Join host Greg Carlwood of The Higherside Chats podcast as he talks GMOs, Pesticides, and Toxic America with guest, McKay Jenkins.
While many of us can agree that corporations such as Monsanto, Dow Chemical, and DuPont have had a negative effect on the health and well-being of citizens throughout the globe and their products have contributed to the decimation of bee and butterfly populations, pollution of our water supply, and poisoning of our environment -it can be difficult to fully understand the complete impact of their atrocities.
And with many of us living in concrete jungles and cookie-cutter suburbs, slowly we have alienated ourselves from our food sources. So, due to the marginalizing local farms to the outskirts of communities, the subsidizing of inner city food deserts with factory farmed produce, and the bought-and-paid Washington lobbyist working on Big Agro’s behalf -we are left consuming a never-ending chain of bullshit that slowly chips away at our health, and leave us deficient and weak.
While much of this comes as no surprise to many at The Higherside, today’s guest, McKay Jenkins, has taken this thread one step further. As an author of books such as “Food Fight” and “ContamiNation”, Jenkins has first hand knowledge of just has far this problem of toxicity spreads and the most impactful ways to effect change.
2:45 While a phrase like “GMO” is considered a loaded term, it is important to remember that the situation is extremely complex and in order to properly understand the entire picture, we must look at both the macro and micro ecosystems of our planet. Jenkins begins by addressing our relationship with consumption, our detachment from how our food is made, and our ignorance about the chemicals used in their production. He continues by discussing the evaporation of local farms and the subsequent effects this detachment to the food chain has caused.
11:11 With Big Agro hiding behind claims that GMOs are a necessity for solving world hunger and uplifting developing nations, Jenkins walks us through the ways in which this argument is not simply disingenuous, but outright misleading. As McKay points out, the crops designed by Big Agro corporations are not designed to be grown in 3rd world countries, the vast majority of commercial farming using GMOs is done in the US for us and our trading partners, and lastly, major corporations are not even investing in research and progression of crops that would be beneficial to developing nations. Greg and McKay also discuss the impact of World War II and the interstate highway system on how we grow and produce food.
22:00 McKay discusses the connection between some of the world’s biggest chemical and seed companies and the nefarious motives behind this agropoly.
33:42 McKay discusses the sub-discipline of people trying to apply the wisdom of ecology to the growing of food, otherwise known as agroecology. Jenkins explains, although factory farms out put a sizable amount of calories on very little land, it is incredibly inefficient and comes at a higher environmental cost due to the large amount of petrochemicals needed throughout the process.
43:00 Greg and McKay discuss the topic of government subsidies and areas where government involvement exacerbates the problems rather than alleviating them. As Jenkins points out, our focus shouldn’t be on symptoms of these issues, but rather the systems that allow them to occur, such as the centralization of our food supply, regulation and the revolving door between Washington and corporate America.
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– the Bee Armageddon
– legal food battles fought in Hawaii and Maine
– how to go back to the old ways
– other toxins in our culture, particularly how bad it is in the largely unregulated cosmetics industry
– safety regulations in other countries vs America
– restoring the true picture of Precolonial America
– lawns, AstroTurf, and water-bottles
A few valuable resources from the interview:
The Golden Rice Project: http://www.
Hawaii’s GMO Papaya: http://hawaiitribune-
Want more McKay Jenkins?
Check out his website: https://mckayjenkins.com/
Or pick up one of his books, including “Food Fight: GMOs and the Future of the American Diet” or “ContamiNation: My Quest to Survive in a Toxic World” on Amazon: https://www.amazon.
Or Penguin Random House: http://www.
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