re that fascism/corporatism post, how could I forget to include the fact that the Tories are trying to privatise half the state, including the police, and seemingly want to outsource everything wholesale to fucking G4S, who are already the third-largest private sector employer in the world, and whose management positions are filled with ex-military…

et-in-arcadia-ego:

Someone stuck this on an abandoned shop-front in hammersmith.

Who wants to bet G4S win the contract?

If you don’t know who G4S are, ask yourself why because they’re the largest employer in the world bar Walmart. But what do they do?

• Airport security. Three G4S security guards at Heathrow were responsible for the death of Angolan refugee Jimmy Mubenga in Oct 2010 when they kept him heavily restrained, despite his repeated complaints of not being able to breathe.
• Immigrant detention camps. In Australia, G4S were ‘faulted for lethal neglect and abuse of solitary confinement’ (NYTimes). Again in Australia, up to 50 asylum seekers went on hunger strike and sewed their own lips together in protest over conditions. G4S also ran these lovely detention boats in the Netherlands that were deemed ‘inhumane’ by the European Parliament.
• Guarding the entire length of the southwest US/Mexico border and deporting undocumented immigrants. Anyone starting to feel like G4S don’t like immigrants for some reason?
• Private UK police (already). G4S is already contracted to employ half of Lincolnshire police, and are building a police station there.
• Private prisons in the UK and US. Because why stop with immigrants?
• Juvenile detention centres. Because why stop with adults?
• Profiteering off the UK ‘Welfare to Work’ scheme. Which is essentially an ingenious device for taking tax-payer money away from those who need it, and giving it to G4S (who have the nerve to fob much of their workload off onto charities and other non-profit organisations). At the same time the scheme allows companies like Tesco to profit from slave labour as people are made to work full-time for their unemployment benefits.
• Military security in Afghanistan. Popular pastimes for the G4S employees guarding the US embassy in Kabul included: lighting fires, getting naked, pissing on each other and conducting humiliating hazings/initiations. NSFW photos here!
• Much more. Too much to list but it includes security for banks, ATM/cashpoint ‘management’, stewarding Live8 and Download and reading your gas meter. Also landmine clearance, which strangely enough is the only one of these things I’d happily trust them with.