h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hey you out there, has none of you seen this interesting documentation on the Coca Cola Company? Theyre absolute pure evil!
Did you know that there exists live footage from the Vietnam war where they make it look like all these poor souls just fight for their daily can of Coca Cola?
And did you know that Coca Cola do campaigns in Africa where they send people with a couple of crates of Coke into some poor villages and give the Cola to them, hoping to gain new customers?
Dont they realise that the LAST thing these people need is a can of sugared water to destroy their teeth?
Do they really think any of these starving children will ever have enough money to afford buying their evil brew?
After seeing this docu film I immediately stopped drinking Coca Cola, and that was half a year ago! I feel a lot better now!
Dont get me wrong, I love sugared drinks, but I just cant enjoy a drink knowing what an evil company it is manufactured by!

Go on, join my Coca Cola Boycot!

Ndvv KSC MOU ETC

I willl have to bow out and be boycott-free today I'm afraid. There is something about a tall glass of that cold, murky brew that
makes all the hoopla about the economy, the supposed existence of intelligent life in Washington DC, or the smoldering argument
on whether or not Australians should continue recognizing the Queen as their Grand High Muck-a-Muck, seem so very trivial.
Corporate politics aside it is a tasty beverage (and will be MORE so after the boycotts are called off) that is driven by advertisement as is any other commercial product ever created. Even unsavory products such as those antifungal cremes and linaments that no one admits to purchasing. Well, maybe once but it wasn't for me, it was for my brother. I swear, really! Quite possibly the South Africans might desire to take part in the beverage choices of a free market system. At least they were able to wrangle free cola out of the deal. I should be so lucky.

Mjt

Perhaps your anger would be better targetted at the market researchers and sales exceutives that make a Coca-Cola campaign in South Africa feasible. Coke is much like McDonalds, or Sony, it's not like they aren't making enough money and have the corner on their market. Do you really think the CEO of Coke is sitting in his golf cart worrying about not having enough Coke in South Africa? Marketing executives make those decisions, and the people who drink it choose to - unless they're selling special intravenous Cokes there and strapping people to tables to administer it.If that's the case: Hostile IV administration of Coke against the wills of free people, then we have a human rights issue.

What? Did i ever mention SOUTH Africa? No, of course in a CITY in SOUTH Africa
they can sell as much Coke as they like to, what I really dont understand is them
going into some REALLY POOR VILLAGE in the heart of Africa (SOUTH Africa is situated in the SOUTH)
where the people are starving and dont have any electricity (ie no fridges), no schools, no shops, no restaurants (=no place where they could actually BUY Coke) nothing
but the clothes they wear and some houses made out of twigs and leaves...
What do Coca Cola hope to achieve there? Make the poor village people get into debts for buying power supply, fridges etc?
Why not donate the money they put into this campaign to charity? So Oxfam or whoever could help the village people build water supplies or something else that is IMPORTANT for a
very very small village 200 miles away from civilistation?
This had NOTHING to do with free market or whatever, in a tiny village in a poor African country (like Ethiopia) there IS no marked for soda pops!

I assume the main reason behind this campaign was to make the world think that Coca Cola are doing something for
charity by giving free Coke to the people there, but I must say that I absolutely dont think they did ANY good there!
What would you say if you were living in such a place, you cant read, you dont speak anything but your village's special dialect, and all of a sudden these
weird people with cameras (but of course you wouldnt know what a camera is!) come along, hand you some drink that really tastes weird (mind, in these places people are NOT used to consuming much sugar!), blather stuff at
you in a language you dont understand and then they piss off again???

If it was supposed to make Coca Cola look like they were actually doing charity work, it didnt really work out.
If it was supposed to be a joke- it didnt work either!

Ndvv

It seems like you had several Cokes prior to writing your entry. My point was simply that marketing executives make those decsions based on RESEARCH. They didn't happen to build any great big Coca-Cola skyscrapers, did they? Perhaps you haven't noticed that capitalism and industrialism are expanding into every sector of the world and that small villages with "huts of twigs and leaves" are developing into industrious nations. And I appreciate your geography assistance but I am capable of reading a compass and understand that most places named "South" something are located below the rest of that something. I'm not saying that Coke should or shouldn't be distributed there, I'm saying that there is no need to jump all over a company for freely giving anything away (unless it's nuclear bombs, poison, explosives, pornography or something truly harmful to health and procreation -WHICH SOFT DRINKS ARE NOT) They didn't leave a lifetime supply of Cokes in attempt to rot teeth and addict people to caffeine, they just dropped off some Coke and took some pictures (according to you). The villagers probably tasted it, liked or didn't like it, drank it or threw it away and moved on with whatever their daily activities are. They are an underdeveloped nation, not invalids with no free will. Pittying them because the demon (sarcasm here)Coca-Cola company brought them drinks does much greater disservice to them and speaks strongly on views of the world and its people that lead to degradation and oppression - views similar to yours, not Coca-Cola's.

im not *pitying* them, i just dont see the point in doing what coca cola did. obviously you havent seen this documentation, and youre not likely to be the kind of person interested in that kind of stuff, but if youd seen it youd understand my point. they made it look like like
they were mere gods for introducing coca cola to *primitive* human beings! im not saying they did any harm but if they wanted to help these people there are better ways of doing so than just dropping off some coke and giving some phoney smiles to the camera posing with (according to them) primitive people... i should mention that this film (by coca cola) was made in the seventies or eighties though..

btw, didnt you know that these small villages (about 10 huts) dont just go POP! and turn into industrial cities? the reality looks different: the people move to large cities hoping to find the paradise because of all the positive stuff they are told about the benefits of capitalism by us white people, just to find even more misery. instead of trying to show off to them by going there with cameras and *modern world products* like coca cola they would rather help them living with the given situation so they can make the land they are living on fertile enough to feed the population.
and not with GM crops, because did you know that GM crops tend to be infertile so whoever buys them (and the main target are african countries because the GM crops are tailored to survive under rough conditions) has to invest the SAME amount of money EVERY YEAR in order to keep up the production because they cannot use the seeds that their crops produce!

Y'see, i am not saying that coca cola are the only company doing this, Nestle for example are also making loads of money in africa, and do you know how? by selling them milk powder without approriate explanations or instructions (they are usually written in english and not in any of the local dialects), so a lot of mothers feed their new born children with milk powder for older babies, or they prepare the milk with water that has not been boiled and is infected with germs...

there are a lot of things going wrong about the acts of industrial countries in africa, but as long as people dont know about this then they will always believe that it is a good thing for us to sell them our GM crops or milk powders or even soft drinks!

Ndvv

im not *pitying* them, i just dont see the point in doing what coca cola did. obviously you havent seen this documentation, and youre not likely to be the kind of person interested in that kind of stuff, but if youd seen it youd understand my point. they made it look like like
they were mere gods for introducing coca cola to *primitive* human beings! im not saying they did any harm but if they wanted to help these people there are better ways of doing so than just dropping off some coke and giving some phoney smiles to the camera posing with (according to them) primitive people... i should mention that this film (by coca cola) was made in the seventies or eighties though..

btw, didnt you know that these small villages (about 10 huts) dont just go POP! and turn into industrial cities? the reality looks different: the people move to large cities hoping to find the paradise because of all the positive stuff they are told about the benefits of capitalism by us white people, just to find even more misery. instead of trying to show off to them by going there with cameras and *modern world products* like coca cola they would rather help them living with the given situation so they can make the land they are living on fertile enough to feed the population.
and not with GM crops, because did you know that GM crops tend to be infertile so whoever buys them (and the main target are african countries because the GM crops are tailored to survive under rough conditions) has to invest the SAME amount of money EVERY YEAR in order to keep up the production because they cannot use the seeds that their crops produce!

Y'see, i am not saying that coca cola are the only company doing this, Nestle for example are also making loads of money in africa, and do you know how? by selling them milk powder without approriate explanations or instructions (they are usually written in english and not in any of the local dialects), so a lot of mothers feed their new born children with milk powder for older babies, or they prepare the milk with water that has not been boiled and is infected with germs...

there are a lot of things going wrong about the acts of industrial countries in africa, but as long as people dont know about this then they will always believe that it is a good thing for us to sell them our GM crops or milk powders or even soft drinks!

Ndvv

You have some very valid arguments, but neither one of us is going to convert the other and it's somewhat defeating to attempt a discussion with someone who thinks people believe 10 hut villages "POP" into bustling industrialized nations overnight. Anyone who has had a history course, or has lived any sliver of life realizes these things take hundreds of years. I am simply of the belief that it this growth inevitable and not necessarily a bad thing.

yahyah.. i am not saying growth is bad, all i was saying was that there are a lot of dodgy things going on concerning the actions of big international companies like Coca Cola, Nestlé or GM producing companies, and that most people dont know about that and sort of think that these companies are doing a good thing.
never mind, just dont take everything i write here so damn serious!

a) Everything I say is true
b) Dont believe a word you read
c) Do you know what I mean?

Ndvv

Wow, this is so cool. Debate. Wow.

All I did was sit and wonder what I could write an entry about and this is the response.

I really, really need a Red Bull and Vodka right now ... Or should I boycott these too?

No, in no way should we boycott red bull & vodka!
its the drink of the gods... or something similar ;0)
plus i havent heard of red bull advertising in africa, so that should be alright...
so to all of you:
Vodka&Red Bull is officially allowed by Pope Ndvv LSC MOU ETC!
Drink it! (As long as you dont throw up!)

Ndvv

Perhaps I took you seriously because you hopped on the web and asked for all out boycotts for the awful evil things Coca-Cola has done....I see now, you were just kidding....

Argh, no, I was not just KIDDING, part of it is true, part of it not...
get enlightened before you try to understand this

NDVV ksc etc mou

My goodness,what a carry on over coke in south africa, I would have thought you would be more concerned about the content of the poisonous additive Aspartame in diet coke and its addictive qualities than anything else.Most multi national companies do not concern themselves with ethics just profits.By the way quite alot of people in Australia are monarchists!!