GMW:_Lord_Dick_&_his_techo-jackboots_win_PANTS_ON_FIRE_AWARD

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GMW:_Lord_Dick_ & _his_techo-jackboots_win_PANTS_ON_FIRE_AWARD

" GM_WATCH "

Thu, 1 Jul 2004 22:33:55 +0100

 

GM WATCH daily

http://www.gmwatch.org

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" The stench from the undergarments of Lord Dick and his techno-jackbooted pals

has to be amongst the most noxious ever to billow out of the

lingerie-conflagration department. I have no hesitation in bestowing the

Smelliest Newcomer award on the incendiary Sense About Science. "

 

Below is a plain text version of the award citation. For the original and some

great accompanying pics of Lord Dick and his techo-jackbooted pals:

http://www.gmwatch.org/p2temp2.asp?aid=60 & page=1 & op=2

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PANTS ON FIRE: *Smelliest newcomer award*

 

WHEN PANTS BURN, THE TRUTH GOES UP IN SMOKE!

 

*pants citation*

 

Lord Dick Lets Rip

 

" When crops burn, the truth goes up in smoke " , was the striking headline of an

opinion piece in The Thunderer section of The (London) Times by Lord Dick

Taverne. In it Taverne denounced the " anti-GM campaign " as " a crusade " led by

" eco-fundamentalists " . He warned, " when campaigns become crusades, crusaders are

more likely to turn to violence " . He referred to farmers being " terrorised " and

claimed that " the tactics of animal welfare terrorists " were being adopted

against GM researchers.

 

New Pants On The Block

 

Taverne's article was part of a media campaign orchestrated by the lobby group

Sense About Science, of which Taverne is Chairman. Sense About Science was

launched in 2002 in the run up to the UK's official GM Public Debate.

 

While it claims independence, Sense About Science's altruistic supporters

include the biotech-industry backed ISAAA, the John Innes Centre (which has

benefited from multi-million pound investments from GM corporations), Martin

Livermore (a PR consultant on biotech who formerly worked for DuPont), Amersham

Biosciences, GlaxoSmithKline, AstraZeneca, Pfizer, Oxford GlycoSciences and the

Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry.

 

(Non)Sense About Science

 

Sense About Science's campaign to smear critics of GM as violent extremists

kicked off with another article in The Times - " GM vandals force science firms

to reduce research " . Based on a survey by Sense About Science, the article

quoted the lobby group's director, Tracey Brown, as complaining, " The burden of

trying to organise the research community to pre-empt and protect from vandalism

is potentially disastrous. "

 

Articles in the Times Higher Education Supplement (THES) and elsewhere followed.

These suggested that the GM public debate had been " hijacked " by " activists " .

This claim was repeated in a letter from GM-supporting scientists to Tony Blair,

ostensibly organised by Prof Derek Burke but in reality the work of Sense About

Science. However, no credible evidence to show the debate had been hijacked was

ever provided, although an article in New Scientist put forward the theory that

it was the " middle-aged mothers " of the Women's Institute what fixed it. (UK

public strongly rejects GM foods )

 

Sense About Science - Fiction!

 

The THES articles claimed that scientists who support GM were being subjected to

a campaign of physical and mental abuse, leading some to leave the country for

jobs abroad. One THES article was headlined, " Scientists quit UK amid GM

attacks " . Another - " GM debate cut down by threats and abuse " - sounded a still

more sinister note. It spoke of " the increasingly violent anti-GM lobby " ,

" growing levels of physical and mental intimidation " , " hardcore tactics of

protesters " , " intimidation by anti-GM lobbyists... mirroring animal-rights

activism " , " increasingly vicious protests " , " a baying mob of anti-GM activists " ,

and " a string of personal threats " . It quoted a scientist's call for " the

government to intervene to protect researchers. "

 

This article, like all the others, failed to cite a single instance of anyone

being assaulted or anything else " violent " or " vicious " having occurred. There

were claims of " threats " but the only specific threat of any seriousness cited

in any of the articles was an alleged bomb hoax that had taken place some 5

years earlier.

 

Don't Choke On That Smoke!

 

The attempt to portray anti-GM activists as terrorists was no spur-of-the-moment

inspiration on the part of Taverne and his team at Sense About Science. It is a

carefully calculated tactic borrowed from America's pro-corporate Wise Use

movement, which has long used the " terrorist " label to marginalize and discredit

environmental campaigners.

 

Though Wise Use tactics have never before gained a foothold in the UK, it's not

from want of trying. Wise Users were featured as environmental experts in the

Channel 4 TV series Against Nature, which represented environmentalists as

doom-mongering imperialists responsible for the death and deprivation of

millions in the Third World.

 

Subsequent investigations revealed that there was more to Against Nature than

met the eye. Some of the programme makers and several key contributors were

closely aligned, or even directly involved, with a magazine called LM. In March

1998, LM ran an article by Wise Use founder Ron Arnold. According to Arnold,

" Our goal is to destroy, to eradicate the environmental movement. "

 

Ever Ready Frank Furedi

 

LM's star columnist, and the star of Against Nature, was the sociologist Frank

Furedi. In recent years, Furry Frank has written for the Centre for Policy

Studies (founded by Keith Joseph and Margaret Thatcher) and contacted the big

supermarket chains, offering to educate their customers against food scares -

for an appropriate fee! A once-fervent Trotskyist, Furry Frank now appears to be

in search of a piece of the action and has even been found defending Monsanto in

the pages of The Wall Street Journal.

 

It's That Man Again!

 

The phone number for Sense About Science is the same as that of the 'publishing

house' Global Futures. But the only publication on the Global Futures website is

by Frank Furedi. Sense About Science's assistant director, Ellen Raphael, used

to be listed by the Charity Commissiononers as the contact person for Global

Futures.

 

Like Tracey Brown , Raphael studied under, er... Frank Furedi, who eulogises

technologies like genetic engineering and human cloning. Brown and Raphael then

went on to work for the PR firm Regester Larkin, which has leading biotechnology

firms among its clients. Both Brown and Raphael have also contributed to LM and

to the Furedi-following post-LM organisations, the lnstitute of ldeas (IoI) and

Spiked-online.

 

Sense About Science has set up a Working Party on peer review, which is expected

to be used as a vehicle for attacking GM-critical research like that of Arpad

Pusztai. In addition to leading Fellows of the Royal Society, its members

include Fiona Fox (sister of lol director Claire Fox) and Tony Gilland (lol

science and society director and co-signatory of Furry Frank's pitch to the

supermarkets).

 

Crazy Like A Fox?

 

Some of LM's most controversial material sought to excuse or deny acts of

horrific violence. In fact, the magazine was finally sued out of existence after

an article falsely accused journalists working for British news broadcaster ITN

of fabricating evidence of war crimes in Bosnia. LM's contributors have even

turned up as defence witnesses at tribunals for people subsequently convicted of

war crimes and genocide.

 

One particularly notorious LM piece denying the Rwandan genocide was written

under a pseudonym by Sense About Science Working Party member Fiona Fox. It

caused an outcry, winning the condemnation of the Nazi-hunting Simon Wiesenthal

Center amongst others. Other articles by Fox provided a platform for those

opposing the peace process in Northern Ireland. In them Fox describes convicted

terrorists as " prisoners of war " .

 

Genocide? What Genocide?

 

There's a splendidly Pants on Fiery irony about Lord Dick - head of Sense About

Science - firing off unsupported allegations of anti-GM " extremists " adopting

the tactics of " terrorists " , while his own staff, and co-members of the Working

Party on which he sits, are part of a genuinely extreme ideological network

which has played into the hands of genocidal killers in Rwanda and war criminals

in Bosnia and Belgrade, by denying the significance, and in some cases even the

reality, of their crimes against humanity.

 

Pants on Fire Fighter in Chief, Jean de Bris commented, " When pants burn, what a

smoke-filled world we get! If you object to GM crops, you're part of the baying

mob; you're a vicious anti-truth extremist. Going in for genocide, on the other

hand, seems to be less of a problem! "

 

Denier, Denier, De Pants Are On Fire!

 

The Pants on Fire Brigade leader concluded, " The stench from the undergarments

of Lord Dick and his techno-jackbooted pals has to be amongst the most noxious

ever to billow out of the lingerie-conflagration department. I have no

hesitation in bestowing the Smelliest Newcomer award on the incendiary Sense

About Science. "

 

 

Afterword: Unlike his staff and others around him, Lord Taverne is not himself

part of the LM network. He is a Liberal Democrat peer. This may explain why he

appears to find the techo-jackboots of the LM brigade so congenial. His own

Party policy calls for a moratorium on the planting of all GM crops.

 

CHECK OUT THE PICS: http://www.gmwatch.org/p2temp2.asp?aid=60 & page=1 & op=2