What’s your main tool you use for people who argue about organic foods??

from M.Sorenson (Sydney)

Answer:

Education.
So, it takes time.
But eventually most of them overcome ignorance (which is bliss) to realize:

organic food has been shown in the Journal of Applied Nutrition (and countless of other non-biased sources) to have higher levels of nutrients.

Nutritious food will more fully satisfy the appestat over less nutritious food. Therefore, you'll eat less and your food bill will reflect that. An addition to the cost argument is that we throw away about 30% of the food we buy. So if we actually just buy what we can eat (and higher nutrition along with higher costs will encourage that), then the extra price for organics is often offset.

Health is another argument, I use. The chemicals sprayed on conventional farms originally comes from warfare. Most work on our endocrine system. And hormones are not something you want to mess with in the human body. But then I'll hear that the government wouldn't approve the use of a particular pesticide if it were proven to be harmful. Then I remind them this is the same government that approved Vioxx before taking it off the shelves; the same government that approved aspartame; the same government which will approve anything if the lobby is strong enough with deep enough pockets. Besides, the long term studies are not done. And the ones studying the effects from the COMBINATION of these supposedly safe chemicals are also sorely lacking.

To convert people who are motivated more by aesthetics than health, I'll explain to them that fat stores toxins. Thus, all of the pesticides, fungicides, herbicides, and artificial colors and flavors will be stored in the body's adipose tissue. That's how they make conventionally raised cows fat--feeding them things (and not just grains) they weren't designed to eat makes them fat and it makes them sick just like it makes us fat and sick. It used to take several years to raise a cow from calf to slaughter. Now it's done in as little as 18 months. Saw dust, cement dust, plastic chips, left over food from vending machines--these are only a few of the items which have been "approved" for inclusion in cattle feed. And the parallel in humans is frightening. Childhood obesity and Type 2 diabetes is exploding in the US and elsewhere due in large part by what our children are allowed to eat.

Those who are environmentally conscious are usually convinced when they learn that the soil's microorganisms are killed through the used of chemical fertilizer and the like. This, of course, impacts the growth of the plants which impact the animals which eat them, which impact the humans which eat them and the cycle continues...of course, soil health is directly related to erosion and water run off. So the conservationists usually have their minds opened easily.

What about feeding the world's growing population? If the avg conventional farmer destroys acres of usable farm land every generation through the short sighted use of chemical fertilizers, etc., then we'll have less arable land. The only way to stop this destruction is with organic practices which have been proven (in places like China where a huge population has been fed for eons on a relatively small land mass) to be able to produce more food per acre than conventional practices. Sources like Under the Veil of Deception are good reads for the skeptical. And experts like Michael Pollan and others typically have arguments in favor of organic farming that are more eloquent and more convincing than my own...

That's just a start.
But I hope it helps.
With chi
--Andrew