Got Hope? You can hold hope in your hand.
Even though 90% of seed variety went extinct in the 20th century, you can still hold, in your hand, the promise of life unto life born again. Even though there are laws that restrict people from growing food from their own seeds, people can “join organizations to support seed freedom.”
That suggestion appears at the end of the film “Seed: The Untold Story.” It appears in a list of suggestions, a common wrap up to activism-stirring documentaries. “Save and swap seeds,” it encourages on an individual level. “Support seed banks,” it promotes as a counterforce to corporate commitments to greedy shortsightedness. “Help ban toxic pesticides,” it reminds about the whole can of tapeworms that that practice introduces.
The film lambastes the foisting of genetically modified organisms on a public that would not choose GMO foods if corporations were required to transparently label their products as such. Maybe it’s true that GMO products are safe for children, seniors, and other human beings. It may also be true that Monsanto is the poster child for evil corporate practices.
Monsanto doesn’t care what it means to develop food products that survive ever greater applications of the dangerous pesticides they sell, grown from seeds they claim to own. Monsanto sues and otherwise intimidates farmers when Mother Nature’s wind blows their contaminating seeds onto farmers’ fields. Such corporations sue governments who would dare protect children from toxic pesticides blown from “test” fields directly upwind from schools. Such corporations don’t give a shrift about unknown side effects that escape from “controlled” profit development.
What makes “Seed: The Untold Story” effective as a documentary is the way it emphasizes the practical, tactical things that dedicated people are already doing to strengthen our chances of sustaining a fundamental aspect of life, the literal seeds of our future. Seed, as one guy boasts about his bean collection, is “a jewelry store of diversity.” They’re quite beautiful. The story needs awareness leapfrogging beyond fossil fuels and fossilized thinking. Be part of turning this fertile soil into “Seed: The Told Story.”