The Rich Roll Podcast - Consumed By GMO: Daryl Wein & Zoe Lister-Jones On The Future of Food

Episode Date: May 29, 2016

You've probably heard of GMOs. You might even have an opinion on the subject of genetically modified food. But I think it's fair to say most of us are woefully under-informed when it comes to truly understanding and fully appreciating the vast extent to which this rapidly evolving science impacts all of us on a daily basis. 54% of all Americans polled know little to nothing about GMOs despite the fact that 80% of all processed foods currently contain GMO. Those statistics shock me. Even worse? To date there exists no long-term studies on the impact of GMO on human and environmental health. I'm no expert on the issue. But I do know we need to talk more about GMO. Because they were so great on their first appearance on the podcast ( RRP 191 ), I invited Daryl Wein & Zoe Lister-Jones to return to the show to bring us up to speed on the latest scientific and political developments in this incredibly important and rapidly evolving world. In case you missed our first conversation, Daryl and Zoe are the filmmaking dynamic duo behind Consumed, a dramatic thriller in the vein of Erin Brockovich and Traffic set in the incendiary world of genetically engineered food. You may also know Zoe from her prime time CBS comedy sit com Life In Pieces or her appearance in Confirmation, the new HBO drama about the Anita Hill scandal. Daryl and Zoe are not scientists and they don't play ones on film or television. They are artists. That said, they are passionate and incredibly informed when it comes to the broader, long-term implications of toying with the genetic material that forms our biosphere. Few issues are as delicate, controversial or emotionally charged as GMO. It takes courage to tackle the subject on film. I applaud that. Today we pick up where RRP 191 left off and get granular, diving much deeper into what in my opinion qualifies as one of the most important subjects of our time. Specific topics explored include: * what are GMOs? * the conundrum of labeling * the need for long-term scientific study * factory farming awareness * the power of the people & affected change * widespread use of glyphosate in our food supply * industrialized agriculture & controlling the food source * consolidated capitalism * genetically engineered animals Also, Consumed was just released on demand. It's available in certain territories on iTunes, Amazon and Google Play, but the best place to find it, stream it, download it, watch it and learn more is consumedthemovie.com. The film is really well done — impactful, earnest, thoughtful and entertaining. But it’s not a documentary. It doesn’t presuppose to answer questions, only ask them. As for questions, I've got a few of my own. So let’s get to the asking. I sincerely hope you enjoy the exchange. Peace + Plants, Rich

There's really not a lot of independent studies on GMOs because they're so expensive for independent scientists to do, which is why, you know, they rely so much on outside funding. And all of the studies that are done, unfortunately, are still self-regulated by these biotech corporations that are manufacturing genetically engineered food. That's Daryl Wein, along with Zoe Lister-Jones, and this is The Rich Roll Podcast. The Rich Roll Podcast. Hey, everybody. How are you guys doing? My name is Rich Roll. I am your host. Yes, indeed. This is The Rich Roll Podcast, the show where each week I have the grand privilege of just sitting down with really cool people, people that inspire me. in diet, nutrition, our food system, which is what we're going to talk about here today, athletic performance, how do we unlock our potential as an athlete. We talk about meditation

and mindfulness and spirituality. We even talk about entrepreneurship from time to time. Basically, I canvas a broad spectrum of subject matters. And the idea behind all of this is just to help all of us be better, to do a little bit better, to establish perhaps a more positive forward trajectory for all of us so we can unlock and unleash our best, most authentic selves. So anyway, thank you so much for tuning in today. I really do appreciate it. I appreciate everybody who has subscribed on iTunes and especially those people who have taken a moment to leave a review on iTunes. Thank you very much for that. It does help us out a lot. But first, let's acknowledge the awesome organizations that make this show possible. All right. So, I have a very intellectually stimulating conversation for you guys here today. It's one that I hope will make you think, make you question, make you ponder, and hopefully stick with you well beyond the time

that we spend together here today. It's with my friends Daryl Ween and Zoe Lister-Jones. They are the filmmaking couple behind the dramatic thriller Consumed, which is a movie, how do you describe it? I guess you could say the best way to describe it is sort of Erin Brockovich meets traffic set in the world of agriculture and GMOs. And it's a really well done independent film. It's got a great cast, Danny Glover, Victor Garber, Taylor Kinney, and of course, Zoe is the lead actress. It's socially conscious. It's impactful, earnest. Most of all, it's entertaining. It doesn't presuppose to answer questions, really just ask them. And if you're a longtime listener

to the show, you know that Daryl and Zoe have been on before. That was like a year ago, maybe not quite a year ago. It was episode 191. If you didn't listen to that, definitely go back and dial it up. They're fantastic. And you'll learn a little bit more about their background in that one. Because today I decided to have them back on for two up. They're fantastic. And you'll learn a little bit more about their background in that one, because today I decided to have them back on for two reasons. The first one is that Consumed is now available on demand. When I had them on before, you could only see the movie through special prearranged screenings. Not that many people were actually able to see it in the theater, but now it's available worldwide for download and streaming anywhere

in the world. Just go to consumedthemovie.com, consumedthemovie.com, which is the best place to watch it, stream it, et cetera. It's also available on iTunes, YouTube, Amazon, Google Play, all those kinds of places, but only in certain territories. So the best way to make sure that you're able to do it and watch it is go to consume the movie.com. Uh, the second reason I wanted to have them on is just to really pick up where we left off last time and discuss the latest in, uh, in GMO, uh, the latest developments, the latest news, what's going on in the science, et cetera, out in the world. And just, you know, further my education and, uh and hopefully share some insights with

you guys. Daryl and Zoe have become really good friends of Julie and I. We always have amazing conversations and exchanges. They are very up to speed on the latest developments in the whole GMO world, but they're not scientists, nor do they play ones on film or the internet. On that note, though, I am working on getting a leading scientist authority on GMO on the show very soon. So stay tuned for that. But no, Daryl and Zoe, they're artists. Daryl is a writer and director. Zoe also co-wrote, consumed, and produced it along with Daryl, but she's predominantly an actress. You've probably seen her or may have seen her in

the primetime CBS comedy sitcom Life in Pieces, which just got picked up for a second season. She's also in the new HBO drama Confirmation, which is all about the Anita Hill scandal. But like I said, they're passionate, incredibly informed on the subject of GMO. I appreciate their perspective and I applaud their mission to introduce this important subject matter to mainstream audiences because we need to have this conversation. I've said this before, but 54% of all Americans polled know little to nothing about GMOs, despite the fact that 80% of all processed foods currently contain GMO. 64 countries across the globe mandate labeling, yet the USA does not. And to date, there exists no long-term studies on the impact of GMO on human health. Now, look, I don't purport to have the answers to the many questions that are

posed by GMOs. I will say that I am a staunch supporter of mandatory labeling laws, of corporate transparency, of informed consumer consent, and long-term independent scientific research on the subject matter. But I do have questions, and I do feel strongly about engaging the subject matter directly. So let's do just that. You guys ready to rock? Yeah. Rock and roll. Don't you forget it.

I like how prepared you are though. It's so, it's so scary I think because there's so, it's so. Yeah, you don't want to misspeak

you know. Yeah, it's funny as filmmakers to like suddenly be like the voice of a cause I mean not the voice but one voice of many but it makes a lot of responsibility yeah it makes you a target as well you know so you gotta have your ducks in a row yeah right got your shit together man we got our shit together

how you guys doing we're good you just got back from big sir yeah yeah what were you guys doing up there we went to esalen which was awesome our minds got all hippie and esalen do you like take like naked hot tubs and stuff like that we did that's what you do i've never been but i've heard so much about it i was considering going there to like get away to just write you know it's a pretty incredible place. It was our first time. And I mean, the hot springs are insane.

They're like on a cliff and you're just overlooking that incredible vista. Right. And then it's like all amazing kind of organic food. And this is an incredible location where you can really just do whatever. I mean, it would be a great place to write. Right. And people go there and they're like in residence, right? Like they stay for really long periods of time. It's not like a, you know,

it's, it's, it's more like people like that than it is people on vacation. Right. It's people go for workshops. Right. So most people that are there are there for like a five to seven day workshop where they're taking classes every day. And yeah, so we were lucky to get in because the hot springs are open from one to three in the morning to the public and you have to wake up super early and try and reserve them to get in. Or you can try and book a massage to get in and then you have an hour on either side of the massage to go in the hot springs.

But every week some availability opens up if people don't show up to the workshops you just have to keep calling and did you were you going there to go to workshops or you just going there to get away we were going there to just uh do a kind of personal retreat for a short amount of time to just check out the space and the and uh go in the hot springs and decompress nice man yeah so beautiful up there and that place was built like 50 years ago yeah yeah yeah it's a story crazy story storied history yeah i'm sure we could do a whole podcast in the weeds on that but i do want to catch up with you guys i mean so much has happened since the first time we sat down and talked. When we sat down initially, it was on the cusp of you releasing your movie Consumed to the public, and you've done that.

Now it's available everywhere on demand video, right? Yes. Is it platform specific? Right now it has been released domestically on iTunes and Amazon and most VOD platforms, so pay-per-view, depending on your network provider. And the international rollout is happening over the next six months to a year. But people who are listening overseas

can get the movie through our website at consumethemovie.com. So if you don't live in the United States right now, you can go there. So if you're on Netflix, but you're overseas, you can't get it, you'd have to go to your website. Correct. It's not on Netflix yet domestically either.

So you can get it on iTunes and Pay-Per-View, like Daryl said, and Amazon. But yeah, anyone can get it on our website domestically too. Yeah, you can just stream it directly through consumethemovie.com. That's exciting. Yeah, you can just stream it directly through consumethemovie.com. That's exciting. Yeah, it's very exciting. So initially your domestic kind of theatrical rollout

was through that like startup, like crowdsourcing platform, right? Yeah, Gather Films. Gather, right. And how was that experience for you guys? It was cool. It was really cool. It was an interesting learning curve, you know,

because it's such a new way to release a movie, this whole, you know, on demand's such a new way to release a movie, this whole, you know, on demand who, whoever requests it around the country. And if they can raise enough awareness and get enough people to sign up to it, you know, 50 or 60 people generates a screening in that area. So it's been interesting. We've had 50 screenings at this point across the country, which has been really exciting. How many of those were you able to attend? this point across the country which has been really exciting how many of those were you able to attend not a lot of them unfortunately because to to travel to each one is tough because it's out of our own pocket at this point were some of them sort of organized around like q a's afterwards or having like gmo related specialists on site to kind of get more event oriented or we did have i mean that was the kind of the

beauty of that platform gather is that uh you know non-profit or small organization in these local towns and cities could take it on and then have their own speakers do like a panel afterwards and we had a great one in hawaii through the shaka movement and so there's been it's been cool to kind of connect with all of these like-minded organizations. Yeah. And in Illinois and Connecticut, through all the U S right to know, uh, subsidiaries in each state. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. And I want to hear about, you guys screened it on the Hill, right? Yeah. All right. So before we get into that, cause I want to hear all about that,

uh, it probably would be wise to recap what the movie is about for people that didn't hear our first podcast. Yes. Sure, yeah. Consumed is a political thriller set in the controversial world of genetically modified organisms. So it's kind of... And Daryl, what is a genetically modified organism?

A genetically modified organism is an organism that has been altered in a way that uh does not occur in nature so it is it can mean a lot of things it's pretty broad right yeah it i mean i think there's a big misconception that genetically modified organisms are the same as like traditionally crossbred organisms. So I think that's the thing. The trick is whether or not it's found in nature, which is like the really specific kind of caveat. And with GMOs, it's taking the genetic material from one species and transferring it to another. Whereas traditional cross breeding,

breeding, excuse me, is, is like species. Yeah. I mean, it's even, it's even going further than that. It's, it's taking it from even different kingdoms. So it's not even just plants. I mean, it could be from an insect. It could be from an animal, a virus or a bacteria. Yeah. Yeah. That is one of the kind of defenses that you hear like, look, this has been going on forever. There's nothing to be alarmed about. Gregor Mendel was doing this with plant species back in whenever that was, when I read about it in high school. So why is everyone freaking out?

But there's a qualitative difference between that and kind of the cutting edge science of what's happening now. And I do want to get into all of that, but let's stay on the movie. Yes, this is a movie about these issues. Yeah, it's not a documentary. That's the trick. It's like, it's got a great cast. It's Danny Glover, myself, Zoe Lister-Jones.

Victor Garber. For all those Titanic and Argo fans. And Alias. And Alias. Taylor Kinney from alias. Yeah. Taylor Kenny, uh, from Chicago fire. He's our heartthrob.

And, uh, Anthony Edwards, ER, Beth Grant, who's on the Mindy project and has been in like four Oscar nominated best pictures. Fun fact.

And Griffin Dunn, you know, after hours fame. And he's doing so many cool independent films and, uh, and Kunal Nayyar from big bang theory which is cool to see him go from a multi-cam sitcom into a gritty drama so yeah it's a fun cast of characters and um and yeah i mean it's kind of like for those who don't know about it

yet it's almost like the indie aaron bro Brockovich set in the food world. So kind of like Aaron Brockovich meets Traffic or Michael Clayton. Yeah, suspenseful, taut drama set in the world of food and GMOs. You guys wrote the script together, and Daryl, you directed. Yes, correct. And we produced it ourselves, which is always a challenge. I know. What's the name of your production company?

I remember getting a big one. Mr. Lister Films. I'm the Mr. Zoe's the Lister. Always. Exactly. Uh-huh. Yeah, we actually, our original logo, we had the gay and lesbian choir, the West Village gay and lesbian choir sang our opening. You know how there's always the logos before movies?

Right. We did the, I don't know how many people do a live logo, but they sang Mr. Lister. How did you swing that? I just knew I wanted a choir and, uh, and they were into it and they, they thought it was funny and cool. And so that is cool. That can be found on YouTube. They thought it was funny and cool. That is cool. That can be found on YouTube. I'm going to check that out.

It's like a 30 second video. Send me the link to that. Cool. So you make this movie, you release it domestically through Gather and you have that whole experience. We talked about that, but like, tell me about being on Capitol Hill and how that all went down. Yeah, it was cool. So Senator Blumenthal of Connecticut sponsored the Hill screening because you need someone on the Hill to sponsor it. So Daryl and I flew out and we had Dave Murphy from Food Democracy Now and Scott Faber from Environmental Working Group on a panel with us afterwards to talk. And so basically every Hill staffer was invited and it was thrilling. I mean,

that's kind of the ultimate goal with a film like this is to really try and affect actual change and policy. And so to be speaking to the people who have the ability to potentially do that. And at, at such a kind of incredible, um, turning point for labeling in this country, we were there, I think, the day that a new compromise was being introduced. There's this thing called the Dark Act, which has been labeled, deny Americans the right to know by the kind of labeling community. But basically, it would preempt states' rights to label GMOs. So it's a huge fight in this country because we are the only first world country, certainly, but 64 countries around the world label GMOs

and the United States doesn't. Or ban them. Or ban them. And yeah, we still do not label GMOs. Well, we have the, I mean, Vermont has a state law that goes into effect on july 1st right and they're the first state to enact this but the dark act is a federal law so if that passes it supersedes and overrides the vermont law correct exactly that is what they're they're

trying to do right now is they're still trying to preempt this vermont law in there's a few different bills that they're trying to revive uh and it would strip away even in the recent pat roberts bill the ability for voluntary labeling and replace it with some sort of compromised federal standard but that's just has not come to fruition unfortunately and this idea of qr codes has even been floated which is the newest and latest yeah it's very interesting but just to back up and lay a little bit of foundation what we're talking about is labeling food products uh with just basically the disclosure that this food product contains genetically engineered you know items or ingredients, what have you. Why is that so hard, Rich?

Just give people what they want to know. And there's been this battle that's been waging for a number of years where the big food manufacturers are pushing back against this and setting forth a variety of arguments saying, well, this will drive food prices up, it's going to confuse consumers, all these kind of weird arguments. And essentially it's a right-to-know proposition in you know, consumers should know what's in their food,

what's the big deal, if there's genetically engineered, you know, ingredients in this product, we should have a right to know that, right? Well, we don't, you know, how do you classify what is genetically engineered and what's not, it could be anything. And, you know, people don't really understand. But anyway, so this has been going on for a long time and the dark act has been simmering for quite a while too and has been overturned a number of times but it continues to be reintroduced yeah so like it was overturned and then reintroduced and then recently overturned overturned and now is being reintroduced again and i think the kind of manic reintroduction over and over is is precisely because of this july 1st deadline with vermont yeah i mean all all the the food environmental safety movement side is is is

advocating for are four simple words produced with genetic engineering that's it i mean and they have that in the european union and so many countries across, around the world. And we're wondering why are they so afraid to do that? And I think people listening should ask that same question. Why are they trying to deceive people or keep them in the dark? And this isn't even a discussion

about whether genetically modified organisms are bad or good. It's just purely a right to know. Just disclosure. So we have what's going on in Vermont. At the same time, there are food manufacturers that are voluntarily beginning to do this. I mean, like Pepsi and like Frito-Lay. I think like some big companies. Yeah, big companies.

M&Ms. Well, quote unquote voluntary. Right. Well, I mean, it's not begrudgingly. They're doing it because they have to comply with this law on July 1st. And some of them have been breaking ranks, like Campbell Soup was one of the first to come out

and say, all right, you know what? We're just going to start labeling. And so, yeah, it's great that some came out ahead of the pack and said we were going to do it. And, you know, a lot of them are not even announcing that they're doing it. Yeah, they're not exactly making a PR statement. No, they're not. They're just sort of quietly.

Campbell's actually did. Did they? But Pepsi and Frito-Lay are going kind of under the radar. And there's Mars, too. Mars, right. I think ConAgra, Kellogg's. I mean, it is exciting, even though they're under the gun because of Vermont. It is, I think, great that they are voluntarily labeling,

but I think that the issue is that we really do need a federal mandate. Yeah, well, but I think it should be known, though, that they, I think, would very quickly phase out the labels if this dark act. If Vermont goes away. Yeah, if Vermont goes away, which they all want. I mean, they're doing it because they have to do it and they can't just do it in Vermont. They've come out and said that they have to do it across the country. And, you know, the, the argument on the pro GMO side is that it would, you know, it's going to cost them millions of dollars and it's going to raise food

prices for people, which is not true. The environmental working group and just label it did an independent study that showed that food prices will not go up if there is a label on the product as, as they do all the time, they're constantly changing labels. And these labels are not set in stone. You know, they're constantly, they're constantly putting like a new star Wars on it or the Super Bowl. Or a new character or whatever. And they have to change their label. They're already doing it for the 64 countries around the world

that require labeling. Yeah, for years they have been the same manufacturers and companies that are labeling in parts of Europe and around the world. They're doing it there, so they have the ability to do it. Why aren't they doing it here? So why would Mars and Pepsi and these companies sort of quietly do it?

Is it because, well, they have to do it in Vermont anyway, so they might as well just slap it on all of them? Or is there some other reason? Are they just thinking, no, go ahead. They have to do it. They have to do it because i mean it would lose an entire state of consumers i see well of course yeah in vermont but are these products showing up on shelves outside of vermont with this label yes they're already in someone

tweeted it they went into the grocery store in florida and saw that on like a bag of potato chips it said produced with like genetically engineered canola oil or something it would be it would be way more costly for them to just label for one state rather than make it for the whole you know nationwide i mean there was an attempt for the grocery manufacturers association to boycott the state of vermont but they were shut down because it's illegal. There's legal precedent that says you can't kind of coordinate a boycott in that way. The Sherman Act actually says that companies cannot get together and do coordinated boycotts of food products. Right, it's an antitrust issue. Exactly.

Well, what's also kind of interesting on a macro level is I read somewhere that they had polled consumers and like 92% of people are in favor of this disclosure. Labeling, yeah. They want the label and yet. The New York Times, 93%. And yet the fact that it hasn't already happened, you know, either on a federal level or, you know, in more states is a testament to just how powerful, you know, these lobbying groups are in terms of driving, you know, regulatory policy on this, because if the people want it and it's still not happening, then, Hey, you know, what's really going on here. It does kind of put our democracy into question. Yeah. And I mean, in all of the, so, you know, there's the ballot

initiatives that have happened in Washington and in, and in Oregon and Vermont is the first law that would actually go into effect. laundering $11 million during the campaign or the ballot initiative over labeling GMOs into a front group because they can't directly contribute to the campaign. So they have, it's almost like the whole super PAC parallel. Right. This is some shady, you know, basic organization to hold money and distribute it to influence consumer opinion. to hold money and distribute it to influence consumer opinion. Exactly. And you just have to ask yourself again,

why are they working so hard to outspend the organic food movement and environmental movement into deceiving people from knowing what is in their food? Right. Well, it's very similar to the ag-gag laws, you know, preventing any kind of transparency. The less consumers know or the less information they have access to, the less informed their decision-making is, and then they can kind of control the process of manufacturing and distributing the food the way they see fit. And, you know, that is now spilling over. I've noticed, well, when we last talked, we talked about Ken Folta and how he was sort of toppled by these Freedom of Information Act requests that that revealed all these emails that showed that that Ken and a whole number of people were getting paid by the Monsantos of the world to kind of shill for them. Yeah.

And it was done like, oh, we'll give you 25 grand for your research grant. And, you know, in academia, this is kind of how people have to function in order to pursue their career. So there is a little bit of a, well, this is the reality of how, you know, professors make a living. But at the same time, when you realize like they're being funded, you know, to essentially be pundits for this cause. And this was front page news in the New York Times, et cetera. Well, now I just recently read that, that some of these organizations are getting together and pushing back against these FOIA laws to say, well, you can't, you know, access our information for a variety of reasons, because we're not actually federal employees or what have you. So essentially it's very similar to

the ag gag kind of movement. Like they want to prevent any of this kind of transparency and the less information that we have access to, the less transparent they have to be and the more control they can exert. Yeah, I mean, the Kevin Folta example. Ken, I keep calling him Ken. Is it Kevin? I think it's Kevin.

Yeah, I think he was at the University of Florida. Right, yeah. You know, yes, I think in this current world, scientists are funded a lot of the times by corporations, which you do have to kind of question how that impacts their research. But I think the bigger issue is that Kevin Folta always said he was an independent researcher with no financing from outside corporations. So I think that if scientists are being funded, then it's their duty if they're going to speak publicly

on the safety of something like GMOs to say who they're being funded by. And not only is it their duty, I mean, it should be mandated. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I was just going to say for those who don't know that, you know, there's really not a lot of independent studies on GMOs because they're so expensive for, for independent scientists to do, which is why, you know, they rely so much on, you know, outside funding and, you know, all of the studies that are done, unfortunately are still self-regulated by these biotech corporations that are manufacturing genetically engineered food.

And they're doing very short-term 90-day trials and no long-term studies have still been done. So, you know, we just think that whether they're safe or not, we just think there should be more studies done. And there's lots of scientific bodies that agree with that sentiment. There's the Food and Agricultural Organization of the United Nations, the American Medical Association, British Medical Association, all of those organizations still are coming out and saying, we favor pre-market safety assessments. And there isn't a scientific consensus. Scientists all over the world are saying, now more than ever, especially with the genetically engineered salmon, which we can come back to later, we need to really understand how this is impacting our health and the environment. It seems like this is a war that's taking place.

It's a war of information on the internet. It's like who can control the bandwidth of information that consumers are on the receiving end of? Because whoever is loudest is going to win or whoever is hammering the hardest is going to win. And so in just kind of like doing a little research this morning, like poking around the Internet and you see tons of articles, pro and con for the average consumer. It's completely confusing. Like, how are you supposed to make sense of this? This the average consumer. It's completely, you know, confusing. Like, how are you supposed to make sense of this? This guy says this, this guy says that. And then you have to dive into, well, who are these people that are, who's writing this article and who's behind this and who has time to look into this. And you realize like, you know, there are a lot of Kevin Foltes out there, but there's also a lot of people that are from,

you know, the environmental working group. everybody has an agenda. So it becomes very difficult to get to the truth of it. And I think, you know, Daryl, you're really getting at the heart of it. Like we just need more long-term like well-funded, you know, objectively independently funded research to help us understand what's really going on. Because I feel like when you have the gestalt of, of, of commerce and capitalism driving this movement forward, there, nobody's stopping to say, hey, wait a minute, this is a good idea. We just have people at those organizations saying, don't worry about it. It's fine. No one's ever gotten sick. So the presumption is it's safe until proven otherwise, as opposed to it's unsafe until you can prove that it's safe. Well, especially, I mean, I think that obviously risks to human health are a lot more difficult to

assess, especially because of the lack of labeling, even though a lot of these genetically modified organisms have been commercialized for 20 some odd years. Because they're not labeled, odd years, because they're not labeled, you can't trace them back to the increase in disease or food-related allergies in this country, which have exponentially increased since GMOs were released onto the market. But correlation doesn't prove causality. And so you're kind of stuck in this very gray area with making any accusations around impacts on human health. But I think impacts on our environment are becoming much easier to really argue in terms

of the adverse effects of GMOs. And just, I mean, from the basic standpoint of biodiversity and our ecosystem and that GMOs are basically just creating monocultures all over the world. What has sustained agriculture for centuries has been the rotation of crops and the replanting of seeds. And that helps with soil health and all of these things. And there have been so many studies that really show that regenerative agriculture and sustainable organic agriculture are the really the only way to combat climate change. And factory farming obviously is hugely detrimental in terms of climate change. So GMOs factor largely into factory farming. Obviously these are huge cash crops, cotton, corn, canola, soy. Yeah, I mean, we have to stop.

To stop greenhouse gases, we have to suck them down. And, you know, we need to suck them down 250 billion tons over the next 25 years in order to help reverse climate change. And you do that through photosynthesis,

through exactly what Zoe's saying, regenerative agriculture and carbon sequestration. And carbon, you know, it belongs in the ground. It makes for healthy soil. And it's not good to rip holes into the ozone layer as we continue to do. And Courtney White is someone who talks a lot about this and is really good to read.

And also Naomi Klein, who wrote This Changes Everything, which is, you know, she touches a little bit on this subject, but she gets really deep into the whole climate change issue. Are these people journalists, or who are they? Well, Naomi Klein, yeah, I mean, is a pretty big journalist. And, yeah, I mean, they really dig in to the whole, you know, factory farming and connection there. And, you know, I think that's something that is a big connection to GMOs because they take up so much farmland. And, you know, we need to find a way to stop, I think, disrupting the atmosphere.

Yeah, I think that fundamentally, GMOs are kind of like this attempt to hack around the sort of standard ecology rules of the planet. Like how can we continue to plant the same thing forever in this soil and have it still grow properly? So fundamentally on a very macro level, like a vote for GMOs is a vote for industrialized agriculture like the status quo of how we've been always producing food,

which is a broken unsustainable system that is using too many resources and raping the planet. Now, I don't purport to have the solution to this. Like we're not gonna go back to becoming an agrarian society. I think, you know, my position is if we can, you know, reduce livestock, that's a huge step forward. And that's a different issue from GMOs.

But also government subsidies. Well, subsidies is like, you know. They're going to factory farmers instead of organic farmers. Yeah, to support small. And I think that on a consumer level, and I do think that we are shifting towards this paradigm more and more, is supporting local farmers and going to farmers markets and that we have the power of the penny, so to speak, that consumers can actually affect change by

buying more organic or non-GMO foods. And I think that ultimately is probably the most powerful way to affect change. But also the chemical, I mean, you were you were just you know just back to the factory farm thing just for one quick second is the the increase in chemical herbicides i mean that has destroyed the environment and that gmos you know everyone on that side has said that it's gonna it's actually decreasing toxic substances into us and into the ground, and it's just not true. So yeah, this is the subject that I think doesn't get enough attention in the GMO debate. It's not necessarily just

the genetically modified organism. That organism in many cases is bred the way that it is bred so that it is bred so that it can withstand being bombarded by glyphosate and other pesticides. And so these are the pesticides that are found on the foods, these genetically modified foods that end up on our plate, right? And the World Health Organization classified glyphosate

as a probable carcinogen. There's been some controversy and debate around that. Just recently. But the only reason they even called the World Health Organization said probable carcinogen is only because they haven't been able to do human trials. So it's almost as if saying it is carcinogenic. But didn't they like withdraw that

and there was something recently that happened, there's like been some debate about that classification. Yeah, the EPA released documents just like a week ago and then the following Monday immediately pulled them down because there was all this controversy. They were saying that glyphosate might be safe. They took a lot of heat for it, and it wasn't necessarily true. But I just wanted to just backtrack just for a second,

basically just to explain what glyphosate is and how it relates to genetically modified organisms. A number of genetically modified organisms are engineered to withstand this weed killer, glyphosate. It's an herbicide so that farmers used to have to spray the weed killer only on the weeds and avoid the crop themselves. Now these crops have been engineered

to withstand the herbicides that they can spray it all over the crops and the weeds and not have to worry about it. It makes their lives, you know, quote-unquote easier. But it's then now led to huge increases in the use of this toxic herbicide. 527 million pounds since... Between 1996 and 2011. And glyphosate is the active component in Roundup.

Exactly, which is tied to these crops. So you can't buy the genetically modified seed without buying the chemical component that goes with it. So not only has it increased these things exponentially, we also do have to ask ourselves how much of this toxic probable carcinogen we're consuming. And then obviously, and then, you know, the EWG also did a really interesting study that showed that, what was that? Three-

3,200 elementary schools are within 1,000 feet of genetically modified crops that are spraying glyphosate. And it's in 60 to 100% of the rainwater in the Midwest. I mean, it's just everywhere this- Right, and organic farms that are approximate to these farms can't keep the genetically modified seeds off of their property. So what's happening with the spray?

I mean, if you think that that spray isn't ending up in the lungs of these kids at these schools, I mean, you're insane. You know, this war, we talked about this last time, but this is the front lines of all of this is in Hawaii because everything is very compressed there. It is a Petri dish, youri dish grand experiment happening in real time. There's actually over two dozen Hawaii schools within one mile of GE field test sites.

And there are kids that are getting sick there, right? And are they just passing this off as they can't prove that this is because of this? Or what is the status of that? are they just passing this off as, as, you know, they can't prove that this is because of this or, or what is the status of that? I mean, the whole Hawaii issue, I mean, is, it's almost like a microcosm for everything that's happening. I mean, the battle that's waging there is, is really devastating. So it is so, I mean, so many groups there that are trying to fight for them to stop testing on Hawaii. Which is, I mean, it's the irony of using this epically natural and gorgeous place as a field testing ground for this propyl carcinogen. I mean, Maui citizens, they were campaigning to pass a moratorium on GE crops back in 2014.

And Monsanto and Dow spent 10 million in advertising to basically misrepresenting the initiative as a farming ban. And basically trying to spread the fear that it would lead to job loss. I mean, the whole deception campaign and money that they're pouring into trying to confuse people over the issues just continues to mount. There was a, uh, there was a really interesting article in wired magazine this month that I just read about the power of bots. And it was specific

to political campaigns, but you know, like a Twitter bot, like it used to be, you could, you could tell immediately, like, well, that's just a bot, you know, but now they're becoming indistinguishable from real people. Like they've gotten a lot better. No, a bot is like an, a computer generated automatic response to a certain set of keywords. So they can be set up and programmed according to certain algorithms, I suppose,

to basically propagate a message across the internet. So people that are running for office, they hire these companies that then, you know, they're basically purchase followers, but they can also contract these bots to just basically put their message out there or put it put a negative message out against whoever they're running against or whatever issue they're running on and for the average consumer like going through their feed or reading responses it starts to you know impact your thinking and look we know this is like a play right out of monsanto's playbook right like do this all the time life to do is follow the food babe and see how she gets responded to or other people, not just her, but other people that are trying to promote, you know, organic, et cetera. And so that's yet another thing that makes it very difficult for the consumer to

parse reality from fiction when it comes to, you know, determining objective truth on this issue. Yeah. And I think we've been on a very small scale um victim to that too or i think it becomes really scary the just the the kind of cyber bullying that starts happening have you been so what so back to the movie this is a movie we're talking about issues that are in the movie consumed um you know on a small scale like and whether they're bots or trolls i i have a hard time you know telling but you know like what's the difference yeah one has a heartbeat and the You know, on a small scale, like, and whether they're bots or trolls, I have a hard time, you know, telling, but you know, like, what's the difference? One has a heartbeat and the other one. Yeah. One has, I don't know if they have a heart. I guess they do have a heartbeat.

But yeah, I mean, it's. We ran into a real big issue with our IMDB rating. We noticed that overnight or when the movie first came out hadn't come out yet yeah right the movie hadn't even come out yet which was even more confusing because our imdb rating it's sort of like it's sort of like uh you know your am if you're if you're a writer it's your amazon reviews and ranking but it for a movie maker, it's IMDb. Exactly. And I think actually the star meter on IMDb shows up when you are renting. Renting it in some various platforms. So actually the way that people rate it

does matter to filmmakers. Well, we noticed in it. Before it came out, Daryl had put like a post on Facebook to his friends saying- If you've seen the movie, you know, give us a good rating. Please vote for it if you liked it and it speaks to you and you want to raise awareness.

And obviously, you know, a lot of people see that and it gets passed around. And we noticed the next morning we had 200 new votes from 200 different IP addresses that voted the movie one star out of 10 stars. Before they could even see it. There's no way they could have seen the movie and it could have been real.

There's nothing we could do about it because if you register an IMDB account and you go and vote, then it counts. If you have your own IP address. The rating was one out of 10 stars. Since then, the movie's come out and it's jumped up now to four stars.

How do you overcome that? It's like the people that do it first set the tone and the stage for everything that follows. Like the first person that reviews your book on, whatever it is, people see that and they're like, oh, that person must know what they're talking about. And those comments were the first comments on IMDb too. Right, they rise to the top.

Yeah, they rise to the top. So anyone out there who wants to help vote on IMDb, please do. But yeah, I mean, just in small ways, like, uh, you'll just see on, on Twitter, if I post something about the movie, sometimes you'll just, I'll just get a, a nasty comment. And I, I go to see, and obviously there are people who disagree, who have no other agenda. It can be a subjective opinion. But a lot of the times I'll go and see who that person is, and their whole feed is, like you said, going after people who are talking about labeling.

Yeah, it's probably a housewife in Des Moines who's making a little extra money by being paid by some company to just troll all day long and attack anybody who is propag you know, you know, propagating a message that's anti to whoever she's working for or he or whoever it is. And it does really instill fear. I mean, for me, it really does. It makes me not want to go talk about it. And I think that is the battle of, um, kind of making a film that has a political message because you are caught in the crosshairs of what

it means to be an activist. Not just a political message, but a very divisive, very heated, very emotional issue for a lot of people. Yeah. It's the food we're eating. I mean, it's so emotional. And I think also like you were talking about the, the, the purse strings attached to it in terms of corporate lobbying, like this is it. This is the food we eat. This is such a major, major industry in this country that the stakes are really high. Yeah, and again, in the movie, we obviously as filmmakers have come to our own conclusions. We've been researching and working on this for so many years.

So in the movie, we do show both sides and we don't really lay any claims or anything definitive that's like necessarily the end all conclusion. We raise a lot of questions to try and spark a dialogue as people finish the movie so that they can have a conversation about these issues. But outside of the film, we have our own beliefs and we believe that these foods should be labeled and people should have the choice to know what they're eating and that there should just be more studies done on them. Yeah, more research, more transparency.

I mean, you can't really rebut that. And there is some positive things happening. I mean, in Hawaii, I believe they're giving tax credits now to farmers that are going organic, which is interesting. That's cool. You know, and how this labeling thing is going to shake out. Like, it's just fascinating to watch. I mean, we didn't, let's follow up on that QR code thing because that's hilarious. A QR code are those little square barcodes that people might have seen on certain products or posters that allows anyone with a smartphone device to be able to, with an application, capture that barcode.

And it will then link to whatever source that barcode wants you to find out information from. Some URL. Exactly, URL or website. And so what the biotech industry has been lobbying for heavily is, well, instead of labeling the foods with simple language that people can easily read, they said, why don't we do a barcode and stick it on the package? And the barcode would then go back to a website that you would be able to learn about which ingredients were genetically engineered.

This is really problematic for a number of reasons. First off, not everybody has a smartphone. And not everybody has a data plan in grocery stores that they go into. And it's discriminatory. You know, it's not for older generations who don't have this technology. It's not something that I think will work. And it's also a privacy issue. It gets into if you scan a barcode,

what are you agreeing to exactly by using that technology and that application? Right, they're mining that data. What kind of data? For some kind of reason. But any time you put steps in between the information and the consumer and make it more difficult. It's never going to work. Yeah, so it's very contrived.

I mean, I'm as tech savvy. I don't like code or anything like that but I'm like fairly up to speed and I don't have like a QR reader app on my phone I never like scan those things yeah most people don't and who's gonna while they're shopping for groceries you know people are potentially with like a kid on their arm they've got their kids or you're you're coming from work you're at the end of the day you don't want to be taking out your phone go going to the food product and trying to scan it and wait to see if that takes you to some website with like pages and pages of information it's just it's not it's just another way to try and deceive customers i'm not anti qr i mean put it on there and for people that want to

go and they can find out tons of information, that's all fine, but that should be in addition. Exactly, and QR codes do already exist on certain products. Yeah, we're just saying that can't be the only solution. It needs to be in tandem with the words. Yeah, did you see that Gwyneth Paltrow video about the QR code thing? No, I haven't watched it. There's a video, yeah, I'll show it to you guys afterwards.

But it's basically just illustrates what you just said it's like a woman who's shopping and she's like got kids and she's harried and hectic and she pulls out a can of something and she's like does this have gm she asked the guy like hey do you know if this has gmos in it he's like scan the qr thing and she's like trying to do it and she's like dropping her phone and her kid's screaming and and right when she's about to like get it all lined up and take the picture right of the thing and get it to work like her her kid drops a glass thing and it sprays all over and so it's just kind of making a pun out of like how and then gwyneth paltrow walks up to the rescue

she gets a hard time i don don't know why, but well, yeah, but another way people can avoid, you know, GMOs when they're shopping is to buy something that's certified organic or that's has the seal non GMO project verified. Right. And we're seeing more and more of that.

Um, you know, then it, it's still, you know, it's a cost and socioeconomic issue for a lot of people though. So we've got to figure out how to scale this in a way that makes it accessible, affordable. Like you were saying, subsidies to the organic farmers.

And there's also a great new company called Thrive Market. I don't know if you know them. I've known Gennar, the CEO. I was his lawyer back at his other startup back in 2000. That's amazing. I had Gennar on the podcast recently. He was on CBS this morning, today or yesterday. Yeah, they're blowing up.

Blowing up, which is great because it really speaks to the interest on the topic and also the desire and hunger for organics. But basically what Thrive Market does is it's an online shopping service that delivers organic food products, non-GMO food products to your door at a discount rate of 30 to 50% per product. And so it really does combat or it's helping to combat a lot of the issues with food deserts and access to organics in this country. And for every person that pays, it's a, I think it's like a $50 annual membership fee, but for every person that pays, uh, that fee,

someone who can't afford it gets a free membership, like a military family or an underprivileged family gets a membership. So it's kind of like a Costco model. Um, and they're working to get food stamps, uh, accepted on a big fight, but it would be an amazing, amazing new step. Yeah. And that's a big program that's happening now. I mean, the fact that people can't use food steps, food stamps online anywhere, and they can only go towards, you know, cheap processed food is crazy. Yeah. That's just broken bureaucracy. You know, that's crazy. So yeah, there is really cool stuff happening. You know, technology.

I mean, Thrive is really, you know, it's a technology company, but really in the sense of distribution, like finding more efficient ways to distribute food affordably. But then there's interesting things happening in the tech of biology too, with like Memphis Meats, like they're forming, they're growing meat and petri dishes. And so is that genetically modified?

What is that? I mean, it's very interesting. It brings up bizarre ethics issues. And I think as our culture continues to wrestle with these issues, I mean, they're not going away, right? And we do need solutions to our food problem. We do, except for, I mean, I think that there is a misconception that there's a lack of food because we actually have enough food to feed the country. I mean, to feed the world, excuse me. It's just about distribution and access. And so it's a little

bit of a red herring, I think, to look at these so-called solutions for a problem that actually doesn't exist. And the idea, to get back to GMOs, that they are feeding developing nations that are facing starvation is, I think, a falsity. There's much more sustainable solutions to feed the third world. And again, it's not about the amount of food. It's about creating regenerative agriculture and creating food security by teaching sustainable farming practices in those countries. You know, there's this like GM banana now that's in the news. Bill Gates is behind. They've been testing in Iowa. And Bill Gates is behind.

They've been testing in Iowa. And it's, again, to me, a little bit of a red herring because there's already a red banana that has increased levels of vitamin A in Papua New Guinea. That's the argument for this version, this new version, is that it has more vitamin A? Yeah, exactly. To go to Uganda, right? And where there's vitamin A. Yeah, exactly. To go to Uganda, right? And where there's vitamin A deficiency,

there are ways to traditionally crossbreed this red banana without the use of genetic engineering that would potentially solve the problem. It's the same thing as golden rice, which has been in research and development for 20 years and never been commercialized, but still for some reason is like the poster child for how GMOs are saving the world. And they were using Japonica rice instead of the Indica rice, which was actually the rice that people use in those parts of Asia, which is the same thing with the banana.

Like the, the banana that they're the banana so-called banana that they eat in Uganda is actually more of a plantain. It's a cooking banana. The banana that they're doing the research on in Iowa is a Cavendish banana. It's the bananas that we eat. So when you're talking about, you know, these countries who do have very habitual food habits, you can't just introduce an entirely new food. And if you're going to do that, then introduce the foods that already exist that have higher levels of vitamin A.

Well, on an even kind of more fundamental level, it's very propagandistic and jingoistic to just say, well, this is how we're gonna feed the, we need to feed the planet. We need to solve global hunger and starvation and GMOs are the future and the solution. Because like I said earlier, that's a vote for affirming our current system.

It just further entrenches factory farming. And right now, like look, 1804, there were a billion people on the planet. And currently there's 7.3. By 2100, there's going to be 11 billion people on the planet. Like we need better solutions, right? But our current system, which is basically animal agriculture, is feeding all of these crops to this middleman, the animal, the cow, the pig, etc., which is very inefficient. We do have enough food to feed 10 billion people right now.

It's just that all that feed, all that grain is going to animals, and then we're eating the animals. So it's incredibly inefficient. And it's inefficient because the food isn't being distributed properly. Right. So it's distribution and allocation. Like if we can really get off our addiction to these animals in a fundamental way and start rearranging how we distribute all the food that's coming from all the land that's being right now used to grow crops for grain, for feed, for animals,

then we could solve the problem literally overnight. But that requires a systemic revolutionary change to everybody's perception and habits around how they eat. Well, I think it's about like, what are the motivating factors, which is I think what's so deceptive about the propaganda behind GMOs. It's like, it's capitalist kind of, it's such a, yeah, it's all about profit.

And if all of the money that went towards golden rice research in the last 20 years went towards building infrastructure in the developing world so that they had roads and storage facilities for food, I mean, we wouldn't be facing these issues. And so what are we putting our money towards? Why are we putting our money towards creating, you know, foods that actually we already have in existence? I think it's like, because you need protectable IP. Yeah, exactly. And it's about, and it's about controlling the food source, because not only is this, you know, this broken system of industrialized agriculture, but the thing about GMOs is the farmers are then indebted to the corporations. They have to rebuy the seed every year and they have to rebuy the chemical components.

That's where it gets really dark and predatory even more than in this country where already it's super problematic and and farmers are in lawsuits with biotech companies over patent infringement but but also and i mean we didn't talk about this last time and it is a very controversial subject but in terms of the indebtedness of farmers you can look at india as a prime example of that where the whole whole GM cotton industry has eviscerated the livelihoods of farmers. And the pro-GMO side will say, well, that's not linked to us. That's because of poverty and alcoholism. But you have to really ask, well, what is the root of the poverty? Why are these farmers so poor and not making money? And look at the industry that is in place there. And over 250,000 farmers have committed suicide in the last decade there. And some of them are even

drinking the pesticides from these corporations in order to kill themselves, which is just horrible. I mean, it's horrible to see that that's still happening. And obviously that, like Daryl said, is a hugely divisive topic. But those farmers are indebted to the corporations because, like Zoe was saying, they have to buy the seeds and the chemicals, and they were promised higher yields, and they haven't had higher cotton yields. The yields are not higher. They are not higher. To play devil's advocate on that, what's the difference between that and say, you know, Costco coming into a town and putting all the mom and pops, you know, out of business when Walmart and Costco, you know what I mean?

Like, is it, how much of it is just the sort of, you know, inevitable progression of consolidated capitalism versus something more nefarious? Well, I think when you look at huge chains putting small businesses out of work, I guess that comparison could be more for industrialized farms versus small farmers. But I think when you're looking at the biotech corporations forcing farmers to shift their agricultural systems that have sustained them for centuries, that really gets into a much bigger, complicated issue. Because when farmers are forced to buy their seeds every year and to buy the chemicals that go hand in hand with

those seeds and they're not providing higher yields there. That's, that's just leading to, um, you know, a broken system, financial system for these farmers. It's indentured. It's indentured. And I think in the third world, especially, um, the biotech companies kind of see these openings and try and get in with things like the banana or the rice. And when a lot of the propaganda around why those things haven't worked is because of NGOs, which is also a total falsity. They haven't worked because the research and development hasn't worked and they haven't actually created something that works in these countries. So I think it's just important to look at really, again, like the motivating factors behind what these companies are trying to do

in the third world and actually what's available and could be done instead of what they're doing. And the yield, I mean, the Union of Concerned Scientists did a study that showed that there hasn't been the yield increase promised with genetically engineered crops. Right, so it's all premised upon greater yields and sort of being able to continue to use this soil. Greater yields and sort of being able to continue to use this soil. And it's that adage, you know, I think we said this last time, but it's the hubris of man thinking like, I'm going to shortcut this system. I'm going to outsmart it.

I'm going to figure out a way to end run this and ultimately outwit nature. And that never works, right? It always comes around. Nature always finds a way. So, you know, as my understanding is that these, you know, pestilent resistant strains are now, you know, there are now, you know, pests that are finding their way, you know, through the glyphosate and surviving it. Super bugs and super weeds.

And so now they have to like increase the, you know, the amount of the pesticide or now find a qualitatively stronger one. And so this is how nature functions. Maybe that's a good segue to the genetically engineered mosquitoes that they're now talking about. I saw a little bit about this. I don't know much about it, but tell me what's going on.

Yeah, well, everyone I'm sure has heard of Zika virus now and dengue fever. And so they've been talking about, or not even talking about, they have been talking about or i'm not even talking about they have been genetically engineering mosquitoes to try and combat this devastating disease and they've tested it in brazil and they have shown that they've been able to reduce certain mosquito populations by up to upwards of 80 to 90 percent but they haven't been able to show any kind of transmission decrease in terms of the disease

transmission right so as i as i understand it it's the female mosquito that carries the virus and this genetically engineered mosquito they're only male the genetically ones are males and so they mate and then the the offspring dies immediately. Exactly. That's what happens. That's like so freaky. Which is so freaky. And then, I mean, it's economically just not viable at all. I think you'd have to release, they said 2.8 million engineered mosquitoes a week to suppress 20,000 wild mosquitoes.

Yeah, how crazy is that? They can't afford it. Everything is connected. The soil is a living, breathing organism, right? The plants that grow out of it, everything is connected to the air. It's our ecosystem. The ecosystem of the insects and the animals.

It's like, and to introduce something like this and think you're gonna have this binary impact that's gonna be favorable, I think is so myopic. It's like, there are so, there are billions, if not an infinite number of variables at play here that we can't even begin to conceptualize the impact of. Well, yeah. And I mean, when you look at the superbugs, like these bugs that have now become resistant to the resistance that has been put in the plants. And now,

and now we're going to eventually get to a place where there's nothing that can be done we're just gonna have these kind of like monstrous bugs and weeds because unless you just keep upping the poisonous factors that then we're ingesting and with the mosquitoes it's the same thing it's like um if all of these larvae die then we've got a new species of mosquito that's gonna be like more dangerous yeah Yeah. The resistant mosquitoes. That's the next movie. I think it's kind of like Donald Trump, right? So hear me out. Like in the way that, that, uh, the rhetoric of the right and the Republican party over the last several years

has basically created this creature now, right? In the same way, uh, this, this GMO push and kind of where we're going with tech and big ag is going to produce this super bug, the Donald Trump of insects. Yeah, totally. Great analogy. Yeah.

And it's our own fault. We're creating our own monsters. Like we did it to ourselves. Totally. And I just think that, it's like, look, I'm not a scientist, you guys aren't scientists. I don't have the answer to ourselves, you know, and I just think that, you know, I don't, it's like, look, I'm not a scientist. You guys aren't scientists. I don't, I don't have the answer to this, but I think I have, you know, a healthy level of humility to understand, like we're playing with something really big that we don't quite understand. And at a minimum, like let's put the brakes on a little

bit. Let's be a little bit more cautious. Let's do some studies. Let's really try to understand as best as we can, what's going on before we just foist it on the world and go, whoops, 20 years later when people are sick or we've indelibly changed the ecosystem of an area in a very detrimental way. We're playing with fire, we're playing with matches. And I think there's just a lot of ego and arrogance about this that I think needs to be checked.

We're moving way too quickly. And when you look at something like the GE salmon or the GE mosquitoes, I mean, once those are released into our environment, the impact is irreversible. We'll never know if a GE salmon mates with a wild salmon. We will never again know if we're eating a GE salmon. So when we were last on the podcast, that hadn't yet happened. So since then, the first genetically engineered animal has been approved for human consumption, the genetically engineered salmon

by Aqua Advantage, Aqua Bounty. And they have been working on producing the eggs for the salmon on Prince Edward Island in Canada and also in Panama. And just so people know, the facility in Canada is 50 feet from a river that contains wild endangered salmon. So if there, if there was ever a facility breach or some sort of flood or any, anything. And the, and the, the eggs are only 98% sterile. So there is this like 2% risk, like Daryl saying, if there were a breach. Yeah. That if one of those salmon eggs were to get into the river somehow, or a salmon were to get out and mate with a wild salmon, we would never again know the difference between wild and genetically we would never again know the difference between wild and genetically engineered,

and who knows what the consequences would even be. So that's only one of the risks. They're also saying that they're not going to label the salmon. And Consumers Union did a poll that asked people if they would want them to be labeled, and 89% of people said they would want their locks on their bagel, they would wanna know if they were genetically engineered.

I think something like 50% or something said that they would just stop eating salmon. Yeah, no, and there's been a huge backlash since that news came out. Costco and thousands of grocery store chains have said that they will not carry the genetically engineered salmon. Yeah, there's a big difference

between like soybeans and salmon. Once you start talking about animals, the creepy factor just starts to wake up. The giant salmon that grows twice as big, twice as fast. I think it's easier for people to wrap their heads around is why the salmon has, I think think created so much more controversy than than soybeans or canola because i don't think people understand quite how pervasive gmos are in our food supply and how many derivatives are in the processed food that they're eating that contain gmos whereas

salmon it's like oh okay that i understand if that's genetically modified salmon i eat that and i'm eating something that isn't occurring in nature. There's so many other issues. Like just the nutrition rate of the genetically engineered salmon is way lower, 10% lower than the nutrition rate. In terms of the omegas. Yeah, omega-3s and omega-6s.

They get more meat? It grows faster? It's all year. Yeah, the hormone is turned on all year long. So they can produce way more salmon and takes less time and there's more meat. Yeah, it's a larger salmon that is bred in half the time. But what they also have kind of ignored is the increase in antibiotic use that's going to have to happen. There's a higher infection risk once you start genetically

engineered salmon. And, you know, they were, Zoe, you know more about the insect larvae thing. What's that? With the mosquitoes? Oh, no. Yeah. Sorry. No, that's back with the mosquito thing. See, there's so many issues. Right. It's almost hard to keep track of, but. But with the GMO salmon, they still have to pump them with antibiotics? Or are they, how does that? Well, I mean, it's just a risk. It's like when you look at factory farming and how sick cows and chickens get, then they require more antibiotics.

No, no. Actually, it was the insect larvae. Aqua Bounty was going to engineer insect larvae to feed to the salmon. And so- It's a complete GMO supply chain. You know, like a front pillar to post. And do you know what salmon are eating now? bounty was going to engineer insect larvae to feed to the salmon and so this is right complete gmo supply chain you know and you know what salmon are eating now genetically engineered corn and soy yeah so they're salmon that should be eating farm-raised salmon that should be eating other fish are eating more the genetically engineered salmon are going to be eating genetically engineered corn it gets back to the pervasive thing that you were talking about and this has

now become the subject of lawsuits like Chipotle was like, you know, we're getting rid of GMOs, we're GMO free. But the animal products, the pork and the beef and whatever that they were serving there was fed on GMO grain. So it's not which they admitted. Yeah, which they admitted. But it's like, it makes you understand like, oh, there's, it's not, it's not a, it isn't a binary dualistic thing. No, at this stage, I mean, what's so scary about our food supply in this country in particular is like over 90%, I think, of corn and soy and canola in this country is genetically modified. So 80% of processed food contains those genetically modified ingredients. I mean, we're, it's irreversible. And when you talk about drift and how organic farms are finding themselves with genetically modified crops,

it's like we're already at the point of no return. Yeah, I disagree. Do you think we can try and slowly reverse it? There's so much money and energy and political clout and momentum behind all of this. I don't see it moving in the other direction. Guys, we have to have hope. You guys, you can't give up hope.

If you're giving up hope, then there won't be any hope. I'm not giving up hope. I'm just sort of noticing what's going on. It's sort of like the way that technology propagates. We're inevitably headed towards this virtual reality world and ultimately you know ai and i don't see any way that we're gonna not that that's not gonna happen no they're gonna always exist side by side but the food and environmental movement has really proven how potent they are as a body in terms of how it's impacted the biotech industry. The biotech industry lost, I think it was $4 billion in the last few years over people saying

that they're basically fed up with all of the not knowing about the GMO labels and they're not buying it as much. And so there is some movement that is helping. And it was just reported in the New York Times that last year, 2015, was the first year that profits for genetically engineered crops decreased. Right, I did see that. And acreage decreased, I think, as well. I mean, I think there are other factors at play with that, but, um, but that is interesting. Yeah. So I do think that there is a movement, some momentum in this country towards, um, I think health and wellness. I mean, your

podcast is a testament to that, that people are really hungry for this information and it just, hungry for this information and it just yeah and it just takes you know voices like yours um and and filmmakers and journalists to just continue pushing the conversation forward yeah i mean it's it's it really is a grassroots thing you know it has to happen at the grassroots level and it has to happen at the highest level like you guys we didn't even finish the story about you screening the movie on the hill. So you have to have both ends, like both poles of that spectrum functioning at the same time. And I think the higher ups will respond

when the grassroots movement becomes loud enough and strong enough and powerful enough. And demands it. Yeah, and one of the things that I always say at the risk of sounding repetitive, but it's so easy to feel disenfranchised like your vote doesn't count and you don't have a voice or a say

and what could you possibly do? You're just one person. How could you provoke change? But it is really powerful how you spend your money and the dollars that you choose to allocate towards the foods that you're eating are a political statement you know and i think that consumerism and capitalism will shift to align with those choices so the more people who are really you know investing their money in in foods that that that reflect how they feel about the environment and

the planet and their you perspectives, et cetera, that the system will respond in kind. And it might maybe a little bit more money upfront to pay for organic food, but think about the benefits of it costing you in the long run when you're eating processed food and all the doctor's bills and visits.

I know, it's so tough to motivate people with that argument though. And we are living in- But why? Because we're the sickest country in the world. We want instant gratification, that's way down the line. You know what I mean? Like it's hard to psychologically motivate people that way,

but it does get at what you were just saying, which is we're living, there's two countries right now. There's people that are super into wellness and whether're, you know, whether they're eating grass fed paleo or vegan or what, you know, they're all about like reducing their carbon footprint. And they're very conscientious. I find young people to be very, you know, um, vociferous about this. And then you have a lot of people who are just checked out, you know, like they're just whatever they're getting through the day. They're just trying to pay the bills and they're, you know, eating at seven 11 and McDonald's and they just don't have time for it. They're not educated. They don't understand.

And they're not motivated to do anything differently. I think there is that sense. And I'm, I'm sorry that I lent my voice to this, to the sense of like defeated, um, um, voices in this, in this country. But I do think that there's this like, well, we're all going to die anyway. Might as well enjoy my, my potato chips and my burger. Yeah. My life is hard enough. I don't need to make my life harder by, by having to limit my food choices. But I do think that I don't think that, that the sickness that, um, is associated with eating processed foods, um foods is that far down the line. I mean, we're in it right now. We're in the thick of it. I mean, I forget the I think one in

three children are going to have type two diabetes, like by 2050 or something. I mean, we're 50% of Americans by 2030 will be diabetic or pre diabetic. Yeah, cancer rates are through the roof. I mean, it's an, it's an epidemic that we need to face now. And the only way to do that is I think to shift the way we see, um, the food we eat. It's not about looking at, at it as limiting. It's actually about looking at it as opening up your,

your choices in your lifestyle. It feels good to eat healthy food. I mean, I, I am the perfect testament of that. I grew up eating crap food, processed food. We talked about this on the last podcast. And in the last few years, I've completely shifted and I eat so many more plants. Thank you, Rich, for really pushing that. pushing that. But more plants, more organic, more healthy things. And looking at the vegan and interesting, healthy sweet options too, they taste good. I mean, eating a date, a really good date from the farmer's market that tastes so good for those sweet tooths out there compared to like a real artificial, you know, sweetened candy. I noticed the difference and I feel better after I eat it.

I don't feel like I'm laying sideways on the couch and have a stomach ache the next day. So I think people will, the more you try and get over that hump and start to really invest in eating healthier food, I think you'll feel better and you'll be more productive and clear-minded. Yeah. Well, you're preaching to my choir. Are you preaching to the gay and lesbian choir that sang your logo song? We're always preaching to the gay and lesbian choir. And that's, you know, why we made this movie at the end of the day,

just to bring it back around. You know, we want to entertain people and we want we want to you know we're filmmakers we want people to sit down and enjoy the movie and go on a ride and you know be in suspense and connect to these characters and every character in the film from zoe's character as a midwestern mother who's taking for for taking care of a kid to to Danny Glover playing an organic farmer, to the scientists, they're all representative of their symbols of the people that are in our society. Yeah, they're all archetypes.

It is very similar to traffic in that regard where you have all these sort of archetypes that are ultimately on a crash course with each other through sort of destiny. Exactly, it's just in the food industrial complex. They're representative of the real stories that are out there in the world. And we really tried to capture that authentically

while at the same time, trying to get people to think a little bit more deeply about how GMOs are impacting all of us and the environment. If people want to get involved in GMOs or want to learn more, like what do you think are the best resources or the best sort of receiverships for that energy? Well, you said one of the great organizations earlier, the Environmental Working Group. So definitely check out their website.

Definitely check out the Organic Consumers Association website. And then, you know, there's other more active. Food Democracy Now. Yeah. The Center for Food Safety. I mean, there's a number of websites that can really give you a plethora of information where you don't need to constantly, like you said, be battling like, oh, who do I trust and what is the agenda driving this piece? Yeah, those are pretty trusted sources.

So I would definitely look, look there. And, you know, really just try and be aware going forward of what you're eating and trying to choose organic when you can and trying to spark a conversation about it, you know, like, don't be afraid to talk about it with friends and post about it on Facebook and, and social media. I think people get so afraid, you know, and almost, you know, want to, when you go to a restaurant, it's like this fear mentality of, I got to order how everyone's ordering. It's like when you, when you go to a party, if you don't drink, you feel like you need to have a beer in the hand, in your hand because everyone else has one. And you don't have

to do that. You can be, I think, confident in your own skin and know what makes you feel good internet, read up, go to the websites. I'll put links to all of those, you know, uh, resources in the show notes. And of course, you know, watch your movie and take that, uh, you know, spark of inspiration that you'll receive from watching it to, you know, go to the next level and make your decisions for yourself. But I think you'll find as you guys obviously have. And as, as I have is there's a lot of fuckery out there, you know? And there's a lot of people vying for your, not only your attention, but your sort of consent, right? And your money. And there's a lot of tactics being used to confuse,

you know, it's right out of the tobacco playbook in the way that they're trying to confuse consumers, which makes it more difficult and all the more important for you to take the, you know, the debate seriously to, you know, mine for the truth. Yeah. It's so much bigger than whether or not you want to eat a bag of potato chips. I mean, it's really about our world and the future of our environment. Yeah. That's the craziest thing about GMOs is people quickly assume

that it's just this little fringe issue. And when you really unpack it, as we have now twice, you see how it is impacting every single aspect of our world. It's us, it's the farmer, it's the's us it's the farm yeah and the more the more it finds its way yeah it's a completely you know the completely controlled supply chain from beginning to end right and all of that ends up in our bodies and becomes who we are like it's it's fundamentally like the most pervasive thing there is it's the food eat. And it's impacting our microbiome, which, you know, is a whole other discussion, but you know, the whole glyphosate thing, I mean, that gets into.

Well, there wasn't, what was the video of the, who was it? Like some higher up at Monsanto and the journalist challenged him to drink a glass of glyphosate because he was saying how safe it was. Yeah. Go ahead. Just drink this glass of glyphosate. And, uh, and then he's like, Yeah, go ahead, just drink this glass of glyphosate. And then he's like, I'm not drinking that. And that went viral. Yeah, I mean, I would encourage people to look at what the International Agency for Research on Cancer published on glyphosate. And I think that will definitely open your eyes to the truth.

All right, good, you guys. Awesome. Yes, please check out the movie. Yes, consume the movie on iTunes. No, buy it through our website. That helps the film the most, actually. Consumethemovie.com. Consumethemovie.com is the best way you can help support the film.

And can you stream it there? Are you downloading it? You can stream it there. You can download it. Yeah, you can buy it right there. And please tell friends and Facebook about it. But you can also watch it on iTunes or pay-per-view if that's easier for you. You can, but try and watch it through the website

if you can. And Zoe, your show Life in Pieces just got picked up for a second season. It did literally the second you walked in the door. Oh, really? Oh, and that had just happened? Yeah, it was like 20 minutes before. How does that work? Who calls you? Your agent? My agents emailed me,

but it was my cast mates that texted me. That was the first thing I saw. Oh, that's so great. I think when we sat down first, like it had just, the show had just started, but it hadn't really been like, it was the very, it was just before, like there was a big media blitz. And I remember after we did the podcast, like suddenly your face was like ubiquitous. Like you were on every bus, like everywhere I went, I was like, Zoe is everywhere. The show is like, it's been so cool.

It's been awesome. And I mean, we just all really love each other and have such a great time doing it. So it's a real blessing. We were dancing to Beyonce right before you walked in. Oh, you were?

We did. We did a Beyonce celebration dance. That would have been a good Snapchat zinger. Are you on hiatus right now or is the show being filmed now? I am. I'm on hiatus now. We go back in August.

Right. That's so cool. Yeah. Cool. And Daryl, what are you working on right now? I wrote this pilot for Amazon, which is exciting. So we're waiting to see if that gets picked up. Can you talk about it or no?

Can I talk about it? I don't know if I can. That means you probably shouldn't. I don't know if i can if i'm hesitating yeah but a tv show pilot a tv show pilot which uh is cool i can i can say that it does deal with ageism that is the kind of central thrust of the show right and so you're waiting to hear whether they green light shooting the pilot exactly or do us Or do Amazon sometimes they'll just pick up the whole thing. Yeah, it could. Like the whole season.

They could do that too, yeah. So, you know, fingers crossed that that happens. And then we're working on, yeah, a couple other, a couple other balls in the air. We're trying to. Hollywood's so secretive. We're trying to be super secretive.

No one's listening. It's okay. Just watch Consumed and watch Life in Pieces and you'll be set. And eat organic food. What night is it on? Last year it was on Thursdays, but I don't know if we're going to have

a shift in our schedule, so stay tuned. Yeah, cool. Awesome, you guys. You guys are so cool. You're so cool. Thanks for doing this again. Rock and roll. That's right, man. Come back and talk about GMOs anytime.

Thanks, Mitch. Thank you. And just final thing, on the internets, what's the easiest, best way to connect with you guys beyond consumethemovie.com? At consumemovie on Twitter and Instagram

and then at Daryl Ween, W-E-I-N and at Zoe Lister-Jones on the same platforms. All right, you guys. Rock on. Rock on. All right, you guys rock on. Rock on. Peace. Plants.

All right. I hope you guys enjoyed that. They're delightful, right? And I learned a ton. So anyway, I feel elevated as a result of that conversation. I hope you guys enjoyed that. They're delightful, right? And I learned a ton. So anyway, I feel elevated as a result of that conversation. I hope you do too. Please make a point of checking out the show notes

for this week's episode. I have a bazillion links and resources related to everything that we talked about today, all kinds of news sources, et cetera, to take your edification, your infotainment beyond the earbuds. I want to thank everybody who helped put on the show today. Jason Camiolo for audio engineering and production, Sean Patterson for help on graphics, Chris Swan for production assistance,

including helping compile the show notes, which is a huge job. Thank you, Chris. And as always, the theme music for this show by Analema. It's been the theme music since day one, when those guys recorded it in like a half an hour in the warehouse. I thought that would be the music for one or two episodes until they sat down and really wrote something, but it just stuck and there you go. So anyway, thanks for all the support, you guys.

Final thought. Whatever, however you come down on this whole GMO conversation, all I'm saying is just educate yourself, ask questions. Don't be satisfied with just what your friends say or what you see on the nightly news or read in a short article. Take yourself, take your health, take this inquiry seriously and explore, take responsibility for your own answers. You know, as always, I'm not here to tell anyone what to do or how to be, but I think it's super important to make sure that the decisions that you do make for yourself and

for your kids for the next generation are informed and well-considered. What we choose to put on our plate is a political act. It does say something about you. It says something about who you are and what you stand for. And I heard this great thing the other day. I'm not sure who to attribute it to. I can't quite remember. Perhaps it's Michael Pollan. But we all know that adage, you are what you eat, right? You are what you eat. But this person, again, I think it's Michael Pollan said, actually, it's the opposite. You eat what you are. So who are you?

See you guys next week. Peace. Plants. Thank you.