TOTW: Branding®

two middle fingers up at normie society!

Topic of the Week- In 2001, FRONTLINE (PBS) released a documentary titled “The Merchants of Cool,” which examined the tactics, techniques, and cultural ramifications of marketing directed towards teenagers as they look for their identity in society(!). These media moguls, executives, marketers, and cultural critics spend their days examining the streets, schools, malls, and the Internet to find the next big thing to market for billions of dollars a year. With adolescents as the most lucrative demographic in the USA, the documentary questions if it is actually the kids making these choices or if their desires are being manufactured by corporate America. This week we’re taking a look at the branding and rebranding of anarchist ideas.

One recent example from popular culture of rebranding is that of RadioShack. The rebranding has taken many steps, but this past week “[t]he 100-year-old retailer reintroduced itself on Twitter with a stream of often-profane tweets — some since deleted — filled with crude comments and drug references.” Their chief marketing officer goes on to say, "It's our voice, a new voice, one for the people." "RadioShack's audience used to be only an older demographic, but as times have changed and e-commerce has taken over, the old voice of RadioShack is no longer relevant."

Closer to home, do you think anarchists have “rebranded” the most beautiful idea to change with the times to attract new people, clarify their ideas, or have their “anarchist” project be more attractive to those with capital? One brief example is that of anti-civ ideas and how some like Kevin Tucker have now created a new word in the anarchist lexicon to describe their views. It’s not anti-civ, “anarcho-primitivism” (which was already really frowned upon), or green anarchy anymore, but the new primal anarchy. What are other examples of this from the anarchist space?

Do you think anarchy has an image problem? If so how do anarchists change this image and rebrand (admittedly a gross marketing term) to make sure more comuniqués are being signed by "- some anarchists," and our ideas reach a wider audience? Or do anarchists just keep doing what they're doing and raise two middle fingers up at normie society?

This week, we are also including a challenge to make a meme where you create an ad for your own brand of anarchy or logo redesign and upload it to Anokchan with the tag “branding.” Then drop a link in the comments here along with your reply.

There are 36 Comments

No, i don't think anarchy has an image problem.
Anarchy has an understanding problem. As in, a lot of people who think they want to be anarchists seem to think anarchy is just one thing — either mayhem or "all the good things" or direct democracy or something along those lines, like it pisses off one's parents.

Once most of those people find out freedom is more than aesthetic, that it requires something else from us, those who want the simple aesthetic brand of anarchy fall away, or become alphabet soup commies or Republicans.

So, maybe that is a branding issue, because it is hard to sell something that takes effort over the easy slap a circle a on it and call it anarchy path. & it is hard to sell what isn't for sale and can't be bought. Anarchy has to be stolen from the gods.

"one" can be a useful way to refer to a person unit.

as you were...

First they came for the oogles. Back in July of 2002, a year after releasing “Evasion” by Mac – CrimethInc. wrote:

“All traveler kids purged from CrimethInc. membership: Dispatch from the CrimethInc. Central Committee for immediate release” found here:
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/crimethinc-all-traveler-kids-pur...

In part of their dispatch relevant to this TOTW, it reads:

“The Stalinists, Surrealists, Situationists, and even Southern Baptists all had their bloody purges and internal dissensions, so why can’t we, too? Having no membership should be no obstacle: we can still hold exclusions from time to time, just to be sure everyone remembers. These are festive occasions for us weathered politicos, analogous to the subtextual backbiting at the dinner parties of the bourgeoisie or the witch trials in the Salem, Massachusetts of old.”

Purging all oogles from their anarchy seems very much like a professional rebranding effort that slowly turned their project into more of what CrimethInc. has become known for today, exactly 20 years later.

yeah but like ... are you saying DON'T purge the oogles?

i say this as an aging oogle with a lot of internalized self loathing.
you know how many other oogles spent my last $50 and then broke my heart?! more than two!

oogles are an important part of the anarchist eco-system. and are not the only ones who break hearts.

spoken like an oogle heartbreaker!

alright fine, obviously this is about how I was 20 and being an idiot with my last $50. called out. whatever tho.

Oogles are great reminders to have around. Reminders of what we might become if we stop being anarchists and resign ourselves to suckling on society's teet while spanging from techbros to buy dope instead of food for our malnourished dogs.

yeah sure ayn rand, cuz poverty is about resignation. shouldn't you be watching The Secret whole you blow steven pinkerton?

It seems that lumpy thinks oogles live in poverty involuntarily and aren't trustifarians living that way voluntarily. So naive.

ha! have you folks slept through the events of the last 20 years or what? that's a pretty 90s era thing ... when the western equivalent of hypernormalization still allowed us to entertain these prejudices about voluntary coolkid poverty tourism? as if that's anything but a snarky remark about aesthetics?

most of the former middle classes are just actually poor or choking on debt now, what's more, the economic data strongly suggests that most of those hobo kids weren't "trustifarians", that was just neoliberalism starting to bite. low wages, shitty jobs, the dream had already soured so who's being naive?

i mean, sure, i've met a few rich kids in disguise but so what? not the real issue.

Poverty is in the eye of the impoverished, its a subjective call ol' boy!
I have absolutely a fortune of experience and ideas to furnish my spontaneous tenure upon this sacred earth,,,

Yes let's figure out how to better appeal to normie society! What a stupid fucking topic. This is almost as stupid as Kevin Tucker coming up with "Primal" anarchy after seeing "Primal Beef Jerky" while standing in line at the grocery store with a cart full of snack cakes . Instead of stupid things like rebranding and calling for memes why not stop being such normies and be anarchists and call for anarchy?

"call for anarchy?" how are the 5 anarchists in my town going to accomplish anything at all by calling for anarchy?

yes, "branding" is a dumb word, but the point, and question, is: "how do we make new anarchists?"

hermit anarchism goes nowhere.

other people exist

LOL. What are you trying to accomplish? Where are you trying to go? Do you think if you meme and market hard enough the 5 anarchists in your town can amass 5 more anarchists from other towns and then successfully anarchy the whole continent? There’s plenty of anarchy you 5 can do right now where you are. Have a picnic. Start a fire. Drive a truck into a cop station in Minecraft.

i agree 'hermit anarchism' goes nowhere but actually most things 'go nowhere' so whatever.

to me what's important for anarchists to do is find those who share their desires and then collab with them as a means of building (destructive) capacity.

anarchy isn't a religion we need to prosletyze or a product we need to sell. those who don't see the importance of tearing down and/or burning this disgusting world can go on having kids, voting etc. freedom of association.

i hate this whole 'activist' paradigm where the pinnacle of political action is to 'organize' others aka plead with them to act in their own best interest. fucking pathetic. propaganda is fine but imo anarchy doesn't need better branding just more fanatical adherents.

bold action is the best way to expand others' limited sense of possibility, but imo it's also the best way to do anarchy

the desire to fuck and nurture children isn't something that can be done away with, and as far as being "fanatical", everyone is going to compromise in some way or another. Unfortunately we've mostly been robbed of the ability to live without $$$

"the desire to fuck and nurture children isn't something that can be done away with"

Of course when you don't question your inculcated desires they can't be easy to be done away with. Like the very fact you're associating "fucking" with "having kids", or the idea of making love as requiring literal "fucking"... These are all made-up robotic patterns you get from society at a young age.

Making babies ain't wrong, sure, but making them just because "desire" is fucking dumb irresponsive. This is a living human being you're birth to... and one you'll need to take care of for at least 20 years, damit.

however, i do have to work around the fact that i have sexual desires, and expecting people to stop wanting to have "irresponsible sex" or have children (yes, they are both related, you can call it fucking, love making, whatever). It's not simply "free choice", humans aren't above animals.

There's a simple zen methodology of dealing with the suppressed frustration that voluntary celebates suffer which was known to be practised by ancient folk, its the sacred act called onanism, a wonderful natural method of birth control banned by the +tian churchianity institution. I am an expert in this ancient art. Enjoy!

This is the great anarchist news content I am here for. Good work, bros/broettes.

And yet unlike other animals their sexual desires are at least partly emanating from a system of representations and codification. What makes you gay or hetero is another story, maybe more related to genes.

Also "desiring" does not make you fuck. It relies on complicated socio-linguistic games to get there, that change from one culture to another... and just think of the headache of desiring someone who doesn't speak any of the languages you know!

Yes, unlikely to happen unless you go Trump or Kevin Spacey on them...

during my social adventures I have met people who can more or less "just get there", who are very straightforward and just people for permission. That's quick route to get past the word games and into the body language games.

Your analysis reminds of the book "sex, drugs, and cocoa puffs", the guy talks about how his dating life depends on pretending be one of the famous actors the adults from the 90s and early 00s would have been into.

I somewhat look like him but...

I used the direct approach quite a few times but can't help feeling was too directed if not rapey. So I then supposed it's more a thing for young cocky dudes with little self-awareness or at least are okay asking someone straight up if they "wanna cunny" or a "fuck in the pussy"?

Yes of course! When I approach attractive people I always make sure to unzip and show my credentials before making a specific offer.

But no, being a wild mountain feral I prefer letting my pheromones play the harp and also not change clothes too much.

Noooo! You're all just fragments of my endless imagination.

Nooo, actually you are The Great Onanist! Be proud of your wankability!

obviously there are positive things about talking to new people, and figuring out what is appealing to more people vs what is a developed taste (to use a metaphor).

also obviously there are positive things to talking to each other (for some value of "each other") and developing trails of thought that are more focused (focusing on the developed and developing tastes, to continue that metaphor).

and also obviously there's a lot of room in between those two poles (to abandon the metaphor completely) that is also usefully and interestingly explored.

can we take all that for granted and talk about when one track or another is better or worse? and better or worse for what?

kthnxbai

anarchist adjacent beliefs are often attributed to the villains in mass media, almost always paired with a psychopathy that has to do with past trauma (the bad guy became evil because he was rejected from mainstream society!) Uncoupling those ideals from silly revenge fantasies is the difficult part. "I'm not crazy, but..."

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