I remember the movie Erin Brockovich where they offered the lawyer a glass of contaminated water to drink and iirc the person actually drank it. I always wondered what happened to that person IRL.

Okay, the interviewer isn't offering him a glass of water, he's offering him a glass of glyphosate. Lets be honest here, No one would drink that. (Glyphosate is the actual Roundup poison)

The concentration level in a solid glass of that stuff, would send anyone to Poison Control. As would most of the chemicals they use in our food.

I won't defend them, I hate Monsanto, but be realistic here. I also wouldn't recommend anyone to drink a full glass of Vinegar, Dish soap, Hot Sauce, Vanilla, or many other Safe to eat things from the kitchen.

Yeah, I agree with Sagemind. It's one thing to drink water from a place where roundup is used. It's quite another to actually drink a full glass of the stuff, undiluted.

So the video is deceptive?

now I remember where I am

But the good doctor himself opened the door for the invitation to drink... what a dick.

The 'good' doctor stated that drinking it wouldn't harm him. In that much the science says he is correct, the toxicity tests on the concentrations used for application say that. The toxicity of the concentrated form is way higher, but even then the cases of deliberate attempted suicide by drinking it often fail. The maximum concentration for application is 10%, but ranges all the way down to 0.1%.

When one guy talks about the effects of 0.1% concentrated substance, and the other talks about the effects of nearly 100% concentration, you get different results. That's because you are talking apples to oranges. That IMHO makes you both fools, but I have to tip a bit of the hand to the guy that is at least talking about the real world application levels rather than the one that makes the story he wants.

You could make a similar story out of vinegar and how the food industry is pouring a poison into our food chain. After all, highly concentrated form of the acid will even burn your skin, never mind trying to drink it. The reality in application of the low concentration vinegar most of us regular consume though is fine, with the recommendation that pouring it in your eyes won't be fun, and if you were asked to drink a glass you'd likely refuse despite the knowledge it wouldn't be so bad for your health.

Nothing deceptive about the video. The guy says Roundup is safe to drink and then says he'd have to be an idiot to drink it. Water had nothing to do with the video and was never even implied until ghark mentioned it as an aside.

The 'good doctor' said "you can drink a whole quart of it, it won't hurt you", not 'you can drink a whole quart of it, but only if you dilute it to <1%'.
Please point out where in the video he said anything about it being harmless ONLY AT DILUTED CONCENTRATION, and not a blanket "you can drink a whole quart of it (talking about pure 100%glyphosate) and it wont' hurt you" Also please point out where the interviewer says the glass is pure undiluted chemical...he only said "I have some for you to drink", it might have been a <1% solution for all we know.
"I'm not stupid" and "I'm not an idiot" means 'I'm not stupid enough to believe that idiot liar that just told you it's harmless and agreed to drink it'. I love that he keeps repeating essentially 'it's harmless, but keep that dangerous crap away from me'.

"People try to commit suicide with it and fail fairly regularly" implies that they succeed more often, or he certainly would have said '...and they usually fail' or '...and they never succeed'. People try to commit suicide with draino and fail fairly regularly too, and it's deadly flesh rotting poison that damages you terrribly for life, even if you don't die.

EDIT: as for your vinegar example, people DO drink pure vinegar for many reasons. It's unpleasant, but not harmful in small doses (not only harmless in extremely diluted doses).

When talking about round-up, your audience is supposedly people that might actually use it. NOBODY uses it at 100% concentration unless they are the type to go home and heat their house with a fireplace full of money too. Round-up in most situations is terrifically effective against plants at less than 1% concentration. When you talk about round up and the associated risks, your talking about what is expected to be sitting in the tank of the sprayer.

The vinegar example is one you've used to nicely illustrate my point. Vinegar is nothing more than diluted acetic acid. In common language nobody talks about the hazards of vinegar being the same as those of concentrated acetic acid. Concentrated acetic acid though is not something you want on your skin or anywhere near your mouth. The whole point of my making such an unfair comparison is to illustrate that the same is true of round-up. In common usage, nobody's sprayer tank that they take into a field is gonna be anywhere close to 100% concentrated, it's gonna be much, much closer to 1%. That makes a difference, and glossing over that is also dishonest.

First, even you said it's normally properly used at up to 10% concentration. Most people use it at the maximum concentration so it works effectively. 1% concentration almost never does the job....often 10% requires repeated applications, I know from experience.

Second, where does the interviewer EVER say it's PURE roundup in the glass? Where does the interviewee ever question the concentration level, or say "it is dangerous at full concentration"?...he doesn't, he said it's not harmful and I'll be glad to drink it. Period. he actually said, talking about PURE glyphosate "You can drink a whole quart of it and it won't hurt you"...and 'I'd be glad to drink it...not really'....Not 'it's not harmful when diluted to 1%', not 'it's not harmful when used correctly with proper safety gear', but blanket 'it's not harmful, you can drink it', which is obviously a lie. At anywhere near full concentration, it's deadly, and even at full maximum dilution, it's harmful to ingest and studies seem to indicate it causes cancer and other problems...which is why he won't drink it like he claimed he would.

You said vinegar, not pure acid. Pure concentrated acetic acid is not the same thing, but diluted to normally found full concentrations it's completely harmless, unlike roundup. Pure water is deadly, but not something you can find, just like pure acetic acid is something you can't find...but pure roundup is how they sell it, and how many (idiots) use it. That makes it a totally FAIR comparison, especially when the spokesman is telling you clearly that the pure chemical is completely harmless and drinkable (only commenters have brought up concentration levels, not the spokesman, he just said "not harmful, drinkable").

Kinda agree with Sagemind here, but maybe the doctor should be more careful with his use of words... this is the kind of thing that has basically led to a culture of disinformation from just about every walk of life. If something is safe to drink in dilute form, you simply say "it's PERFECTLY safe!" It was sort of the truth, but also sort of a lie. Because that kind of thing has been going on for so long, no one can believe anyone anymore, and that's possibly by design. Rule by confusion.

As for @lantern53, if other videos were deceptive as you say, it should be quite easy for you to prove that in the comments. In actual fact, you're just upset that people disagree with your heinous opinions and end up burying you with logic and facts (the best of which you ignore). By cherry picking this particular video to say "see! deception!" you almost validate that the other cases were not deceptive. Why choose this one to make your point? Perhaps because even you realise that this one has something that the others do not....

When you're being interviewed about the dangers and problems of Monsanto products and legal restrictions on or bans of their uses, your audience is supposedly people who think there's an issue with your product(s).

Obviously, we are devoid of some context, but the very opening words from 'doctor' is a reference to his not believing that glyphosate is contributing to cancer rates in Argentina, you can drink a quart of it and it won't hurt you.

In this context, it would sound like the claim had been made that round-up usage was causing cancer in Argentina? Unless Argentina is selling round-up as an energy drink, the discussion is in the frame of consumers of food containing products from plants grown in fields that were at some point sprayed with diluted round-up. The good doctor is declaring it far fetched to claim eating something grown in a field that was at some point sprayed with round up is causing cancer. He then exaggerates in his own right observing you can safely drink a quart of it...

As to the typical usage concentration, you are pretty wrong to say most guys will use the max concentration to get the most effect. Spraying a field at 10% costs 10 times as much money as spraying it at 1%, and 100 times as much money as spraying it at 0.1%, which is the span of recommended rates. Guys are going to use the lowest concentration they can while still being confident it will have the effect they want.

I stand by the notion that round-up and glyphosate and vinegar and acetic acid are equally pertinent comparisons in language for expected concentrations of a substance. Nobody uses 100% glyphosate on their field anymore than they use 100% acetic acid on their food.

Yes, I wish we had the run up to the 'interview' to have better context here as well.

Well, to me when he mentions the pure form of the chemical itself, not the 'normally used diluted mixture', he's saying clearly that the chemical is not cancer causing, or dangerous, so much so that you can drink it pure and not even die (driven home by the 'attempted suicide failures' he mentioned, they certainly aren't drinking dilutions). If he means only the diluted form, he should not say "glyphosate" and talk about suicides, because that's only about the pure chemical form.

To me, he was obviously trying to make the point that the chemical is SO safe, you can drink it straight with no ill effects, a point seemingly seized by the interviewer who offers him what can be assumed is supposed to be pure glyphosate (we have no idea what it really is, it might be just water and a quick interviewer's trick), because that's what the interviewee had been defending.

OK, I'll conceded that most large farms likely use it at the minimum concentration that will work for them, I meant most consumers. I suppose it's likely that large farms use WAY more than consumers do, I just don't know. Home users rarely even read the label, and often double the dosage so 'it will work better/faster', and sometimes just use pure concentrate (breathing it as they spray).

I continue to contend that acetic acid is NOT a pertinent comparison because pure glyphosate is how the product is sold to consumers on the shelf with barely any warnings, but you can't buy pure acetic acid outside a chemical supply store with multiple severe warnings about it's extreme dangers...but you can buy pure vinegar on the shelf, and it's normally diluted to between 10% and 1% when people use it too, so I see it as a much closer comparison...and it's what you mentioned...not acetic acid, vinegar is different from 'diluted acetic acid', it's a specific product, not a dilution of another product. It's not made by mixing water with pure acid. OK?

Piss is safe to drink, but that doesn't mean I'd drink it, not even to prove a point.

Or maybe to give a better and more accurate view on round-up toxicity, this summary from a scientific journal article prepared by The Department of Pathology, New York Medical College, Valhalla, New York, link to full article follows:

Results from several investigations establish that
the acute toxicity and irritation potential of Roundup
herbicide in humans is low. Specifically, results from
controlled studies with Roundup showed that skin irritation
was similar to that of a baby shampoo and
lower than that observed with a dishwashing detergent
and an all-purpose cleaner; no dermal sensitization,
photoirritation, or photosensitization reactions were
148 WILLIAMS, KROES, AND MUNRO
observed. Furthermore, the incidence of occupationalrelated
cases involving Roundup is low given the widespread
use of the product. Data from these cases indicated
some potential for eye and skin irritation with
the concentrated product, but exposure to dilute spray
solutions rarely resulted in any significant adverse
effect. Most importantly, no lasting dermal or ocular
effects were noted, and significant systemic effects attributable
to contact with Roundup did not occur. Studies
of Roundup ingestion showed that death and other
serious effects occurred only when large amounts were
intentionally ingested for the purpose of committing
suicide. These data confirmed that the acute oral toxicity
in humans is low and consistent with that predicted
by the results of laboratory studies in animals.


http://www.ask-force.org/web/HerbizideTol/Williams-Safety-Evaluation-Risk-Assessment-RR-2000.pdf

Dirt is safe enough to eat. Does that mean I have to eat a handful of dirt? It's weed killer, guys. But, yeah, don't claim it's so casually drinkable if you aren't willing to casually drink it.

It's a video with 2 jerks being played to a choir full of jerks. A circle jerk, in fact.

The old Monsanto guy is jerking off the interviewer telling him, "Make this interview good and I'll keep jerking you off. People can drink all the juice I tell them they can drink. Even if it's my weed killer jizz."

But the interviewer knows old Monsanto man likes humiliation so he's like "no, YOU drink it, bitch."

But what he didn't realize is that old Monsanto man would cum so quickly and leave without drinking what he had for him to drink. It was merely the thought of drinking that nasty shit that was enough.

Boom! Instant gay porn classic.

Please, explain how it's deceptive.

Dr. Moore says: "I do not believe Glyphosate.. is causing increases in cancer. You can drink a whole quart of it and it won't hurt you."

Interviewer: 'You want to drink some? We have some here.'

Dr. Moore: "I'd be happy to actually."

Where is this said deception?

The only way of really knowing if glyphosate is safe is through good quality studies; ones that aren't funded by Monsanto in this case. Having a guy tell you he 'believes' it's safe carries zero weight - this Monsanto mouthpeice is simply trying to sway those that don't know how science works. In the same breath though, getting him to drink a cup of it takes away from the discussion that could be happening about the latest research results. Not that this Moore guy would want to discuss those issues anyway...

So in terms of the research - there's evidence now that it is harmful, and probably a carcinogen to humans, so common sense to me would be to limit it's use, replacing it wherever possible with farming techniques that minimise damage to both the environment, and humans. So I would basically echo what CSPI Biotechnology Director Gregory Jaffe says:

"farmers should reduce their use of glyphosate and practice integrated weed management, something many were doing before the introduction of glyphosate-tolerant crops but stopped when those crops became available. Such a change would have the added benefit of slowing the spread of glyphosate-resistant weeds due to overuse of glyphosate".

from:
http://ens-newswire.com/2015/03/26/common-herbicide-glyphosate-a-probable-human-carcinogen/

Fun fact: the Dr. in question, now representing Monsanto, was a prominent member of Greenpeace and still referred to as an "environmentalist".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Moore_%28environmentalist%29

My family owns and operates a farm, wheat and corn, in Kansas. We use Roundup herbicides sometimes.

Specifically, there is a GMO variant of field corn called "Roundup Ready" where the corn is genetically resistant to the herbicide. Plant a field of that corn, then after it emerges but well before harvesting (obviously) spray it with Roundup, diluted to an appropriate level. All of the pest plants in the field die. The corn looks a little wilted / harried for a few days after spraying, but bounces back and grows out just fine.

We use that specific kind (Roundup Ready) about 1 year out of every 4 or 5, only when pest plants are starting to become an issue. They'd love to sell it to farmers every year, but most only rotate it in when necessary, just like us, and use a small amount of normal seed (not GMO, just some of the normal corn we harvest) held in reserve from previous year(s) in the other years.

Before Roundup (and other major herbicides and pesticides), pest plants could be a major problem. From what my family says, corn can cross-pollinate or do some kind of hybridization with other crops like milo or sorghum or something, which results in a sterile cane-stalk plant like corn that produces no actual grain. Back 20+ years ago, that was a fairly major problem ... but it is very easily controlled nowadays with herbicides, and Roundup in particular.

Pure, concentrated Roundup is pretty nasty stuff. Then again, farmers still use or have used a lot of much nastier stuff during normal farm operations, like Malathion being sprinkled into grain bins to kill off insects and other small pests. I wouldn't want to chug down a glass full of any of that crap, BUT on the other hand I think we're way better as the human race off WITH all these things being used to control what can be or have been significantly damaging pests than how things would be WITHOUT them. Not to mention that all of these things are used in very very trace amounts compared to the actual amount of food produced itself, and usually a *really* long time before it becomes food. I think you'd be pretty hard pressed to detect any of them in the parts-per-multi-multi-billion scale by them time we eat them.


...That being said, the dude walked right in to this one. If his message was "this stuff is 100% safe and beneficial if used properly", I'd actually 100% agree with him. But when he's trying to oversell it by saying that it is perfectly safe to drink a glass of it ... of course somebody is going to call his bluff. Duh.

Seems to me that company reps who don't want to look like shitheads shouldn't make unqualified and outlandish claims they aren't willing to back up.

The interviewer was right to put him on the spot even if it feels unfair.