Is the corn in breakfast cereal safe to eat? What about the shell wrapping that taco?
Students, professors, scientists and interested citizens alike gathered to discuss genetically engineered food and medicine Monday night in Wells Hall.
The event was planned by the ASMSU Programming Board and featured discussion led by Georgina, the co-founder of Primal Seeds, an activist group from the United Kingdom, and Dee Dee of the Bioengineering Action Network. The two activists refused to tell The State News and the audience their last names. ASMSU is the university’s undergraduate student government.
“We see (genetic engineering) as a tool of capitalism,” Dee Dee said. “There are different reasons people are opposed to it: Food safety and health. There are very few things that can wipe out nature immediately, people are afraid that this is one of them.”
Recently, biotechnology has been a highly controversial issue throughout the United States. Starlink corn, a genetically engineered maize that has not been approved for human consumption, was found in Taco Bell taco shells after mistakenly being processed.
The controversy surrounding such technology has made its way to campus as well.
Ten months ago, Professor Catherine Ives’ office in Agriculture Hall was targeted by eco-terrorists because of ties to biotechnology research. The New Year’s Eve fire tore through the fourth floor of the historic building, causing some $400,000 in damages.
The Earth Liberation Front has claimed responsibility for the arson.
Students are also getting involved with and learning about the activist movement.
Physiology senior Joe Maleszewski and biochemistry senior Jen Sobota are making a documentary about genetically engineered crops through the Lyman Briggs school.
But the two were denied a request to tape Monday night’s forum by organizers. Sobota says she chose the issue for her group to dissect because it is such a controversial issue in science.
“I think it’s really important,” Sobota said. “A lot is changing in agriculture as we know it.
“It’s a misunderstood subject.”
Marty Heller, a research fellow at the University of Michigan and coordinator of MiRAGE - the Michigan Resistance Against Genetic Engineering - said the central problem with genetically engineered food and pharmaceuticals is who is in control of them.
“There’s a lot of talk about saving the world with biotechnology, but it doesn’t seem like it to me,” Heller said.
Heller will be part of a protest near Kellogg’s Battle Creek cereal plant today, protesting the use of genetically engineered food in cereals.
“There are things that humans have designed, and there are inevitable small glitches that turn into big problems,” Heller said. “Humans didn’t design these systems, but we’re trying to add to it. These will be even bigger problems.”
