Viewpoint
Viewpoint
Meacherism
by Alan D.B. From time to time all languages
Malcolm need some new words. Opponents
(Chief Executive, the of new technologies in England gave
Institute of Biology) us the word Luddites, while the
French gave us saboteurs, which we
then plagiarized.
Both these groups of people were
indeed threatened by the advent of
new technology. If you were made
redundant as a cotton spinner or farm
labourer because a new machine came
along, your chance of re-employment
in the days before supermarket check-
outs and call centres was slim. In the
absence of a welfare state, your
prospects were not good. Even though
their causes were hopeless, their op-
position was driven by very clear self-
interest and concern for their families.
But what is the word for someone
who opposes the application of new
technology for use by others who
might benefit, when he/she has no
practical interest one way or another?
A new eponym is called for. A
‘Meacherite’ is one who meaches. (In
French there is the noun meacheur and
the verb meacher, as in vous meachez
or nous meacherons).
*The Right Honourable Let us look at some examples of
Michael Meacher was a the neologisms in use.
minister with responsibil- Cotton does not grow in the
ity for environmental English countryside. In those countries
matters from (China, India etc.) where it is an
1997–2003. In May important crop, the highly destructive
2006, he was awarded boll weevil is controlled through the
the Kant citizen of application of highly neurotoxic
the world award for organophosphate insecticides. Such
contributing to the chemicals cause serious health prob-
scrutiny of genetic lems (sometimes even death) for those
modification. who have to use them. The introduc-
56
tion of new cotton plants that produce
a natural biodegradable insecticide that
obviates the need for these horrible
chemicals sounds like manna from
heaven (or from the plant-breeders lab-
oratory). We in England consume the
products every time we buy a pair of
knickers. A meacher blathers on about
Frankenpants, as if by wrapping ones
genitals in the material, terrible things
might happen to our eggs or sperm.
Farmers in Brazil have been so des-
perate to get their hands on the seeds
of herbicide-resistant soya (also miss-
ing from UK agriculture) that they
have been smuggling them across the
border from Argentina, where the
Government has encouraged its farm-
ers to use these new plants. The
Brazilian Government has now acced-
ed to public demand and now also
endorses their use. We in England con-
sume the products (emulsifier, starch
and protein) in every fish finger, salad
dressing, cake and biscuit going. The
meaching brigade (les gens qui
meachent) wants to ban imports of
such material, oblivious of the fact that
the derivatives in the food chain con-
tain no DNA (genes) of any sort and
are in fact completely unchanged from
the ingredients in traditional use.
We can now see that a meacherite
is one opposed to farmers who are less
well off than himself benefiting from
the new seeds. Opposition is not moti-
vated by selfishness (indeed most
meacherites are regarded as left wing).
The problem is based in their igno-
rance as to how traditional plant-
breeding has been conducted during
The Biochemist — August 2006. © 2006 Biochemical Society
the last few decades. Chemical muta-
gens are used to soak the seeds, or
radioactivity blasts the little darlings
Downloaded from http://portlandpress.com/biochemist/article-pdf/28/4/56/4879/bio028040056.pdf by guest on 27 July 2023
and forces them into producing new
mutants, in much the same way as car-
cinogens and radiation can give rise to
mutations in mammals and which can
lead to cancer. Thousands of mutants
are made that are then tested to see
which ones have improved characteris-
tics and the remainder are then binned.
Anyone with an open mind would
recognize that the use of GM technol-
ogy is simply a much more efficient
way of making new varieties.
Cotton and soya are not grown in
the UK. Not much cotton pollen
seems likely to blow from China into
Norfolk and pollute the local arable
crops. Which plant is waiting to
receive the unwanted advances of soya
seeds wafting 4000 miles across the
Atlantic?
It is rumoured that the Scottish
Parliament is contemplating pre-
venting farmers in Hampshire from
growing GM maize, and hence forc-
ing them to continue spraying their
crop with insecticides. Since it so
cold up North that no one since the
Romans left has attempted to grow
maize within 200 miles of Hadrian’s
wall, one might ask “Why?” The
answer is that the Parliament has
been meacherized.
Tell the Oxford English
Dictionary to hold the ‘M’s’ —
there’s a new entry on the way.
The views here are the author’s
personal ones.