Peace activists at Cal Poly are being threatened by their administration for the second time this year because they dared to sing songs in front of the Raytheon table at their career fair. The students have organized themselves under the SLO Peace Coalition. They’re doing all they can to highlight the relationship between their school and Raytheon, and Raytheon’s role in the war in Yemen.
These brave students first disrupted the Raytheon booth at their spring career fair. After two months under investigation, vague threats, and in the face of community outrage, the administration told them they had done nothing wrong, case closed. Emboldened, they disrupted Raytheon again at the fall career fair. This time they received a formal warning, even though their actions were no different from those the previous spring.
We believe the administration is threatening its students in an attempt to appease the weapons manufacturer Raytheon. This is the same school that bent over backwards for a student who wore blackface and the far-right provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos in order to be seen as a free speech champion. So why are they targeting a handful of peaceful singing students? It’s up to us to show that Cal Poly would rather maintain ties to the killing of children and civilians in Yemen and frighten its own students than lose funding. Please sign and share the petition to demand Cal Poly President Jeffrey D. Armstrong drop the threats against the SLO Peace Coalition students.
In Solidarity, The UFPJ Coordinating Committee
