It’s beverages like Coke that try men’s souls.
The Coca-Cola Company ‘- ubiquitous international corporation, producer of refreshing but unhealthy soft drinks and alleged committer of countless acts of human rights violation and environmental degradation the world over ‘- owns or produces just about every beverage sold on campus.
They also pay the
But a local chapter of Killer Coke, an international campaign aiming to take the Coca-Cola Company to task for murders and kidnappings of union leaders at Coca-Cola’s bottling plants in
‘Most people don’t even know there’s an exclusive contract,’ Christopher Sweetapple, a UMass graduate student involved in the Killer Coke UMass campaign, said in an interview. ‘We’re really concentrating on educating people about the contract and Coke’s practices, because political action without information is pretty useless.’
Sweetapple said the group isn’t even calling for the banishment of Coke products from campus. ‘Our main goal is to make this exclusive contract non-exclusive,’ he said.
Ethical dilemma though it may be, the University is unlikely to renegotiate its contract given the school’s $46 million budget deficit. According to the agreement, UMass received $1.75 million in ‘Sponsorship Fees’ ‘- paid in annual installments of $350,000 since August 2004 ‘- in addition to high-fructose deal sweeteners like $15,000 for the Chancellor’s Merit Scholarship and $150,000 to renovate beverage areas in the dining commons.‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘ ‘
They also dropped $20,000 for a Bill Cosby benefit performance. Killer Cosby.
So how exactly does one reconcile the questionable ethical practices of a multinational corporation with the fact that they’re essentially subsidizing your education? And what the hell are exclusive pouring rights, anyway?
Well, in part it means the ‘University will use its reasonable, good faith efforts to maximize the sales and distribution of Products on the Campus, including hawking Products in stands and Approved Cups or twenty-ounce contour bottles during all events when any items of any make or description are hawked,’ according to the agreement.
Translation: Coke is the sponsor, UMass is the pusher.
As for reconciling Coke’s practices with your education, you can opt out of buying their products, but it’s tough.
Executive director of dining and retail services Ken Toong said in an interview that despite the exclusive pouring rights Coke holds at the dining commons, the DCs ‘respect students’ right to make decisions on what they drink,’ and items like water, milk, soymilk, coffee and tea are all non-Coke products offered. All the items in soda fountain, however, are Coke.
At least you can take solace in knowing that when you steal beverages from the DC, you’re an agent of some sort of cosmic cycle of karma that starts with marginalized Colombian union workers and ends in a thermos full of Minutemaid.
And you were probably just thirsty.
Other venues on and around campus, like the People’s Market, Earthfoods Caf’eacute;, Greeno Sub Shop and the Newman Center Caf’eacute;, offer alternatives to Coke products.
‘For me, any corporation that sells a lot of shit tends to forget about people and to focus on the bottom line,’ said Kate Silverstein, a co-manager at the People’s Market in an interview. ‘And that’s diametrically opposed to what we’re about here.’
But the lion’s share of drink distribution ‘- from which the University takes about 40 percent commission ‘- goes to Coke.
Killer Coke UMass calls it ‘coercion.’
‘We’re asking the University not to force students to support a company whose practices they find unethical,’ Fallon Wall, a UMass junior involved in the campaign, said in an interview.
To that end, Killer Coke UMass is planning a ‘Boycott Coke
Day’ on Monday, May 4, calling for ‘an immediate end to the University’s exclusive contract with Coca-Cola,’ according to their flier.
UMass’ ties with Coke won’t easily be slackened, considering the company contributes everything from sponsorship of athletic and cultural events to advertising revenue and scholarships. It’s a quandary of capitalism that a company accused of so much evil abroad can contribute positively to the campus ‘- on an exclusivity agreement, of course.
‘It’s not like we don’t benefit from this; that’s not our argument,’ said Sweetapple. ‘It’s an ethical question.’
And that question should come down to individual students, not former Chancellors or a handful of administrators.
S.P. Sullivan is a Collegian columnist. Read him online at blog.masslive.com/umass101. Former Collegian editor Tim McCall contributed to this article.
