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

I know that this is very British ... I was just watching The Mark Thomas Product ... all about Nestle ... third world ... baby milk ... EU directives and World Health Organisation guidelines etc

By all means discuss TMTP ... a great show and a brilliant man ... who seems to be combining comedy with social justice ... he makes you laugh and think and makes you want to join him in changing the world.

But this Nestle thing ... it really annoys me that I agree that they are doing bad things ... I try to avoid Nestle products ... but they keep buying up all these companies like Rowntrees ... so far I am trying to stop myself eating Cheerios, Shreddies, Kit-Kat, After Eight Mints and thses are all things I like ... I eat other things I just realised that doesn't look like a good diet ... but I really like them and every now and again I miss them

Does three months without one of the above allow me the odd treat or does that make me shallow and bad ?

Also what is the matter with these companies ? ... Why do they pay PR & Press people to make them look so bad ? ... If they are on television if somebody is having a pop at them why don't they draft in people to make them look better ... they looked like idiots ... honesty and admitting mistakes would have made them look so much better as a company ... but instead they fobbed him off and avoided the issues ... Nobody watching them would trust them an inch after that little display of corporate speak ... end of rant ... sorry ...waddya think ?

I also just watched the MTCP thingy about nestle and i had a craving for h2g2 - no idea why - and lo and behold eight minutes into my time this pops up! Anyway I completly agree with whatever your name was. I wouldn't touch nestle products with a barge pole now, anyones barge pole for that matter. What I found annoying was the PR womens political response to all of Mark Thomas's questions - you know the ones, a simple yes/no will surfise but no they have to drag it out and answer a completly different question and make it sound like they are answering the one they were asked(sorry) - ohh I just wanted to, to well it wouldn't be a pretty site anyway.

As to whether you can eat the odd nestle. Hmmm tough one, you could close your eyes and tell yourself it was cadbury's ??? No, not much help you're right. Errm. Stop eating sweets nah never work, oh yes I have an idea, it may involve waiting a while but you could just stop nestle - I won't dignify them with a capitle letter - being such under-handed, devious, coniving little shites that they are.

< breaths deeply to calm himself>

good grief you have it worse than me
a whole day later and i am no calmer about this
You are right about the PR woman she was dreadful ... I know whatever the word for less than nothing (and here follows a 20 people response with the appropriate word for less than nothing) and i could have done a better job than her.

I will just have to be strong and banish them from my home altogether.
(just eat them in the street or when other people make me!)

It's crap PR. I had a colleague who was PR agent for a quarry which was being accused of something. He advised the management to be open and honest about whatever they could, but to state firmly when some information was commercially sensitive; then to give a response as full as possible without revealing precise details.

The problem is, too many of these people are afraid to say "I don't know" when faced with something they plainly don't have a clue about, and they end up bullshitting and digging themselves into a hole.

Well done Mark Thomas, by the way, but ten years late at least.

I'm assuming this is not the same Mark Thomas who ran for Wellington Central in NZ in the 1996 election, and got nobbled by his own party (a very cruel story - see link to Campaign site on my page).

No he's not the same one, but having been to your page a few times I think you would like him, he started out as a stand up comic (still is - and very funny) but has a social consience, anyway don't take my word for it click here- http://194.129.77.60/mark_thomas/intro.html , as you will see he has tackled the Burmese goverment as well as TNCs (Trans-national Corporations), last series he got the Indonesean ambassador to admit they used touture and Hawk jets to surpress those in East Timor at a time when the majority of this country's population had never heard of the place or the 200,000+ E. Timorese killed since the invasion.

Mark has also tackled the rich in this country who claim tax exemption ion inherit art works and land if they make them available to the public, problem is they never do or put so many restrictions on them it's impossible to see them. Last series an aristocrat ended up taking his art work of the list and paying the inheritance tax (is this just a UK tax or do other states tax you on what you inherit?). About £300,000 ended up gbeing paid.

Maximum respect.

CH

Of course they own much more than sweets...

Check out this brands list: www.nestleusa.com/p19.asp

And this list is only a partial inventory; they own much more. Plus they provide baking ingredients to commercial bakeries, making it nearly impossible to avoid them entirely. I just try to use as few products as possible.

Dose anyone know when Mark Thomas will be back??

I added *www to the above link but that did not get me any where.
From what has been said he sounds like an interesting personality to check out.

http://www.channel4.com/news/microsites/M/mark_thomas/index.html

Must admit C.4 keep moving him in the schedules and I haven't seen much of him late, but it looks like the campains are still continuing.

Recently a UK school had the pupils vote for the replacemet of nestle vending machines - I don't know if Martk T influenced them, but it showed something was getting through to the youth of today

CHawke

Thanks for the link C Hawke