Organic Food Lovers to Eat Genetically-Modified, Corporate-Farmed Crow

I'm a huge fan of eating fresh, organic, locally-grown meat and produce. I have this belief because I read on the intertubes, once, that organic apples are packed with so many nutrients - if I ate enough of them - I'd gain the ability to shoot laser beams out of my eyes. Apparently, though, I no longer have a reason to support that theory:

You mean to tell me I was wrong when I thought I was getting the nutritional equivalent of 10,000 store-bought plums each time I ate one organic plum? That's outrageous! What am I spending all that money on if not more vitamins per pound of food ingested? How can it be that produce raised naturally and with little-to-no human interference offers no discernible nutritional value over produce that's been developed in a lab, with its DNA sequence patented, and selectively bred to resist insects, meteor showers, and lolcats?

See that hippies! Nutrient-for-nutrient comparison proves that all the money, time, energy, and animal misery that goes into manipulating cow and kumquat DNA has produced no significant difference between those products and the ones you can just let grow naturally. Take THAT! It's a tie!

It's good to know that the amount of vitamins crammed into a Monsanto carrot(TM) will be exactly the same as an organically raised carrot. Now I don't have to worry about using an embarrassing position like "nutrition" as a reason to buy organic food any more.

Instead, all I have to do is rely on reports that show how organic farming is more environmentally friendly, has a lower carbon footprint, reduces or eliminates livestock suffering, increases biodiversity, is better for your local economy, doesn't contribute to the development of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, reduces cancer rates, and reduces geo-political tensions over resources as reasons to buy organic food. Apparently the US government feels that way, too, and has created a nice gateway to all that information here.

Silly me. I always thought the debate was just about the vitamin and mineral levels in my avocados and the future promise of laser-vision.

Hey, those non-organic foods have even MOAR nutrients than that organic crap . . . well, if you count pesticides, chemical fertilizers, preservatives, and poisons as nutrients.

Which any RealAmerican (tm) does. On to McDonalds!!!!

Your forgot hormones...sweet delicious hormones.

Hey, don't be knocking the hormones . . . isn't there some study that links bovine growth hormones with girls getting boobs earlier?

This is quite true. Lets take cheese for example. The best cow-milk cheeses in the world come from cows (I know, there are more steps) that are strictly grass eaters. But, since feeding a cow a mix of grain and "feed" produces more milk, few dairies go with a grass-only diet.

Ignore him he's hormophobic (r) Monsanto

Organic eggs do taste different. So do organic fruits and vegetables, most of the time.

This study seems so strange to me. Is it a common belief that organic food is more nutritious?

I don't eat organic food because I think it has "nutritional benefits," I eat it because it tastes better and isn't grown with hormones and pesticides, and for all the reasons Lufy specified at the end of his first post.

Exactly. There's a "concentrating" effect that occurs. As you go up the food chain, everything that's "food" from below gets concentrated in the animal above and then passed on to the next higher animal. I believe we're taught that in middle school.

It's the reason you don't want to eat clams that were raised near a sewer pipe outlet.

The feeding of non-grasses to cows and other ruminants has got to count as animal abuse. Forcing livestock to eat food their body is not designed to digest, just because it's cheaper, is downright cruel. Then there's the whole "recursive cow" phenomenon......don't get me started about how livestock is allowed to be raised in this country. It's disgusting.

I'll stick to organic meat and dairy, thank you.

Which is why that study is so odd. Did anyone respectable ever posit that organic produce was more "vitaminy?" It makes no sense.

Unfortunately, in my experience...it is. I think the misconception comes from your average Joe who is not very food conscious

I eat a lot of organic food. I do it mainly to help promote sustainable agriculture...and to keep stuff out of my body that I don't want in there.

I eat two meals a day at work because of my schedule. When the guys I work with see my eating organic food...they makes jokes & ask stupid questions.

Like the time I had organic ice cream.

Yes, there is definitely a taste difference. I find it hard to go back to regular milk after drinking organic milk.

i think the organic-food-as-healthier thing is largely a baby boomer deal. my parents totally buy into it. they tell me all the time about how they always feel more filled after eating organic stuff compared to non-organic. i've never even noticed a difference in taste, myself... but then, i have to stop and think to differentiate between skim and whole.

I remember reading an article about a study that indicated that organically grown food was more nutritious, so I guess this is meant to refute claims along those lines?

It's largely because of the crap they ate growing up. Whenever scientists discovered some new chemical, they'd say, "Hey, let's put this in kids' cereal!" Ever see the footage of the kids chasing after the DDT trucks in their bikes? Yeah. I think that's why that generation is now trying to eat tree bark to compensate.

Come on now....I've told my grandmother how to program her VCR after the power goes out roughly 7000 times, and I don't think she's amazingly stupid. And yet....I've gone to her house 7000 times to get rid of the blinking turquoise 12s.

It's not a matter of being stupid...it's a matter of being uninformed. It's a matter of growing up in a time when organic food was not well-known...or mainstream...then having it thrust into your world without really understanding what it was.

man, that's a powerful ban--it's prevented me from ever having joined the cheese lovers group!

I didn't know there WAS a cheese group.

*joins*