The Notorious Revolving Door
A young child walks into their first revolving door, full of excitement and fear. Once they step in, they realize that walking between two glass doors isn’t as intimidating as it once seemed. After the child steps back out of the forever rotating entrance, they have had a new experience, one that many find to be miniscule and insignificant. But what if this revolving door attached the entrances between dominant food companies, the government, and the FDA? Quite an experience it would be, right?
Now, instead of a child, I want you to imagine a lobbyist: he struts through these doors in a brand new, expensive tailored suit, with a briefcase in one hand and a never-ending ringing iPhone in the other. He walks through these doors a lawyer for a large food company, such as Monsanto, and walks out as the deputy commissioner for the FDA. His name is Michael J. Taylor, and he, my friends, is very dear to you. His power is omnipotent, his salary only something an average American could dream of; he is the controller of your food, the higher power that exists in government but remains unknown to the average American.
Taylor, educated at the University of Virginia, was originally a staff attorney for the FDA. In 1981, Taylor decided to take up a job opportunity at King & Spalding, a law firm whose clientele included Monsanto, a biotechnology company responsible for much of America’s genetically modified and processed foods. At King & Spalding, Taylor fought to allow companies like Monsanto to add carcinogens into processed foods, as long as the amount was miniscule, or “de minimis;” I highly doubt Americans would agree that any resemblance of carcinogens, leading agents in causing cancer, should be added to the foods they consume on a daily basis. After establishing this policy, Taylor decided to leave the firm and return to the FDA as deputy commissioner, a higher profile and higher paying position. Basically, because Taylor was able to implement policy favorable to Monsanto and disregard the health of Americans, he received a higher paying job and even more power over the foods we consume.
During this reign of the FDA, Taylor signed a federal register notice allowing food suppliers of milk to not label their products that came from BGH
treated cows. BGH, or bovine growth hormone, allows cows to produce more milk in less time, therefore increasing the profits of companies producing dairy products. Unfortunately, hormones like BG transfer into the consumer’s body, and in high amounts, can sometimes cause health issues, such as the onset of puberty at extremely young ages. Unfortunately, many researchers have claimed that this hormone intake may be a factor in producing higher teen pregnancy rates across the country. After producing the policy allowing BGH, Taylor left the FDA to return to Monsanto, just to make an even prettier penny as Vice President of the company.
Do you see the revolving door here? Taylor manipulated the Food and Drug Association in order to produce policies that benefitted Monsanto
economically. Monsanto was not the only one living more comfortably though; between each job switch, Taylor’s salary increased as he moved up in rank through the revolving door. I would designate his motto to state, “start off a lawyer, put American’s safety in danger, and become a VP”.
Sounds like an anger-provoking, exasperation-inducing concept to me, how about you? How do you feel when your children’s hormone intake will increase just because you picked up the BGH, unlabeled, carton of milk? How did you feel when I told you studies showed that increased hormone intake has caused puberty to onset at earlier ages? Or how about that Monsanto’s own scientists told the board directors that genetically modified foods could cause harmful health effects?
The point is, our food is controlled by monopolies who engineer products in the best interest of the economy, not the consumer.
Even our own government allows officials like Michael J. Taylor to infiltrate the FDA and pass policy that does not have the consumer’s best interest in mind. It is awfully frightening to know that lobbyists and lawyers can determine how my food isproduced, labeled, and packaged, not the scientists screaming behind the scenes that mass production can only hurt our health in the long-run. Where is the humanity between the glass doors of the revolving entrance? And why, I must ask, is the consumer standing outside, but not really looking in the windows?