The Yes Men have struck again (photos, videos, and links):
Imposters posing as ExxonMobil and National Petroleum Council (NPC) representatives delivered an outrageous keynote speech to 300 oilmen at GO-EXPO, Canada’s largest oil conference, held at Stampede Park in Calgary, Alberta, today [June 14, 2007].
The speech was billed beforehand by the GO-EXPO organizers as the major highlight of this year’s conference, which had 20,000 attendees. In it, the “NPC rep” was expected to deliver the long-awaited conclusions of a study commissioned by US Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman. The NPC is headed by former ExxonMobil CEO Lee Raymond, who is also the chair of the study. (See link at end.)
In the actual speech, the “NPC rep” announced that current U.S. and Canadian energy policies (notably the massive, carbon-intensive exploitation of Alberta’s oil sands, and the development of liquid coal) are increasing the chances of huge global calamities. But he reassured the audience that in the worst case scenario, the oil industry could “keep fuel flowing” by transforming the billions of people who die into oil.
As Jon puts it on the heads list:
The Yes men have consistently found some of the best ways to deal with hard hitting topics. Their use of humor to humiliate organizations is brilliant, and we should all be thankful to them. If only there was more of this going on. It seems that the use of truthful information and satire against blatantly assholic organizations really has potential (especially when it’s directed at a large group of their sheep).
Or, as Marissa succintly puts it:
These guys don’t fuck around, and they are smart and hilarious to boot.
I first came across the Yes Men at an art exhibit at MASS MoCA. They were running a video projector of The Yes Men documentary. In it, the Yes Men give a talk at a WTO “future of textiles” meeting in Finland. During the talk, Andy tears of his velcro-seemed business suit to reveal a golden body suit. A large golden phallus inflates from between his legs (at the exhibit, they had the suit fitted on a mannequin with phallus constantly inflating and deflating). The phallus sends signals to devices implanted in the textile workers anuses and gives immediate feedback to the boss donning the suit. It’s one of the funniest and smartest actions I’ve ever seen.
For a limited time, ballistichelmet is now hosting the movie for your viewing pleasure.
Jon also pointed out a recent documentary, Bringing Down A Dictator, he saw on the student movement Otpor (Serbian for “Resistance”) that helped bring down Milosevic in 2000 using humor and satire in a similar way to the Yes Men.
A few more links to Yes Men videos (thanks to Jon):
- Democracy Now! video - The Yes Men have struck again. On Tuesday, a man claiming to be a representative of Halliburton gave a presentation at the “Catastrophic Loss” conference at the Ritz-Carlton in Amelia Island, Florida. Conference attendees include leaders from the insurance industry. We speak with the Yes Men’s Andy Bichlbaum, who took part in the hoax. (transcript).
- This is a little satire from the Yes Men fooling around and seeing if people will sign a petition in favour of preemptively annulling all gay marriages. very funny!
- The Yes Men strike again. Impersonating a Dow Chemical spokesman on BBC, “Jude Finisterra” promises a huge compensation for the thousands of victims of the Bhopal disaster in which Dow Chemical’s subsidiary Union Carbide India was responsible for in 1984.
- The Yes Men Andy Bichlbaum is interviewed after the media finds out about his Dow Chemical impersonation
- The Yes men and their take on the oil industry.
Again I am reminded of the situationalist spirit and the book Lipstick Traces seems all the more relevant to the best of today’s activism.
