Designing Action to Subvert Spectacle
Turn Your Back on Bush: Resisting the “Mandate” Meme
Action Mill
Washington, DC
The Problem: After the 2004 presidential election, the administration was crowing about Bush’s “mandate,” despite a razor thin margin and widespread accounts of voter disenfranchisement in places like Ohio and Florida. The January 2005 inauguration was heating up as a key point of intervention to protest Bush’s flawed policies, but the entire route of his inaugural procession was to be militarized with police and secret service, which were to prevent ‘demonstrators’ from participating in the ceremonies.
The Solution: Turn Your Back on Bush – an elegant nonviolent direct action to show mass opposition to Bush and challenge the spectacle of the inauguration by having key constituencies turn their backs on the parade.
The Strategy: Mobilize people from all walks of life to come to Washington, line the parade route, and symbolically turn their backs on the motorcade. The story was one of a grassroots response to a regime claiming to represent the consensus of a deeply divided country in the midst of war. The outreach and organizing targeted the constituencies that Bush was claiming to have: Veterans, firefighters, military families, and others. The media strategy amplified these voices, and spread the meme to “Turn Your Back” when Bush appeared elsewhere.
smartMeme’s Role:smartMeme was immediately excited about the idea of “Turn Your Back on Bush,” as a great example of “Direct Action at the Point of Assumption” and a “Meme campaign.” The action targeted the assumption of “mandate,” and withdrew legitimacy and consent from the spectacle of power. It also had a memetic effect, with activists as far away as London replicating the action at 10 Downing Street. SmartMeme’s role was to support the action with media strategy, action design, and messaging.
The Result: 5,000 people participated by turning their backs on the parade. The meme spread and people turned their backs as Bush traveled the nation touting his social security plan. The action received major media coverage on every continent (except Antarctica) and was featured on shows like BBC World News and even entered pop culture consciousness by being the subject of a skit on Saturday Night Live: