White Coats & Green Boots In The Vanguard

If GM technology is, as its most outspoken proponents testify, the answer to feeding an ever growing world population, to decreasing the use of harmful chemical pest/herbicides on the land and making food an altogether safer experience, one cannot find fault in the origins of this belief. Likewise, if an organic agricultural system is the answer to a deteriorating rural environment, a reason for the re-establishment of trust in the food we eat and a generally ethical path for future food production, one cannot find fault in the roots of this belief either.

Both dreams have supreme merit. But the truth is they are fantasies built on neo green utopian visions. And like most utopian delusions the reality of their existence and results of their pursuit differs greatly from those of the dream.

GM proponents label their opponents Luddite, anti-technology and even Nazi (ironic when one considers the Nazi’s employment of science in the development of super high tech solutions during the pursuit of their utopia) while the Organic movement considers the development of GM technology a far right corporate mission to once and for all take control of nature for profit. There is reason for consideration of most of these points. But to do so is to miss the central point of both sides.

While the methodologies differ starkly – both movements are market driven in their quest for fulfilment. They both sell the idea of an ethical alternative to the status quo – their way is the only way towards a truly green, ethical and sustainable future. The problem for proponents of both sides is that their dreams are in reality just products of a market. Both are high-tech ideological products designed to service economic imperatives. In this sense the true believers on both sides are cheated, as together the products of their dreams merely make up the current vanguard of the modern market place.

Thus the outcome of this battle is already decided. Both sets of believers will ultimately lose while the products of their dreams are dependant on the governance of a market for their viability. Until this changes, Biotechnology and Organic Agriculture can only offer hope but little or no promise of the utopia’s they reach for. When thinking can develop and find viability outside such constraints, maybe sincere alternatives and solutions to our concerns can then be pursued.

AC Jan 2004