By Doug Porter

San Diego

I wasn’t too surprised by the lack of coverage of San Diego’s demonstration against Monsanto this past Saturday. If you read Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States, you’ll realize that successful protest movements rarely get proper credit or acclaim for their influence.

Our local daily fishwrap, aka UT-San Diego, couldn’t be bothered to send an actual reporter to Balboa Park on Saturday. They relied instead on an Associated Press account in Sunday’s paper that mentioned Los Angeles and perhaps there were some other protests…yada, yada, yada… The Los Angeles Times coverage at least mentioned that there was a protest in San Diego.

San Diego

I went. I took my family. We had a great time. So did 1500 other people gathered around the fountain in BalboaPark on a perfect San Diego day.

The rally reminded me of protests from the very early days of the Vietnam War. Home made signs, colorful garb and a positive vibe were the order of the day.  Like the national and international demonstrations again Monsanto, San Diego’s rally was born on the internet by people who believed in a cause. There was nothing slick or professional about it.

San Diego

From the (U.K.) Guardian story, here’s the big picture:

Organisers say that two million people marched in protest against seed giant Monsanto in hundreds of rallies across the US and in more than 50 other countries on Saturday.

“March Against Monsanto” protesters say they wanted to call attention to the dangers posed by genetically modified food and the food giants that produce it. Founder and organiser Tami Canal said protests were held in 436 cities across 52 countries.

Genetically modified plants are grown from seeds that are engineered to resist insecticides and herbicides, add nutritional benefits, or otherwise improve crop yields and increase the global food supply. Most corn,

soybean and cotton crops grown in the United States today have been genetically modified. But some say genetically modified organisms can lead to serious health conditions and harm the  environment.

San Diego

……….

The “March Against Monsanto” movement began just a few months ago, when Canal created a Facebook page on 28 February calling for a rally against the company’s practices. “If I had gotten 3,000 people to join me, I would have considered that a success,” she said Saturday. Instead, she said, two million responded to her message.

The photographs from around the world are from Facebook. San Diego pictures were taken by Haley Joy Porter.

Ireland

Marseille, France

Sacramento

Ontario, Canada

Buenos Aires, Argentina

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Doug Porter

Doug Porter was active in the early days of the alternative press in San Diego, contributing to the OB Liberator, the print version of the OB Rag, the San Diego Door, and the San Diego Street Journal. He went on to have a 35-year career in the Hospitality business and decided to go back into raising hell when he retired. He won numerous awards for his columns from the Society of Professional Journalists in 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017. Doug is a cancer survivor (sans vocal chords) and lives in North Park.

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