THE PAPER-Adbuster

                        AD-BUSTERS ORGANIZATIONS

We could say that consumerism arrived just before the Industrial Revolution. Since then, this term has evoluted parallelly with many phenomenons like capitalism, materialism, economic growth and globalization, amount others.

Nevertheless, the origin of this movement can be attributed to the old term of "conspicuous consumption" originated at the turn of the 20th century in the writings of sociologist and economist,Thorstein Veblen. The term describes an apparently irrational and confounding form of economic behaviour, where people buy unnecessary objects and desires.

Nowadays, it’s undeniable that consumption or consumerism and their implications, rules our lives. In fact human existence or at least western civilizations are undissociable related to this social and economic order that is based on the systematic creation and fostering of a desire to purchase goods and services in ever greater amounts.

Since consumerism began, various individuals and groups have consciously sought an alternative lifestyle, such as the "simple living","eco-conscious" movements.

In many critical contexts, consumerism is used to describe the tendency of people to identify strongly with products or services they consume, especially those with commercial brand names and perceived status-symbolism appeal, like luxury cars, designer clothing, or expensive jewelry. In this identification Publicity has a crucial role by “educating” consumers behavior.

So, the aim of this document is to analyse Publicity and their implications in a critical perspective. It is to say, how publicity can be used as a anti-consumerism tool instead of been considered the paradigm of consumerism. Because of this the subject is going to be Adbusters organizations. The paper will be structured in two big parts:

First of all were are going the settle an theoretical frame, explaining the main philosophical ideas or movements that influence this kind of organizations.

In a second part, we are going to see which are the the most important adbusters organizations with their specific features.

                     I-THEORETICAL FRAME                                                  

Mental environmentalism:

This is one of the core ideas of Adbusters philosophy. This theory is explained with a metaphor: If nature or physical environmentalism can be polluted by industrial toxins, mental environmentalism, our minds, can also be polluted by what they call “info-toxins”. These “info-toxins” are the 3000 advertisements that assault our minds each day intending to persuade us to think and see the world as corporations establish.

The message we are getting with increasing frequency is that we are not good enough unless we purchase and consume whatever product is release to the market. Products that used to be designed to last for decades are now obsolete either physically or technologically, in years or even months.(bur this is another subject, also considered our blog)  We are conditioned to want (and think we "need") increasing amounts of stuff.

Besides, from a mental health overview, this is a serious issue. We have an entire society, now, that has been raised with constant mental distraction 24 hours a day 7 days per week, as a way of life. So, we are not only talking about a mental predisposition or determination as consumers, but also about a health matter.

We can not continue talking about this theory without quoting Michel Serres, an eccentric French philosopher, that has written the first truly philosophical work of the mental environmentalist movement, the radical re-conception of pollution - (that i explained above) - that stands the Adbusters critique. This unique idea it’s presented on his book : Malfeasance: Appropriation Through Pollution?.

Beyond simply being a philosophical treatise, Malfeasance is a war cry.  Aware that the earth is being contaminated by the soft pollution of corporations, Serres does not hide his anger.

At the end of this book he does not argue for acquiescence but yells for social revolution. In reference to this revolution Micah White, one of the members of the organization “Adbusters” says:

“To escape the mental chains, and finally pull off the glorious emancipatory revolution the left has so long hoped for, we must become meme warriors who, through the use of culture jamming, spark a wave of epiphanies that shatter the consumerist worldview.”

These lines can be used as a transition to another ideological movement on that Adbusters organizations are based: Culture Jamming

 Culture Jamming:

The concept of culture jamming has been called resistance movement to cultural hegemony, although some prefer to define it as individual avoidance of all forms of herd mentality, or run and can not be thus treated as a movement, is a individual form to get away from society as a whole or even social movements. Culture jamming is not defined as a specific political position or message, neither as a cultural position, so in these terms Culture jamming it’s more a tool than a theory.

The common feature is especially to satirize  (ironizar) about the homogeneous nature of popular culture. (a consequence of globalization but that it’s another work too). Also in some cases been associated with the concept of guerrilla communication, as opposed to the government or other powers.

The concept was, coined in 1984, denotes a tactic used by many anti-consumerist social movements to disrupt or subvert mainstream cultural institutions, including corporate advertising.

As i said before, culture jamming has to do with tactics more than with philosophy. These tactics include re-figuring logos, fashion statements, and product images as a means to challenge the idea of "what's cool" along with assumptions about the personal freedoms of consumption.

But how do these activist work ?

Activist try to touch people in a emotional way and to evoke some kind of reactions. For Jammers, there are four types of basic emotions considered as a catalyst for revolution. Precisely, they believe that through shock, shame, fear, and anger they can make people act in order to make huge social and political changes.The basic unit in which a message is transmitted in culture jamming is the meme.

Wikipedia defines Memes as “condensed images that stimulate visual, verbal, musical, or behavioral associations that people can easily imitate and transmit to others.”

In cultural critic context, the term meme was popularized by Douglas Rushkoff that claimed memes were a type of media virus.As we said before about mental environmentalism, Jammers use a metaphor to explain their ideas.

“Memes are seen as genes that can jump from outlet to outlet and replicate themselves or mutate upon transmission just like a virus.”

It’s quite difficult to resume all the tactics and tools implemented by culture jammers activist due to the dispersion and heterogeneity of  the artists involved, so we quote below a resume of wikipedia.

 “Culture jammers will often use common memes to such as the McDonald's golden arches or Nike swoosh to engage people and force them to think about their eating habits or fashion sense In one example, jammer Jonah Perreti used the Nike symbol to stir debate on sweatshop child labor and consumer freedom. Perreti made public exchanges between himself and Nike over a disagreement. Perreti had requested custom Nikes with the word "sweatshop" placed in the Nike symbol. Nike naturally disagreed. Once this story was made public over Perreti's website it spread world wide and sparked conversation and dialogue about Nike's use of sweatshops.Jammers can also organize and participate in mass campaigns. Examples of cultural jamming like Perreti's are more along the lines of tactics that radical consumer social movements would use.

These movements push people to question the taken-for-granted assumption that consuming is natural and good and aim to disrupt the naturalization of consumer culture; they also seek to create systems of production and consumption that are more human and less dominated by global corporate hypercapitalism. Past mass events and ideas have included "Buy Nothing Day", "Digital Detox Week", virtual sit-ins and protests over the Internet, producing ‘subvertisements’ and placing them in public spaces, and creating and enacting ‘place jamming’ projects where public spaces are reclaimed and nature is re-introduced into urban places.

The most effective form of jamming is to use an already widely recognizable meme to transmit the message. Once viewers are forced to take a second look at the mimicked popular meme they are forced out of their comfort zone. Viewers are presented with another way to view the meme and forced to think about the implications presented by the jammer. More often than not, when this is used as a tactic the jammer is going for shock value. For example, to make consumers aware of the negative body image that big name apparel brands are causing, a subvertisement of Calvin Klein's 'Obsession' was created and played world wide. It depicted a young woman with an eating disorder throwing up into a toilet.

Culture jamming is sometimes confused with artistic appropriation, which is done for art's sake, and vandalism, in which destruction or defacement is the primary goal. Although the end result is not always easily distinguishable from these activities, the intent behind culture jamming is very different from that of artists and vandals. The lines are not always clear-cut; some activities, notably street art, will fall into two or even all three categories.”

II-A PRACTICAL VIEW: ADBUSTERS ORGANIZATIONS.

There are many adbusters organizations worldwide and they are highly connected ans organised between them. In spite of the similarities, these organizations have different tactics or tools. In this document were going to analyse some of them:     

Adbusters:

It's the first, best organised and most notorious organisation among the adbusters movement. they define themselves as  “a global network of artists, activists writers,pranksters, students, educators and entrepreneurs who want to advance the new social activist movement of the information age. their aim  is to topple existing power structures and forge a major shift in the way we will live in the 21st century.”

Adbusters way of doing it’s composed by 3 main tools: the Adbusters magazine, campaigns and blog.

The magazine:

Adbusters is a not-for-profit, reader-supported, 120,000-circulation magazine concerned about the erosion of our physical and cultural environments by commercial forces.

“Adbusters magazine offers incisive philosophical articles as well as activist commentary from around the world addressing issues ranging from genetically modified foods to media concentration.

The magazine is dedicated to examining the relationship between human beings and their physical and mental environment. We want a world in which the economy and ecology resonate in balance. We try to coax people from spectator to participant in this quest. We want folks to get mad about corporate disinformation, injustices in the global economy, and any industry that pollutes our physical or mental commons.”

Campaingns:

They do  annual social marketing campaigns like:

Buy Nothing Day + Buy nothing Christmas : they try to find creative ways to persuade people not to bay. Besides yo can send you on ideas or supports to stand for this event, so they can published in their web or magazine.

Digital Detox Week that consists in unhook people of electronics devices that rule our every day live. there are 3 ways to kick off Digital Detox Week:

•               Take a Zen Moment:Tomorrow morning, try a little self discipline before you switch on your computer. For 60 seconds, look at the reflection of yourself in the dark, empty screen.          Meditate on your relationship with this box. What is it really all about?

•               Slow Down: Share this 60 second animation about our hectic pace of life with your friends. Then chat with them about their digital lives and how to move in different, more meaningful ways.

•               Reconnect with Reality: Talk one or more of your friends into going for a walk or a hike or a camping trip with you during Digital Detox Week.

Kick It Over

Adbusters invites economics students around the world, especially PhD students, to join them as a force of jamimng. They have to read for articles and instructions in order to fight the science of economics by doing actions like printing and pinning posters all around.

Casseur de pub:

It’s the french version of abusters, their actions are quite similar. They also organise events such as  or "Le jour sans marques" "Le jour sans telé" (quite similar to Buy Nothing Day an to the Digital Detox Week)

Nevertheless we could highlight that theirs actions are not only directed against the society of consumption, but they they also fight agaisnt 

global economic issue like economic growth or world oil production. (as you can seen in the video linked)

R.A.P (Resistance a l’agression publicitaire)

It’s another french organization. They have the same philosophical background than other adbusters orgs but their actions are focused on a legal approach. Their objetives are:

To ensure strict compliance with laws and regulations on advertising, signs

To change legislation in the direction of greater environmental protection and a greater respect for the rights of citizens threatened by the advertising practices;

To fight against unfair trade practices and contribute to the objective information to citizens;

To educate the public and especially the younger to the influence of advertising in society;

To fight against the introduction of advertising into public services and particularly within the education system.

Other jamming actions.......

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The Bubble Project

The Bubble Project is a collective that paste comic bubbles in the  ads we can see on the streets. According to its manifesto, these stickers attempt to change the corporate monologue into an open dialogue where anyone can fill the bubble with any form of expression, free of censorship.

"More Bubbles mean more free spaces, more shared thoughts, more reactions to recent events, and more importantly, the imagination and fun."

In the image we can see a young model where the bubble says: What am gonna do when I’m 23 ? Citing the fact that models are getting younger.

llegal Advertising

llegal Advertising is an independent blog that brings you the best in underground online advertising. Illegal, banned and rejected commercials, spoofs, very virals, director cuts underground campaigns and exclusive previews.

it’s surprising that  a group wants to publish ads banned or not approved by brands and companies. They have created a website showing all that advertising censored or not allowed to see for violating certain rights.

It’s like anti-advertisement movement that work in reverse.