@EveryCrazyDay
King Corn is such an underrated gem of a documentary. Both super informative and entertaining while also being very authentic to the whole vibe of the story.
@kvr22_
As a native Iowan I'm really glad to see John cover this. The subsidies hurt small farmers and normal Iowans in the same way they benefit big ag. It's been one of the largest issues affecting our water sources and is one of the key ways big ag continues to control Iowa and hold oligopolies.
@oldred9122
For those wondering where our old friend Monsanto is in this episode, that company has been bought by Bayer
@jazzmasterjax83
John Oliver is the only person I can listen to talk about corn for this long
@masonvega
John Oliver screaming "What are you doing!" has become my favorite thing.
@bojome3751
Thanks HBO for making Thursdays the new monday.
@KuriusOranj
There was a corn field near my house when I was growing up. They eventually turned it into a subdivision. The new homeowners complained that the soil was essentially dust, and was nearly lifeless. Most struggled annually to keep anything alive in the yard. The corn farming had completely destroyed the soil.
@laalaa99stl
Any time the word legal is prefixed with "perfectly" you know some shady shit is involved.
@JaydonTobler
I remember I had a professor in my early years of college who told us: “You want to know how to lose a presidential election in 5 seconds? Just say ‘I want the US farming sector to be a free market.’”
@notthegoodgirl
I’m from Missouri, and what Big Ag and the gov’t has done to regular farmers is criminal. Big Ag is also to blame for the Colorado River running dry.
@stevelevy2845
As good as this segment was, I can't get "beans want to be it, oats want to f*ck it" out of my head. Watched it back three times, howled each time.
@laalaa99stl
Randy Beavers. Rusty Butz. Tricky Dicks. This episode had it all!
@Martha-q8p1b
Thank you for covering this. As an organic gardener/ permaculture practitioner/ vegetarian and environmentalist, who has spent over a decade researching biodiversity/ nutrition/ soil/ etc....I just wish more people cared about the planet and health of the poor livestock. There are many terrific (disturbing) documentaries about corn. John Oliver, you are a national treasure! Thank you for being a wonderful, sane voice in the world!
@lisam.willson1679
I am LITERALLY screaming, crying, and nodding my head with PURE JOY. As a soil science student and future conservation agronomist, I have been saying for YEARS everything that the Last Week Tonight team has reported here. There's much, much more to this than what they had time to cover, but the point being made here is that growing a heavily subsidized crop over millions of acres of what's left of our agricultural land in the way that it's grown and for the purposes it's grown causes MASSIVE damage to the land, the environment, our health, our economy, and our farm communities. This practice MUST STOP. Huge, huge thanks to John and the LWT team for bringing attention to this!!!
@aurum79argentum47
Here's an untold cost of growing corn: my Iowa grandparents spent 10 miserable years dying of Parkinson's disease in a nursing home. The incidence of this disorder is 6 times higher among farmers using pesticides around their rural wells. After a life of hardship growing America's crops crops, they had their they had their Golden Years taken away from them.
@Ironraven001
I grew up a small organic vegetable farm that directly feeds 500 families year round, supplies 3 small grocery stores, and 10 restaurants with the majority of their freah veggies, all without commercial fertilizers, herbacides or pesticides, all on 10 acres of land. Spoiler, we have never been eligible for a single aubsidy. Feeding PEOPLE hasn't ever been the point of a farm subsidy, when i was in high school the largest recipient of farm subsidies was the Chicago Bulls player Scotty Pippen...
@katerogers6319
Farmer here. Thank you for covering this.
@DJVC1985
John Oliver managed in 25 minutes to do what Stephen King tried multiple times: Make Corn scary.
@StephenGreene-uo3oz
This is one of the BEST JO productions I have ever seen. I have beenteaching this CORN DILEMMA for decades. Thanks,John.
@MrTJP777