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June 20, 2007
Viva Vivoleum
Collective efforts to expose injustice and systemic hypocrisy manifest
in many different forms. Some people take to the street, others get
loud in the blogosphere, while the Yes Men head to the limelight, using
web- and email-based trickery to commit sensational acts of 'identity
correction,' capture media attention, and ultimately cast their
targeted subjects into dubious light. In the past, the Yes Men have
impersonated, representatives from Dow Chemical, McDonalds, and the
World Trade Organization. On June 14th, Yes Men Andy Bichlbaum and Mike
Bonanno struck again, taking the stage at Calgary's Gas and Oil
Exposition, as Shepard Wolff of the National Petroleum Council and
Florian Osenberg of Exxon Mobil. The featured speakers at the costly
keynote luncheon, Wolff and Osenberg discussed their plans for
Vivoleum, a new fuel made from the deceased human bodies of
climate-change casualties. Their message had a twisted logic that
doubled as harsh criticism of the oil industry: Vivoleum wouldn't help
the environment but would rather ensure the oil industry wouldn't dry
up. Wolff and Osenberg were forced off the stage after they began
playing a video detailing their first Vivoleum experiment. (See
'Tribute to Reggie,' as well as photos and press on their site.) Their
performance may not have saved the world from global warming, but it
has whipped the press into a frenzy of activity, and the Internet into
a cacophony of discussion. The Yes Men have proved, yet again, that two
regular guys can put a wrench in big power machinery, with the aid of
faked websites and rented suits. In the words of artist and Rhizomer
Pall Thayer, 'Viva Vivoleum!' - Lauren Cornell |
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