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January 16, 2005
Monsanto: DNA copyright bastards
Another farmer is being sued by biotech asshole firm Monsanto for piracy issues. His crime was to replant seed, like we have been doing for millenia. Now it's a crime. This is not the first time this has happened. A few years ago a Canadian was ruined when he had the nerve to replant seeds, or rather, when nature had the nerve to distribute seeds by means of wind and so on. They fucking ruined him. And he never even did business with Monsanto.
Percy Schmeiser says he's never used Monsanto's seed. He saves the seeds from his own crops, then replants them in the spring. But Monsanto investigators say they've found Monsanto DNA in Schmeiser's crops. Monsanto says Schmeiser never paid for the rights to use its DNA. Now they're suing Schmeiser for the money.
"We were approached by someone in Monsanto asking if Percy had some seed treated there, we said there was. They asked for a sample. I asked my superior in Saskatoon if it was okay to give a sample, he said it was okay, so we did," Pappenfoot says.Monsanto says Schmeiser has stolen its DNA.
In fact, Monsanto has accused dozens of farmers of growing the special seed without paying for it.
The problem is, Mother Nature has been moving DNA around for thousands of years. Monsanto's is just the latest.
"It will blow in the wind. you can't control it. you can't just say, put a fence around it and say that's where it stops. It might end up 10 miles, 20 miles," Schmeiser says.
What could stop Monsanto from planting some of this stuff in someone's fields and then saying that they stole DNA if the farmer pisses them off somehow? Or a competitive farmer? Not the law. Nor the courts, apparently. The U.S. Supreme Court in 1980 allowed for the patenting of genetically engineered life forms and extended the same protections to altered plants in 2001. I know it sounds far-fetched, but if someone alters your DNA so that you no longer get colds or flu, does this mean that you have to pay that company for every child you have? Does this mean that your genetic material is now owned by some biotech firm? Jerking off could be a breach of contract. I'm serious, because it's only a matter of time before we will be doing some real alterations to our own genetic material and paying private companies to do it. They will "own" the rights to genetic material the way music companies "own" music. I don't want to fight for "fair use" rights for my genetic material, or that of what I eat. I don't think I should have to.
I wish that people emphasized things other than money. That way Monsanto's position would be exposed as ridiculous.
Posted by JonasParker at January 16, 2005 7:00 AM
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Comments
here's the other shoe: the Monsanto crops have all been specifically designed to be resistant to... Round-Up, a Monsanto HEAVY pesticide that withers normal crops (and pretty much all other forms of life).
it's pretty grim...
Posted by: mtlanglo at January 16, 2005 7:36 AM
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