Stop the paranoia

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  • #169814
    editer
    Member

    I read as much I could read of Hope Tierra’s “What Do You Mean I Can’t Grow My Own Food Anymore.” Scott, you have to start screening members’ articles more closely. Just following the links that Hope provides, shows what garbage she is handing out. She provides the evidence that undermines her article.

    First I linked to the site for s510. The bill is described as: “A bill to amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act with respect to the safety of the food supply.” Sounds innocuous enough. I followed the link on this page to the summary of the bill. There are 39 sections and I read a representative portion. A lot of dry governmentese. I suppose that if you have a paranoid mind, you might read the same dire predictions into these paragraphs that Hope has gleaned. I saw no reason to panic.

    Next I linked to the site for Dr. Shiv Chopra and I ended up on a website for NWOfighters (Fighting the New World Order Since 2010). It has an interesting logo: eight stick men overturning a pyramid with the very top breaking off. I get the impression that these nwofighters run around on weekends wearing camo and shooting off their automatic weapons.

    (Here’s an interesting sidenote: the first link Hope sent us to had as its logo, an eye in a triangle and here’s a pyramid with a separated top. That’s food for thought for you conspiracists at wlcr. You know who you are.)

    Finally I followed the link for Executive Orders and found the list of presidents from Herbert Hoover to Barack Obama. The range of Executive Orders for each president is entered beside his name. They are listed in numerical order. The earliest Executive Order on Hope’s list is EO10990 the last Executive Order on her list EO11921. According to the page that Hope sent us to, the first EO was issued by John Kennedy and the last was issued by Gerald Ford. That’s a long time ago and I’ll bet that they didn’t contain any of the stuff that Hope claims.

    Like I said, Scott, you really ought to start reading members’ submissions more closely. Or do you agree with Hope’s ideas? God, I hope not.

    #169815
    waggoner41
    Member

    [quote=”editer”] “What Do You Mean I Can’t Grow My Own Food Anymore.” [/quote]

    That would be a real reason for revolution. Most of the people I know have at least a tomato plant growing in the back yard.

    #169816
    areca
    Member

    I find the US government raids on organic farms and Community Supported Agriculture in the US to be very alarming. Police should not have the right to trash the healthy food providers. Combined with GMO foods taking over the US grocery stores…these are trying times. Food police, who knew?

    The article was was informative. Thanks Scott.

    #169817
    sstarkey
    Member

    I enjoy this site and am using it to prepare for my upcoming move to C.R., but have to admit, the tin-foil hat brigade content doesn’t add much value, IMHO, and I bet it probably drives some good people people away. I can’t even be asked to try to refute articles such as this anymore – it’s too easy – like shooting fish in a barrel – and it’s a waste of my time.

    The thing is, this stuff is EVERYWHERE, even on websites such as this that are useful and valuable. I’ve learned to simply ignore it.

    #169818
    editer
    Member

    I agree with you sstarkey, the stuff is everywhere, and I usually have the same approach that you suggest. I ignore the silliness. There have been a lot of postings on wlcr reader forums which I thought were inane, including some from members whom I agree with politically. Generally I just bite my tongue and move on. The difference this time is that Scott has presented this article on the home page with factual articles about farmers markets, affordable Costa Rican dentistry, and building homes using steel framing and drywall. He is presenting an opinion piece as news giving it a cachet of truth. This is what I see happening in the States and it’s one of the causes of the dumbing down of a large percentage of our population. (That’s my opinion, of course, but this is the forum, not the home page.) So I felt that I needed to say something. Edmund Burke is credited with saying: “All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.” I do nothing often enough. Once in a while I like to pull my head out of the sand.

    It took about an hour and a half to construct my letter, including reading the citations that Hope Tierra provided. Maybe it was a waste of time, but it was somewhat cathartic for me. I’m in a different place than you are sstarkey. I’ve already built mi casa in Perez Zeledon and have been enjoying the pura vida for several years now. I also enjoy this site and have learned a good deal from it. It’s helped me to make my transition to pensionista. I just don’t want it to morph into a sounding board for a bunch of whackos. You admit that they probably drive “… some good people away,” but you “…can’t even be asked to refute articles such as this anymore.” It’s your choice.

    Now this response has used up about another hour of my time, but again I feel rejuvenated, so I won’t call the time wasted. How did you feel about the 10 or 15 minutes it took you to post your opinion? You don’t think you wasted your time, do you?

    #169819
    DavidCMurray
    Participant

    [quote=”areca”]I find the US government raids on organic farms and Community Supported Agriculture in the US to be very alarming. Police should not have the right to trash the healthy food providers. Combined with GMO foods taking over the US grocery stores…these are trying times. Food police, who knew?

    The article was was informative. Thanks Scott.[/quote]

    areca, you seem to be very well informed, so perhaps you could post a list of the organic farms and community supported agriculture that the U.S. government has raided. Can you give us dates, locations, and maybe website references? I know you’re not making this up.

    #169820
    clayton
    Member

    I think the article was informative. I would rather have some knowledge than be ignorantly unaware. Some how ” I told you so…” will echo a little hollow should the time come. Let us pray we never see the day.

    #169821
    *Lotus
    Member

    What annoys me more than articles about things I don’t agree with, those folks that feel they need to police the internet against what is in their opinion “the tinfoil hat brigade” etc… Instead of getting your knickers in a knot, just don’t bother reading the offending material and simply click on the stories you are interested in. This way you won’t waste hours of your time, I agree life is just too short. I personally have better things to do than argue with people who disagree with me, or have different interpretations of events. If you begin to read something you find offensive or silly STOP READING.
    Now if you are the type that wants to engage in an editorial debate, by all means do so. But if you have “better things to do with your time” please don’t rebuff said material and then whine about all the time you have wasted…the choice is yours. It really is that simple, like turning off the telly when not interested.
    I would say I read about a 1/3 of the articles on the site, the others I simply pass on by, no wasted time or unneeded aggravation. I did just spend 4 minutes typing this though 😉 But an old saying comes to mind; “Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water.”

    #169822
    editer
    Member

    areca, you seem to be very well informed, so perhaps you could post a list of the organic farms and community supported agriculture that the U.S. government has raided. Can you give us dates, locations, and maybe website references? I know you’re not making this up.

    David,
    Hope does supply a substantive reference to government raids at http://www.grist.org/article/food-five-tips-for-surviving-a-raid-on-your-farm-or-food-club/P1/

    The web site seems to be geared toward alternative farming and the page cited is about raids on two farms by [u]state agencies [/u] in California and Wisconsin. I don’t know what the underlying facts are as to why the farms were raided. There could have been sanitation problems or perhaps licensed dairies pulled political strings to eliminate competition. However it was not the federal government that raided the farms. The agencies were local. I don’t know if the federal government has conducted similar raids. I do know that I have no problem with someone monitoring the safety of the food I eat. I’m not sure if those nearly 400,000,000 suspect eggs would be off store shelves if profit were the only motivating factor after the recent salmonella outbreak.

    But this is all beside the point! It’s the extreme examples that Hope presents that got me writing:

    EO10998 gives them the ‘right’ to take over all food resources and farms. Whoa Nellie! Do our farmer friends know this? Do you know that this also applies to your raised bed of salad greens, tomatoes and herbs?
    EO11000 gives them the ‘right’ to mobilize civilians – you and your family – into work brigades under government supervision. Work Brigades? As in slave labor? Or chain gangs?
    EO11051 gives them the authority to put all orders into effect should there be tensions, economic and financial crisis.

    Chain gangs? Slave labor? The Geheim Staatspolizei stealing the tomatoes from our backyard gardens? All these Executive Orders give “them” the right. The ever unholy “them.” It saddens me that more forum members don’t see the ridiculousness of these claims.

    #169823
    sstarkey
    Member

    @Editer – In all honestly, I salute you for taking the time to actually look into these claims and debate them. I belong to a global social networking site that, not long ago, had its normally very intellectual and interesting discussion forum ‘hijacked’ by a few conspiracy theorists…you can guess what the subjects were…FEMA concentration camps, all manner of 9/11 nonsense such as controlled demolition of the Twin Towers with Thermite, etc.

    Naturally, all of these threads were directed against the U.S. (despite the site being a global one) and I was one of a determined group who spent a lot of time researching and refuting the authors’ claims. Those threads infuriated and exasperated lots of very smart, thoughtful discussion contributors to the extent that several sadly terminated their memberships, not only due to the offensive content, but due to the behavior of the conspiracy theorists themselves. People just got tired of being called ‘brainwashed sheeple’ and having their very valid rebuttals and opinions completely ignored.

    I honestly got tired and gave up debating, because logic and reason just were not valued by the conspiracy theorists. I do appreciate, however, those with the energy to keep trying to debate them! So, bravo!


    @Lotus
    – I by no means want to ‘police’ the internet – please read what I said above. My lack of desire to continue to debate subjects that have been debunked soundly elsewhere with individuals who, in my experience, have proven not to want to listen doesn’t mean I’m not entitled to voice an opinion.

    My position is clear – the vast majority of these ‘conspiracy theories’ aren’t worth debating because they’re full of very obviously spurious claims, (as Editer has found with respect to subject article), and it’s a shame (to me) that they clog up websites that I find otherwise valuable. That position in itself is one that has relevance since the subject of this thread is ‘Paranoia’. Believe me, if I find a conspiracy theory that seems to have merit, I’ll research and debate it. I don’t believe this particular one has any, however, so I won’t.

    If you don’t appreciate my viewpoint, then please put my posts in the ‘2/3 of those that you don’t read’ category, thanks!

    #169824
    editer
    Member

    Thank you, sstarkey. You’re a class act to acknowledge the sincerity of my posts. I understand your exasperation with the present state of political discourse. It’s sad that reasonable people can’t have reasonable discussions anymore.

    And don’t take Lotus’s comments too seriously. Go to the Search link above; not the one at the very top, but the one under WeLoveCostaRica.com Forums. Type Lotus into the field and you will see that he has no qualms about adding his two cents worth to a wide variety of topics. He has a gazillion posts on this forum and it’s disingenuous of him to discourage others from posting their opinions.

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