 |
| Image 1 |
The March Against Monsanto (MAM) page on Facebook I'm observing has regular posts from the administrators about food and the global network of implications of how Monsanto affects people and our global food supply. I have used this image of the modern farmer, a MAM post, it demonstrates how the globalisation of agriculture has destroyed farmers businesses and the offending corporations have reemployed the bankrupt farmers as employees on what used to be their own land (Patel, 2007). The week seven reading articulated this perfectly saying, " Who chooses the safe level of pesticides, and how safe is defined? Who decides what to pay the farmers and farm workers? Who makes money out of the additives in food and if they do more harm than good?" (Patel, 2007). The answer is Monsanto, well partially anyway. There is a very clear connection to Monsanto, Patel's reading this week and both images i have used. If the former vice president of Monsanto is now the head of the FDA, which is the US Food and Drug Administration, this is a major conflict of interest and abuse of power.
 |
| Image 2 |
Facebook is also subject to corporate control, the second biggest shareholder ACCEL Partners also owns shares in virtual networks like Spotify, Drop Box, Etsy, check out the links. The terms and conditions dictate Facebook has access to all users metadata and they do what they like with it. Mainly it is used for more affective advertising to users. This brings me back to lecture two where we discussed power models, structures, the panopticon. Governments and corporations like Monsanto have complete repressive power over the population's food supply and make maximum profit in doing so (Petray, 2013).
Reference List
Patel, R (2007). Introduction. Stuffed and Starved. (pp.1-19). Melbourne, Victoria: Black Inc. Retrieved from: hppt://learnjcu.com.au
Petray, T. (2013). BA1002: Our
Space: Networks, narratives and the making of place,
Lecture 2: Power: Big Brother and Surveillance. [PowerPoint
slides].
Retrieved from http://learnjcu.edu
Image Credits
March Against Monsanto (2013). Image 1. Retrieved from: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=661527707199086set=a.566016720083519.1073741828.566004240084767&type=1&theater
March Against Monsanto (2013). Image 2. Retrieved from: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=661795723838951set=a.566016720083519.1073741828.566004240084767&type=1&theater
This is an excellent post Jazmine. The connections between the readings & your network couldn't be clearer. This statement "corporations like Monsanto have complete repressive power over the population's food supply" made me wonder about the role of the MAM group in addressing this power differential. Do you think social networks like MAM make a difference in terms of holding corporations like monsanto to account?
ReplyDeleteTheresa has done some really interesting work looking at the relations between social networks and activism. Her study looks at Aboriginal activism and social networking sites. But I think her conclusions also apply to other forms of online/offline activism. On the one hand social networks unite activists and help with the dissemination of information (& this is really good), but on the other hand people often fall into what Theresa calls "push-button activism" and real-world action gets sidelined in favour of online petitioning signing and "likes". It's kind of a double edged sword, although there have been cases where pressure on corporations via social media has resulted in actual world change (cadbury and the use of palm oil is one example).
Here's a link to one of Theresa's articles on the topic if anyone is interested in reading more: http://mcs.sagepub.com/content/33/6/923.short
You should be able to access it via the eJournals link on the JCU library page.