>Date:         Thu, 30 Aug 2001 17:54:05 -0500
>Reply-To: Todd <[log in to unmask]>
> Todd <[log in to unmask]>      cultural jamming at its finest [log in to unmask]
>heh heh
>
>   This message is not commercial. Get off our list by writing
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>
>August 30, 2001
>FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
>
>WTO INTRODUCES NEW MEMBER
>Gold and one meter long, phallus is brand-new technology to control
>distant workers
>
>Anti-WTO impostors have struck again, delivering a lecture about the
>rights of slavery, the stupidity of Gandhi, and the supremacy of free
>trade to an enthusiastic crowd of scientists, engineers, and marketing
>professionals--all of whom thought they were watching an official WTO
>representative.
>
>The 150 experts at the "Textiles of the Future" conference in Tampere,
>Finland heard one Hank Hardy Unruh explain that Gandhi's "self-
>sufficiency" movement was entirely misguided, because it centered
>around protectionism, and that Lincoln, by outlawing slavery, had
>criminally interfered with the trade freedom of the South, as well as
>with slavery's own freedom to develop naturally. Had slavery never
>been abolished, Unruh said, today's much cheaper system of sweatshops
>would have eventually replaced it anyhow; following this free-market
>logic to the end, Unruh declared the Civil War just a big waste of
>money.
>
>Finally, to applause from the highly educated audience, Unruh's
>business suit was ripped off to reveal a golden leotard with a
>three-foot-long phallus. The purpose of the "Management Leisure Suit",
>he explained, was to allow managers, no matter where they were, to
>monitor their distant, impoverished workforces and to administer
>shocks to encourage productivity--assuring that no "Gandhi-type
>situation" develop again.
>
>"If a group of Ph.D.s cheers at such crudely crazy things, just
>because it's the WTO saying them, what else can the WTO get away
>with?"  said Andy Bichlbaum of the Yes Men, the impostors' umbrella
>group. (The entire PowerPoint lecture is available at
>http://www.theyesmen.org/finland/, along with some shots captured by
>a video crew preparing a film on the Yes Men's activities.)
>
>The Yes Men had a similar experience last October with a group of
>international trade lawyers (http://www.theyesmen.org/wto/). And in
>July, a member of the group, again passing as a representative of the
>WTO, appeared on a major television network show about protest's
>effect on the market (http://theyesmen.org/tv.html); among other
>things, he spoke about how the privatization of education will
>naturally eliminate "unproductive" thinkers from the high-school
>classroom, a long-term solution to the problem of protest. (Because
>the imposture was not noticed and the Yes Men hope for further
>appearances, the show's name is being withheld.)
>
>In other quarterly developments:
>
>* A conference session on techniques to counter anti-corporate
>activism, normally available for $225 to corporate clients, is
>available to activists for free at http://rtmark.com/prsa/, thanks to
>an anonymous donor.
>
>* At the G8 protests in Genoa, activists distributed one thousand
>vanity mirrors, which were then used to reflect the sun into the eyes
>of attacking policemen; this fulfilled RTMark project MIRR
>(http://rtmark.com/archimedes.html), and those who carried it out
>received a $1,000 anonymous investment.
>
>The "Archimedes Project" comes on the heels of the medieval catapult
>attack on the FTAA fortress in Quebec City, for which the workers were
>awarded $200. For the upcoming IMF protests in Washington, D.C., on
>September 29, an RTMark investor has offered $500 to any Lacrosse
>team that harnesses their skills and equipment to throw tear gas
>canisters back to the police (http://rtmark.com/fundhigh.html#LACR).
>
>* A software development kit and book from http://hactivist.com,
>entitled "Child as Audience", allows anyone to reverse-engineer the
>Nintendo Gameboy. Because of content that many will find
>objectionable, RTMark has lent its corporate veil to the project,
>meaning that any legal flak will be absorbed by the RTMark corporate
>body rather than by those responsible.
>
>* The same label that enraged Geffen Records with "Deconstructing
>Beck" is issuing its fourth RTMark-sponsored release, "A Mutated
>Christmas," a paean to musical sharing illegally assembled from
>copyrighted holiday music. Promotional copies will be available in
>late September; press and radio requests should be directed to
>mailto:[log in to unmask]
>
>
>RTMark's primary goal is to publicize corporate subversion of the
>democratic process. To this end it acts as a clearinghouse for
>anti-corporate projects. A list of just-added projects is maintained
>at http://rtmark.com/new.html.
>
>                             # 30 #
>
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-
"Every act of rebellion expresses a nostalgia for innocence and an appeal to the essence of being."
(Albert Camus)

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