[ethinson]

Budweiser has a new commercial to counter the bad publicity... "but we still don't use corn syrup!"

"Greetings Subjects, I'm King John Barley the Fourth... you may have heard we use some chemicals to keep the pesky weeds out of our golden barley fields, and yea verily that is true, but I doth proclaim that our beer is still the purest in the land since we do not use corn syrup to make our beers like our neighbors of the North.."

[Joe T]

This is what always ticks me off about these articles/studies.  No one understands what "trace" means. Trace means barely detectable with the testing equipment.  They finally took saccharin off the "known carcinigens" list when they realized a human would have to eat 2000+ pounds daily.

"Assuming the greatest value reported, 51.4 ppb, is correct, a 125-pound adult would have to consume 308 gallons of wine per day, every day for life to reach the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s glyphosate exposure limit for humans," he said "To put 308 gallons into context, that would be more than a bottle of wine every minute, for life, without sleeping."

Also, as a scientist, I get they went with several name brands.. but 5 wines, 15 beers and 1 cider? That's not "randomly selected".. that's not even enough to count as a sample size.  They discovered this compound in 19 of 20? There are thousands (if not hundreds of thousands) of beers and wines out there.  You expand that to 1000 samples and it's still only in 19? What then? This study is invalid.

https://www.ecowatch.com/15-health-problems-linked-to-monsantos-roundup-1882002128.html

I realize the Roundup causes cancer stuff is debatable but the article reinforces the fact that Roundup is in virtually every conventionally produced food. And some foods have more than others, especially meat, where glyphosate can concentrate in the collagen. So who knows how much we may be consuming? With side effects that range far beyond just a cancer risk, it's not a bad idea to be aware so you can make an informed decision. "Very low doses can disrupt human liver cell function", toxicity to beneficial gut bacteria, low levels of seratonin, testosterone, and tryptophan, etc etc etc. are enough reasons to rethink your exposure. And don't forget drift. Careless farmers spraying on windy days end up spraying their neighbors. Happens all the time. I personally don't support that.
Or you can just trust Monsanto. They say it's safe. They said it denatures soon after application but it shows up in our food. They said DDT was safe. They said Agent Orange was safe.
Now I don't stress out over avoiding it. I wouldn't think twice about eating a home cooked at a friend's house or restaurant or a beer or a soda or whatever. But I grow a big garden and hunt and forage and brew and bake with mostly organic ingredients. Mainly because I find it incredibly satisfying to produce a large, high quality portion of my family's sustenance but it certainly gives me peace of mind that it's good clean food because everything these days seems to be polluted with something.

We all have to die from something but if risk of irritable bowel syndrome, colitis, depression, alzheimers, kidney disease, heart disease, liver disease, diabetes, also, Ms, Parkinson's, etc. can be reduced by avoiding just one thing, I'm interested.

Give me a quick death and an easy one
A pretty girl and an honest one.

[ethinson]

I think it was mentioned higher in the thread, but the only verified health problems from that article were in places where the workers were getting actively sprayed with it while in the fields. That's a huge problem, but also a different debate about worker conditions and worker health.  If you sprayed people with ammonia nitrate they would get sick, if you sprayed people with manure, they would get sick.  Actively spraying fields with workers in them is a practice that needs to stop no matter what your spraying, but again, different debate for a different time.

As mentioned above, there is a difference between ingesting the pure product and ingesting the trace amounts remaining in food. Is it something to be aware of, sure, but in this case, in my opinion it's not something to worry about. 

Workers getting sprayed vs us drinking a beer is the difference between 1 (one million parts per million) and 0.0000000001 (One part per billion).

Also, just to clarify language, to denature doesn't mean it's no longer there.  We denature protein when we cook but the meat doesn't evaporate.  Denature means to change shape (particularly for proteins and enzymes) so that it no longer performs the function it previously did. You may have known that but the way it was written "it denatures but we still find it" implies that it just disappears which isn't accurate.

[Joe T]

The fact that Roundup kills beneficial gut bacteria is especially troubling to me. A tiny amount may not affect me directly but it's sure to kill some of those beneficial bugs and a daily micro dose can't be good for the overall balance of Flora in my gut. This is particularly concerning for my wife since, as a homebrewer I regularly consume unfiltered beer containing yeast which undoubtedly contributes to my flatulence.

[Visor]

 Interesting thread with a lot of valid concerns and reasoned observations, but love it of hate it, try for a moment to imagine the world if roundup was banned next week or year. We'd all probably lose that pesky beer belly cuz very few of us could afford to eat.

[Joe T]

Interesting thread with a lot of valid concerns and reasoned observations, but love it of hate it, try for a moment to imagine the world if roundup was banned next week or year. We'd all probably lose that pesky beer belly cuz very few of us could afford to eat.

I get the impression Monsanto's ultimate goal is to control the entire food supply and they seem to be constantly inching toward that goal. What would happen to prices then?

[Wilbur]

Interesting thread with a lot of valid concerns and reasoned observations, but love it of hate it, try for a moment to imagine the world if roundup was banned next week or year. We'd all probably lose that pesky beer belly cuz very few of us could afford to eat.

I agree that GMO's and agricultural industry has done a ton in terms of improving food availability, but there is a huge issue with roundup resistant/dicamba resistant/etc. crops. Drift is a huge issue, and can often be underestimated. Farmers feel pressured to buy herbicide resistant crops because their neighbors buy herbicide resistant crops and spray heavily, forcing more neighbors to adopt these crops.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2019/02/07/691979417/is-fear-driving-sales-of-dicamba-proof-soybeans
https://www.npr.org/2017/06/14/532879755/a-pesticide-a-pigweed-and-a-farmers-murder

I'm really excited to see how some of the aquaculture/hydroponic startups go. Fresh food year round, no need to use herbicides, local, no shipping. Now, if only we could reclaim some farmland as natural prairie or forest...

https://www.outsideonline.com/2389106/urban-organics-fix-food

[Lazy Ant Brewing]

Interesting thread with a lot of valid concerns and reasoned observations, but love it of hate it, try for a moment to imagine the world if roundup was banned next week or year. We'd all probably lose that pesky beer belly cuz very few of us could afford to eat.

I agree that GMO's and agricultural industry has done a ton in terms of improving food availability, but there is a huge issue with roundup resistant/dicamba resistant/etc. crops. Drift is a huge issue, and can often be underestimated. Farmers feel pressured to buy herbicide resistant crops because their neighbors buy herbicide resistant crops and spray heavily, forcing more neighbors to adopt these crops.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2019/02/07/691979417/is-fear-driving-sales-of-dicamba-proof-soybeans
https://www.npr.org/2017/06/14/532879755/a-pesticide-a-pigweed-and-a-farmers-murder

I'm really excited to see how some of the aquaculture/hydroponic startups go. Fresh food year round, no need to use herbicides, local, no shipping. Now, if only we could reclaim some farmland as natural prairie or forest...

https://www.outsideonline.com/2389106/urban-organics-fix-food

Land can be reclaimed to natural prairie and forest, but that requires someone giving up the use and likely the income from that land.  Would you like to be the first to volunteer to do that?

[denny]

Please, let's keep this about beer.