A Place to Stand

I have been reading an article by Michael Fumento, whose list of online articles is well worth checking. The particular article in question comes from his Food Irradiation section. Looking at the list of arguments against food irradiation it is obvious they are all false

WORKERS MAY GET HURT ON THE JOB AT IRRADIATION PLANTS. "While irradiation does kill bacteria, it involves the use of inherently dangerous materials and poses its own risks to workers," CSPI’s Jacobson has declared. Yet there have only been about half a dozen accidents in U.S. irradiation plants over four decades, with no deaths. Conversely, each year, almost two million workers are hurt on the job, and 10,000 killed. Those who harvest our food, farmers, have three times the national job-related death rate.
IRRADIATION CREATES NEW CHEMICALS IN FOOD, AND WE DON’T ALWAYS KNOW WHAT THOSE CHEMICALS ARE. Yes, and the same is true of roasting, frying, broiling, and boiling. We don’t even know the full chemical composition of most foods BEFORE they’re irradiated.
IT’S POSSIBLE THAT SOME OF THE CHEMICALS CREATED DURING IRRADIATION MAY BE CARCINOGENIC. There’s no evidence of this. On the other hand, using rodent testing, ALL traditional methods of cooking food have caused cancerous tumors and mutations. Rats and mice aside, other types of food preservation appear to be clear human carcinogens. The incredible 75 percent drop in stomach cancer rates in this country since the 1930s is generally attributed to a decline in the consumption of cured foods, especially salt-cured ones.
THERE ARE NUTRIENT LOSSES. There is some nutrient loss with irradiation, as with most methods of preserving, refining, and cooking food. When you boil a pot of vegetables and drain the water, much of the vitamins go with it. Heat sterilization can knock out 90 percent of the vitamin B-1 (thiamine) in meats such as pork and ham, while even high-dose irradiation reduces it by less than 20 percent

If, as the article says about 9,000 Americans die annually of food poisoning then proportionally about 1,500 will in Britain. That compares with the 1,000 the BMA said die of passive smoking (though it makes it less than the 1,000 Scotland's First Minister promised in Parliament would be saved in Scotland alone by a smoking ban). Obviously if any of the politicians & activists who put so much effort (& so much of the people's money) into pushing a smoking ban actually cared in the slightest about human health they would have put more effort into promoting food irradiation. Not one of them did.

Not comparable to the 1 1/2 million killed annually by Luddites using scare stories to ban DDT, but still unnecessary deaths.

The eco-Nazis will tell any lie to promote their scare stories. Over time virtually none of them have proven anything other than lies

Not the recycling, because it is so often wasteful, inefficient, or simply not done, or made redundant by better design. Not the DDT, because in fact it is overwhelmingly more beneficial than harmful. Not the nuclear, because it is in fact a marvellous way to generate usable heat. Not the organic farming, because inorganic needs much less land, much less wretched toil, and allows the poor to eat well. Not the acid rain alarm, because it was mostly a false one. Not the ozone layer alarm, because ditto. Not the attack on capitalism, because therein in lies our best hope. Not the peak oil scare (well scares since it has been repeated every couple of years since "Limits to Growth"), not the limits to growth,(Moore's law is purring away), not all the other resources running out as per LtG, not global cooling, not deaths of hundreds of millions from famine, not the need to evacuate coastal regions because of the smell of the death of all sea life (Ehrlich), not extinction of most animal species, not massive pollution, not US life expectancy dropping to a very precise 42 because of pollution caused cancers (Ehrlich), not rising sea levels, not the no lower threshold claim of radiation damage (in fact at low rates it is beneficial),not slowing of the Gulf Stream, not the expansion of the Sahara, not net world deforestation, & I am willing to bet the recently claimed slowing of the world's winds due to more forests &/or climate change will prove a chimera too.

On the other hand the DDT ban alone has killed 70 million people so the Green scarers have far more blood on their hands than Hitler. I think the cartoon is overly generous.

Further than that the eco-Nazis do not actually care about the environment - it is simply a useful false flag, essentially a cuddly animal shield, for them to use to project their false scare stories. One example of the way that not only will the occasional nutter say anything (eg NASA isn't a government funded organisation) & maintain it but more importantly there is no ordinary member of the movement who will, under any circumstances disagree with the most obvious & total lies [again example here & I will let you know if any "environmentalist" anywhere decides to show any slightest trace of honesty.}

As further proof that the eco-Nazis aren't actually motivated by concern for the environment but by Luddism & parasitism see would be mass murderer George Moonbat (h/t to Delingpole) saying precisely that in the Guardian.

Environmentalism is not just about replacing one set of technologies with another. Technological change is important, but it will protect the biosphere only if we also tackle issues such as economic growth, consumerism and corporate power. These are the challenges the green movement asks us to address.

Indeed so, since all the claims about the biosphere being in any danger have turned out to be total lies & since they provably care nothing about human life the only thing the entire movement of liars & thieves actually stand for is impoverishment, reducing freedom of choice & opposing free enterprise, 3 aims which go well together.

Labels: eco-fascism, Government parasitism, Science/technology