Hasta La Creative!

How to subvert business as usual.

We are in the midst of the 39th G8 Summit deep in the back woods of Northern Ireland, Fermanagh County. An unprecedented security operation was put into effect for this summit. Thousands of police officers circle the five-star hotel and golf resort where leaders of the world’s most powerful countries are meeting for two days to discuss the geopolitical problems they collectively face, all whilst sipping away at whiskey, or Guinness, and dining on Kilkeel crab salad and braised shin of Kettyle beef with violet artichokes.

Aring of police officers encircling the locale – carefully placed razor wire, 4-mile long metal fencing and surveillance drones – all work to create a land and air exclusion zone around the venue. To further deter any activists (that is, those few hard-cores who do somehow make it to the-middle-of-nowhere) from protesting, temporary detentions centres were built in Northern Ireland and special courts were set up with sixteen judges on standby. All of this and more just to instil fear in anyone who feels that discussions over the world’s most pressing issues should involve attention to the voices of many rather than an elite few.

When world leaders go to such great lengths to radically separate themselves from the people, when many seasoned activists are giving up protesting the G8 because they can’t even get within the vicinity … when the G8 spends 60 million British pounds to sit around, pontificate and maintain the status-quo whilst preventing us from challenging them with Orwellian levels of security and surveillance – what is left for we, the people to do?

We’re working hard to figure that out, but for the next two days, go to kickitover.org, find a poster, meme or image that hits you in the gut, print it and post it up somewhere where it counts. And if you’re an economics student, nail it to your prof’s door.

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