After six years testing the safety of cloning, the Food and Drug Administration has deemed cloned animals fit for consumption. Don't like it? Well, you don't have much of a choice. The FDA also decided that labels won't have to divulge whether or not they contain parts from cloned animals, because the ingredients are no different from that of animals raised the old-fashioned way. Besides, aside from the creep-out factor, most people probably wouldn't choose to eat a cloned animal to begin with; they cost ten times as much as your average, farm-raised cow or pig.
Americans should be used to to science and industry playing a starring role in our food choices. From pesticides to force-fed ducks to hormone-laden dairy products, it shouldn't be any surprise that cloned animals were the next step.
And our food is already meddled with, sometimes without our knowledge (ever wonder how you can perfectly fresh peaches and strawberries in the middle of February?), and sometimes quite obviously (plutots, anyone?) But while this shouldn't come as a shock, this newest agricultural development does seem like an eerie foreshadowing of events to come.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
1-17-2008 @ 11:05AM
Lewis said...
Well, it was just a matter of time. I think it's a matter of sustainability. The more people you have on Earth (growing everyday) the more mouths you have to feed. This growth means more farm lands are needed but therein lays the conflict.
More people = less land
So a new form of 'farming' if you will needed to be born.
Of course people are going to freak out but just like everything; CNN's attention span is about 2 years long at best and with the public - out of site out of mind.
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1-17-2008 @ 11:40AM
Harlan said...
I dunno. A clone is just a fancy way of making an identical twin. There are no strange genes from jellyfish in there or anything. I'd much rather have a free-range pastured happy pig whose great-great grandmother was a clone than a traditionally bred pig raised in a stinking cage. The first pig knows nothing of its ancestry, while the second pig is miserable. From the animal's point of view, this is a non-issue.
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1-17-2008 @ 11:52AM
noza said...
I think there's a big difference between Genetically Modified and just Genetically Copied.
The only concern I have is not a food safety concern, but more that the genetic diversity of livestock will be severely hampered. Natural breeding introduces such things as increased disease resistance - and problems with cloned plants have already shown these can be big problems.
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1-17-2008 @ 12:24PM
kevjohn said...
Well it's about time!
Let me be the first to try a plate of cloned steak and eggs. Eggs from cloned chickens of course.
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1-17-2008 @ 1:34PM
Amber said...
Sensationalism much? And if I'm getting fresh out of season fruits it's because they are being shipped from somewhere else where they can grow.
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1-17-2008 @ 1:42PM
JustaTech said...
Really, I think that the most likely application of cloning in animal agriculture is to clone stud males, not actual meat animals.
And a pluot is a case of cross-breeding, a long tradition in fruit, not some kind of terrible lab accident. And those peaches? Either they came out of a greenhouse (nothing new there) or they came from somewhere in the Southern Hemisphere. So far I don't know of any science that would force plants to fruit twice a year, particularly in the cold.
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1-17-2008 @ 2:24PM
Eddie said...
Great idea. I think we're far too picky here in the states about the food we eat. If the FDA has cleared it, I'll eat it- especially if it lowers the price of my steak.
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1-18-2008 @ 9:56AM
yogachef said...
I'm surprised to hear so many people are unmoved by this new approval by the FDA. Six years of study is a pee hole in the snow when it comes to studying the effects of altered food on humans.
Cummon folks...do you have kids?
http://roomfullofchefs.blogspot.com/2008/01/cloned-meat-and-dairyfda-has-its-head.html
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1-18-2008 @ 7:37PM
Simon Arch said...
EXCEPT! these are genetically COPIED, not genetically MODIFIED.
Big, huge, tremendous difference there. Grow a cow with the characteristics you like, sample its DNA and then grow fifty of them with the same DNA. Maybe they'll turn out the same, maybe not, but in no way does this mean they're "altering" the animal.
I'll take the FDA's word over somebody on blogspot any day of the week, and brother, let me tell you: I don't TRUST the federal government.
1-23-2008 @ 7:21PM
Durwood said...
Is this site becoming sponsored by PETA or something? PETA videos, Vegan "cookbooks" - what the hell? Eat or be eaten, hippies. I'm losing my freakin mind.
A CLONE is genetically identical to its DONOR. The only difference will be in their "experiences". (And the next chucklenuts that tastes "happy", be sure and post a description here - bet it tastes like chicken).
Hey, pasty-skinned, pimple-infested vegans:
You eat clones every freaking day - potatos, bananas, grapes...
You also eat "genetically-modified" foods every day - ever hear of "artificial selection" - too bad, because without it that bowl of freakin rice in front of you would cost $17.
BTW, cloning is NOT the evil creation of the horrible humans that have no right to inhabit their own damn planet - try reading up on parthnogenisis sometime - maybe you can stand outside the local salt marsh and protest aphids or something.
I'm gonna go throw plastic bags in the ocean and calm down.
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