What Mr. Rifkin is after is something even less competitive than a monopoly. He wants nobody in the genetic technology business at all. The second half of the lawsuit makes that quite plain. Large swaths of it address the environmental and safety objections to genetically modified crops. Monsanto, say the plaintiffs, rushed its seeds to market without adequate testing.
Nobody really knows if they're safe.
Regulators in the U.S. and abroad don't trust them. Farmers who bought them were duped. Consumers hate them. This half of the complaint is largely premised on the claim that Monsanto's bad genes won't stay bottled up at all. Bad crops, say the plaintiffs, will get mixed up with good.