Buy Nothing Day – 24th November 2007 — Steal Something Day

The last Sat­ur­day of Novem­ber sees Inter­na­tion­al Buy Noth­ing Day tak­ing place in many cor­ners of the globe; par­tic­u­lar­ly the afflu­ent cor­ners!

This year Buy Noth­ing Day will be marked in Birm­ing­ham city cen­tre by a num­ber of activ­i­ties aimed at rais­ing the pro­file of a range of aspects asso­ci­at­ed with mass con­sumerism.

Sev­er­al groups will be putting togeth­er Buy Noth­ing Day themed stalls, dis­plays and events, includ­ing a San­ta Claus parade, Free Shops, Free Food, Bicy­cle-pow­ered Free Drinks and (free) Music.

If you have any­thing to give away for free, be it pos­ses­sions, ideas or skills then leave your mon­ey at home and get out­side to enjoy a con­sump­tion free day.
Buy Noth­ing Day aims to chal­lenge con­sumer lifestyles on envi­ron­men­tal, human rights and polit­i­cal grounds, but if you have oth­er rea­sons to “Stop Shop­ping” then Sat­ur­day 24th would be an ide­al time to tell the world about them.

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Come down to the peace gar­dens in man­ches­ter at 11 am. There will be a free stall and loads of info and music etc. Rhythms of Resis­tance band have organ­ised this plus a cou­ple of small tables and a web­site for free things — all addi­tions wel­come.
www.freemanchester.org .In the after­noon oth­er things are planned for after the Karen Reiss­man demo so it would be great to see you all any­time from eleven.

Any free stuff or info about free events or peo­ple want­i­ng to do mini work­shops would be very wel­come.

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Sat­ur­day 24th Novem­ber. Get stuff you want for free! Give your old stuff away!
Don’t throw away things that could be use­ful to others…freecycle them! Bring things to give away, and pick up some­thing for your­self or for Christ­mas gifts…for free!
10.30am to 12.30pm The Southville Cen­tre, Beauley Road, Bris­tol BS3 1QG.
Event organ­ised by Tran­si­tion Bris­tol www.transitionbristol.org & Freecy­cle Ash­ton Bed­min­ster & Southville
http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/freecycleashtonbedminstersouthville
This event coin­cides with Nation­al Buy Noth­ing Day
www.buynothingday.co.uk

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Buy Noth­ing Day: Con­sumer Zom­bie Flash­mob

Broad­mead (junc­tion of Mer­chant St and Broad­mead), Bris­tol, 2pm, Sat­ur­day 24th Novem­ber

This Novem­ber, envi­ron­men­tal­ists, social activists and con­cerned cit­i­zens in as many as 65 coun­tries will hit the streets for a 24-hour con­sumer fast in cel­e­bra­tion of the 15th annu­al Buy Noth­ing Day.

Fea­tured in recent years by the likes of CNN, MSNBC, Wired, the BBC, USA Today, The Age and the CBC, the inter­na­tion­al event has been gain­ing main­stream momen­tum as the cli­mate cri­sis dri­ves aver­age peo­ple to seek out green­er alter­na­tives to unre­strained con­sump­tion.

Timed to coin­cide with one of the busiest shop­ping days on the retail cal­en­dar, as well as the unof­fi­cial start of the inter­na­tion­al hol­i­day-shop­ping sea­son, Buy Noth­ing Day has tak­en many shapes, from relaxed fam­i­ly out­ings, to free, non-com­mer­cial street par­ties, to polit­i­cal­ly charged pub­lic protests. Any­one can take part pro­vid­ed they spend a day with­out spend­ing.

In past years, street activists have proven par­tic­u­lar­ly imag­i­na­tive in their cel­e­bra­tions, bring­ing zom­bie march­es, cred­it-card cut-ups, and shopa­holic clin­ics to malls and pub­lic squares in an effort to expose the envi­ron­men­tal and social con­se­quences of First World over-con­sump­tion.

Kalle Lasn is the co-founder of the Adbusters Media Foun­da­tion, the orga­ni­za­tion respon­si­ble for launch­ing Buy Noth­ing Day as a year­ly, glob­al event. He explains that while most par­tic­i­pants used to see the day sim­ply as an escape from the mar­ket­ing mind games and fran­tic con­sumerism that have come to char­ac­ter­ize mod­ern life, the focus has since shift­ed in light of the new polit­i­cal mood sur­round­ing cli­mate change.

“So much empha­sis,” he notes, “has been placed on buy­ing car­bon off­sets and com­pact flu­o­res­cent light­bulbs and hybrid cars that we are los­ing sight of the core cause of our envi­ron­men­tal prob­lems: we con­sume far too much.”

“Buy Noth­ing Day isn’t just about chang­ing your rou­tine for one day. It’s about start­ing a last­ing lifestyle com­mit­ment. With over six bil­lion peo­ple on the plan­et, it is the respon­si­bil­i­ty of the most afflu­ent – the upper 20% that con­sumes 80% of the world’s resources – to set out on a new path.”

Last year, Bris­tol Uni­ver­si­ty and UWE Peo­ple and Plan­et activists worked togeth­er to cre­ate a per­for­ma­tive and cre­ative way to cel­e­brate Buy Noth­ing Day, bring­ing the undead to the streets of broad­mead to par­o­dy the way in which first world over con­sump­tion is unques­tion­ing­ly march­ing towards eco­log­i­cal and social dis­as­ter.

This year on Novem­ber 24th join the zom­bie con­sumers as they stag­ger and stum­ble around Bris­tol’s soul­less retail dis­trict in an attempt to make peo­ple think about their con­sumer habits in an enter­tain­ing and enjoy­able way.

Rumours abound of pos­si­ble undead orches­tras and ghoul­ish cir­cus per­form­ers…

But as is the case with any flash­mob… no one quite knows what will hap­pen until it emerges and self-organ­is­es itself into exis­tence.

For videos doc­u­ment­ing last year’s BND actions check out

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=wlMMaLqxXng

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=wlMMaLqxXng
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Steal Some­thing Day for the orig­i­nal call-out and cri­tique of Buy Noth­ing Day