve agriculture. — Nina Fedoroff

I didn't want to throw him in any ol' piranha tank, I wanted to throw him into a tank filled with genetically modified super-piranhas carrying tasers and bullwhips. Asshole. — James A. Hunter

I would avoid any product that contains genetically modified (GMO) corn, because there are still questions regarding the long-term health effects of genetically altered foods on the human body have not been thoroughly tested. Sugars are also sneaked into tons of different foods, especially foods marketed to kids. Again, study the labels carefully before buying. — Deirdre Imus

Back in 1983, the United States government approved the release of the first genetically modified organism. In this case, it was a bacteria that prevents frost on food crops. — Jeremy Rifkin

I'm against the theory of the multinational corporations who say if you are
against hunger you must be for GMO. That's wrong, there is plenty of
natural, normal good food in the world to nourish the double of humanity.
There is absolutely no justification to produce genetically modified food
except the profit motive and the domination of the multinational
corporations. — Jean Ziegler

Myths about the dire effects of genetically modified foods on health and the environment abound, but they have not held up to scientific scrutiny. And, although many concerns have been expressed about the potential for unexpected consequences, the unexpected effects that have been observed so far have been benign. — Nina Fedoroff

90 percent of the corn and cotton and 93 percent of the soy-beans planted in the U.S. last year were genetically modified. — Anonymous

Many of the genetically modified foods will be safe, I'm sure. Will most of them be safe? Nobody knows. — Jeremy Rifkin

History is a treadmill turned by rising human numbers. Today GM crops are being marketed as the only means of avoiding mass starvation. They are unlikely to improve the lives of peasant farmers ; but they may well enable them to survive in greater numbers. — John Gray

Europe believes that providing clear labelling for genetically modified food is a consumer right, but such practice is absolutely opposed by the vast majority of states in the U.S. — Zac Goldsmith

Fairness forces you - even when you're writing a piece highly critical of, say, genetically modified food, as I have done - to make sure you represent the other side as extensively and as accurately as you possibly can. — Michael Pollan

Genetically modified foods are good. — James D. Watson

People are vaccinated with dangerous chemicals during their childhood, indoctrinated with immorality through television while growing up, taught to reject God by their teachers, fed with genetically modified food, and led to suspect others by their relatives and friends, and then you wonder why it's so difficult to find a normal person in this modern world, why nobody assumes responsibility for their words and behavior, and why everyone is so selfishly abusive. The biblical apocalypse has begun and the zombies are everywhere. It's just that we call them stupid and selfish instead. But they do act like there's no life inside of them anymore. There are no more normal human beings around. The survivors of this apocalypse are extremely scarce and must be treasured. — Robin Sacredfire

Genetically modified foods and chemical drugs. Two things that will change our consciousness as we become slaves to the world we made, not what the Divine gave us to live in this place and space called earth. — Steven Machat

Cows given genetically modified growth hormones make more milk, but have painful swollen udders, have ulcers, joint pain, miscarriages, deformed calves, infertility, and much shorter life spans. Their milk contains blood, pus, tranquilizers, antibiotics, and an insulin growth factor that can cause a fourfold increase in prostate cancer and sevenfold rise in breast cancer. This is the milk used in our school lunch programs and served to our children. This is the milk that you buy every day. This is the milk used in all cheeses, yogurts, butter, and cream. — Kevin Trudeau

Genetically modified organism (GMO) foods are feared and hated by environmentalists and the public alike. Yet the scientific assessment of GMOs is remarkably different. Every major scientific evaluation of GMO technology has concluded that GMOs are safe for human consumption and are a benefit to the environment. — Ramez Naam

We are sliding back into a dark era, and there seems little we can do about it. I am profoundly depressed at just how difficult it has become merely to get a realistic conversation started on issues such as climate change or genetically modified organisms. — Nina Fedoroff

There are no wild, seedless watermelons. There's no wild cows ... You list all the fruit, and all the vegetables, and ask yourself, is there a wild counterpart to this? If there is, it's not as large, it's not as sweet, it's not as juicy, and it has way more seeds in it. We have systematically genetically modified all the foods, the vegetables and animals that we have eaten ever since we cultivated them. It's called artificial selection. — Neil DeGrasse Tyson

In the two years after No Logo came out, I went to dozens of teach-ins and conferences, some of them attended by thousands of people (tens of thousands in the case of the World Social Forum), that were exclusively devoted to popular education about the inner workings of global finance and trade. No topic was too arcane: the science of genetically modified foods, trade-related intellectual property rights, the fine print of bilateral trade deals, the patenting of seeds, the truth about certain carbon sinks. I sensed in these rooms a hunger for knowledge that I have never witnessed in any university class. It was as if people understood, all at once, that gathering this knowledge was crucial to the survival not just of democracy but of the planet. Yes, this was complicated, but we embraced that complexity because we were finally looking at systems, not just symbols. — Naomi Klein

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) reports that current food production can sustain world food needs even for the 8 billion people who are projected to inhabit the planet in 2030. This will hold even with anticipated increases in meat consumption, and without adding genetically modified crops. — Barbara Kingsolver

We can look at the way of improving the key biochemical processes like photosynthesis itself. A lot of energy is lost to keep the plant cool. So maybe we can think of building plants which are more resistant to heat. Genetically modified plants can be one answer and we can imagine more efficient plants, call them 'energy plants'. And I believe, contrary to what ecologists think, they can still be beautiful plants. — Jean-Marie Lehn

In terms of the short-term objective [halving world hunger by 2015], the position I have always taken is that we don't need genetically modified organisms. — Jacques Diouf

The position I took at the time was that we hadn't really examined any of the potential environmental consequences of introducing genetically modified organisms. — Jeremy Rifkin

Seth could see that it would not be long before Ukraine, which currently enforces a ban on GMO products, became a card-carrying pro-GMO member, just as the United States had become, without the people even being aware of it. — Kenneth Eade

The huge arrogance of the companies developing GMO crops and their determination to destroy the line of accountability which links the developer to the product is breath-taking. When something goes wrong, as it inevitably will, there will be a great benefit to those who have taken a stance against genetically modified organisms. — Jonathon Porritt

Foreign Invaders: An Autoimmune Disease Journey through Monsanto's World of Genetically Modified Food Dara Jones — Dara Jones

If manufacturers are so sure there is nothing wrong with genetically modified foods, pesticides and cloned meats, they should have no problems labeling them as such. After all, cancer will kill one in every two men and one in every three women now alive, reports Samuel Epstein, chairman of the Cancer Prevention Coalition. Like our ancestors, we act in ways that will bemuse future societies. The military-industrial complex lubricates the mass-agriculture system with fossil fuels. Tons of heavy metals and other hazardous, even radioactive, waste is sprayed on American agricultural soil. — Adam Gollner