Monsanto is never far from the news but even it gets fed up of the near
constant stream of negative stories about its business model. So what is a
company like Monsanto to do? It did what any right-minded company would
do, and decided to try something new -- it hired the private security firm
Blackwater to spy on its critics!
Unbelievable, isn't it? Instead of doing the right thing, Monsanto decided
to hire the world's largest military contractors to spy on people worried
about genetically modified food! Unfortunately, this is becoming all too
common among the world's multinationals, and is just the sort of thing our
community is going to face in the future if we keep challenging and
beating the biggest companies in the world.
Over the past twelve months, SumOfUs has achieved great things. Together,
we've fought and beaten some of the world's biggest multinationals. But
that doesn't exactly endear us to the rich and the powerful. We can be
sure that some companies like Monsanto want to shut us down and will try
every trick in the book to accomplish it.
Creating a fairer world was never going to be easy and we shouldn't shy
away from the task at hand. But nor should we be naive to the risks to us
as a movement. We've seen lots of corporations use underhanded, unethical
and illegal tricks to discredit their opponents and it's only a matter of
time before they target us.
That's why we need to take concrete steps now, before it happens, to
protect our movement.
[2]Can you donate $3 to help us beef up our security and protect our work
from attack by corporations?
We expected to not exactly be popular in boardrooms around the world, but
we need to be prepared for more than just being unpopular. Already, we've
been threatened with court action from a huge company that could outspend
us dramatically. We've also been alerted to our internal documents
potentially being accessed without authorisation. We've also received
suspicious calls that we're pretty sure was a corporate spy working on
behalf of Walmart.
Corporations have deep pockets and can buy in whatever they need to win.
But we're not defenseless, we can get outside help from security experts
who can give us proper advice on how to protect our movement.
This all might sound a little paranoid, but we know that corporations use
tactics like this all the time. Recently, besides the horrendous story
about Monsanto, we've also heard about:
* The US Chamber of Commerce (an umbrella group for mega-corporations)
was investigating how to entrap political opponents, including US
trade unions.
* Walmart tried to infiltrate a group exposing its corporate misdeeds.
* Dow Chemical is being sued by Greenpeace after it hired a private
security firm that stole thousands of documents from Greenpeace.
These are just the latest in a long line of corporations using
questionable tactics to silence dissent. We need to ensure that this can't
happen to our movement too. Can you help protect our movement from outside
attack?
[3]If we all chipped in $3 we could make sure that corporations won't be
able to break our security.
What started as a small group of hardy citizens is now a global movement
of over a million people. We all should be proud of what we've achieved
together. We successfully made Apple take responsibility for people who
make its products. Together, we persuaded Pepsi to take a stand for LGBT
rights in Uganda. And recently, we forced dozens of global brands protect
Bangladeshi garment workers. We've done a lot of amazing work -- but there
is so much more to do.
Our mission is so important right now. All over the world power and
resources are concentrated in the hands of a few rich and powerful people.
We're proving that citizens, consumers, workers and investors can
successfully challenge corporate power. Corporations will want to stop our
movement before we get even bigger and cause them even more problems.
We need to get expert advice on how to protect our data, our computers and
our smartphones if we are to keep on successfully challenging corporate
power. Corporations will try everything to stop us from holding them to
account, so we need to make sure we stay one step ahead.
[4]Can you help by chipping in $3 to hire security experts so we can keep
on challenging corporate power?
Thanks for standing up to corporate power,
Martin, Kaytee, Marguerite and the rest of us.
References
Visible links
1. http://act.sumofus.org/go/1946?t=1001&akid=2015.839841.0vZXaj
2. http://act.sumofus.org/go/1946?t=1002&akid=2015.839841.0vZXaj
3. http://act.sumofus.org/go/1946?t=1003&akid=2015.839841.0vZXaj
4. http://act.sumofus.org/go/1946?t=1004&akid=2015.839841.0vZXaj
SumOfUs is a world-wide movement of people like you, working together
to hold corporations accountable for their actions and forge a new,
sustainable path for our global economy. You can follow us on Twitter,
and like us on Facebook.
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