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Students Target Unethical Career Corporatism

Student Activist | 22.10.2008 22:37 | Anti-militarism | Education | Globalisation

On Monday 20th October the annual AISEC Careers fair commenced at Nottingham University, featuring many organisations with despicable or at least dubious ethical credentials and social-responsibility records, including BAE Systems, Rolls-Royce, Qinetiq, E.On, BP, RBS, MoD and the army. The fair also featured some student activists and Grim Reapers who had made an appearance in order to remind fellow students of the deadly consequences of working in the arms trade or climate change industry.

Grim reapers
Grim reapers

Banner drop
Banner drop

BAE re-branding suggestion
BAE re-branding suggestion

Educating BAE reps
Educating BAE reps

Happy grim reaper, unhappy corporation
Happy grim reaper, unhappy corporation

Fliers
Fliers

"right, you lot have to leave"
"right, you lot have to leave"

F.OFF
F.OFF

BAE Flier
BAE Flier

Rolls Flier
Rolls Flier

Careers fair ethical guide
Careers fair ethical guide


AISEC claim to be 'the international platform for young people to discover and develop their potential so as to have a positive impact on society.' The organisation also claims to envision "Peace and fulfillment of humankind's potential." Despite this, at Nottingham, the organisations' main endeavor appears to be to give a platform to arms dealers! For more see:  http://www.aiesec.org/

Concerned about the presence of such unethical corporate entities and the glaring hypocrisy of AISEC, a group of students came together with the aim of raising awareness of the unethical nature of many of the companies at the fair and oppose the general presence of mechanisms of the capitalist death machine.

The morning began with fliering at various stalls, collecting of shiny corporate merch, and using up the representatives time. Nottingham University Security were being their usual oppressive selves and tried to prevent the students from fliering near the glossy corporate stalls. Threats of calling the police were also issued. The students also had a permanent stall next to the army (courtesy of One World Week) from which alternative information about companies, personal discussion and careers guides could be disseminated. When the army rep left his stall, a couple of students kindly stepped in to fill his role and invite students to 'join the imperial death machine'.

In the afternoon four Grim Reapers appeared and went to pay a visit to the stalls of BAE and Rolls-Royce, much to the amusement of passers-by and bewilderment of corporate representatives. Simultaneously, a rather unambiguous banner was dropped in the main access stairwell of the building reading 'BAE KILL'. The four reapers loitered at BAE and Rolls-Royces stalls for an hour or so handing our fliers and chatting to students and reps, before doing a mini-tour of other dubious corporate outfits in Portland Building (E.On, BP, Qinetiq). University Security reacted initially with 'you lot have to leave or we'll call the police', one BAE rep intervened to assure security "it's cool, they're Ok". Security later changed their line to 'please take off your masks it's causing intimidation', and finally, meekly asked 'can you please stop filming', before eventually leaving the students to do their thing. A combination of knowledge about basic rights and the fact that they were armed with a video camera successfully protected the protesters from any silly games that security may have wished to play. Thankfully, this time, freedom of expression and the right to protest prevailed.

Some interesting discussions were had with some of the representatives. One BAE rep was heard to proclaim 'Free Palestine', despite working for a company that has provided parts for Israeli military equipment (notably electronics for the F-16 fighter aircraft) and also subcontracted work to Israel. The same rep also confessed feeling slightly guilty about working for BAE, despite being at the Careers fair precisely with the purpose of trying to convince others to do the same thing! A Qinetiq representative admitted that he felt the student protesters were doing a good thing, and was ultimately somewhat envious of the passion they clearly had for this issue. He also suggested that the student s should be targeting Airbus and the MoD additionally.

An eventful time was had by all, especially BAE's reps! E.ON were the only company to actively complain about the student protests (as far as we know), the moody gits! Clearly various teddies were thrown out of various power-stations. On Tuesday, the second day of the fair, the vast majority of the REALLY immoral companies were not present.

For an awesome video of the action see:  http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=VfJ8geHkaRk

Student Activist

Comments

Hide the following 2 comments

Soledarity and Congratualtions

22.10.2008 23:16

This looked like an awesome demo guys.

Kick Em Off Campus is an anti-military campaign at the University of Sheffield.

Care to drop us a line and maybe we can discuss things? We're looking to call a national day of action around the anniversary of the invasion of Iraq in February, and are trying to organise a meeting to talk with other groups about this on the 30th of November.

Kick Em Off Campus
mail e-mail: kickemoffcampus@googlemail.com
- Homepage: http://www.kickemoffcampus.org


Oh come on we all know war is good for the ecomony, look how well we

24.10.2008 20:11

did in the 20th century especially after the first world war.Even recessions after war help get rid of the riff raff, dont you know.
What the hell do all these scientists & tree huggers blathering on about cooperation, climate change& sustainability know anyway?
We must convince the next generation of the necessity of a chaotic war like system for maintenance of peace.Where would BAE profits be if wasnt for Al Queada?, shame we have to spend so much on politically corect PR. But we have to prove that we war is peace.
So basically Darling you& Mr Brown are best doing what we tell you otherwise Iam afraid accidents,sucicides & heart attacks happen, how are your family by the way?, its such a sadly brutal world.
Now that Henry Kissinger he has the right idea on "population control" with a human face, what a chap heh

Lord Belchit


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