Marching for BIOJUSTICE despite biotech cops
By Will Stockwin
The recent demonstrations against biotechnology in Fort San Diego left the lasting impression that, along with all of its other frightening implications, with biotechnology you get cops. Lots of cops.
Five helicopters worth of cops, squad car cops, motorcycle cops, armored-horse cops, bicycle cops, boat cops, plain clothes cops, riot tank cops, undercover agent provocateur cops, downtown high-rise sniper cops. All with badge numbers taped over, flexing for mayhem in the face of approximately 1,500 chanting, singing, peacefully united citizens practicing their constitutional rights to free speech and public assembly.
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"Bio patents are the true corporate takeover of life. Section 101 of the U.S. Patent Code says you can only patent 'machines or manufactures,' so by patenting genetic material they've reduced life to that level. What dignity is left to human beings if we say all genetic material can be reduced to the level of machines?" Andrew Kimbrell, Center for Technology Assessment and Center for Food Safety |
During our march across a virtually deserted city, I was suddenly struck by the contrast in images between the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) convention and the Eco Farm Conference at Asilomar in January.
The annual gathering of organic farmers known as Eco Farm is four days of farming and issue sessions, knowledge and information sharing, catching up, fantastic food and partying in a beautiful setting. The sessions are open to anyone who wants to learn more about producing wholesome food in harmony with nature.
BIO, by contrast, conducted its sessions behind closed doors and an unrelenting public relations smoke screen, the same way it does its science. And it had thousands of cops to harass and intimidate any and all prepared to question BIO's science and veracity.
Not once in all the years Eco Farm has existed has it ever been necessary to defend the conference with an army of thousands of cops behind chain link fences and concrete barriers. Like organic farming, Eco Farm is conducted in the open for all to see; no trade secrets or life patents needed.
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"Patents on life are a moral outrage and every decent human being should ignore them. This idea that eating poison food will somehow feed children in India is not just ridiculous, it's evil. Regaining control of our plants, our lives and our future will mean civil disobedience, intentional non-compliance with life patents and going to jail for many of us. This is going to be a difficult fight, but short-term courage will make for long-term joy." Vandana Shiva, Director of the Resarch Foundation for Science, Technology and Natural Resource Policy; author of Stolen Harvest: The Hijacking of the Global Food Supply |
The June 24 protest march was preceded with two days of public teach-ins by farmers and experts from all over world on the various dark aspects of biotechnology, including genetic trespass and pollution of non-biotech crops, bio piracy, control of scientific research through patent royalties, and legal intimidation. The BIOJUSTICE protest organizers invited BIO on at least three separate occasions to a public debate between all the experts both camps had assembled in San Diego.
BIO refused. It wanted no part of an open, democratic process that it could not control because at its heart, control is what biotechnology is about. Control through a subverted regulatory process; control through secret research data shared with no one; control through field tests in thousands of undisclosed locations around the country; control through an unquestioning corporate media addicted to and enslaved by biotech's advertising dollars.
Among its trading partners, America stands virtually alone in its blind acceptance of biotechnology. Catching up with the rest of the world can be as simple as declaring a moratorium on all agricultural and industrial uses of biotechnology until we finally get answers to some basic questions like:
What authority gives biotech companies the right to steal the genetic heritage of indigenous cultures all over the world? Why are farmers whose crops have been polluted by genetic trespass being sued for biotech patent violations? If genetically modified organisms in food really are safe and beneficial, why is the industry fighting so hard against the more than 450 thousand people who have asked the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to label those foods? And why does an industry with the lofty and humanitarian goals claimed by the Biotechnology Industry Organization need to hide behind all those cops?
What authority gives biotech companies the right to steal the genetic heritage of indigenous cultures all over the world? Why are farmers whose crops have been polluted by genetic trespass being sued for biotech patent violations? If genetically modified organisms in food really are safe and beneficial, why is the industry fighting so hard against the more than 450 thousand people who have asked the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to label those foods? And why does an industry with the lofty and humanitarian goals claimed by the Biotechnology Industry Organization need to hide behind all those cops?
