Friday, February 27, 2009

Something Fishy This Way Swims

The other day my friend sent me a link to fishscam.com.

I was immediately suspicious of this site claiming that there really is nothing to be afraid of in terms of mercury in your fish and to keep BUYING certain seafood. I was immediately suspicious because whenever there's some campaign out there going up against scientific studies and it's urging you to keep on purchasing certain items, it causes one to stop and wonder- just who is behind this?

Fishscam is a project of the Center For Consumer Freedom and describes itself as:
A growing cabal of environmental activist groups, public health researchers, and government bureaucrats are using junk science to needlessly frighten Americans about the fish they eat.

Something seemed fishy, so I did some snooping around...

According to Source Watch, CFCF is actually a (get this!) FRONT group for the RESTAURANT, TOBACCO and ALCOHOL industries! AAAND- this organization also runs petakillsanimals.com and is backed by Philip Morris!

What seemed fishy IS fishy.

We are overfishing our oceans. This is a fact. An inconvenient, annoying fact? Yes. But a fact it still is. That fact ALONE should be cause for people to adjust their eating and buying habits, but unfortunately for the masses (yes, I'm talking to YOU) that usually isn't enough. People usually don't start to pay attention unless they are DIRECTLY in harm's way, SO yes- mercury in fish IS cause for concern (as are a lot of other things in a LOT of other foods...) and doesn't it seem like common sense that one might not want to indulge in food that contains unspecified traces of a sometimes toxic element? AND isn't it cause for GREATER concern that the food industry is manipulating the public in order to make a buck (which is the oldest trick in the book) and that people (yes, I'm talking to YOU again) are TRUSTING them?!

Just sayin'.

This may seem like a small, unimportant issue in the great scheme of things, but it is in fact something that needs attention immediately and it is a HUGE INDICATION of many other situations much shadier than this.

Creepy little findings like this should motivate each and every one of us to read between the lines and question everything. There's nothing wrong with that. It just takes a little more time and effort and an application of the integrity and individuality so many of us claim to have.








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