Had an interesting but brief conversation today with a friend of a friend proudly wearing an I heart Monsanto sweater. What I took initially for irony was actual sincerity. He greatly supports this company and has some decent reasons for doing so. While I do think Monsanto is generally deserving of the highly criticized reputation, due to the nature of its global influence (not to mention its history of producing agent orange for Vietnam) the focus of business is business and not social well-being. Social well-being is not profitable, although it is every large companys advertising focus (omg Pepsi! I am looking at your gag worthy diversity commercials!). This is true of most large and even small companies. The important thing to take away from evaluating companies based on morality is the realization that business is amoral. This means any business will have examples of why they are good or bad morally across the map. My personal opinion of Monsanto is that there are some damaging rumors about them that should be looked at with skepticism on all fronts. But the biggest reason I am against them is not because of these rumors. It is a moral objection I have of their entire product. A standard which -- because of what I just said above -- is hard, even unfair, to apply to this company or any. I do anyway. So here goes: I think is it morally wrong to hold & sell patents to seeds of any kind and then go on to ruthlessly defend it as merely an innocuous business venture. It make them the Microsoft of the the food production industry. My biggest issue with Microsoft is that, despite its wide use and status as a company that can afford it, its not open source. Monsanto takes from nature, the most rich open source genetic code, to improve on crop production & agriculture but it does not give back. It does not freely allow the public to purchase a product and then for reasons of social well-being & evolution, let it be improved on by farmers, scientists, nature itself, etc. Given that the company has a motto of “agents of a future prosperity that will trickle down to all” and takes great lengths to distance itself from its questionable past of producing some of the worlds most toxic chemicals, I think they are inviting evaluation based on social well-being. Do they measure up? They take advantage of the well of natures genetic code, yet cannot understand when others do the same. Im not sure I will get a response that sticks to this subject because it is such a hot topic that is a moral objection and not necessarily a coldly logical one. But lets see how it goes! In defense of monsanto: theaggie.org/2013/01/16/in-defense-of-monsanto/ monsanto & agent orange: monsanto/newsviews/pages/agent-orange-background-monsanto-involvement.aspx monsanto doesnt allow farmers to re-seed : monsanto/newsviews/pages/why-does-monsanto-sue-farmers-who-save-seeds.aspx monsanto crop patent expires among antitrust suspicions: nytimes/2009/12/18/business/18seed.html?_r=0 supreme court documents on seed patents: https://techdirt/articles/20130513/12113523062/monsanto-wins-case-seed-patents-planting-your-own-legally-purchased-grown-seeds-can-be-infringing.shtml why not to trust monsanto: globalresearch.ca/from-agent-orange-to-pesticides-and-genetically-engineered-crops-why-not-to-trust-monsanto/5336444
Posted on: Fri, 19 Sep 2014 22:18:56 +0000
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