if you're not for ART, then you're for EVIL
if you read my blog with any frequency, you probably hate me by now because i have been updating so infrequently. i think it's perhaps too late to think about redeeming myself. i apologize. big-time. i'm fed up with the writing side of myself too, you're not alone.
so i have this thing about boycotting stores, corporations, labels, whatever, etc. i don't boycott much though. i don't buy dasani [coke] water because it has sodium in it; so it's like the oxymoron of hydration. but now coke owns odwalla, and odwalla, frankly, is pretty good [and so are odwalla bars i found out yesterday], so i don't really hate odwalla. or coke. i actually prefer coke over pepsi when feel like drinking cola. and it pairs up perfectly with whiskey, so you really couldn't ask for much more from a beverage, especially one that's brown. so no dasani, dasani bad. dasani isn't really a brand even, it's just some concoction we should call coke water. dasani's just a name. coke is the brand. the coporation. the mongul. mongul? the monster.
so. the only real, true, steadfast boycott i've sustained is against diesel. five or so years ago diesel had an ad campaign that went like "________ is now sponsored by diesel." the "_________" got filled in with various nouns, so the ads ended up having these bright, colorful pictures of people wearing diesel clothes and smiling with the slogan "freedom is now sponsored by diesel." or, "happiness is now sponsored by diesel." "pleasure is now sponsored by diesel." these slogans made me ranging wildbeast mad. wildebeest mad. like rabid. totally, totally rabid. [yes, i do admit i was reading adbusters religiously at the time, too.] i don't think i even really need to elucidate how terrible and ridiculous and reprehensible it is for a brand of clothing to act like it can/will/should facilitate capital-"X" [ok, kinda--see plato's theory of forms] aspects of the human experience like Happiness, Freedom, &tc. but! clothes and consumerism and all that shit does bring people lots of happiness [myself certainly not excluded], so who am i to criticize? PLUS, it's marketing. marketing doing EXACTLY what it's meant to do. look -- it's YEARS later, and i gave up 15 minutes of my life and about 100 words just to rant about it on my fucking BLOG. the bottom line is i never have bought diesel anything, and i never will. i'm not quite the steadfast wildebeest [how much do you love that that word is spelled with two e's?] i was in my younger days, but now it's become a habit of mine to not consider diesel as a viable option for clothing myself. EVER.
so i lied. big-time. i've never been to wal-mart ever ever in my life, and the last several years have been out of boycott and not out of happenstance. wal-mart blows, and if you haven't realized this or why wal-mart blows by now, here is some reading ---> here. so i've never stepped into a wal-mart, ever, and i swore to never do so BUT! but...there's a problem. about a month or so ago i started knitting cotton waRshcloths from the new mason-dixon knitting book [check out the fantastic knit-a-long blog ---> here], and the cotton yarn they use [peaches and creme, if anyone's actually paying atttention] is ONLY available in stores around here at...wal-mart. [i just found that someone wrote this on the that blog: "Many folks seem to find Peaches at Wal-Mart, but I don't shop there on principle."] yep. ok. sure, there are other cotton yarns, and i have been using them. i have! it's just that...i know that this yarn at wal-mart is better, i've seen it written about. and i know for SURE that there are better colors and more selection than the yarn i've been working with. but! to step into wal-mart?! well, not only step in the store, but actually PURCHASE [read: support EVIL] from wal-mart? this is a difficult quandary. so it is washcloths or wal-mart? ART or EVIL? am i willing to forgoe my principles for the sake of art [yes, this knitting is ART]? am i lame if i do? how lame? who's counting? just me? isn't there an all-knowing boycott higher power up in the sky keeping tabs on who is supporting what corporations and who is voraciously NOT?
so i have this thing about boycotting stores, corporations, labels, whatever, etc. i don't boycott much though. i don't buy dasani [coke] water because it has sodium in it; so it's like the oxymoron of hydration. but now coke owns odwalla, and odwalla, frankly, is pretty good [and so are odwalla bars i found out yesterday], so i don't really hate odwalla. or coke. i actually prefer coke over pepsi when feel like drinking cola. and it pairs up perfectly with whiskey, so you really couldn't ask for much more from a beverage, especially one that's brown. so no dasani, dasani bad. dasani isn't really a brand even, it's just some concoction we should call coke water. dasani's just a name. coke is the brand. the coporation. the mongul. mongul? the monster.
so. the only real, true, steadfast boycott i've sustained is against diesel. five or so years ago diesel had an ad campaign that went like "________ is now sponsored by diesel." the "_________" got filled in with various nouns, so the ads ended up having these bright, colorful pictures of people wearing diesel clothes and smiling with the slogan "freedom is now sponsored by diesel." or, "happiness is now sponsored by diesel." "pleasure is now sponsored by diesel." these slogans made me ranging wildbeast mad. wildebeest mad. like rabid. totally, totally rabid. [yes, i do admit i was reading adbusters religiously at the time, too.] i don't think i even really need to elucidate how terrible and ridiculous and reprehensible it is for a brand of clothing to act like it can/will/should facilitate capital-"X" [ok, kinda--see plato's theory of forms] aspects of the human experience like Happiness, Freedom, &tc. but! clothes and consumerism and all that shit does bring people lots of happiness [myself certainly not excluded], so who am i to criticize? PLUS, it's marketing. marketing doing EXACTLY what it's meant to do. look -- it's YEARS later, and i gave up 15 minutes of my life and about 100 words just to rant about it on my fucking BLOG. the bottom line is i never have bought diesel anything, and i never will. i'm not quite the steadfast wildebeest [how much do you love that that word is spelled with two e's?] i was in my younger days, but now it's become a habit of mine to not consider diesel as a viable option for clothing myself. EVER.
so i lied. big-time. i've never been to wal-mart ever ever in my life, and the last several years have been out of boycott and not out of happenstance. wal-mart blows, and if you haven't realized this or why wal-mart blows by now, here is some reading ---> here. so i've never stepped into a wal-mart, ever, and i swore to never do so BUT! but...there's a problem. about a month or so ago i started knitting cotton waRshcloths from the new mason-dixon knitting book [check out the fantastic knit-a-long blog ---> here], and the cotton yarn they use [peaches and creme, if anyone's actually paying atttention] is ONLY available in stores around here at...wal-mart. [i just found that someone wrote this on the that blog: "Many folks seem to find Peaches at Wal-Mart, but I don't shop there on principle."] yep. ok. sure, there are other cotton yarns, and i have been using them. i have! it's just that...i know that this yarn at wal-mart is better, i've seen it written about. and i know for SURE that there are better colors and more selection than the yarn i've been working with. but! to step into wal-mart?! well, not only step in the store, but actually PURCHASE [read: support EVIL] from wal-mart? this is a difficult quandary. so it is washcloths or wal-mart? ART or EVIL? am i willing to forgoe my principles for the sake of art [yes, this knitting is ART]? am i lame if i do? how lame? who's counting? just me? isn't there an all-knowing boycott higher power up in the sky keeping tabs on who is supporting what corporations and who is voraciously NOT?
posted by margaret @ 1:05 PM
2 Comments:
At 13 June, 2006 15:50,
Anonymous said…
It's a moral judgement you have to make, no one is watching, no one is keeping tabs. The best thing you can do is place yourself in someone else's position and think about your yarn. How was that yarn made? Who did you buy it from? Who did you buy it from? Are those circumstances and conditions that you would be able to accept?
It's less about boycotting walmart and more about supporting business and practices that you agree with.
At 22 June, 2008 19:54,
Anonymous said…
The Diesel ads were satirizing corporate sponsorship. When you got all angry about them, you completely missed the point they were making. Congratulations.
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