"Spray the People"



by Bev Conover


I recently saw a farmer from central California being interviewed on 

television regarding the medfly problem.  Not surprisingly, his opinion

was that it was better to spray the people of L.A. than the citrus 

crops.  I know we are supposed to have a self-esteem problem, but I had

no idea it had gone this far.  


In any case, this started me thinking.  If this spray is so harmful to 

citrus crops, what about our backyard orange and lemon trees?  Should 

we cover them during the spraying along with our cars?  Why is it o.k. 

for our backyard crops to be sprayed, but not the huge groves of 

agribusiness?  Why isn't agribusiness spraying their own crops instead 

of convincing government to spray the people?  To me this is like 

sealing your dog in a plastic bag to kill the fleas.  It's effective, 

but not a nice thing to do.  


Then there was the idea of releasing "stingless wasps" for controlling 

the whitefly problem.  These special wasps have been carefully raised 

in a laboratory only to be released and promptly killed by the spray 

meant for the medflys.  Maybe we could outfit the wasps with little 

raincoats before releasing them.  


Better yet, I think we should develop the politofly.  This creature 

would only attack the politicians who bought the absurd idea that it is

better to spray people than crops.  But something tells me the funding 

for such a project just wouldn't fly.