Monsanto Gothic at Laguna Beach rally May 25, 2013. You read it here first, unfortunately! Photo from the unsuspecting Tom Giles.
UPDATE, Wednesday May 29:
Sometime on Tuesday, The Register did report on the rally, with photos provided by rally organizer D’Marie Mulattieri. The paragraphs not behind the paywall:
Monsanto protests draws hundreds to Laguna
By JOANNA CLAY / ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
Hundreds rallied on Main Beach on Saturday during a March Against Monsanto, a bio-tech agricultural company, along with other cities across the U.S. and around the world, according to organizers and police.
Monsanto is known for products such as the weed killer Roundup and the herbicide Lariat. In 2002, Monsanto became the first company to classify and sell corn hybrids, called Processor Preferred Corn Hybrids, which would give farmers more ethanol per bushel, the website said.
We congratulate OC’s paper of record on their conscientiousness. Can’t read the rest, of course, but OJB hopes that as it went on it did not sound quite so much like bland Monsanto PR.
ORIGINAL STORY:
Food activists had a big old rally in Laguna Beach yesterday against Monsanto — and it has received even worse coverage that I would have expected — and my expectations were not high to begin with. SO! — it’s time to celebrate National Embarrass the OC Register Day. Fire up those barbecues and break out your spiciest sauce.
Monsanto, as we might have mentioned recently, is doing all sorts of bad things recently, such as paying to defeat Prop 37 on GMO labeling, denying (apparently without adequate support) that GMOs cause damage, and seeking federal legislation eliminating their liability from lawsuits just in case they’re wrong. (And the patent law abuses, abuses towards small farmers — really, just go look it up.) Monsanto has faced sanctions in many countries, largely ones we consider our regulatory peers in Europe, and the U.S. population is mostly just blinking into the sunlight wondering what the fuss is about.
So, yesterday is a series of marches, 24 of them in California and many more all over the country and parts of the rest of the world, against Monsanto. POSSIBLY OF PUBLIC INTEREST, one might think, right? Los Angeles gets coverage of its rally from its local paper. But regarding Orange County’s rally in Laguna Beach, Orange County’s newspaper of record writes … nuthin’. Nada. Bupkes. It’s like it didn’t even happen.
Well, maybe nothing happened, right? Judge for yourself. These pics and videos are taken from the Facebook coverage offered by mi amiga, organizer Carole Levers. I’ll identify people as best I can.
Video of the rally, from Leo Nico:
Not too shabby for OC, eh? Now here’s a deeper look at the rally, submitted by someone named Jacqueline DuBois. She claims that 2000 people attended the rally in Laguna Beach. If so, that would be newsworthy. I can’t comment, not having been there (due to my daughter’s concert up here in Brea), but maybe one of our readers can. Even 1/10 that amount would seem to be … newsworthy, right?
Still not enough? Want a short clip of a cute kid speaking out on the topic? We’ve got that. Meet Alicia:
Oh, look, it did get some contemporaneous press coverage — from the Laguna Beach Independent!
Activists included Laguna Beach in an international protest over genetically altered products and plan a March Against Monsanto on Saturday, May 25, at Main Beach.
Mindful of a Facebook post showing 800 people plan to attend, police have requested extra officers be available, said police Sgt. Louise Callus.
Local resident Billy Fried told the City Council on Tuesday that the rally starts at 11 a.m. and speakers are expected at noon.
OK, OK — that’s not much coverage, and technically it appears to have been written before the rally, rather than actual coverage of the rally, and I’ve never heard of the Laguna Beach Independent before (although for fans of our Friday “OC Dearthwatch” feature, its global rank is 1,456,620, meaning that it’s doing better than most Art Pedroza blogs), but the thing to bear in mind is that it is still more coverage than the OC Register has given it in the past week (if Google is to be trusted — and isn’t it?)
At least OC Weekly — which by our calculation of present trends will exceed the online presence of the Register later this decade — gave advance coverage of the rally.
Vivacious and dedicated activist speaking at Laguna Beach rally — and don’t mess with her because she WILL mess you up badly. You have been warned. We’d think that this is our writer Inge, except that she usually carries THREE microphones at one time, not TWO, so it may be someone else.
The best coverage I’ve seen (aside from the above videos) is on a page of 74 photos by Tom Giles, which Carole has helped to promote. So check it out if you’re able to see it. I will steal and post some here now, because I am guessing that Mr. Giles won’t mind.
This brings us to the question of what penance the Register should do to make up for its bungling of its solemn “newspaper of record” responsibilities this weekend, to the point that someone sitting at home has to cobble together something from his Facebook friends just so that people have any idea that something big happened on an issue of global significance this weekend in Orange County. (Note: we hope that the Register is covering the debut of the new season of OC-based Arrested Development on Netflix this afternoon — we don’t want to have to do everything ourselves.
So, contact the Register, if you are so inclined and ask them the following questions:
- WTF, guys?
- Seriously — WTF?
- Did you not know about this rally? Because if you really didn’t know about it, you can assign someone to read the Orange Juice Blog for tips about upcoming events that are part of coordinated global activist drives.
- If you knew about it, why didn’t you cover it?
- In penance, will you commit to doing some serious research — serious meaning NOT JUST QUOTING MONSANTO-AFFILIATED SOURCES — about why these people are up in arms about Monsanto’s actions, enough that they would spend a delightful morning at the Main Beach at Laguna? (OK, there is probably a better way to phrase that. How about “so they would hold a rally instead of lying on the beach and frolicking in the water?”)
We’re happy to provide the Register — and any other news sources considered more serious than we are — with contact information for people who can help. Because if you’re going to charge readers $1 a day to be Orange County’s newspaper of record, the least we should be able to expect of you is that you will actually BE ORANGE COUNTY’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD.
And this rally belongs in Orange County’s “official record.” Here, check out some more photos.
TAKE COVER! THEY ARE ARMED WITH WITTICISMS!
Look — even the POLICE knew about this rally!
Monsanto protesters — even naming the bad legislation. And look, they have a big American flag! Don’t you respect the flag? (Seriously, folks, that is a non-negligible amount of people present at this protest. Contact the Register and ask them whether OJB has embarrassed them enough that they will finally deign to cover it. We don’t actually WANT to be the County’s newspaper of record, though you are still welcome to send us $1 a day.)
send the Register an email and see if it gets published in their “opinion’ page.;
letters@ocregister.com
Thanks so much for reporting on this. I missed the rally and was sure I could read about in in the Regisrer. I just wrote to the editor and reprimanded them for their failure to report.
*Go Inge…….we will be at the next one!
Note: story has now been updated to reflected Tuesday’s inclusion of a story on the protest in the Register. I’d say “better late than never” — but I’d want to read the story first.