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Newsletter Issue 5: September -
October 2001 | |||||||||
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Say YES! to Corporate Stupidity! The
Yes-men are a genderless, loose-knit association of some three hundred
impostors worldwide... In other words, the Yes Men are team players... but
they play for the opposing team.' from their website - www.theyesmen.orgIn March 2000, the Yes-men were given control of GATT.org by the group that designed it. Gatt.org looks just like the WTO's official website (but conveys the WTO's message more clearly, because it was designed by anti-globalisation creatives RTMark). In May 2000, an organizer of a conference on international law wrote to GATT.org inviting WTO Director-General Mike Moore to present. Three months later, 'Moore' politely declines but suggests a replacement, Dr. Andreas Bichlbauer of Vienna. Dr Bichlbauer attended the conference, where he gave a presentation on 'barriers to trade', including, amongst other things, the suggestion that the logical conclusion of the WTO's agenda would involve the standardisation of culture across the world, abolishing local anomalies like the Mediterranean siesta. He also argued in favour of schemes allowing apathetic citizens of 'consumer democracies' to sell their votes to the highest bidder - notably the spoof site voteauction.com, run by the Yes-men's close collaborators RTMark. A few of the audience were mildly offended by remarks suggesting Italians preferred having fun to pursuing the work ethic [What's offensive about that? I'm sure I'd rather have fun…Ed.], but no-one noticed anything wrong with the voting suggestions. This August, in Tampere, Finland, the yes-men struck again, with unofficial WTO representative Hank Hardy Unruh 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. Even when, at the climax of the presentation, Hank Hardy Unruh ripped off his business suit to reveal a skin-tight gold bodysuit with a three-foot long inflatable phallic appendage - the 'management leisure suit', supposed to allow managers to communicate directly with workers via chips implanted in the suit and in the workers' brains - no-one called his bluff. We contacted the yes-men at their secret hideout in an almost extinct volcano [What?!…Ed] to find out what makes them tick. Corporate Watch: Who or what inspired the Yes men in their quest to discredit the WTO? Andy: Well, the WTO is a really big deal that has a lot to say about what happens and what doesn't. And you take a look at the things they say in the press and on their website and it's so ludicrous, so infantile. They say things like 'Letting big companies do whatever the fuck they want anywhere in the world will lead to cleaner air because the companies will have really big profits and therefore so will the countries they are in and then those countries will spend that extra money on buying equipment that's better for air quality.' This is really the gist of what Mike Moore has said. Given this sort of idiotic idea, it's really funny to see how much respect this organization gets from really and truly smart people. And we wonder: just how totally repulsive could it be and still get respect and allegiance from those really smart people? Could it, say, proclaim something like 'Voting should be privatised-companies should be able to purchase votes for president'? Could it say 'Today's remote labour system is a lot like slavery, but even better'? Could it say 'Gandhi was really misguided'? Would people clap? The answer has always been a resounding YES - and that's why we are the Yes men. We say YES too! CW: Your accounts suggest the audiences make virtually no response at the time of the presentations - no questions, booing, heckling, only polite applause - mightn't this be better interpreted as a sign of incomprehension than of acquiescence? Alternatively, was anyone listening? Andy: Well, in Finland, they certainly were listening. After the lecture, Mike and I wandered around the enclave and spoke with people in various environments - at lunch, at dinner, in the lobby, etc. Always people understood what the lecture had been about. Always people said it was not offensive. Under other circumstances they would have found it offensive, but because it was the WTO saying these things, they were ready to goosestep. And they gave us more than polite applause. They gave us robust applause, in fact. And the president of the conference mentioned the talk at least three times in public - once right after, once during the day, and once during his dinner announcement, right before the traditional Finnish folk music part. Each time, he said how grateful they all were for this very nice presentation by this WTO representative. In Salzburg they were listening too, though apparently not quite as well. Perhaps they were less smart? Or perhaps the performance was less clear? I have learned to enunciate. SLA-VE-RY. GAN-DHI. E-LEC-TRO-CU-TION. CW: What do you think these responses indicate about the mindset of the corporate man? Andy: Ready to goosestep. Fully in sync with the bottom line of the commanding operation. And not just the corporate man: the corporate woman, the academic man, the political woman, the alcoholic child. Many, many people, regardless of education, are easy prey for the ideas of the corporate decision-makers. Present them with a decision, they will accept it! This is why it is important for citizens to decide what sorts of corporate decisions are and are not acceptable. It is never possible to count on the highly educated to filter the okay from the rotten. It is not possible to expect that Ph.D.s will always be on the lookout for the fascist and murderous. Fortunately, it is possible to establish laws that regulate the behaviour of corporations and the like. That way, it is not necessary to rely on the alertness of Ph.D.s to yell when scary things get said. CW: Your speakers presumably circulate among the delegates after their presentations - what sort of reception do they get? Andy: Very friendly! Apple wine and pretzels! Hearty handshakes! Sometimes, great earnestness and desire to continue relations into the future between our camp and yours. Do you have a card? Here is mine. Let us read one another's position papers! I like you!  CW: What's your opinion of the mainstream media's response to
your actions?Andy: Very nice. We do what we do because we think it is very funny. Mike and I, we can laugh for hours about these things. We are really stupid that way. The mainstream press picks up on the funniness and transmits it, it may be what they like the best. But almost always the journalist gets the serious point too, and transmits it to the journalism-consuming consumer. CW: Has the WTO ever made any direct response to you? Andy: Not direct, but they have told at least two reporters (from Transfert, and from New York Times) that they 'deplore' us. 'Deplore'! Well, we deplore them! Those dumb-asses! Also, in Transfert, they suggested we should wear masks of Mike Moore's face and run around yelling angry epithets about him. That would be funny, they said. They are really stupid! CW: Is claiming to be a WTO official, a passport into any obscure corporate trade meeting? Can anyone do it? Andy: Sure!! WTO identity is not necessarily the only thing to do - it's also just as interesting to pass as any old corporate worker or manager. To do so you can just dress up real splendid-like and make up a history - no one ever asks for proof of identity at most things. Party-crashing, very fun. Can learn things and make points. It's like this urban exploration thing, where you climb into tunnels and go through buildings and so on, where you're not supposed to, so that you get a sense of what's behind things - you can do the same thing in society. Then you get a sense of how strange things are, a sense that most of those who are actually within the environment, no matter how smart they are, rarely get, because they're used to it. CW: Have you any measure to gauge the success of an action? do you get fan mail? Andy: Sure, lots of it, and that's a measure of success for us - shows us that the point we're making is coming across and people are inspired to do similar or parallel stuff. We also like to see how much press we get - if we get a lot, it must mean that a lot of reporters think we're as funny as we do! CW: And finally, in 25 words or less, your message to the anti-corporate anti-globalisation movement from your hideout in the depths of an almost extinct volcano: Andy: Well, just that the destruction of the Twin Towers shouldn't change things too much. It's going to confuse a lot of people - they're going to think that the freaks who dance around in the street to oppose the corporate takeover of society are the ones who crash planes into buildings. This seems like an obvious difference to us, but people will make the mistake. Nevertheless, the big picture hasn't really changed at all. It's just the first time that, in the war between the First and Third Worlds, the First World has been so horribly hit. The Third World has suffered many such devastating blows... | |||||||||
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