Column | Ugly guts – NRC

The House of Representatives wants Piet Adema in Brussels to vote against the continued use of glyphosate, but Piet refuses. He does not consider it proven that there is a link between glyphosate and Parkinson’s disease. During the committee debate, D66 MP Tjeerd de Groot asked who Piet was actually here for: the business interests or public health. “I’m not going to let that happen to me!” Piet shouted with an indignation that made me doubt whether he was going to Brussels or to the Televizier-Ring.

Tjeerd’s question also reminded me of that one broadcast of Zembla about how producer Monsanto got and kept glyphosate on the market. Scientists came into the picture who, for a fee, lent their names to articles written by ghostwriter Monsanto. Entire chapters of Toilet Duck were reproduced in reports from admissions committees. It won’t be long before they convince your mother to take glyphosate for a cough. Meanwhile, groundskeeper Dewayne Johnson, who worked with the weed killer for years, showed how his skin peeled off. That was because of cancer, not Parkinson’s. Good thing, too.

In the category of timeless agro-horror, the Zembla broadcast is the favorite, followed by the French entry featuring the renowned scientist who claims that you can even drink glyphosate. The journalist asks if he would really do that. Yes, with pleasure. “That’s lucky, we have it with us. Bottle or glass?” The renowned scientist walked out of the picture cursing. No more thirst.

After years of litigation, Bayer, which took over Monsanto, had to transfer approximately $20 million to the terminally ill groundskeeper. Quite strange for a product that is not harmful. It is also strange that this safe product is not allowed to be used in parks and public gardens in the Netherlands. The city dweller is not allowed to recreate on it, but the farmer is allowed to live and work in it 24/7. You would expect that parties with a heart for the farmer would immediately vote that stuff away from their supporters, but SGP and BBB want to pass on when in doubt.

On Wednesday, the committee tried to convince the minister again: stopping glyphosate would actually boost progress! A quarter of that stuff goes to floriculture! An organic bulb farmer was waved at, the surrounding area spoke of his field full of weeds, but the farmer was not dissatisfied.

The House of Representatives may have been well informed, but Adema had also spoken to scientists, so fuck the will of elected representatives.

“We have to conclude that we have a minister without courage,” said Eva Akerboom, but Adema does have courage. The courage to take risks with other people’s health. A kind of Sywert van Liendenlef. Courage is like courage: feeling afraid of something and doing it anyway. That can be for something nice like reversing a wrong decision, voting against or choosing health over profit. Or for something ugly such as betraying your people, selling out democracy or putting profit above public health. Colloquially this is called bad guts.

The House of Representatives voted on Thursday: the courageous minister must do what she says on Friday.

Carolina Trujillo is a writer.

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