the shock doctrine.

First, the capsule review: the book is damn good, changed my opinion on Naomi Klein, and is highly recommended to anyone who wants to better understand the dangers of ideology being more important than evidence.  Go read it, and talk to your friends about how screwed up unregulated (or fundamentalist) capitalism is.

Now, what I actually learned from the book.  I've detested Klein's previous work.  No Logo bothered me for a lot of reasons, mostly the idea that there was something wrong with powerful, recognizable brands that resonated with large swathes of society, and influenced behaviour on a global scale.  If the point of the book had been that mis-using this power is wrong, it would have been obvious, laughed at, and unpublished.  By pretending that the danger somehow came from brands itself, it was edgy and revolutionary.  To most people, at least.

The Shock Doctrine however, attacks a specific brand of capitalism, and a specific type of behaviour.  The dangers of unregulated, unchecked behaviour is a reasonable target by any measure.  The book isn't an attack on capitalism in general (Libertarians may disagree), but an attack on an extreme form.  Most importantly, incontrast to Klein's earlier work, I could actually empathize with the victims.  Foreign economies that have been ruined by the greed of intervening governments are very different than disaffected upper middle class children protesting against the companies that employ their parents.

If you are going to condemn something, put together a narrative that shows you understand your target, the victims, and the reality of the situation.  Don't just decide that an entire branch of thinking or strategy is somehow evil, regardless of application or intent.  You have to creat a narrative that supports your opinions, whether in a book, or in a campaign.

To disregard unfairly is to be disregarded summarily.

[I'm still amused at how many of the people I know who read 'No Logo' did so because it was part of their Marketing / Advertising course readings in University or College.]

absurdity is not an argument.

A common mistake in attempts to make a strong political statement, is to drawing a parallel between a commonly held position, and a contradictory position that people will likely react strongly to.

In these two examples, the parallels are between torture as a government sanctioned activity, and torture as a Coney Island attraction, and between the brutal, disturbing murder of a young man on a bus, and the use of animals as food and test subjects.

All I’m going to say is that these ideas only work if the point made falls carefully between two extremes - either people need to generally agree that, despite exaggeration, the points are the same, or people need to be able to justify the comparison made as less directly offensive than the thing you are trying to argue against.

I understand that there is a notable segment of the population that thinks hurting animals is wrong.  But arguing that human life is of the same value as animal life gets people to stop listening to appeals for the animals at all.  

I understand that if people are offended by seeing torture, they should be offended by it being government sanctioned.  But taking a day out with the kids and turning it into some thing mildly traumatizing doesn’t exactly cause a groundswell in support of civil liberties.

If the parallel you are drawing approaches the absurdity than the offensive action that inspired it, you are doing something wrong.  You are doing your argument a disservice.

All attention is good attention, if the only thing you want is attention.  If you want change, you’ll have to do better.

adbusters, authenticity, and the inherent insult.

Kalle Lasn thinks everyone is a moron.

Reading his most recent editorial, where he states "Suddenly, people are waking up in droves from the dreamland of corporate cool. We’re realizing that ever since we were little babies crawling around the TV sets in our living rooms, we’ve been lied to, propagandized, and told incessantly, day after day, that we can find happiness through consumption. That’s why, like rats in a Skinner box, we’ve kept on pressing that BUY button – millions of us marching in lockstep, all dreaming the same consumerist dream." it becomes clear that he thinks we're all morons. Lasn, and the entire ethos behind Adbusters, buys into the idea that 'authenticity' is something that the chosen few counterculture warriors can understand and identify, and that the rest of us are so worn down by advertising that we cannot possibly understand it.

If you've been reading for a minute, you know that I think the concept of authenticity, as it applies to consumerism, is really code for 'continues-to-represent-consumer-identity-over-time'. The same concept can be applied to music, as bands 'sell out' when they stop being a signifier for the kind of identity that the fan wants to project.

I would submit that the assumption that authenticity is like taste, and only a certain, dashing, revolutionary few can locate it, is a bigger endorsement of the capitalist mindset than anything else. Adbusters advocates consumer action, a lifestyle, and more or less a uniform (blackspot sneakers, a no blood for oil pin, and a keffiyeh) in it's fan base. And it tells you to do this because it is supposed to suggest you are better than other people. This is the core of the suggestion that everyone else (who isn't buying the magazine) is being duped.

The idea that consumers don't realize the separation between the corporately created and the 'authentic' offends me. Because it's the companies that lose touch with consumer needs that fail, and it's the ones that identify a niche and change with it that succeed. But anyone who assumes that the consumer, that the society is composed of mindless sheep should, and will eventually fail hard.

But Kalle Lasn thinks that everyone who doesn't agree with his interpretation of capitalist culture is an idiot. And people keep looking to him for ideas on how to kill this dominant culture that only tricks the unlucky morons who don't see the truth available to his chosen few.

democratic panopticon

[This is a work in progress, and it will be either heavily edited (when I am less sleepy), or re-written and re-posted (possibly with better defined arguments). Let's just consider this one workshopping online.]

This post is heavily thematically linked with a previous one, titled Paparazzi Panopticism.

Thing one: Warren Ellis' Crooked Little Vein includes a character who discusses the idea of cellular phones with cameras as a weapon. Any they are, because it allows anyone to create content, news content, information content, disruptive content. If you want the speech, buy the book. Seriously. It's brilliant.

Thing two: My father, who has, over the years, gone from the kind of guy who buys a 286 and convinces his wife that it's good for the kids (which it shockingly was), to the kind of guy who dislikes that blogging gives anyone a platform to say anything, made a compelling comment over dinner. That a world where people have cell phone cameras is a world where corruption is harder to get away with.

These things got me thinking. The effect of everyone being about to record anything isn't the us vs them issue that so many people think it is. The Panoptic reality this creates isn't binary, there is a more complex dynamic than authority vs people. What we're left with instead is a democratised panopticon, where interpretation and evidence can come from all sides, and from all agendas.

The intriguing part of this, for me, is the subversion of the original theory. Panoptic realities are about people policing themselves in fear of an authority who may or may not be watching at any given time. But the current situation isn't just about authority. Now there is reasonable need to fear that any action that would offend a reasonably sized community will be shown, and you will be penalized socially for it, by that group, and groups affiliated.

To put it simply, this isn't just about being caught standing against the whims of authority, now. It's about the possibility of being caught, at any time, for any act deemed against society, or even peace in society. This is more involved than fighting authority, for one simple reason - a democratised panopticon is inescapable.

In terms of fighting authority, it's marvelous that someone can't be tasered needlessly without it being caught on film. Authorities should be held responsible for their actions, because they have power. The same can be said for celebrities, which justifies, to an extent, the concept of the paparazzi panopticon. But a democratic panopticon seems to bring with it a need to better define the limitations of acceptable behaviour, of what acts, statements or opinions are anti-social in a strong enough sense to require response.

Or will the standard reply be something to the tune of 'live like no one's watching'?

i am fully impressed.

I don't know that anyone outside of Toronto has been covering this, but it is by far one of the most effective forms of activism I've seen in recent memory. When I say effective, I mean that it is notable, interesting, below the irritation threshold, and gathering wider media attention. While there are been some debate about the numbers, it manages to inform, and to cause interaction with both the issue and information around it.

Go ahead, tell me a hundred people yelling in Nathan Phillips Square would have been better.

This is the kind of thing I was rambling about, both in Ground War, and the Fixing Protest posts. Dissent is Advertising. Why not have talented graphic designers working on your solutions rather than just asking them to create a new logo for your sign or site?

This day just keeps getting better, I swear.

ground war: fixing protest.

The pdf magazine is shoddily done, and I (yet again) have a new found respect for designers. If only I could be like you, you talented, aesthetically gifted few.

Well, by done I mean the version to be handed in to the prof is finished. The version for me, however, is going to go through several revisions before it is released. The first step in these will be for me to actually learn to use indesign WELL, as opposed to semi-adequately.

Anyone who knows me, and wants the ugly, but livable version, say the word, and I'll email it. Anyone who doesn't know me will have to be convincing.

Now to write a 6 page paper about a 22 page mag-ifesto.

fixing protest (2).

The major flaws with protest, when considered as a medium:

• Inability to attract and keep attention.
• Very little information is shared with those who DO end up paying attention.
• At the end of the day, it’s still a bunch of people talking about someone else’s problem, in terms that in no way make it your problem.

Using the African AIDS epidemic as the issue in question, this is what I would suggest:

Juxtaposition: If people do not respond to someone else’s problem, you present it as theirs. By this I don’t mean to suggest that you can teach someone to value the life of people they have never met. Instead, you alter the terms of the conversation. Present the facts of AIDS, lack of access to treatment, and the relative prices of retroviral medications, and in no way embellish them, EXCEPT, frame the conversation as about West Nile Virus, or the Bird Flu, or whatever current health scare is active in the imaginations of the target people, the target society. I am going to assume that this will be in a fairly large metropolitan area. The important thing is to not lie about what is being said. Talk about the disease, how many it kills, and then inform the individuals you speak to that there is treatment, but pharmaceutical companies aren’t willing to negotiate price. Tell them how much it would cost for someone to get a needed supply of the medication, adjusting prices for the average income of a North American, rather than an African individual. Talk about how the government refuses to bypass the patent. Talk about anything you can find a reference point for, speaking about AIDS in Africa under the guise of Bird Flu in North America.

Present to someone the mortal threat of another, as though it was their own. Let them know, even for a second, how stupid and how hopeless the situation would be.

Presentation: Faux man-on-the-street interviews. Two person teams, both dressed the part as cameraman and interviewee, providing the information, and taping responses. These interviews will be actually taped, and will be under the pretence of an independent website talking about this ‘impending’ insanity. Hopefully, this will both make it easier to convince people that it isn’t a ruse. Each interview ends with giving the person spoken to a business card, or possibly a pamphlet, with little to no real information, other than a website to be open to the public in a short time.

Assuming even 50 people acting together in the ‘protest’, the video interviews could make a pretty interesting addition to a website that would reveal the hoax. Visitors would come to get more information, and find out that what they were afraid of was actually happening to someone else, and they were ignoring it. On the website could be included information on what can be done, more facts, as well as petitions, the ability to donate to relief programs, and links to other organisations, etc. Information on how to help, and people who will actually have a reason to seek it out.

In the plus column, this idea could be almost entirely volunteer-driven, with little in the way of expenses other than the website itself. Enough people have video cameras now that volunteers could borrow them, or use their own. As well, this is massively scalable, and could work with nearly any sized group that would be small enough not to break silence. It personalises tragedy, is based on actual interaction, and presents options for actual positive direct action, as opposed to attempting to guilt the world into changing. As well, something like this is pretty ripe for coverage in the mass media.

I recognise that this is somewhat dishonest, but I think it is excusable, considering the cause, and the fact that even minor research, such as looking at the site, sets the record straight. Luckily, ground level protest and dissent doesn’t have to maintain a squeaky clean public image; not everyone is Bono, trading on near universal appeal. This doesn’t actually hurt anyone. It’s disinformation with a purpose, and not based on personal gain.

Inspiration for this approach came in chunks, from sources including an abandoned short story of mine called The Artificials, The Yes Men, and an Artificials related idea for ‘performance art’ that was in part abandoned for the ethical concerns of screwing with people for personal gain / entertainment only.

four points on fixing protest.

1a) pick a battle. by this i mean several things, but i think an example is in order. have any of you attended a protest recently? i did not too long ago (i think canice was taking pictures) and i couldn't tell you what it was about. there were signs and speeches on everything from palestinian apartheid, to genocide in darfur, and i think i remember conversation about islam, somalia, and probably foreign aid. all of these are important problems with the modern world, and there is no real arguing that. but at the same time, if protest is to be at all useful, you can be generalists on dissent. if someone comes up to you, and asks 'what is it about the world that you are trying to change?' your answer needs to be short enough that there is a chance they will listen. pick a battle. fight like hell for your one battle.

1b) pick a battle. there is no place in this world, sad though it is, where you will be able to both challenge the acceptability standards for appearance, and the workings of governance. i am sorry. this is unfair, it's discriminatory, and it is undeniably true. if you desperately need to drive home the point that you can look however you want and still be successful and smart, then your appearance is your cause. you are sacrificing many things to that altar, and one of them is the ability to have controversial opinions taken seriously by mass groups of people. this isn't some kind of pro-conservative dress rant. but if the people whose minds you are attempting to change dismiss you out of hand, it doesn't matter if they are wrong. it only matters that they have stopped listening.

2) don't be a fucking child. do you want to know what killed the anti-globalisation movement? the battle of seattle. not because the sheer power of the activist mindset so scared the foolish capitalist that they went crazy with security, but because the entire movement was discredited with every smashed window, and every store that was closed afterwards. it got harder for protesters to show up to summits, because the police were waiting with teargas and riot gear. reading press from the time, the activist explanation was that they had done so much already, that they had the bad guys running scared. wrong. they had the completely harmless people, the ones they might have convinced, horrified that the anti-globalisation movement was really just a bunch of young, militant psychos who were going to trash their mini-mall. if you throw your fucking tantrum, if you attack goods and services in a misplaced outrage at CEOs, the people are going to see you, rightfully, as a threat. if the counterargument is that non-violent protest isn't working, then refer to the first sentence of this point. only children resort to violence against those who are merely ignoring them, not acting directly against them.

3) pick a battle you can win. you will not eliminate capitalism in north america, and then worldwide. you won't. impressive goal, i see your reasons, i've read naomi klein too, i get it. but it isn't going to happen, at least not by your hand, for many reasons. first, you haven't presented a good alternative yet. if ethical capitalism (yes, it IS possible) isn't an option for you, if all capitalism is evil, than you need to start your own society, because you are asking for the dissolution of this one. when you try to change something that has become intrinsic (i am not saying natural) to the state of the world, you are essentially asking everyone who is on the working side of the equation, to throw away the system they know and work within, for no guaranteed gain. i understand fears of being co-opted by those in power, and why working within the system is ideologically abhorrent to many. regardless. if you want to change things, you need people on your side. if you are going to try to win them over with the promise to tear down their house, without any blueprints for a rebuild, they aren't going to listen.

4) don't do it for you. i don't mean to suggest that protest is inherently selfish. i'm just making the point that almost every protest is designed in a way that appeals to those who agree, and further alienates everyone who doesn't. if your numbers were so great that you didn't DESPERATELY NEED to bring those on the boundary into the fold, the would would be the way you want it. don't throw a protest that, at best, serves to recruit more people who are either identical in ideology to you, or, at worst, a mass of idiot teens who are rebelling simply for the temporary buzz of stepping outside the mainstream. the design of an act of protest is usually why most people walk by with half a glance and a chuckle at the one last true believer from the vietnam era, shaking his ponytail as he screams into the 11th grade masses.

i would be more than happy to work with someone to create a more viable, and less self-defeating plan for an act of organised dissent, if and when anyone contacts me to do so. i respect ethics and hard work aimed at a desire for a better world. i don't respect the way protest has become a dead horse race.