[patrickaljord]

> GMOs aren't bad in principle, but they are risky

Yeah, but how can someone praise the legalization of marijuana and the prohibition of GMO at the same time? GMO and marijuana are not always bad, but it's important to let people make their own decisions about them. It's like he doesn't even know why he's pro-marijuana legalization, isn't it about individual freedom to put what you want in your body? Thought so. Also, the free laptops for all policy has been tried elsewhere and has always been a big and costly failure.

[Brakenshire]

> it's important to let people make their own decisions about them

You must be strongly opposed to the system of regulation in the US, where GMO products are not fully labelled, so individuals do not have a choice.

This is also (to be blunt) a nonsense, because many of the potential threats that people are worried about are social, and not individual. For instance, they are worried about farmers losing their ability to produce their own seeds, so the nation's food supply becomes dependent on a handful of multinationals. No doubt South and Central Americans are particularly aware of the political implications of putting themselves in a position like that - see the Copper mines in Chile, or the banana plantations in Honduras and Guatemala.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._intervention_in_Chile#Firs...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_republic

If you expect individual consumers to make their purchasing decisions on long-term foreign policy, you are, to put it mildly, setting yourself up for disappointment. They are well within their rights to make decisions that affect everyone within democratic decision making processes.

[patrickaljord]

> You must be strongly opposed to the system of regulation in the US, where GMO products are not fully labelled, so individuals do not have a choice.

Of course they have a choice. They could only buy products that are fully labelled and guarantied to be 100% GMO free. Problem is for you, most people don't care about GMO so they buy GMO products anyway. This is why you want to ban GMO, to force people to care about the same stuff as you do. Don't want GMO? Buy GMO free products or grow your own food. Don't care enough to do so? Welcome to the rest of us.

> For instance, they are worried about farmers losing their ability to produce their own seeds, so the nation's food supply becomes dependent on a handful of multinationals.

Any examples please?

> see the Copper mines in Chile, or the banana plantations in Honduras and Guatemala.

This has nothing to do with GMO. I've lived for 5 years in Peru so I know a bit about South America. People don't care about GMO.

> They are well within their rights to make decisions that affect everyone within democratic decision making processes.

That's a fancy way to say "they are well within their rights to impose their opinion on what we should be allowed to eat on everybody else". Leftists are just like conservatives, always want to tell people what they can or cannot do with their own body. No thanks.

[Brakenshire]

> This is why you want to ban GMO, to force people to care about the same stuff as you do...Leftists are just like conservatives, always want to tell people what they can or cannot do with their own body.

Ah, I see. What else can you tell me about myself, generalizing from a selection of opinions? You should extend your logic to education policy, you could provide me with a devastating refutation of all of my new-found ideas.

I'm afraid you're not even wrong. Firstly, I don't want to ban GMO's, secondly, I'm not a 'leftist', thirdly, if you're going to widen the debate to drugs, leftists are overwhelmingly the driving force behind legalization and decriminalization.

[aluhut]

The problem with GMOs are the unknown long time risks and the fact that you may lose the ability to decide because you don't even know that it is an GMO or you don't have a choice at all.

You don't have to smoke pot, but you have to eat.

[lmm]

Food labelling laws are a good thing and can solve that.

[aluhut]

This theory has already proven to be wrong. Contaminated non-GMO fields, additives, processing aids, flavours, or meat/milk/eggs from animals fed by GMOs, etc. Strict food labelling laws would have been great before the product reached the market...