Buy Nothing Day - Melbourne, Australia 26th November 2004

News


Date: 26/11/2004

Report from Melbourne Buy Nothing Day!

The day began very early for jammer Paul. The breakfast host on a major AM talk station (774 ABC Melbourne) was the one major media outlet to show an interest in our press release. The host conducted an extremely sympathetic telephone discussion with Jammer Paul for over five minutes - more free publicity than we could possibly have hoped for. This was at 7.10 am, much earlier than the interviewee is usually articulate!

A varied group of six to twelve jammers spent the afternoon at a table by the front doors of the biggest department store in the city. This store (Myers, Melbourne) has a "tradition" of putting on a display of animated Christmas themed diorama things in its front windows - the kids drag their parents there to see the windows, then drag them inside to buy the associated toys! Our sound system was just loud enough to drown out the infuriating music that accompanied this polluting of children's imagination's.

Our arrival was greeted by six to eight cops and a police car (parked in the pedestrian mall). They clearly expected some kind of blockade. They lost interest and left when it was clear we were the law-abiding citizens we all, coincidentally, are.

Our arrival also clearly prompted calls from the department store to the local city council. At least four of their "public space" officials turned up, made mobile calls, watched us, etc. Wešd had no less than three separate conversations with said city council's public permits department. Each time, the answer was the same - "We don't know how to classify you, so we can't give you a permit. But we also can't stop you, so long as you're not blocking pedestrian movement and aren't littering." Easy. So the city official types, after telling us to turn the music down, also lost interest and left.

Rounds one and two to the jammers!

We handed out something like 800 leaflets to perplexed shoppers. We had to rush off and to another print run - thanks Environment Victoria! The aim of the day was to spread the word, but also where possible cut up the credit cards of random strangers. This proved harder than we expected - seems the locals LOVE their credit cards. The suggestion that we cut them up was often greeted with something like genuine horror. None the less, we managed to take $38,000 worth of credit out of circulation. Each cutting was video taped and greeted with much cheering. A large number of shoppers were interviewed and videoed by jammer Eva, about their shopping and how good it felt to cut up their cards.

Most memorable card cutter was the wheel-chair bound woman who'd heard about us on a mailing list several steps removed from us, and came down especially. Three grand she owed on the thing, thanks to us she at least won't acquire an more debt.

Pinking sheers, part of a dress makers tool-kit, are great for cutting up credit cards. They have a crinkly blade which gives the card parts a spiky edge.

We received a great deal of encouragement from everyone who stopped by to see what the fuss was about. And a few weird questions like "What'll it cost me?" And "What does Buy Nothing mean?"

What does every event like this need? That's right, shopping Zombies. We had at least seven participants don white makeup and wander the streets and shops around the mall. I can report with pride that they were thrown out of the Nike store, the David Jonešs store (another large department store) and possibly Myers as well. Weird what some makeup and some anti-consumption leaflets will do to store security staff. Environment Victoria also provided masked shoppers with bags full of nothing who paraded the mall for some time, attracting people in our direction.

The day was rounded off by the arrival of the Dresses of Mass Seduction, an extremely hairy troop of men in dresses singing appropriately parodied songs - "I Bought Some More and the Store Won" to the tune of "I Fought the Law" for example. Naturally, this attracted quite a crowd, who were then all handed leaflets and encouraged towards the people with the scissors.

It seemed like the day for protesting in the Mall, with two other groups setting up, at least briefly, within sight of us. We exchanged greetings and the odd pamphlet.

We encountered one minor celebrity, John Safron (minor TV star, has produced and stared in a couple of hilarious documentary series) who just happened to walk past. He spent all of five minutes keeping us company before wandering off again.

Other media: Community television station Channel 31 interviewed one of the organisers, and one of the commercial networks sent down a camera, but werenšt actually interested in hearing us talk. The cameraman was suitably impressed however, wished he had his credit cards with him.

It's amazing what about ten people can pull together in a little less than four weeks. Once we pooled our resources, we had everything we needed to get some awareness happening in this town. As far as we know, previous years BND's in Melbourne have consisted of press releases, some postering and a small amount of street theatre. This is the first time an event like this has taken place in this town. We all came together via the Adbusters mailing lists, some finding that site via the site for the film the corporation.

Huge thanks to Jammers George, Ben, Sam, Geoff, Josh and Eva, wešre made a great start here.

Jammer Paul.


Date: 22/11/2004

All Stands in Readiness.

Flyers have been printed, tables located, zombies recruited, t-shirt printed, press releases created and distributed, and the website finally spell checked. Are we all ready to be buying nothing?

Tune to 774 AM ABC Melbourne Friday 26th November at around 6.30-6.45am during the latter part of Red Symons show to hear one of the organisers interviewed.


Date: 15/11/2004

ACF, Environment Victoria, Friends of the Earth and a bunch of Zombies...

Vigorous activist Ben has been chatting to the peak environment lobbies around the place, and they're all interested!

Everything is on track for the activities of the day - including the probably appearance of a bunch of shopping zombies... If you'd like to be a zombie, drop us a line...

Student Youth Radio Station SYN-FM will be interviewing one of the organisers at 4pm, Wednesday the 17th o' November. Tune them in on 90.7 FM!

The ball is rolling...


Date: 13/11/2004

Progress!

Well, a lot has been happening. The Dresses of Mass Seduction have a new show planned for BND. Our friends at Friends of the Earth are on board, and our ranks are swelling.


Date: 14/11/2004 - Sunday 4.30pm

Second Meeting

Our next meeting is planned for Sunday 14th of November, 4.30pm at the same great pub. If you'd like to join us, getting onto the mailing list via the Contacts page.


Date: 31/10/2004

First Meeting

A core group of four people gathered together at a Melbourne pub to discuss doing something for BND here in Melbourne. We decided to:
  • Create Posters, Fliers etc for BND
  • Contact media outlets about the day, try and get the word out
  • Spread the viral meme that people should challenge themselves to go 24 without buying a thing
  • And decided to follow the lead of a number of other groups around the world and hold a Credit Card Cutting event in the CBD.


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