Comments

• Rachel Claessens

  Hi Rachel, I was relatively uninformed and rather apathetic about organic food, gmo’s and so on. That is until I went back to school for molecular biology. Even knowing all the terrible things I now know since I’ve had so much organic chem, bio-organic chem, molecular bio and horticulture I am still with Rose on this one: the pollutants, toxins, run off from hydraulic fracking, oil and pesticides which have damaged our ground water and soil will very likely take many many years to dissipate and even then, from a purely scientific standpoint, they won’t. Not really. Many of these toxins are always going to be in the air, soil, ground water, etc. Having said this, I do my best to avoid these things but at the end of the day I simply trust God for His hand of protection over me. Incidentally, Whole Foods very recently signed a pact with Monsanto corporation. As part of my thesis project we purchased several assorted veggies from Whole Foods, sliced them down and made slide specimens. After careful analysis we found that all of them were GMO. As far as I can tell (in Pittsburgh at least) the only places selling non GMO produce are locally owned and run co-ops which are actually cheaper than Whole Foods. As I said though, I was blissfully ignorant of these things before going back to school. Education can be a real nuisance! :)

  Reply
  • Rachel Schultz

    Lots of great info – thanks Rachel.

    Reply
• Rose

  Hi Rachael, My opinion is this: I don’t for one second believe that anything IS truly organic because we, as a nation, have poisoned our waters and every single speck of land at one time or another with pesticides, oil, waste and many other pollutants. Even when I grown my own vegetables, which I do, I am not fooling myself with the organic ideal because people all over in my neighborhood have their lawns sprayed multiple times per year to keep the weeds etc… out. The overspray must surely hit my gardens at some point. I DO do my best to avoid chemicals in my home but that does not mean they are not coming in anyway. I don’t think it hurts to make any little changes that I can easily do to minimize the risk but am I REALLY doing any good at all???

  Reply
  • Rachel Schultz

    I’ve never thought of that point. That’s true!

    Reply
• Lauren

  I used to be pretty apathetic about the whole organic situation until I had a nasty allergic reaction about 4 years ago to the pesticide residue on on apple. I had washed it and everything!! But I still had to make a lovely trip to the emergency room and get an IV with benadryl and a shot of epinephrine to the abdomen. It was reaaaaallly not fun, and really expensive. Sort of made the whole “it’s so expensive to eat organic!” excuse go out the window for me. Now I try to buy all of my produce organic, and the meats I buy are at least hormone/steroid-free. I try to stick with organic dairy as well (cheese can be a challenge, but at least at Whole Foods all of the cheese is made with growth hormone-free milk); though these days I’m have a touch-of-the lactose intolerance, so that’s mostly for my husband’s benefit.

  Reply
  • Lauren

    I meant *I have, not I’m ;-)

    Reply
  • Rachel Schultz

    That’s really interesting, Lauren. Thanks for sharing. I’m sorry about your allergic reaction!

    Reply