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posted by martyb on Wednesday July 11 2018, @01:57AM   Printer-friendly
from the trial-roundup dept.

Monsanto 'bullied scientists' and hid weedkiller cancer risk, lawyer tells court

Monsanto has long worked to "bully scientists" and suppress evidence of the cancer risks of its popular weedkiller, a lawyer argued on Monday in a landmark lawsuit against the global chemical corporation.

"Monsanto has specifically gone out of its way to bully ... and to fight independent researchers," said the attorney Brent Wisner, who presented internal Monsanto emails that he said showed how the agrochemical company rejected critical research and expert warnings over the years while pursuing and helping to write favorable analyses of their products. "They fought science."

Wisner, who spoke inside a crowded San Francisco courtroom, is representing DeWayne Johnson, known also as Lee, a California man whose cancer has spread through his body. The father of three and former school groundskeeper, who doctors say may have just months to live, is the first person to take Monsanto to trial over allegations that the chemical sold under the Roundup brand is linked to cancer. Thousands have made similar legal claims across the US.

Monsanto? Never heard of it.

Also at the San Francisco Chronicle.


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  • (Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:32AM (33 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:32AM (#705525)

    A corporation is NOT allowed to let anyone know that there is a problem. There is a legal, fiduciary duty for executives not to believe that any problem exists.

    Doublethink is a government policy. That's what retroactive liability produces.

    Instead, a government should require chemical companies to label produces with "THIS HAS NOT YET BEEN PROVEN SAFE, AND MAY KILL YOU." That's it. When proven safe, great; when proven unsafe, it should either be removed from the market or be required to be labeled "THIS HAS BEEN PROVEN UNSAFE. CAVEAT EMPTOR."

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  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by tftp on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:50AM

    by tftp (806) on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:50AM (#705534) Homepage

    A corporation is NOT allowed to let anyone know that there is a problem. There is a legal, fiduciary duty for executives not to believe that any problem exists.

    Constrained by law. Otherwise nobody would disclose that their food is infected, and millions of dollars should be thrown away. However car companies are not required to recall unless they want to, as it is rare when they are ordered to do so.

    Also it is sometimes a bad policy to deny recall. Imagine what would happened to Samsung smartphone production if they flat out refused to recall the dangerous model? But they did, and all is forgiven.

    Overall, it us a very bad plan to reject reality, to replace it by the imagination. Just ask Uber self-driving department, who sent to the streets a car that couldn't see anything in front if it and wouldn't brake. But they thought it's nearly ready.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:52AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:52AM (#705536)

    A corporation is NOT allowed to let anyone know that there is a problem..."THIS HAS BEEN PROVEN UNSAFE. CAVEAT EMPTOR."

    "Amazing. Every word of what you just said was wrong" - L Skywalker

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:00AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:00AM (#705543)

      I guess I'm not witty enough to get it.

      I don't get it.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @04:59AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @04:59AM (#705599)

        I guess I'm not witty enough to get it.

        I don't get it.

        It's a quote from a film, a Disney satire of Star Wars.

  • (Score: 2) by Thexalon on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:54AM (18 children)

    by Thexalon (636) on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:54AM (#705537)

    If the laws demand behavior that's bad for the public as a whole in such an obvious and egregious way, then the laws ought to be changed. And if the politicians won't change the law, they should be changed too (cue the old joke about politicians being like diapers, needing to be changed regularly, for the same reason).

    --
    The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
    • (Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:58AM (17 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:58AM (#705539)

      Under capitalism, you make your own law by negotiating your own contracts with other members of society.

      That's the future of Civilization. Pure Capitalism.

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:05AM (9 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:05AM (#705548)

        You've mistaken capitalism, an economic system, for anarchy, a political system.

        If men were angels, they would form a society based on free market anarcho-socialism, meaning the ownership of capital by the workers, who buy and sell goods in a free market, not anarcho-capitalism.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:07AM (8 children)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:07AM (#705551)

          This universe has resources. They are used for this or for that.

          Everything reduces to a question of economics.

          • (Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:19AM (7 children)

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:19AM (#705558)

            Ah, so we come already to an infinite regress of contract enforcement services.

            I am having trouble picking out a contract enforcement service, and I hope you can help me. It seems we are unable to resolve who should enforce the contract enforcement contract if there is a disagreement. For example, I am concerned that any contract enforcement service I might pick might have an undisclosed agreement with the other party to the contract for which I was seeking a contract enforcement service. It seems the only way is to find a contract enforcement service to enforce the contract enforcement contract for the contract.

            If men were angels, I suspect I would not need contract enforcement at all, alas.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:55AM (6 children)

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:55AM (#705576)

              The answer: Neither; they co-evolved.

              Secondly: If men were angels, government would work.

              • (Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @04:25AM (3 children)

                by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @04:25AM (#705588)

                The answer: Neither; they co-evolved.

                We need an answer that is more specific. All that this says is that you haven't a clue how it will work but that you have unwavering faith that it will work

                Secondly: If men were angels, government would work.

                How does anarcho-capitalism deal with the fact that men are not angels and that they are instead prone to escalating all conflicts to violence, no matter how clearly the facts stand against the party resorting to violence?

                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:05AM (2 children)

                  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:05AM (#705600)

                  The answer has been known for a long time: Separation of Powers

                  That's why "modern" governments have multiple branches (usually legislative, judiciary, and executive); however, such a separation of powers is smoke and mirrors. The most general form of the separation of powers is competition withing a market of voluntary trade, where "voluntary" means "according to contracts to which each party agrees in advance of interaction".

                  Anarcho-capitalism doesn't deny or eschew the non-angelic nature mankind, but rather embraces it. That's why it's a superior foundation for the organization of society: It's not based on fantasy, but rather on objective reality (proven objective over millennia of observation).

                  At the level of the "nation state", there has always existed anarchy. The only reason humanity hasn't yet annihilated itself in the hell of absolute Tyranny is that there has always been some degree of a separation of powers (e.g., Russia versus the U.S., etc.).

                  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @12:49PM (1 child)

                    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @12:49PM (#705689)

                    By invoking the United States and Russia, your argument rests on thin ice. Are you familiar with how Stanislav Petrov prevented nuclear war [wikipedia.org]? What is striking about that incident is not that he did the right thing.

                    You seem to have a poor grasp of capitalism if you believe it will lead to a separation of powers. We can look around us today and see the accumulation of power into the hands of fewer and fewer corporations, who become larger and larger by acquiring each other. This is an inherent property of capitalism, and it is the nature of the inherent contradiction. Rational actors in a capitalist system behave in ways that eventually destroy capitalism.

                    Can you give me some specific examples of how government interference leads to corporate mergers, so that I might understand how this would be avoided by an anarchist political system?

                    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 12 2018, @01:11AM

                      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday July 12 2018, @01:11AM (#706033)

                      I see this story is about to drop from the front page.

                      Looks like that's it, for now, but until next time, may the power of the cosmos be with you!

                      Yes! Yes! Yes!

              • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:23PM (1 child)

                by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:23PM (#705734) Journal

                Secondly: If men were angels, government would work.

                Surely, you are aware that hell is populated by fallen angels? Lucifer is one of them. If men were angels, I suspect that things might be far worse than they are, here on earth.

                • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @06:54PM

                  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @06:54PM (#705869)

                  Shirley you are aware of The Federalist No. 51 [constitution.org]! Let us hear what pseudo-anon Publius, who I understand has an exceptionally low UID, has to say:

                  If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.

      • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:19AM (2 children)

        by Thexalon (636) on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:19AM (#705559)

        Under US law, those contracts, which you frequently can't negotiate, now routinely say that you can't sue them no matter what the corporation in question does.

        Also, you can only negotiate a contract when your agreement is required for the corporation to legally do something. If, say, your neighbor is spraying poison all over his property, that's likely to affect you, and you had no opportunity to negotiate any kind of contract with either your neighbor or the manufacturer of the poison in question.

        --
        The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
        • (Score: 0, Disagree) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:46AM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:46AM (#705570)

          How have you not yet convinced yourself that every problem of society is the lack of well-defined property rights.

          Capitalism is merely the philosophy that every resource ultimately needs to be associated with a well-defined owner, and that the best distribution of ownership results from an iterative process of contract negotiation, dispute resolution, and enforcement.

          • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Wednesday July 11 2018, @10:40AM

            by Thexalon (636) on Wednesday July 11 2018, @10:40AM (#705660)

            How have you not yet convinced yourself that every problem of society is the lack of well-defined property rights.

            Because it isn't. And I just described an example of a problem that isn't caused by a lack of well-defined property rights: A person is able to cause serious problems for his neighbor by poisoning the air, ground, or water of his own property with a chemical. And this sort of thing isn't limited to small-scale problems: For example, a few years ago poor storage of toxic chemicals near a river caused a city of 150,000 to be unable to use their primary water supply.

            When dogmatic rules fail to match reality, the rules are incorrect and need to be changed to fit reality.

            --
            The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
      • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday July 11 2018, @01:50PM

        by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday July 11 2018, @01:50PM (#705713) Journal

        That's not Capitalism. That is Greed Run Amok.

        Which is the current system we have devolved into.

        --
        People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
      • (Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:41PM (2 children)

        by DeathMonkey (1380) on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:41PM (#705830) Journal

        Under capitalism, you make your own law by negotiating your own contracts with other members of society.

        Yep! And then I take the money, deliver a fake product, and if you try to do anything about it I'll murder your family. PROFIT FOR ME!

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @06:20PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @06:20PM (#705842)

          Actually, I have no idea what you think "capitalism" means; the only thing I know is that your ideas do not match mine.

          • (Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Monday July 16 2018, @02:22PM

            by tangomargarine (667) on Monday July 16 2018, @02:22PM (#707889)

            You people who seem to think pure, unfettered capitalism is the solution to everything overlook the fact that we have laws enforced by the government to keep companies from doing exactly what the GP is saying, promise something and then not deliver.

            But that's "violent imposition" I'm sure, and somehow a bad thing.

            --
            "Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
  • (Score: 3, Informative) by Mykl on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:36AM (8 children)

    by Mykl (1112) on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:36AM (#705568)

    A corporation is NOT allowed to let anyone know that there is a problem

    Wrong.

    1. A corporation exists to make money. By a simple cost/benefit analysis, if it will cost the corporation more in the long run to hide the information and lose the trust of the public (plus fines etc) than it would by coming clean early, then the corporation should choose the option that will cost them the least
    2. You're forgetting all of those laws that they have to follow. They are NOT allowed to ignore the law. There is a legal, fiduciary duty for executives to not knowingly break the law and expose the company to potentially ruinous damages through lawsuits, sanctions, company breakups, increased regulation etc
    • (Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:49AM (5 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @03:49AM (#705572)

      You wee, heuristical humans always choose the simplest route: Deny that there is a problem at all.

      This is what leads MORE disaster than NECESSARY, because the retroactive liability exacerbates the situation.

      GOD. It's so obvious it hurts. Forgive them, for they know not what they do.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:09AM (3 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:09AM (#705602)

        Just what God Are you praying to??

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:28AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:28AM (#705607)

          I beg myself to forgive you.

        • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:43AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @05:43AM (#705609)

          Just what God Are you praying to??

          Mammon [wikipedia.org]?

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:00PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @02:00PM (#705717)

          I believe he worships the god of Deuteronomy, which he considers a separate being from another god who is operating in different works collected in the Old Testament.

      • (Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday July 11 2018, @12:13PM

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday July 11 2018, @12:13PM (#705680) Journal

        You wee, heuristical humans always choose the simplest route

        What exactly is supposed to be wrong with a "heuristical human"? First, heuristical means:

        1. Enabling a person to discover or learn something for themselves.

        1.1. Proceeding to a solution by trial and error or by rules that are only loosely defined.

        Doesn't sound like a legit complaint to me.

    • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @08:19AM (1 child)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @08:19AM (#705638)

      Lots of corporations exists for other reasons than for making money. One of the biggest of those reasons is to limit legal liabilities, but there are many other reasons. Stop spreading the false notion that greed is mandatory for corporations and that anything which increases profit is moral and is in fact immoral to not pursue. That concept is completely false and quickly leads to a massively corrupt society, which is has.

      • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday July 11 2018, @01:57PM

        by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday July 11 2018, @01:57PM (#705715) Journal

        Greed and lust for power are innate in all humans.

        It does not disappear in persons who rise to the top levels of gigantic multi-national concentrations of wealth and power. In fact, they are probably prerequisites for getting into that position.

        Limiting legal liabilities is a problem. Without other government oversight, it removes the restraint to act with any motive other than the pursuit of money and power. (And fame) When our system makes it a breach of fiduciary duty to act in any manner that does not increase shareholder value, then the only option becomes one of increasing shareholder value, especially short term, regardless of other consequences. Putting executive incentive systems in place to further motivate such bad behavior only makes it worse.

        And that is how we got to where we are now.

        --
        People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @07:39AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 11 2018, @07:39AM (#705627)

    What the fuck makes you think they would want to put any such label on the products even it they were not responsible for previous incidents? Are you thinking at all? They would still fight the labeling and studies just as they do now just because it is a product that sells. You know nothing.