General Mills surrenders to GMO labeling, reluctantly decides to label foods but still believes in fundamentally deceiving its own customers

Monday, March 21, 2016
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger
Tags: General Mills, GMO labeling, food transparency

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(NaturalNews) General Mills, a highly unethical food corporation that bitterly fought against labeling GMOs in California and Oregon, has now surrendered to Vermont's labeling laws and announced it will start labeling GMOs across the country.

"General Mills has announced it will start labeling products with genetically modified (GMO) ingredients, becoming the second major food company to make the transition following Campbell Soup’s decision last month," reports Ecowatch.com. The pro-Monsanto biotech shills in the mainstream media -- like Forbes.com -- have also covered the story, but they're ridiculously claiming that printing an extra line on food labels is going to raise food prices across the country and make groceries unaffordable.

This surrender by General Mills stands as yet another huge victory for consumers and a staggering defeat for the food monopolists and Monsanto deceivers who have desperately tried to block all GMO labeling by any means necessary (including engaging in illegal campaign money laundering carried out by the Grocery Manufacturers of America).

General Mills desperately hoped the DARK Act would pass

All along, General Mills financially supported that money laundering and helped fund highly deceptive efforts in California to block GMO labeling there. Even now, General Mills' totally clueless executive vice president and chief operating officer Jeff Harmening laments the fact that the DARK Act did not pass as General Mills wanted. In a deceptively worded post on the General Mills website, he even states that he was "disappointed that a national solution has still not been reached."

By "national solution," he means the nationwide outlawing of mandatory GMO labeling laws. That was what General Mills pushed for, along with Monsanto, PepsiCo and all the other usual food giant suspects whose entire business models depend on tricking people into buying and consuming things they would probably avoid if they really knew the truth about what's in them.

General Mills, like every other food giant that depends heavily on GMO ingredients, doesn't want you to know what you're eating. In fact, they've only surrendered to labeling after being dragged kicking and screaming to that inescapable conclusion. General Mills could have chosen to label their GMOs at any time over the last several years, but they refused to do so. Even as Campbell's took the lead and announced its intention to label all GMOs, General Mills refused to engage in food transparency until it was forced to do so.

Even its own page explaining its reluctant GMO labeling cave-in begins with a huge lie. It states "We believe you should know about your food and how we make ours." But that's not true! In reality, General Mills believes in hiding GMO ingredients in all its food products and making sure consumers are left in the dark about what they're buying and eating.

Unethical corporations like General Mills will only label GMOs when forced to do so

"One thing is very clear," General Mills' Jeff Harmening writes on the company's website. "Vermont state law requires us to start labeling certain grocery store food packages that contain GMO ingredients or face significant fines."

And that's precisely the point. Deceptive corporations like General Mills -- who essentially function as manufacturing and propaganda partners of Monsanto -- will never engage in honest food transparency unless they are forced to do so. They have no self-derived ethics or honesty, and they have only announced this GMO labeling initiative after being forced to do so by the voters and lawmakers of Vermont, whom they strenuously opposed at every turn.

Even in announcing its intention to label GMOs solely to avoid being fined by Vermont, General Mills can't resist spreading yet more pro-Monsanto GMO propaganda and lies.

As Harmening writes, "All sides of this debate, 20 years of research, and every major health and safety agency in the world agree that GMOs are not a health or safety concern."

Harmening just can't stop lying, in other words. To state that "all sides of this debate... agree that GMOs are not a health or safety concern" is a desperate deception that's almost Obama-esque in its invocation of neurolinguistic twistery. It's also a page ripped right out of the Monsanto playbook, claiming that there is essentially no side to the debate that isn't pro-GMO. (The "science is settled" even when it isn't.) Isn't it obvious that some sides of this debate have legitimate and scientifically backed concerns about health and safety? One look at GMOseralini.org tells the side of this debate that Monsanto and General Mills hope you never discover!

When rats fed GMOs and glyphosate develop horrific cancer tumors -- and when government agencies like the USDA and FDA function as nothing more than industry lapdogs -- there are legitimate safety concerns surrounding GMOs.



Entire books have documented the enormous health risks associated with GMOs and glyphosate herbicide, including Altered Genes, Twisted Truth and GMO Myths and Truths: A Citizen's Guide to the Evidence on the Safety and Efficacy of Genetically Modified Crops and Foods (both really informative books that I highly recommend).

General Mills, in other words, is still spreading GMO propaganda and lies even as it is surrendering to labeling requirements that it strongly opposed (and tried to block). The company still doesn't get it, and its executives just can't stop LYING.

General Mills has a long history of deceptive labeling and dishonest products

That's no surprise, as General Mills is the same company that once released a TOTAL breakfast cereal named "TOTAL Blueberry Pomegranate" that contained absolutely no blueberries or pomegranates.

A few years back, I actually put together a hilarious Monty Python style satire skit making fun of General Mills for this insanely deceptive cereal product, which exemplifies the kind of systemic deception still being practiced across the entire company:

General Mills has no intention to stop feeding you GMOs and glyphosate

General Mills clearly has no intention to stop feeding people GMOs, and they have absolutely no intention to stop using glyphosate-soaked wheat as a source ingredient in their cereals, bars and other products, either. General Mills, in other words, is steeped in a culture of DENIAL about GMOs and their health implications.

This is precisely why voters and state laws are so crucial to setting boundaries for these unethical food corporations. Without state laws that mandate honest disclosure, companies like General Mills will deliberately deceive their own customers through ingredient secrecy and deception. There is zero chance that they will voluntarily do the right thing on their own, in other words.

When companies like General Mills speak of "national solutions," what they mean is nationwide BLOCKING of all GMO labeling. That's what General Mills wants, and that's what it helped fund. There isn't a shred of evidence that General Mills is genuinely interested in food transparency. The General Mills corporate culture is steeped in systematic deception and ongoing efforts to deny its own customers access to accurate information about the origins of its food ingredients.

I have no doubt that General Mills is still lobbying lawmakers in Washington to block GMO labeling nationwide, possibly with another version of the DARK Act they're likely trying to push through.

Stop buying General Mills products, even if they're labeled

Because General Mills really has no real interest in food transparency, the company doesn't deserve your business.

Stop buying General Mills products, including their natural and organic brands such as Larabar, Annie's, Cascadian Farm and Muir Glen. Don't hand over your money to a deceptive corporation that actively fought to keep you in the dark about GMOs and that still thinks anyone who has health and safety concerns about GMOs is a kook.

General Mills has demonstrated no redeeming corporate values whatsoever in the realm of GMOs or honest food labeling. This is a corporation that actively fought against food transparency and is still likely doing so. This is a corporation that has only agreed to label GMOs after being forced to do so. It did not come to the idea of food transparency on its own; that had to be forced onto the company by the voters and legislators of Vermont.

Even in labeling GMOs, General Mills still somehow behaves unethically

The fact that General Mills is now reluctantly complying with this law only as a last ditch effort to avoid fines is actually a further condemnation of its deceptive business practices. General Mills is a corporation that remains mystified and baffled by the very idea of corporate ethics or honest food labels; and it has no intention of behaving ethically on such matters unless it is dragged kicking and screaming to a point where it has no other option.

Remember: General Mills is a corporation that took profits from the products you bought, then funneled those profits into campaign opposition schemes to defeat GMO labeling in California, Oregon and other states. And they succeeded nearly everywhere! Yet they failed in Vermont, and now Vermont is forcing the entire industry to face the reality of food transparency across America.

By the way, this also demonstrates the power of local laws to reshape issues on a national scale. Go Vermont! (And the Tenth Amendment!)

Continue to boycott General Mills products

For all the reasons detailed here, I am continuing to recommend a boycott of all General Mills products -- including its organic and natural brands -- until this unethical, clueless corporation comes around on the issue of food transparency and honest labeling.

When a food manufacturer continues to wage a war of propaganda and disinformation against its own customers, it doesn't deserve your business. Today, you can send a powerful message to General Mills by refusing to buy its products.

Whose products should you buy instead? Nature's Path, One Degree Foods and other brands that promote organics and non-GMO products. Look for the "Non-GMO Project Verified" label on foods at the grocery store, and buy organic wherever you can.

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Sources for this article include:
http://ecowatch.com/2016/03/19/general-mills...
https://www.naturalnews.com/046303_GMO_labeli...
http://www.blog.generalmills.com/2016/03/we-...
https://www.naturalnews.com/052625_Campbells_...
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