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You and others can use our new flyer, created by the DISARM Committee, to inform graduating engineering students about the alternatives to – and downsides of – the attractive job offers they get from the weapons-manufacturing industry.
These students have no idea what is involved in war work and how a security clearance will change their thinking and curtail some of their personal freedoms. We have designed a compact flyer that describes these disadvantages and lists several online job sites and non-defense companies that employ engineers.
This alternative information can be a counterbalance to the higher salaries and generous benefits offered for working on military contracts. Few students know of the disadvantages. Very few realize, for example, that once hired by an arms developer, such as a nuclear weapons company, the missile engineers may get daily reinforcement of the pro-nuclear weapons position from their co-workers.
Currently munitions career promoters are already approaching young engineering students looking for a first job. It’s up to us to give at least the same energy for peace outreach, to promote civilian engineering jobs.
You, our WILPF branches, and collaborating peace groups can now find ways to disseminate this new flyer during our everyday activities as well as through focused flyering at college events. Leave copies on tables in public libraries! Carry copies to give out in places like supermarket check-out lines, doctor's offices, on planes, trains and buses. Download the 2-page pdf to your computer and print it two-sided, flip on the long edge, then fold it along the gap between the columns. You can have the WILPF logo showing or the drone – your choice.
For more focused flyering, consider the college(s) in your city where engineers get trained. Those college engineering departments have public lectures. These public events are good opportunities to get into conversation with engineering students or just leaflet outside the building, before or after the lecture. The parents of the graduating engineers should learn about this topic too, so we should disseminate the flyer widely.
If you get questioned about what other jobs are available to beginning engineers, direct that person to the book called “Warheads to Windmills: Preventing Climate Catastrophe and Nuclear War” by Timmon Wallis, published by Indispensable Press. This book describes jobs for mitigating climate change which can be found all over the US.
Now Through July 7 – More Peace and Anti-War Actions
Please support and advertise both the current Peace Walk 2024 and the NO to NATO, Yes to Peace events in Washington, DC, July 6-7. Further details about them were provided in our April eNews article.
The Peace Walk's website has lots of information about this long pilgrimage, passing near several WILPF branches’ and at-large members’ hometowns. Look at the route and try to get involved. Aside from walking small sections of the route, people are needed to find sleeping places for the walkers and to help organize events as the Peace Walk proceeds each day.
Additionally, WILPF encourage members to go to Washington, DC, for the NO to NATO, Yes to Peace events on the weekend of July 6-7. For further information about connecting with other WILPF members in DC, email WILPF Program Committee Chair, George Friday: ProgramChair-Friday@wilpfus.org.
Webinar on Recent Geopolitical Shifts to a Multipolar World
On May 22nd, our sister organization, Campaign for Peace, Disarmament and Common Security (CPDCS), hosted a webinar called “The World’s Tectonic Geopolitical Changes and their Implications”. Professors Richard Falk, Anu Chenoy, and Michael Klare shared their in-depth analyses on the interregnum between centuries of Western hegemony and the multipolar world which is emerging with its own dangers. The analyses they provided can help you as you frame your advocacy and deepen your commitments to activism and organizing.
The situation is urgent. The world needs diplomacy in support of common security in order to defuse flashpoints. Otherwise, they can escalate to the unimaginable.
As activists for a better world, we can support and press for building cooperation amongst countries around their shared interests, especially nuclear disarmament and reversing the climate emergency.
Click here to see the CPDCS May 22 webinar recording.
Join the Disarm Issue Committee
Our DISARM/End Wars Issue Committee welcomes new members; see that website link to learn more about our many ongoing campaigns. We seek more people to work on them. We meet on Zoom on the second and last Sundays of the month. To request more information and to join the DISARM/End Wars Committee, contact disarmchair@wilpfus.org .
Cherrill Spencer
DISARM Co-chair
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