Re: Examples of harm
Sam020857@aol.com wrote:
> Ray:
> I still don't see the IAC and push to register
> plants as cheating the consumer.
Sandie,
If you go back through every single post on this subject, I don't think you will
find one word written against registration. Nobody that I know of is arguing
against registration. We are arguing against the AHS dictating to people and
punishing those who do not agree with official policies trying to ban plants
that, for whatever reason, are not registered. The promotion of registration is,
I think, a valid endeavor for the Society. Telling us what plants we are allowed
to grow, sell, or give away, what we can call them, and sticking its nose into
what you do in your garden or your business is not.
I was only half joking in my post about removing unregistered plants from you
garden. The objective of the program is to get all plants registered, and if
that is not possible, to keep those plants that are not registered from being
distributed. It is not just rare plants, the IAC list includes plants such as
Blue Mammoth, Bright Lights, Candy Hearts, Blue Seer, and many others that are
very common and very popular. The AHS is essentially telling you that if the
breeders of these plants do not want to register them, you shouldn't grow them.
My argument is that while I understand why the AHS would like to have all plants
registered, some people frankly don't care what the AHS wants, and I don't think
it's any of their business what plants I grow.
One justification of the policy put forth by the board is that if a plant is
unregistered, the buyer doesn't know what he is getting. The problem with the
argument is that it implies that if a plant IS registered, you do know what you
are getting. Unfortunately, since there is no attempt made to verify
registration information, that simply isn't true. There are many plants
currently registered with incorrect information, there are plants in wide
distribution that don't match their discription, there are plants suspected of
being identical registered under two different names. The current policies under
discussion do nothing to prevent this. If you register a new hybrid today, I
could buy one from you and register it under a different name tomorrow.
Registration is simply a list of hosta names and the description of the plants
associated with those names, as supplied by anyone who wants to supply it and who
has five dollars.
The board keeps implying that those of us that are against these policies are
against registration. Being against the death penalty for drunk driving does not
mean you support drunk drivers.
Chick
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