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What is a Whirl-Mart?
The action is comprised of a group of anti-shoppers ranging in size from 1 to 50 members. The ritual consists of activists/actors arriving at a Wal-Mart, Toys-R-Us or another chain superstore at 12-noon on the first Saturday or Sunday of the month and proceeding to push empty shopping carts slowly and silently through the aisles. Eventually, all of the participants locate one another and form a single-file chain of anti-shoppers which weaves, wanders, and whirls throughout the store for about an hour. It is a collective reclamation of space that is otherwise only used for buying and selling. It is a symbolic display of the will to resist the capitalist ideology.
'Whirl-Mart' is an experiment that can be approached from several different angles. As a work of art, it examines and blurs the boundaries that have been established between performance art, protest, living sculpture, and direct action. As an action of resistance, it utilizes the power of silence in occupying private consumer-dominated space with a symbolic spectacle. As a ceremony, it is a counter-ritual to shopping that transforms the super-store and its wall-to-wall array of products into a surreal and colorful cathedral. And what the heck-- it's just darned fun!
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Whirl-Mart Ritual Resistance International Whirl-Mart HQ World Changing Models, Tools, and Ideas for Building a Bright Green Future Critical Mass Critical Mass is not an organization, it's an unorganized
coincidence. It's a movement ... of bicycles, in the streets. Rev Billy's Church of Stop Shopping Lots of great scripts from/for performance interventions
with a heavy focus on Starbucks. Commerce
Jamming Commerce Jamming source page. AdBusters A global network of those who want to advance the new social
activist movement of the information age. Commercial Alert wants to keep commercial culture within
its proper sphere, and to prevent it from exploiting children and subverting
the higher values of family, community, environmental integrity and
democracy. No Media Kings Jim Munroe's guide to doin' it for yourself Booksense.com Internet book search that sends your order to your nearest
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PLUS the News Dissector's Weblog. CorpWatch.org counters corporate-led globalization through education,
network-building and activism.
[via CNN] About 75 percent of consumers surveyed shopped over the
weekend, starting with "Black Friday," the traditional kickoff to the
holiday shopping season and one of the busiest shopping days of the
year, the latest installment of the National Retail Federation's
Holiday Consumer Intentions and Actions survey said.
ShopperTrak RCT, which tracks retail data, said Saturday that Black Friday sales were up 12.3 percent from last year.
In its survey, ShopperTrak found that sales rose 9 percent Saturday
compared with the same day a year ago, bringing the two-day average
pace up 10.9 percent from the same days following Thanksgiving last
year. The two-day sales total rose to $12.6 billion from $11.4 billion
a year ago.
MediaChannel.org
