# General Discussion > Opinions >  Is genetically modified food safe?

## Hachiko

That is the question I ask you: is genetically modified food safe?




> (AP) - The European Union's head office said Friday it would approve a type of genetically modified corn for human consumption, ending a 6-year biotech moratorium that the United States has challenged at the World Trade Organization. European farmers will still be prohibited from growing the Bt11 insect-resistant corn, however. And companies trying to import such foods face an uphill battle in convincing European shoppers that the products are safe.(AP) - The European Union's head office said Friday it would approve a type of genetically modified corn for human consumption, ending a 6-year biotech moratorium that the United States has challenged at the World Trade Organization. European farmers will still be prohibited from growing the Bt11 insect-resistant corn, however. And companies trying to import such foods face an uphill battle in convincing European shoppers that the products are safe.


Yahoo! News

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## Frank D. White

having the food labled as such so I know & have a choice
to buy it or not!

Frank
 :Doubt:

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## Hachiko

> having the food labled as such so I know & have a choice
> to buy it or not!
> 
> Frank


Figures. Frank's liberalness put to work.  :Bluush:

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## EscaFlowne

Me, myself i choose not to mess with genetically engineered food, right along with that vegetarian meat product.....

Vegetarian hamburger....you see the wrongness in it. vegi...meat...It just dosen't seem right for the body to have something made genetically  :Doubt:  It just takes away from the wholesomeness of haveing something grown from the earth and put into your body.  :Sou ka:

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## Hachiko

That's why we have _organic_ food.  :Smiling:

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## EscaFlowne

:Okashii:  
right......
not good....

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## dreamer

Hum...Genetically modified food is everywhere now...anyway I don't think it'll affect our generation but if your kids eventually have 3 arms or 6 legs...awww :Shocked: 
I think the worst thing to happen is people to get cancer, however who knows maybe it's mankind's fate to commit a mass suicide?

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## kirei_na_me

Well, I think all of those processed foods are terrible. Having grown up on a farm and having everything from milk to broccoli to chicken _fresh_, I am kind of picky about what I eat now. Instead of shopping at those big supermarkets, I shop at a small private grocery store here who carries local produce and meat, which is all organic. The organic/locally grown produce might not look as shiny and plump as the other, but the other is like toxic waste to me...  :Sick:

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## Lina Inverse

> having the food labled as such so I know & have a choice
> to buy it or not!
> 
> Frank


They _do_ have to label it accordingly, that's why the article talked about an "uphill battle in convincing shoppers".

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## playaa

I do not really trust it, because if its still not safe to genetically modify human's why should we be eating genetically modified food? Reactions can be bad, because how do you know what properties have changed and will you be allergic maybe?

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## Lina Inverse

Uhm... ever thought about that genetically modifying a _human_ might just be a _weenie bit_ more difficult than genetically modifying a simple _plant_?  :Relieved:

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## playaa

heh, but what I am saying is, how do you know the genetically modified "simple plant" won't hurt the human consuming it?

Everyone is different so don't use the lab tested excuse, because they cant test EVERYBODY.  :Wavey:  

And do not take it as I am saying it should not be done at all, as Frank mentioned as long as its labeled so what? But if it isn't labeled then it becomes a problem.  :Sorry:

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## Lina Inverse

Well, you can also be allergic to a lot of stuff that's not genetically modified. Lots of people are allergic to nuts (don't ask me why). Should you ban anything that contains nuts now? Surely not. That's why there's a warning now that goes "Can contain traces of nuts" where it is not obvious.
The notice about genetically modified plants on the food should be understand likewise. Tests have shown that a broad range of people didn't have any problems with it, but as you said, they can't test anyone. So if you're in doubt if you're allergic to it, visit your physician and make an allergy test.

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## Foxtrot Uniform

Personally, I don't think theres anyhting wrong or dangerous about genetically engineered food. People have been doing the same thing for hundred of years in a less technological way by selective breeding - mating different plants to get the biggest, tastiest, strongets plants. The actual size of wild corn is smaller than your little finger but people have been breeding larger and larger corn over the centuries, and genetically modified food is the similar but its just done much faster in a labratory. There are problems that arise such as damage to the environment, but using GM food can be a good thing too because there can be larger yields of crops or more animals which may solve world hunger. As I said before personally I don't care, and in the future, GM food will probably become more and more common.

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## bossel

Actually, it's not the same as breeding, that's the problem. They are often introducing new material into the DNA. Long term effects are often not known.

The dangers are often overestimated, I think, but, well, nobody really knows.

There is also a problem with labelling GM-food. For if animals are fed GM-food, the meat doesn't have to be labelled accordingly. Only food directly for human consumption has to be.

Not that I care so much, I'll keep going to the same supermarket to buy the cheapest meat around.

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## Duo

Personally I would like to stay away from g.m. food. I would like to stick to organic just in case. Also I feel that the organic taste of things is better. It's true today our food has toxins and chemicals everywhere, so we must carefully choose our diet. Personally I try to avoid fast food places, cuz all they are is just stuff with flavor additives. Also many other products are the same, so I think is best to steer away from them.

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## Frank D. White

us old folks beyond the breeding age! There are so many things waiting in the wings to knock us oldies off, food 
would not be too much to worry about. Put a good senior citizen discount on it so it's cheaper that "real" food & it will sell like hotcakes!

Frank

 :Laughing:   :Blush:

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## mad pierrot

Pretty much all the food people eat today has been genetically modified, with the exception of wild game and such. By definition, genetically modified foods are organisms whose genetical material were modified in a way which is not found in nature under natural conditions of crossbreed or natural recombination. This includes domestication. Domesticated plants and animals include wheat, barley, peas, lentils, flax, melons, olives, sheep, goat, cows, dogs, chickens, rice, millet, soybean, hemp, pigs, silkworms, corn, beans, squash, cotton, turkey, etc. The list goes on and on. Many of these were in inedible in their "organic" form. Hell, wild almonds are poisonous!

So, I'm going to have to go with Sh-i-tkicker on this one. GM food is kind of an umbrella word that does include selective breeding. As far as the other processes go, like changing DNA in a lab, I don't know much about it.

Hell, what is "natural" anyways? Is anything not?

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## mygger

I think most of people would prefer organic food.

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## Maciamo

Selective cross-breeding varieties of plants or animals amounts to genetic modification. Yet nobody would criticise that practise. People tend to be afraid because modifications are made directly on the DNA in labs to save time. I don't see why. It is not the same as using chemical fertilisers and insecticides. GM food can very well be organic, if it is grown without fertilisers or insecticides. Anyway the DNA of the food we eat is destroyed by digestion, so it doesn't enter our organism. Modified in lab or not, it doesn't make any difference.

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## JackMack

> That is the question I ask you: is genetically modified food safe?
> 
> 
> 
> Yahoo! News


Yes it is. Period. The DNA you eat as well as all the other natural aspects of foods (ie. no preservatives, chemicals, etc...) is totally digested and safe.

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## keyoghettson

We should never mixture with nature. Scientists have tried that many times. Most times the result have been disaster. It's not nature that should adjust to us. We should adjust to nature. We are a part of nature like everything living.

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## LeBrok

But that's our success to adjust nature for us. We adjust wood and rocks to build our homes, paper to write our knowledge on. We adjusted wheat to give us more crop. We adjusted oxes to make them into cows to give us more milk and meat. We adjusted atoms to give us more energy, building material, computers, Internet, music in every phone, and talk to our friends around the world, etc...
For god sake, our ancestors adjusted stones to make stone tools to start our civilisation. Our civilisation is based on adjusting the nature to our needs!
But we should do it wisely! Mistakes are unavoidable though.

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## last-resort

The issue for me (to consume the GM product) is that the GM modification stay within Kingdoms. No animal DNA in plants and no plant DNA in animals. The No animal DNA in plants is the big one. As to the danger in producing the GM product - that some element gets distributed in unintended ways - that is another issue.

I encountered my first GM label - sunflower seeds from Bulgaria. Said they were GM. Had they said, "No animal DNA used", I would have bought it. The seed kernels were larger than usual.

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## LeBrok

> The issue for me (to consume the GM product) is that the GM* modification stay within Kingdoms. No animal DNA in plants and no plant DNA in animals*. The No animal DNA in plants is the big one. As to the danger in producing the GM product - that some element gets distributed in unintended ways - that is another issue.
> 
> I encountered my first GM label - sunflower seeds from Bulgaria. Said they were GM. Had they said, "No animal DNA used", I would have bought it. The seed kernels were larger than usual.


 Too late. Nature had this idea a log time ago. We all carry ancient and recent genomes of viruses and bacterias. The best examples is mitochondrial DNA.

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## last-resort

> Too late. Nature had this idea a log time ago. We all carry ancient and recent genomes of viruses and bacterias. The best examples is mitochondrial DNA.


 Okay. But I did not have any control over that. With knowledge, I can control what i put into my mouth - if my government allows me to know how a product was produced.

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## LeBrok

> Okay. But I did not have any control over that. With knowledge, I can control what i put into my mouth - if my government allows me to know how a product was produced.


I'm for labeling everything. I would like to even know a name of the farm my eggs and pork was grown on. Though there is obvious limitation about knowing everything about your food. Every piece of meat of veggies contain tens of thousands of different molecules.

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