It’s time to blame the people. Again.

We’re told that we have an “obesity problem” and we’re told we have a high blood pressure epidemic and a diabetes epidemic, along with unusual cancers, especially among the children, and we’re told that we have many other problems. We have a problem with water (we soon won’t be able to find enough potable water for our teeming cities) and we have a problem with our air (in many places it’s not a good idea to breathe too much of it).

One aspect of our myriad problems is the possible connection between obesity and genetically modified organisms (GMOs), and the fight that is under way in California. On one side of the issue are the people and on the other side are corporations, like Monsanto and other giant agribusinesses, which have a stranglehold on the American food system.

For many years, people across the country have become increasingly concerned about the way their food is raised, processed, transported, and retailed. In the past couple of decades, they began to be concerned about GMOs, which some call genetically manipulated food crops (and, even, animals). These crops have been rather mysterious (until it was time to market them commercially) and their origins were shrouded in laboratory research, apart from the farms and ranches where such “research” had been done for the millennia.

People who eat were told that GMOs would produce more food, using the same amount of energy and effort, and that in some cases would be immune to specific diseases and pests. It sounded like a miracle or, more to the point, it sounded like magic. As it turned out, it wasn’t so magical. In many cases, the GMO crops did not even produce as much as conventionally hybridized seeds. And their effects on humans and other creatures who consumed them is not known, although there is great evidence that there are many negative effects of consuming these foods.

In California, a group was formed last year, the California Committee for the Right to Know, to ask the government for just one thing: Require the labeling of GMOs. That’s all. Just label the foods you have in your supermarkets that are the products of genetic manipulation, so that we can have a choice about whether to buy them.

The committee gathered a total of 971,126 signatures since last November, in preparation for placing the question on the ballot in this fall’s election. They needed 550,000 valid signatures to put it on the ballot; there is that kind of keen interest in the issue. Between now and then, however, everyone involved expects there to be a battle royal, with Monsanto and Corporate America spending whatever they have to, to defeat this measure. They do not want the people to even consider what the corporations have planned for their dinner (tonight, and on into the future).

As for blaming the people for our nation’s problems…the obesity “epidemic” could have something to do with the manipulation of the food-like substances that food corporations put on supermarket shelves. It is accepted that more than 80 percent of corn in the U.S. is GMO and more than 90 percent of soybeans are GMO. There are other crops that are now genetically manipulated, but much of what is put out there for human consumption contains corn and soy and thousands of items contain high fructose corn syrup, which many scientists have concluded is a leading cause of obesity.

So-called medical experts and others, many of whom represent the food and medical industries, like to blame a sedentary life and the eating of junk food (or unhealthy food) as main causes of obesity, high blood pressure, cancer, and other serious health problems. They also like to point out that the poor among us are fat. How can they be fat, if they’re poor, they ask? Usually, they don’t address the kind of food that is available in poor neighborhoods. There is some effort to change that debate, but it is very slow in reaching the national level, so that it might be an issue in a presidential election.

Often, the closest thing to a restaurant in a poor neighborhood is a fast food shop and there is no supermarket within several miles. There might be a convenience store, but all they offer is snack food, filled with corn and soy products, filled with poor quality oil and high fructose corn syrup (including the ubiquitous soft drinks). When this is the case in a neighborhood, it’s called a “food desert.” It’s hard to get raised healthy in a food desert and millions of our children are growing up in them.

All of this, of course, is not to mention the hormones and antibiotics that have routinely been given to cattle and chickens to make them grow faster (and, thereby, eat less feed to reach slaughter weight) and not to mention routinely giving food animals antibiotics, not just to keep them from getting sick, but also to make them grow faster.

The corporations that control our food system do not want people to think about the food-like substances they are being offered as food. They do not want the people to start thinking that it might be the food, itself, that is causing the problems. Certainly, the uproar that is under way over the labeling of GMO foods is an indication that people are, indeed, thinking about the food they eat and its effect on them.

Blaming the people for the ills of society is an old ploy for those in control. About 20 years ago, there was a problem with salmonella in the chicken that was being sold across the nation. At least some of the problem was traced to the way the chickens were being slaughtered and processed and, as part of the process, the finished chickens were dipped into vats that contained antibiotics, among other things. Some critics called the dip “fecal soup,” since the contents of the vats contained that part of the chicken viscera, as well.

When the chickens were prepared for sale, they were rinsed and appeared fresh and clean. To avoid any trace of salmonella or other contaminant, the U.S. government made a recommendation. Did they recommend that the chicken processing plants change their operations to avoid contamination at the outset? No. They changed the rules and had instructions printed on the chicken packages…for the customer! The steps taken were similar to those of any sanitized space, washing all utensils, the counters the chicken touched, the cutting board, and the cook’s hands. Suddenly, the family was responsible for its own health, and not the processors, who turned out chickens by the millions. The attitude was that, if you got sick, it was your own fault. The American people became responsible for the shortcomings of the food industry.

So it is with GMO foods. The general public does not know how GMOs affect humans, although there is plenty of evidence that it is not good, yet there is an inexorable propaganda and advertising (is there a difference?) drive by the food corporations to force us to eat those foods, simply because we don’t know what we’re eating. That’s why the fight over labeling in California is going to be so fierce. It may take political overtones, since politicians likely will be on the ballot side by side with the question of GMO labeling. And, that’s why it will be important to monitor the money that comes from the side of Corporate America. With the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling, big business money will be unlimited, just as it will be in the elections, in general.

It would be common sense not to put GMOs on the market, until there is proof that the eating of them will not cause harm, but that’s not how it works in this country. Rather, substances (chemical and comestible) are put on the market without testing to determine their safety and they must be proven unsafe. When billions of dollars of profit are at stake, there is little incentive to do any such testing and it isn’t done unless there is a crisis or a catastrophe. Since everyone eats, there is a possible catastrophe waiting to happen and, in fact, may be under way now, but we can’t see it or touch it or feel it. We just know that people have strange ailments and deadly diseases and don’t know why.

At the very least, we need to have GMOs labeled, so that we can make a decision about whether to buy those products, or not. In a country that prides itself on free choice, it should not be very difficult to make a choice about food. All that needs to be done is to require labeling, on raw foods and on food products that contain GMO substances. How hard could that be?

It’s time for the powerful profit-mongers to stop blaming poor families for their poor health and for obesity. It’s time for them to stop blaming all Americans for the “obesity epidemic” and all of the other epidemics that appear directly connected to the food they are forced to eat, food that is produced and marketed by a system that is controlled by just a handful of giant corporations.

Not knowing what you are eating is an unhealthy situation and, as a people, we have very little information about what we eat. It’s why the GMO labeling ballot initiative is so important in California this fall, but let’s go one even better. The Congress should be considering a bill that would require the entire national food system to label GMO foods.

We know that it would not solve all our problems, but it would be a good start. And, it would show that members of Congress can actually accomplish something. Tell them to do it.

BlackCommentator.com Columnist, John Funiciello, is a labor organizer and former union organizer. His union work started when he became a local president of The Newspaper Guild in the early 1970s. He was a reporter for 14 years for newspapers in New York State. In addition to labor work, he is organizing family farmers as they struggle to stay on the land under enormous pressure from factory food producers and land developers. Click here to contact Mr. Funiciello.