Hacker News Reader

Comment by diogenescynic | Hacker News Reader

Because the science is usually funded by Monsanto. And they hire paid shills to keyword search the internet and argue nonstop about it, so their deliberate and aggressive propaganda has made me much more suspicious to whatever they are trying to sell, rightly or wrongly. And... it seems like more and more often we're seeing studies that show some of the main components of their products are harmful or not anymore effective than traditional methods.

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/03/14/business/monsanto-roun...

https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/glyphosa...

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/05/18/gmos-safe-eat-s...

View on HN

The problem with this is it's essentially a conspiracy theory.

To be sure, internet shills exist. But it's punting, and intellectually lazy, to simply dismiss arguments as, "This guy is arguing X; clearly he's a paid shill."

In the same way that tobacco companies were engaged in a conspiracy... yep.

Some conspiracies turn out true, yes. But a great many do not.

This one is fairly well documented as well, and occurs in the same space as issues like price fixing supplements.

Wait, are you actually claiming Monsanto is not paying for that research, or that they do not have a conflict of interest?

Sometimes conspiracy theories are correct.

https://www.baumhedlundlaw.com/toxic-tort-law/monsanto-round...

And Monsanto overdoes it with their shilling on Reddit to the point where it is so much in your fact that it hurts. I guess they do it in house instead of contracting? They aren't very good at it.

It's not a theory if it is actually happening. Same thing with gun control and a few other topics. I worked for a public affairs company where I saw mining companies do his first hand. This is more and more common.

I never have believed the whole "internet shills" thing on any side of any argument, and I would need some hard, hard evidence to change my mind.

There you go https://theintercept.com/2014/02/24/jtrig-manipulation/

Internet shills definitely exist.

On the other hand, I've been accused of it three or four times, and, no, nobody's ever paid me for posting things on the internet. So it's also definitely an accusation flung around in cases where it is not justified.

That's exactly what an internet shill would want you to think ;)

Well, I guess now I've been accused of it four or five times. However, I claim most strenuously and in the strongest terms that zolthrowaway did not pay me to post this. I claim it to be so with downright suspicious strength and vigorousness, in fact. Believe me.

Of course you can never truly prove someone is a "shill", but it was the entire purpose of Correct the Record during Hillary's campaign. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correct_the_Record

Reply on news.ycombinator.com