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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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National & Worldwide
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
independent bookstore. Starbucks Delocator Search that helps you locate locally owned alternatives to Starbucks
Media
The Independent Media Center is a network of collectively run media
outlets for the creation of radical, accurate, and passionate tellings of the truth Project of the Independent Media Institute, a nonprofit
organization dedicated to strengthening and supporting independent and
alternative journalism. The Electronic Frontier Foundation is the first to identify
threats to our basic rights online and to advocate on behalf of free expression
in the digital age. Declan
McCullagh's Politech Politech is the moderated mailing list of politics and technology.
Topics include privacy, free speech, the role of government and corporations,
antitrust, and more. MediaChannel.org The global network for democratic media.
PLUS the News Dissector's Weblog. CorpWatch.org counters corporate-led globalization through education,
network-building and activism.
[....] I may be a knucklehead and a hopeless idealist, but you'd have
to stick a gun in my jock to get me to enter a Sprawl-Mart. [....]
I needed some winter gear last week. Where did I buy it? At the
Army/Navy store in our downtown. I needed two spray bottles and a new
wood bit. Wanna guess where I got 'em at? Main Hardware. Near East
brand (the Cadillac of rice pilaf) rice pilaf and some Green Giant
canned veggies? BILO! And no, I didn't hand over any spare change out
front. Happy Meal for Gage? Downtown Wilkes-Barre. Chips Ahoy! for
Gage? Oh Yes on North Main street. Are they cheaper at Price Chopper?
YES! Do I shop there? NO! Automotive parts? A&A Auto! Downtown
Wilkes-Barre wins again! Toys for the kids in Iraq? Family Dollar!
Wilkes-Barre! And where does the mayor go to purchase Preparation H?
Wilkes-Barre Township! Sprawl-Mart! Whoops! Sorry. Forget I mentioned
it. The fact that the downtown doesn't vote slipped my mind. Then
again, the downtown voted a while ago. With it's feet.
Sprawl-Mart has those super low "slave labor" prices and we've
got a near empty downtown. Am I expecting too much from people?
Probably. [The new mayor] is committed to revitalizing our downtown,
but if we're going to continue to turn our back on it-it'll never come
back.
MediaChannel.org
