OMG. Would you eat it ?

[Capsid]

Well then I blame the scientists for not being able to explain this properly and also the press for fearmongering.

[ladylottie]

I agree with what was said above ^^^^^. I don't want any GM modified stuff in my body, we just don't know enough about it yet. Why O why mess about with our food?
This is one reason why I grow my own veg - at least I know what's gone into it! Wish I could keep my own animals too for that matter and for the same reason.

[Capsid]

What would you need to convince you to eat the meat? After all most of the food we consume has been messed with through selective breeding. Why is this different?

[veggiechicken]

Selective breeding is between animals of the same species, surely?

[Kleftiwallah]

Name, Greenthing.

Occupation. Scaremongering.

Specialist subject Going off half cocked.

Cheers, Tony.

[Capsid]

Selective breeding is between animals of the same species, surely?

It is, just wanted to determine what is meant by "messed with". All sorts of genes (DNA) will get switched on and off with selective breeding. And all animals have foreign DNA in them from retroviruses. So a lot is known about DNA and gene insertion (gene therapy for instance). When we eat food which contains large amounts of DNA, it all gets destroyed by digestion, this would be the same for GM food.

[rinabean]

There's no ethical reason to be against this in the way that people are against GM crops for ethical reasons. Wind doesn't blow sheep into neighbouring farms, bees don't carry sheep for miles and spread GM sheep genes. Don't eat it if you don't want to, but no need to get scared or angry. If there's a health problem with this meat (which I doubt, but that's beside the point), it will be easily contained. It's not being thrust upon anyone.

I wouldn't eat it, but only because I don't eat any meat

[Mikey]

We've been tampering with our food for centuries, you only have to look at wild wheat compared with what we grow these days, or bananas that have been bred so that they no longer self seed.

I have no problem with GM crops or meat, I'm not sure I'd intentionally eat them though.

If you look at our medicines they utilise all sorts of plants and animals, I'm happy to take whatever my doctor gives me if he tells me I'll get better.

The media always blows things out of proportion and polarises opinion on this subject, I think in the future we won't have any choice but to accept GM, if we continue to grow as a species then we will out grow our food sources. If we don't modify them to either grow in harsh environments or larger crop yields we'll cease to survive.

[Hilary B]

same as the ones agasint genetically modified crops I'd imagine....
although mine are because a) they're genetically modified, you really dont know what you're messing with when you start messing with food, and b) it's the equivalent of monsanto involved which make it an auto no-no.....
I dunno, I sound like an old nay-sayer when I start saying stuff like 'oh, you don't wanna mess with that' but really, I dont want my food messed with, if anyone is going to mess with it, I want to be the one with the choices, not have stuff like that thrust upon me. Call it fear of the future, or whatever....sci-fi does have it's uses, but also it's pitfalls.
And as VC says below, feeding food to your food is a bit weird, and sparked the whole CJD and scrapie thing before....I don't want to find I've been fed that stuff without even knowing this time round...

My dislike of GM crops is the unknown effects on the natural environment, there isn't a spare one if we manage to totally mess it up, and we're doing that fast enough without the GM issues! GM livestock might be less drastic, but then again... it might not!
Monsanto and similar worry me.....

[Hilary B]

We've been tampering with our food for centuries, you only have to look at wild wheat compared with what we grow these days, or bananas that have been bred so that they no longer self seed.

I have no problem with GM crops or meat, I'm not sure I'd intentionally eat them though.

If you look at our medicines they utilise all sorts of plants and animals, I'm happy to take whatever my doctor gives me if he tells me I'll get better.

The media always blows things out of proportion and polarises opinion on this subject, I think in the future we won't have any choice but to accept GM, if we continue to grow as a species then we will out grow our food sources. If we don't modify them to either grow in harsh environments or larger crop yields we'll cease to survive.

And if we don't control the numbers of the human population, we will destroy everything we are not actually using, and then we will starve anyway, but take the rest of the planet with us. GM resources are just a way of doing all this rather faster than by less drastic methods.