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| The Art of Distributing Flyers & Droplifting: A SUmmer Intern's Tale of Woe and Success |
 PRINTABLE VERSION |
If you’ve ever felt sorry for the poor suckers handing out flyers on the street, you’d definitely feel some sizeable pity for the TakingItGlobal intern who had to endure angry glares and verbal confrontations at the rear entrance of Fairview Mall which is situated in North-Eastern Toronto, on a Thursday afternoon during the execution of her Call-to-Action.
Being the intern in question, I’d have to say that my key intention for the Call-to-Action was to engage youth in taking action against the various forms of child labour taking place in the village Kurshumpur, Bangladesh by raising awareness through the distribution of informative flyers and Droplifting reverse sales tags at a well-known retail store franchise which I found to be distributing a particular clothing brand that staffed a liberal percentage of children as workers to manufacture its clothing.
“Droplifting” for those of you, who were wondering, is the reverse action of shoplifting. Unlike the case of shoplifting in which you take an item from a store without paying for it, droplifting involves the act of leaving an item behind in order to get a message heard. The aim of droplifting is to have individuals accidentally come across a droplifted product while they are in hard-core consumer mode.
Artists, musicians, and political activists have been noted in popular culture to be the individuals who are the most likely to choose this channel of action to promote their ideas. But in my particular situation, I decided to stealthily droplift informative sales tags on various clothing tables that were stacked with t-shirts, tank tops and jeans from the particular clothing brand in question. My preference to droplift reverse sales tags on this particular brand stemmed from my accidental discovery that a moderate percentage of the workers within the local factories of Kurshumpur were between the ages of 8-13.
I had also composed a couple of flyers to draw attention not only to the child workers that staffed the factories of Kurshumpur, but also to the other children living in the village that work in bonded labour contracts with auto mechanics, shoe polishers and chai salespersons. A few methods of action that I recommended in my flyers were;
- Telling your local Member of Parliament exactly how you feel about child labour in Kurshumpur by starting letter campaigns.
- Speaking out on blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Skype or MySpace.
- Getting in Touch with the High Commission for Bangladesh in Ottawa; Constitution Square Centre, 340 Albert Street, Suite # 1250 Ottawa, Ontario, K1R 7Y6.
I didn’t get the response I wanted with the flyers because most of the people that I handed out my flyers to either immediately crumpled them up, or angrily questioned my motives. But thankfully I was able to carry out the droplifting in one smooth stroke. I can only hope that the people who end up with the clothes attached to my reverse sales tags take a more conscious approach to what products they decide to purchase from now on. And that my efforts with raising awareness about the plight of the children of Kurshumpur can motivate the masses or someone with more influential capacity to get in touch with the Bangladeshi Embassy in Ottawa and relinquish child labour once and for all in that part of the world.
Do you think you can lend your voice and help abolish child labour in Kurshumpur and elsewhere once and for all?
RELAY your VOICE in the Discussion Threads below.
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Writer Profile
Raisa Bhuiyan
Hello everyone,
I became familiar with TakingItGlobal from a summer internship that I took on in early June of 2009. Being a undergraduate student who is very interested in global issues, the internship allowed me to learn and experience a great breadth of knowledge about online collaboration and social networking.
Im an avid reader of old english literature, and love writing short stories of the humourous variety in my spare time.
I can only hope that my panorama submissions measure up to the great works of my fellow writers.
Cheers!
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Comments
More Grease to Your Elbow Anietie | Sep 1st, 2009
Hello,
You did a wonderful job. God bless you.
Child labour is a global issue which need everyone's effort at tackling the menace. Everyone country, continent and the world at large is faced with the challenge of eradicating child labour. Our children especially the not-well-to-do are opened to difficult lifestyle as a result of poverty. Children are allowed to fend for themselves through series of odd jobs thus relegating education to the background.
Little effort in our various local communities where this thing is prominent such as yours would go a long way to help reduce if not eradicate it. T
Thank you for the good job and keep it up.
Mission Possible? Raisa Bhuiyan | Sep 17th, 2009
Thanks a ton to Sheridy and Anietie for their wonderful comments! Panorama readers, there is some good news that I am compelled to share with you.
I leanred not too long ago that a few of my flyers which i distributed for my call to action reached the ears of a well-known youth child rights activist in Toronto. This activist started a campaign of his own against the operations of the factories in Kurshumpur, Bangladesh, which eventually was noticed by officials at the Bangladeshi Embassy in Ottawa.
Those factories are under current review, and are temporarily shut down as a result. This is tremendous news for the child woerks in and around these factories as much of them are being placed in educational institutions Just wanted to share this amazing news with you all.
Cheers!
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