09.26.10
Keep Frankenfish Fiction
Published on Saturday, September 25, 2010 by the Boston Globe
Keep Frankenfish Fiction
by Derrick Z. Jackson
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2010/09/25-3
I’M NOT getting anywhere near Frankenfish. I mean, do I really want to eat an aquatic Roger Clemens?
The Food and Drug Administration is close to approving a farm-raised salmon jacked up with enough growth hormone to come to market in 18 months instead of three years. In a publicity photo, the genetically-modified salmon is a battleship to the dinghy of a normal one. I do not care that the FDA says it is safe. We seethe at athletes on steroids and growth hormones, yet we’re about to digest a food that is the equivalent of Shaquille O’Neal growing to seven feet by fourth grade? I don’t think so.
But there is a far more important reason to shun Frankenfish. We need to rethink farmed fish, period. Aquaculture messes with Mother Nature far too much for the convenience of having fish available 24/7.
Farmed salmon are a classic case.