Is Occupy Wall Street targeting Ag business?

Occupy Wall Street, Not My Belly
By Cathryn
Corn Commentary
National Corn Growers Association

For more than a month and a half now, Occupy Wall Street protesters have taken over city parks and the national news programs protesting social and economic inequality and corporate greed and power. Within weeks of its beginning, the movement grew not just geographically, with satellite protests springing up across the nation, but also internally. By now, some protesters even carry signs with such articulate messaging as “I AM VERY UPSET,” as seen on the front page of a recent New York Times.

Guess what? A lot of people are upset about a lot of things. But, as the many causes associated with the demonstrations multiply, some food elitists have started joining the “99%” while pushing an agenda that is not supported by the masses. Delivering misconstrued messaging that purportedly promotes democracy and touting dubitable sources, these fear mongers hype a plight that does not exist.

A recent blog post on Civil Eats outlines what the food-motivated occupiers actually want. The outcome of their desires would effectively squelch the freedom of average Americans to select the diet they prefer in favor of dictating a “healthier” America. By painting a seriously skewed picture of American agriculture, the elitist radicals deny the basic tenets of capitalism, an idea most Americans closely link with freedom. They condescend, offering only scant information provided by sources which either speak out of their field of expertise or have been debunked time and time again. Relying on a conception that Americans will embrace this emotionally charged propaganda without meaningful consideration, they aim to dictate both the choices of consumers and the ability of farmers to produce an abundant supply of healthy food choices.

Since an early age, children learn that they can “vote with their pocketbooks” as, in a free society the laws of supply and demand provide a tool with which they affect corporate America directly through their purchasing decisions. Yet, these protesters instead pose the idea that “75 percent of the population are obese or overweight and many are chronically ill with diet-related diseases” because of a corporate-controlled food supply. In doing so, they offer the easy out to anyone who makes poor choices by denying the long-valued ideal of personal responsibility.

Americans are not spoon-fed or force-fed the oversized portions of high-calorie foods that lead to weight gain. Instead, they choose a diet that they enjoy. Average Americans may not make the same choices as these activists, or even base them upon the same values, but that does not discount their opinions.

That argument sounds strangely familiar…

Many people take the easy academic out and blame corporations for producing the choices that they secretly favor. So, the protesters validate them. By blaming obesity on the corporations, these master debaters place the blame on faceless, callous mental images of corporations. These arguments further disguise an elitist agenda under the blanket of anger against corporations spun with the threads of discontent with financial entities whose corporate irresponsibility pushed our nation toward recession.

While these protestors claim to stand up to corporate farming, they rage against a corporate machine that doesn’t exist in the way they portray it. g. In all reality, 95 percent of all farms in America are still family owned. These growers, most often the descendants of a proud tradition of the rugged individualists who first made farming flourish here, make informed decisions every year on what to put in their fields. Farmers understand what types of climates and soil produce certain crops. They know first-hand that selecting seeds that can resist stressors common in their area will increase the chance of a successful harvest. They study their land, growing the most abundant crop possible in a way that preserves the environment- the single greatest resource as growers.

Pushing this reality aside, the blog post in particular jumps to the idea many espouse: somehow, big companies are behind what farmers produce. While a variety of companies do sell seeds, as consumers farmers select what they see as the product that will grow the best crop given their particular circumstances. If they did not see value in biotech, they wouldn’t pay for it.

Pointing to the rapid growth of sales for corn seeds with the Roundup Ready trait, the blog implies that, in order to achieve this type of success, the seed provider must be exercising some sort of secret power. In a way, successful seed providers are exercising a power that may be mysterious to the protestors. They make effective, proven, safe products that farmers like. Most average citizens understand that, when you make something that people like instead of just empty rhetoric, it tends to become popular quickly. Mystery solved.

The activists cite self-proclaimed “experts.” Again relying on the inaccurate assumption that the average Americans they claim to represent will be too lazy to examine these experts credibility, their arguments rely heavily on the claims made in the Oscar-nominated documentary Food, Inc. (To read up on the problems of the documentary, read American Agri-Women’s Food Inc Analysis.)

The aforementioned blog post in particular also cites a doctorate. Instead of the logical selection of citing a medical doctor for information on human health, or even a biologist, nutritionist or dietician, the information sourced are the opinions of a physicist. While a doctorate requires mental aptitude and dedication, it seems like a large leap to place trust in someone speaking so far outside of their area of expertise. If a physicist is in no way licensed to practice medicine or dispense dietary advice, it might appear more credible if the expert cited in these areas were thus raising the question of how the author made such a selection. The word “desperation” comes to mind…

Opponents rely on inaccurate data and select seemingly odd sources only when no better choices exist. This proves true yet again with the implication that Americans chose processed foods because they are cheaper. Looking at the research shows, cooking homemade meals from the ingredients that they deem healthy, albeit produced using more modern practices, actually saves money. Again, food choice has not been obliterated by a corporate plot. The average American simply does not chose the foods that the protestors’ agenda would dictate.

Instead of occupying a park only to spout propaganda, those seeking to occupy our nation’s fields and stomachs should face reality. The food system, while as much of a work-in-progress as any other human endeavor, is functional. Every year, farmers provide an abundant supply of quality food. They do so at prices lower than anywhere else in the developed world. They do so despite challenges both from the weather and from the very people eating the food they grow.

Do not let the occupiers win. The monopoly they seek to create would take away choice, push up prices and kill the efficiency that allows farmers to feed the actually impoverished, hungry masses they pretend to represent.

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