This Sunday: MILLIONS AGAINST Monsanto

Bring Millions Against Monsanto to Occupy Together!

No World Food Day Event in Where You Live? Take the Millions Against Monsanto Message to Occupy Together!

Events are springing up across the country in solidarity with Occupy Wall St. Already, there over 1,000 "occupied" cities.

What does Millions Against Monsanto have to do with Occupy Wall St. and the Occupy Together Movement?

Well, for one thing, we can all agree it's time to get money out of politics!

Why do we need a Millions Against Monsanto campaign? Why do we need to fight for labels on genetically engineered food? Why isn't our right to know respected?

Corporations run this country. Companies like Monsanto have the economic power and they have the political power. Their campaign contributions determine the outcome of elections. Their lobbyists literally write our laws! As workers, consumers and voters, we have very little influence.

When corporations like Monsanto write the laws, they saddle us with a multitude of problems like the ones enumerated in the list of grievances published in the Declaration of the Occupation of New York City,including:

"They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.

"They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless animals, and actively hide these practices.

"They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.

"They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.

"They have donated large sums of money to politicians, who are responsible for regulating them."

If we had a real democracy, where the will of the voters - the 93% of us who think genetically engineered foods should be labeled, for instance - trumped corporate money, we wouldn't need to fight Monsanto. We could get on with the urgent task of going organic to save our health and our planet.

What can Occupy Wall St. and the Occupy Together movement learn from the Millions Against Monsanto campaign? Monsanto is the perfect poster child for the greed-driven corporate takeover of American Democracy. Millions Against Monsanto, Occupy Wall St, and Occupy Together are one and the same; one movement; 99%.

Click here to download and distribute the Millions Against Monsanto OccupyWall St. flyer (PDF)

Here's just a brief outline of the Monsanto's anti-democratic behavior:

Monsanto, Never Having to Say They're Sorry

In 2004, Jill Montgomery, a spokesperson for Monsanto, said Monsanto should not be liable AT ALL for injuries or deaths caused by its Agent Orange, saying: "We are sympathetic with people who believe they have been injured and understand their concern to find the cause, but reliable scientific evidence indicates that Agent Orange is not the cause of serious long-term health effects." The Dept. of Veterans Affairs lists cancer and spina bifida in children of veterans exposed to Agent Orange among several conditions associated with exposure to the herbicide.

Monsanto, Keeping that Revolving Door Spinning

In the Clinton Administration, FDA deputy commissioner Michael R. Taylor wrote the labeling guidelines for Monsanto's genetically engineered bovine growth hormone, rBGH, which blocked rBGH-free dairies from telling consumers about the hormone's link to cancer in humans and birth defects in cows. Taylor had previously worked as a lawyer for Monsanto crafting legal theories on how to stop laws that would require milk produced with rBGH to be labeled. Now he's in the Obama Administration, along with many others with ties to biotech, including USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack.

Monsanto at the Top of the Charts, Consistently the Worst Corporation

Monsanto is the least ethical company in the world according to the Swiss research firm Covalence. The company, which leads the world in the production of genetically engineered seeds, has been subject to myriad criticisms. Chief among them, the company is accused of frequently and unfairly suing small farmers for patent infringement. Genetically modified crops and the international patent regime block farmers' ability to save and share seeds, threatening biodiversity and food security. Patents restrict innovation, as seed breeders can no longer freely use patented plants.

Monsanto, Worst Climate Lobbyist

Monsanto can't top the horrors wrought by companies extracting fossil fuels from tar sands, mountaintop removal or gas fracking, but it's a climate criminal, too. It was voted Worst Corporate Climate Lobbyist for promoting its genetically engineered crops as a solution to climate change and pushing for biofuels when the expansion of GMO soy in Latin America is contributing to major deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions. Climate activists chose Monsanto as the company who did the most to sabotage efforts to stem climate change by lobbying for their vested interests.