Tag: Change government behaviour

END VIOLENCE & EXPLOITATION

CHOOSE THE RIGHT THING

CREATE SOME CHARACTERS

INVOLVE CONSUMERS

LIE TO TELL THE TRUTH

MAKE IT FUNNY

MAKE IT SNAPPY

MAKE IT AVAILABLE

PROMPT GOOD CITIZENSHIP

“Teleshopping AK-47“
A spoof teleshopping channel promotion directed by Dougal Wilson and post-produced by MPC for Mother, commissioned by Amnesty International.
Full video embedded above. Search online for versions with other titles here.

Amnesty International is trying to get 1 million people involved in their campaign to tighten loopholes in international arms trade legislation. To demonstrate how easy it is to buy weapons like AK-47 assault rifles, how cheap they are, and how they end up being used in armed conflicts (often involving child soldiers), they commission some culture jamming. Its a short video that imagines that these weapons can be sold by cheery presenters on TV shopping channel’s chintzy pastel-coloured set, just like ice-cream makers and his ‘n’ hers dressing gowns. They’re perfect for child soldiers, the presenters say, like those in Liberia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. They give one to a child to demonstrate on set, who cheerfully shoots a mannequin to pieces. Amnesty commission this darkly comedic, camp and chilling 135 second film to show in cinemas, alongside the real ads. They publish it on YouTube. Later, it’s included as an extra on the DVD of Nicholas Cage’s Hollywood arms trade blockbuster Lord of War [see our page on its Life of a bullet opening credits here]. Amnesty can’t advertise on UK TV because they’re a political organisation. And the use of pastiche / parody / humour is a novel approach in human rights campaigning in 2006. But Amnesty really go for it. On top of the cinema ad, there’s a viral email campaign, spoof arms shopping catalogues are delivered through people’s doors, and pop-up high street weapons shops open around the UK with live shooting demonstrations. Commenters are shocked by this disgusting, deeply sinister but informative campaign. One says these weapons are beautiful and every American should have one. Another pretends to agree, saying that guns don’t kill people, people do and, if guns were taken away, people could just as easily kill eachother with knives or rubber ducks. Some say humour is inappropriate for such a serious topic. Others say the ad and the catalogue is so light, so beautifully done, so plausible, that it’s perfect for generating conversations about the international arms trade and its (lack of) regulation.

Page reference: Daisy Livingston (2024) Teleshopping AK-47. followthethings.com/teleshopping-ak-47.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 30 minutes.

Posted on October 16, 2024February 20, 2025 by Ian Cook

Ghosts

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Grocery

SHOW CAPITALIST EVILS

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INCLUDE HAUNTING & HORROR

TRANSLATE & SUBTITLE

“Ghosts“
A documentary film written by Nick Broomfield, Jez Lewis & Hsiao-Hung Pai, directed by Nick Broomfield for Beyond FIlms
Official trailer embedded above. Available on Box of Broadcasts (with institutional login) here. Search online here for other streaming availability.

Documentary filmmaker Nick Broomfield is known for his quirky, in-front-of-camera documentaries but, after a 2004 disaster where 23 Chinese migrant workers picking cockles were drowned by a fast-incoming tide in the UK’s Morecamble Bay, he decides to make a docu-drama to show what happened and why. This is a tale of people smuggling, modern slavery and violent, corrupt gangmasters sourcing and providing cheap slave labour in the UK to pick vegetables like spring onions and seafood like cockles for sale in mainstream supermarkets (which the film names). It was co-written with Hsiao-Hung Pai – a Taipei-heritage UK journalist and writer – was researched through the writers’ visit to China to visit the victims’ families, starred former illegal immigrant Chinese non-actors working with an improvised script, was filmed where the disaster happened, and ends with a plea for audience members to donate to a fund to help the dead workers’ families pay their people-smuggling debts. The tale is told from the perspective of a female worker called Ai Qin. She and her compatriots speak in Mandarin so that that ‘Ghosts’ – their white gangmasters – can’t understand they are mocking them. In the final scene, just before Ai Qin drowns, she calls her son in China to sing him a farewell song on her mobile phone. Who is to blame for their deaths? The migrant workers? The people smugglers and gangmasters? The supermarkets? The government? This film was made to be put to use, to have a positive impact. On public attitudes to migrant workers. On the law. On the victims’ families. In contrast to a documentary film, a docu-drama can script and film anything, anyone, anywhere. So a fuller picture of the challenges that workers and trade justice activists face can be pieced together to provoke change.

Page reference: Harriet Allen, Etienne Heaume, Lizzie Heeley, Rosie Hedger, Sam Johnson, Olivia McGregor & Lucy Webber (2011) Ghosts. followthethings.com/ghosts.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 51 minutes.

Posted on October 14, 2024January 5, 2025 by Ian Cook

Dow Vs Bhopal: A Toxic Rap Battle

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Home & Auto

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CHANGE CITIZEN BEHAVIOUR

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“Dow Vs Bhopal: A Toxic Rap Battle“
A music video by Sofia Ashraf published on YouTube.
Embedded in full above.

Chennai rap musician Sofia Ashraf’s Nicki Minaj-sampling protest song ‘Kodakainal Won’t’ goes viral on YouTube in 2015, drawing attention to a Unilever factory in India dumping mercury into the environment. A year later, she releases this video to draw attention to the most notorious industrial disaster in Indian history: an explosion at the Union Carbide pesticide factory in Bhopal in 1984 which released poisonous gas that killed more than 15,000 people and sickened over half a million more. A campaign has been running ever since for the victims to be compensated and the toxic legacy of the explosion to be cleaned up, even after Union Carbide was bought by Dow Chemical. Ashraf revived a rap written and performed in 2008 to support an NGO petition to the US Government’s Department of Justice to hold Dow Chemical to account. If the petition reaches 125,000 signatures, the DoJ is obliged to respond. In the video, Ashraf performs both sides of the argument as she sees it: the Indian activist side calling Dow Chemical to account, and the US government’s disdainful approach to those demanding compensation. The video encourages people to sign the petition. The 125,000 goal is reached. But what does this unlock? What can protest music do for trade justice activism?

Page reference: Nicole Sparks, Ginny Childs, Allie Short, Kat Cook, Lauren Warner & Sophie Wolf (2016) Dow Vs Bhopal: A Toxic Rap Battle (taster). followthethings.com/dow-vs-bhopal-a-toxic-rap-battle.shtml (last accessed <insert date here>)

Estimated reading time: 8 minutes.

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

Ahava Stolen Beauty

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Health & Beauty

CHANGE CONSUMER BEHAVIOUR

START WITH A PARADOX

KNOW YOUR HISTORY

TARGET THE RIGHT BRAND

END VOILENCE & EXPLOITATION

“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 26, 2025 by Ian Cook

Tackle The Shackles

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Security

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TARGET THE RIGHT BRAND

SHOW THE VIOLENCE

BRING PEOPLE TOGETHER

MAKE MUSIC

EMBODY EXPLOITATION

PUT YOUR BODIES IN THE WAY

DISRUPT THE SUPPLY

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 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

BRING REGULATORS INTO VIEW

LIE TO TELL THE TRUTH

CHOOSE AN AUDIENCE

INCLUDE THE DIGITAL