Place things carefully – Page 3 – followthethings.com

“Big Boys Gone Bananas!*“
A documentary film directed by Fredrik Gertten for WG Film AG, Sweden
Free trailer and on-demand stream embedded above. Search online for other streaming options here.
The second of two films on this topic. The first is “Bananas!*”. See our page on this here. See the films’ website here.

Swedish documentary filmmaker Fredrik Gertten and his small film company team are looking forward to the premiere of their courtroom documentary Bananas!* at the Los Angeles Film Festival. It follows a class action case in the California courts where a group of Nicaraguan Banana farm workers hold the Dole corporation accountable for their sexual impotence by making them use an agrochemical that had been banned because it caused it. Their case is put together by a California-based attorney, and the documentary includes grainy in-court testimony not only by the farmers but also by the Dole bosses who made the decision to continue using that agrochemical. The film documents a success story, more or less, with significant financial compensation being awarded to the workers. This is a test case. The first of its kind. So more cases will follow. More costs for Dole. More embarrassment. So Dole fights back, mounting a sophisticated public relations campaign to discredit the case (charging its lawyer with fraud) and the film (claiming it’s uncritically promoting this lawyer’s fraud). This campaign starts before the film has been screened. By people who have not seen it. News articles appear reporting that the film is a fraud. The festival is forced to withdraw it from competition, to show it at a remote theatre, and the festival director has to read out a disclaimer before it’s shown there. Then negative reviews start to appear as soon as it’s seen. Can this seemingly coordinated effort to silence corporate critique succeed? What would you do as a filmmaker if this happened to you? Gertten does what he knows best. He turns his camera on and makes a film about Dole’s attempts to discredit his film. He steps out from behind the camera to become its central character. Unbelievable things are happening to him, to the people he works with, and to the film they made together. But his film company had taken out an insurance policy that allowed them to pay for expensive legal help to fight back. They cleverly coordinate an counter-information and crowndfunding campaign. And a surprising international collection of allies come to their aid. Dole’s efforts to censor Bananas!* are a complete failure and, more than anything, make it and this Big Boys sequel a 100% must see double-bill for anyone interested in trade justice actvism. Read below to see how this story unfolds. It’s a genuine ‘David vs. Goliath’ story. You could never make this up! There’s so much to learn from this. Buckle up.

Page reference: Camilla Muirhead, Katie Lambert, Katie Joyce, Will Sensecall, Izzie Snowden, Matt Creagh & Harry Cousens (2020) Big Boys Gone Bananas!*. followthethings.com/big-boys-gone-bananas.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 1 hour 53 minutes.

Posted on September 20, 2024January 25, 2025 by Ian Cook

Ahava Stolen Beauty

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Health & Beauty

CHANGE CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR

CHANGE CORPORATE BEHAVIOUR

CHANGE GOVERNMENT BEHAVIOUR

START WITH A PARADOX

KNOW YOUR HISTORY

TARGET THE RIGHT BRAND

MAKE THE HIDDEN VISIBLE

PLACE THINGS CAREFULLY

“Ahava Stolen Beauty“
An activist campaign organised by CODEPINK Women For Peace.
12 video YouTube playlist compiled by the US Campaign for Palestinian Rights embedded above shows protests taking place at multiple sites selling Ahava products in Canada, USA, The Netherlands, Israel & France. Click here for more footage of campaign protests and explainer videos. Click here for Code Pink’s ‘Ahava Stolen Beauty’ campaign website.

After the aftermath of Israel’s invasion of Gaza in 2008-9, members of the American women-led grassroots peace and human rights organisation CODEPINK visit a factory on the bank of the Dead Sea which makes cosmetic products from its salts and minerals on occupied Palestinian land. According to the Geneva Convention, occupying forces cannot take or profit from the natural resources of an occupied territory. Sold in department stores, spas and Ahava stores around the world, Ahava products are stamped as ‘Made in Israel’. Critics say that the company’s profits support the illegal settlement where the factory is based. So CODEPINK encourage women are concerned about beauty and disgusted by the occupation to use their consumer power to boycott Ahava products, and to use their citizen power to protest at their sites of sale (in bikinis and bathrobes to attract attention). When the US arm of Ahava later launches an #ahavareborn rebrand campaign on twitter and asks for suggestions, critics pile in with sarcastic slogans about aspects of the occupation that Ahava products can help to conceal or wash away. As the boycott gathers momentum, supporters of Israel criticise it – and the wider Boycott, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) movement that it became part of – as antisemitic, and pro-Israel consumers start counter-campaigns, buycotts, encouraging people to buy as many Ahava products as they can from targeted stores. But, despite this, Ahava stores shut, retailers refuse to stock Ahava goods, governments pass legislation forbidding ‘Made in Israel’ to be printed on goods produced in occupied Palestinian territories and, eventually, Ahava moves its factory to an unoccupied site. To add to this mix, laws forbidding the boycotting of ‘Made in Israel’ goods are passed around the world. This is an epic, controversial example of effective trade justice activism. The message was simple: there was no beauty in occupation. The repercussions of this actvism are with us today

NB this page is a taster. There’s much more to add after out new site is launched. Please check back.

Page reference: Ian Cook et al (2024) Ahava Stolen Beauty (taster). followthethings.com/ahava-stolen-beauty.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 19 minutes.

Posted on September 20, 2024January 5, 2025 by Ian Cook

Where Heaven Meets Hell

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Grocery | Health & Beauty | Home & Auto |

START SOMEWHERE DIFFERENT

MAKE THE HIDDEN VISIBLE

INCLUDE HAUNTING & HORROR

USE MYTHS & LEGENDS

PLACE THINGS CAREFULLY

SHOW IT BACK

“Where Heaven Meets Hell“
A documentary film produced by Sasha Friedlander for Sasha Films LLC & Independent Television Service
Trailer embedded above. Search for online streaming here. Track down a DVD copy here.

Filmmaker Sasha Friedlander visits a stunningly beautiful active volcano in Indonesia called Kawa Ijen. Heaven. It’s a place that loads of tourists visit to take photos of this bubbling cauldron of toxic sulphur gas. They’re also shocked and amazed to see men emerging out of these sulphur clouds carrying on their shoulders baskets containing blocks of raw yellow sulphur, mined hot from the volcano’s insides. This is unbelievably picturesque, hard and dangerous work (physically and chemically). Some say it’s a vision of hell. Friedlander sticks around, her tiny crew following the sulphur miners down into the volcano to better understand the work that they do, their lives and their reasons for doing a job that’s clearly so poorly paid and so extraordinarily hazardous to their health. Making this film is hazardous to the filmmakers’ health too. They struggle with their working conditions. This film they make provides intimate portraits of four men who do this work and their families. Audiences are moved by what they see. It’s beautiful and horrific. Friedlander returns to the village where most of the miners live to show the film to their families. That’s filmed too. They’re shocked. The men hadn’t told their families what their work was like. Some commenters say that workers unhappy with their jobs should get a safer and better paid job somewhere else. They’ve ‘chosen’ to work there. This film shows why making a different ‘choice’ is not as easy as it sounds. Where Heaven Meets Hell follows the journey of sulphur up and out of the Kawa Ijen volcano, to the cabins where the miners get paid for it by weight. But that’s as far as the following goes. Sulphur (and its derivatives) can be found in countless commodities and the processes used to make them – e.g. it’s used to refine sugar, and its an essential ingredients of matches – because it brings specific properties that producers and consumers rely upon. Where Heaven Meets Hell is an excellent example of a follow the thing project that ‘starts somewhere different’. It doesn’t start or end at a factory, for example. Those followings can be nice and linear, easy to trace, easy to convey to an audience. But starting in a place where a raw material is extracted from the earth presents a different view of international trade. So many raw materials like sulphur travel along countless supply chains, and become ingredients in countless industrial processes and commodities. Following raw materials can be much, much more complex. The supply chains of something basic like sulphur can infiltrate so many other supply chains, so many other things, so many other places and lives. This means that any trade justice ‘solutions’ that audiences might want to support are from straightforward. Try boycotting sulphur! Start by looking for sulphur compounds on ingredient labels. That’s the top of the volcano.

Page reference: Ian Cook et al (2016) Where Heaven Meets Hell. followthethings.com/where-heaven-meets-hell.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 53 minutes.

Posted on September 20, 2024January 5, 2025 by Ian Cook

The Oil Road: Journeys From The Caspian Sea To The City Of London

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Home & Auto

2012

BRITISH PETROLEUM

CRUDE OIL

SOURCED IN AZERBAIJAN

USED IN EUROPE

PUBLICATION

SHOW CAPITALIST EVILS

TELL THE TRUTH

TEACH ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY

REACH NEW AUDIENCES

CHOOSE THE RIGHT THING

TARGET THE RIGHT BRAND

START SOMEWHERE DIFFERENT

MAKE THE HIDDEN VISIBLE

SHOW THE VIOLENCE

KNOW YOUR HISTORY

PLACE THINGS CAREFULLY

“The Oil Road: Journeys From The Caspian Sea To The City Of London”
A non-fiction travelogue by James Marriott & Mika Minio-Paluello, published by Verso.
Google Books preview embedded above.

‘Oil corporation resisters’ James Marriott and Mika Minio-Paluello travel the length of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline which carries crude oil from Azerbaijan’s Caspian Sea oilfields to refineries in Europe and, from there, into the region’s cars, buses & other oil-burning machines. They find this oil’s human stories, secret places and complex connections, and companies and governments that don’t want them to be revealed. They investigate how British Petroleum – which operates and co-owns it – wields incredible power over the governments of the countries the pipeline passes through that it is able to sweep aside everyone and everything in its path. The Oil Road paints a picture of the West’s ‘energy imperialism’ and insatiable addiction to oil. But this is far from a dry academic or NGO report of ‘energy security’ and oil geopolitics. Rather, it’s a vivid piece of industrial / infrastructural travel writing. A page-turning detective thriller that’s accessible to readers who don’t identify as oil-geeks. The authors use a familiar road trip format for political advocacy, to ‘show the filthy entrails of the global economy close up’, as one commenter puts it. Some commenters rage at BP, and/or say the authors are obviously a biased against BP, and/or bemoan the lack of alternatives and/or express greater worries about the ‘carbon web’ that the book vividly – but only partly – reveals. This is thing-following in multiple ways. It follows oil along a pipeline. It follows the pipeline itself. And it follows the money generated by the oil flowing along the pipeline.

Page reference: Molly Mansfield, Louise Ford, Olivia Rogers, Millie Smith, Bryony Board & Charlotte Watts (2013) The Oil Road. followthethings.com/the-oil-road.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 33 minutes.

Posted on September 20, 2024January 26, 2025 by Ian Cook

Tackle The Shackles

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Security

END VOILENCE & EXPLOITATION

CHANGE GOVERNMENT BEHAVIOUR

START WITH A PARADOX

TARGET THE RIGHT BRAND

SHOW THE VIOLENCE

BRING PEOPLE TOGETHER

MAKE MUSIC

EMBODY EXPLOITATION

PLACE THINGS CAREFULLY

DISRUPT THE SUPPLY

PUT YOUR BODIES IN THE WAY

HOLD ‘EM ACCOUNTABLE

“Tackle The Shackles“
Two protests organised by Reprieve, Amnesty International, Save Omar Campaign & the Birmingham Guantanamo Campaign at Hiatt & Co, 111-115 Baltimore Road, Birmingham, UK (see map) on 8 September 2005 & 11 January 2007.
Selected photographs above. Featured in a scene from the documentary film ‘Taking Liberties since 1997’ (check streaming availability here and start at 1hr 20 minutes).

British citizens and residents are detained in the USA’s Guantanamo Bay detention centre, but none are charged with a crime. They notice the Hiatt & Co. leg irons restraining them are ‘Made in England’, or ‘Made in Birmingham’, just like them. When some go on hunger strike in 2005, and when the 5th anniversary of the camp’s opening takes place in 2007, musicians, doctors, lawyers, comedians and activists protest outside the Birmingham, UK factory where they are made. They dress as Guantanamo inmates and dance the ‘shackle shuffle’ to a live band performing on a flatbed truck. Former detainees, their family members, lawyers, celebrities and activists carry photos of detainees and give speeches. People chain themselves to railings and deliver a cake to the factory. Historically, protestors say, leg irons and other restraints were made in Birmingham to chain enslaved African people in the days of the British Empire. Their use at Guantanamo, they argue, is unethical and illegal. Does the export of these leg irons comply with the UK Government’s obligations under International law? Especially as Hiatt is owned by the UK’s BAE Systems and because the New Labour Government of the time had been loudly trumpeting its ‘ethical’ foreign policy. One detainee’s lawyer says, ‘If an ethical foreign policy means anything, it means not profiting from the torment of our own people.’ The protestors want to make this paradox mainstream news, and they succeed. In this trade justice activism, the violence and exploitation is found not where the commodity of produced, but where it is ‘consumed’. Hiatt closes its Birmingham factory and moves production to the USA. So, does this trade justice activism count as a success?

Page reference: Diana Shifrina (2013) Tackle The Shackles. followthethings.com/tackletheshackles.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 54 minutes.

Posted on September 20, 2024January 5, 2025 by Ian Cook

Banksy’s Slave Labour

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Home & Auto | Gifts & Seasonal

SHOW CAPITALIST EVILS

POP THE BUBBLE

REACH NEW AUDIENCES

CHOOSE THE RIGHT THING

BE A CELEBRITY

START WITH A PARADOX

JUXTAPOSE EXTREMES

INCLUDE SUFFERING KIDS

MAKE IT FAMILIAR

MOBILISE THE FANDOM

PLACE THINGS CAREFULLY

“Banksy’s Slave Labour“
Street art by Banksy briefly located on the wall of a Poundland Store in Wood Green, London.
Removed.

It’s 2012. Queen Elizabeth’s Diamond Jubilee is being celebrated in the UK. The London Olympics are also taking place. There’s Union Jack bunting everywhere. It’s cheaply and readily available in discount stores like Poundland. Including one in Peckham, South London. Where the street artist Banksy paints a mural of a child hunched over a sewing machine, making them in India. They spill onto the pavement. It’s a true story. But, like most of Banksy’s street art, it’s quickly stolen and auctioned on the international art market. The story goes viral. That’s usually what trade justice activists want. But that viral story isn’t about slave labour at all. Is the international market for celebrity street art, and the value of Banksy’s work within it, an effective channel to persuade retailers like Poundland to remove child labour from their supply chains?

Page reference: Lydia Dean, Lucinda Armstrong, Jessica Bains-Lovering, Emily Hill, Harriet Allen & Rose Cirant-Carr (2019) Banksy’s Slave Labour (taster). http://followthethings.com/banksy-slave-labour.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 11 minutes.

Posted on August 28, 2024February 4, 2025 by Ian Cook

Primark – On The Rack

"A little deeper into the squalour and another rung down the ladder of exploitation. Children. Several young boys working on the same Primark vest we saw those women sewing earlier...
... one could be as young as 9 or 10. They're testing the stitching so the sequins don't end up falling off in the hands of customers back in Britain. When we asked their ages, their manager kept silent."
[The film then briefly shows the vest's 'atmosphere' label. This is a Primark band promising customers affordable fresh fashion]

followthethings.com
Fashion

“Primark – on the rack“
A documentary film presented by Tom Heap & produced by Frank Simmonds with Dan McDougall for BBC TV’s Panorama series.
Screenshot slideshow of the contested scene embedded above. Watch on Box of Broadcasts (with institutional login) here.

The BBC produces an exposé of cheap clothing retailer Primark. It finds children making its clothes, and sewing and testing their sequins, in factories, slums and refugee camps in India. Primark is asked to contribute to the film before it’s shown. Instead, they decide to cut ties with the supply chains featured, then launch a website to counter the film’s claims. They research the film’s research to pick apart its claims, and then complain to the BBC that one 45 second scene (the one in the screenshots above) is fake. Their critic-silencing strategy has mixed success. The BBC is forced to admit that it cannot be 100% sure that the scene wasn’t faked, and the Panorama team are forced to hand back an award they were given for the film. But Primark’s persistent public attempts to silence this investigative journalism draws attention – for years – to the company’s reputation as the ‘poster boy of child labour in the UK’. Supporters of the film highlight the other 3,555 minutes of the film that Primark didn’t claim the producers had faked? Then, 5 years after the film was broadcast, the Rana Plaza factory complex in Dhaka, Bangladesh collapses and over a thousand garments workers are crushed to death making high street clothes. Journalists, filmmakers and others keep this tragedy relentlessly in the news. UK newspaper headlines refer to this as the ‘Primark factory’. There’s no way that this footage is fake. Primark has to react differently this time.

Page reference: Kate Adley, Richard Keeble, Pippa Russell, Noora Stenholm, William Strang and Tuuli Valo (2025) Primark – on the rack. followthethings.com/primark-on-the-rack.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 124 minutes.

Posted on August 21, 2024January 28, 2025 by Ian Cook

Employee Visualisation Appendage

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Fashion

2001

WORLD TRADE ORGANISATION

TEXTILE FABRIC

WORN IN THE GLOBAL NORTH

EXPERIENCED IN THE GLOBAL SOUTH

ACTIVIST PRANK

MOVIE SCENE

CHANGE GOVERNMENT BEHAVIOUR

CHANGE CORPORATE BEHAVIOUR

BRING REGULATORS INTO VIEW

LIE TO TELL THE TRUTH

CHOOSE AN AUDIENCE

PLACE THINGS CAREFULLY

INCLUDE THE DIGITAL

MAKE THE HIDDEN VISIBLE

CREATE A CHARACTER

MAKE IT PROVOCATIVE

MAKE IT FUNNY

“Employee Visualisation Appendage“
A conference talk prank by The Yes Men at a ‘Textiles of The Future’ conference in Tampere, Finland – filmed & featured in ‘The Yes Men’ movie.

Cultural activists and ‘identity correctors’ The Yes Men set up a fake World Trade Organisation (WTO) website and offer a man called Hank Hardy Unruh to speak at conferences on its behalf. The organisers of a ‘Textiles of the Future’ conference in Finland believe the website is genuine and invite him to give a talk. In the conference hall, the audience watch his assistant ripping off his business suit to reveal a gold lamé telematic suit underneath from which he inflates a huge phallus. This ’employee visualisation appendage’, they say, will allow future managers to give electric shocks to sweatshop workers when their productivity levels dip. To the Yes Men, this gold lamé performance exaggerates to ridiculous proportions the inhumanity of the WTO’s neo-liberal ideology and its dehumanisation of supply chain workers. It’s outrageous and kind of obscene (both the ideology and their performance). Movie audiences find it hilarious. But why is there such a muted reaction in the hall? And what impacts (if any) might these reactions have on the lives of workers in textile supply chains? This compilation page is arranged a little differently than others on our website because this prank had two audiences: the conference delegates and the movie audiences. We find this example fascinating. It’s fair to say that it’s memorable. But where – and upon whom – did it make an impact?

Page reference: Tom Best, Tom Gibson, Beth Massey, Chloe Rees, Kate Ross & Jemma Sherman (2019) Employee Visualisation Appendage. followthethings.com/employee-visualisation-appendage.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 47 minutes.