Monsanto's Harvest Of Fear Analysis

Barlett and James B. Steele is a short essay published in 2008 by Vanity Fair talking about the way Monsanto treats their customers, their workers, and how they do not seem to care about the general public. Monsanto created a genetically modified seed that was capable of withstanding “its own herbicide” and allow farmers to have a “convenient way to spray fields with weed killer without affecting crops” (819). Because they are the bigger company, they often try to contact farmers into buying their seeds and to not collect the ones from their crops at the end of the harvesting season. This has resulted in the farmers having to lose out on profits (they had to buy new seeds instead of using their own) and regular customers having to eat these modified seeds without properly checking it first. With Monsanto’s Harvest of Fear, Barlett and Steele tries to inform their audience about not only Monsanto's shady ways of earning profits, but the overall corruption in the agricultural market. To …show more content…
They were at constant watch from the Monsanto company, just waiting for this to publish so they would be able to sue the journalists for defamation of their name. Another constraint was the constant pressure they put on themselves for them to write an excellent piece on this issue. Going up against one of the largest agricultural companies in the entire United states must have been tough, nerve-wracking, and tedious, because if they got something wrong, not only are they eligible for Monsanto to sue them, but also they would be spreading even more lies that do not help the situation. A lie would only diminish the importance of this topic, as in if the general public find out about this article and something is factually incorrect, they would assume more of the work that is made towards agricultural companies is false and unproven, leaving more people affected by these corrupt companies without their