***** war in the English countryside

[Jim heartfield]

Chris' embrace of the cause of Lord Melchett (and Prince Charles) is
really sad. These upper crust activists are just small-minded farmers
who don't like the opposition from more efficient US firms. The rates of
pay on the organic farms of Melchett and Windsor are positively feudal.

Melchett used to be a Labour minister in that deeply conservative Labour
cabinet of Jim Callaghan ('vote for the party of the family'). Nowadays
Melchett says that he has lost faith in parliament and prefers direct
action. In fact he has lost faith in all democracy. Greenpeace allows
its contributors no say whatsoever in the guerilla actions its middle
class activists undertake.

A straw poll of the Greenpeace members who wrote into the Guardian the
day after Melchett's stunt showed that every one was opposed to Lord
Melchett's act of vandalism against a rival farmer.

Most grotesquely of all, this was not just any farm of GM crops, but a
SCIENTIFIC TEST to uncover the side-effects, if any, of GM Maize. But of
course Greenpeace are not interested in the truth, they have already
decided that GM food is wrong. They wrecked the test because they do not
want to hear the results. This wasn't a piece of class war in the
countryside, it was the equivalent of book-burning, or of the Scopes
monkey-trial, reactionaries suppressing scientific investigation because
it disturbs their medieval belief-system.

In message <3.0.2.32.19990729000926.013e2550 at pop.gn.apc.org>, Chris
Burford <cburford at gn.apc.org> writes
>
>The High Court judge gently offered some stern words. All four had been
>"reckless". If they carried out any further acts of destruction the
>consequences for them would be "dire".
>
>
>A later report said that Melchett had been released but on condition he did
>not damage any more genetically modified crops.
>
>
>These gentle sentences are the British way to tame revolutionaries before
>they become martyrs. They are likely to be met by alternative ingenious
>forms of struggle.
>
>Greenpeace may feel the costs have been worth the publicity.
>
>Meanwhile when US subscribers are surprised to hear their administration is
>conceding the labelling of GM products, they should realise the range and
>breadth of the struggle that is building up about different methods of food
>production, and the trade in their respective commodities across the
>Atlantic. Soon your soya farmers will not be able to sell in Europe.
>
>
>Chris Burford
>
>London
>

-- 
Jim heartfield