Cancun — Activists from all over the world converged on this
Mexican resort town to protest the latest meeting of the World
Trade Organization. Self-styled anarchists in black balaclavas
mingled with third world farmers, paid union activists, and
American college student Indymedia types with cellphones. Press
estimates put their numbers as high as 150,000, but by the time I
arrived Thursday, on the second day of talks, the anniversary of
September 11, the crowd must have shrunk considerably — maybe
15,000 still agitated for change. One taxi driver said that though
these protesters were bad, they were nowhere near as crazy as the
Spring Break crowd, which was ironic, considering that these
illegitimate spawn of Che Guevera actually meant to take
it to the streets.
I arrived there and joined a group from Bureaucrash, a motley assortment
of free market types, on a mission that was either Quixotic or
brilliant. We were there to protest the protesters. Through
pamphleteering, satire, and pure, sweet reason, we wanted to point
out to these so-called progressives the merits of free trade and
globalization, or at least get some good footage of them trying to
work out some of the contradictions in the tangled thicket of
anti-globalist agitprop they reflexively spewed.
Granted, the reason option was a long shot from the start. To
get an idea of how cra-a-azy some of these people were, consider:
The day before I arrived, South Korean farmer and union leader Lee
Kyung-Hae had climbed on top of a barricade with a sign that said,
“The WTO kills farmers” slung around his neck. Once he got the
crowd’s attention by brandishing a pocket knife, Lee stabbed
himself through the heart and bled and died not long thereafter in
the hospital. It was a publicity stunt gone badly wrong; one member
of Lee’s group told us, on camera, that he hadn’t intended to kill
himself and had done sort of thing before with only a flesh wound
to show for it. Maybe he got caught up in the moment.
The self-inflicted nature of Lee’s demise, however, did not stop
the protesters from claiming him as a martyr. His name became a
chant (“Lee! Lee! Lee!”) and his death an act of heroism for the
demonstrators who remained. They constructed an impromptu shrine,
complete with flowers and candles, to him at the edge of a traffic
circle just down from the barricades, and memorialized his name in
graffiti.
Not to speak ill of the dead, but Lee accidentally offed himself
in defense of a subsidy and tariff regime that is particularly
heinous. Korean rice farmers are both subsidized and sheltered from
foreign competition, with the end result of a local price of rice
four times as much as in the U.S., for a food that is a
staple of Asian cuisine. The farmers are made rich at the expense
of everyone else.
In fact, self-interest was a common thread among many
protesters. In the name of “fairness” many European unionists,
subsidized farmers, and various enviro types want to game the
system by attacking the international mediating institutions like
the WTO, that sometimes facilitate the freer flow of goods and
services. That the activists stand to benefit mightily from the
imposition of “fair trade” is true, but considered an obnoxious
observation. People convinced of their own virtue are not amused
when presented with irrefutable evidence of their own
hypocrisy.
Which is the niche that Bureaucrash was made to fill. For our
first “Crash,” we targeted the hotel where Heinrich Böll
Foundation representatives were staying. We hung fliers on every
door. These fliers pointed out that, while Böll
representatives were stumping for fair trade, including strict
labor standards and high wages, the maids in the hotel were working
for the equivalent of $6 a day. The fliers were meant to question
whether Böll and other “fair trade” NGO reps had negotiated a
higher price for their room, or left a giant tip, or had they
merely participated in the exploitation of these poor workers?
Fairness was the overriding concern for the folks marching to
the barricades, but no one really knew how to define or achieve it.
So we decided to set up a “fair trade soda stand” along the parade
route on Saturday. We offered Coke, Sprite, and water to the hot
and bothered activists. The catch was that they could choose from
two options: the free trade and the fair trade price. The sign for
the fair price (20 pesos) explained that the price included the
true cost of the drink plus: health care, environmental
protections, taxes and other welfareish provisions; while the free
trade price (5 pesos) included only the true cost of the
beverage.
At first, this enterprise drew a lot of very confused looks and
some yelling. But a few customers finally grew thirsty enough to
brave the looks the others were shooting at them. We made seven
sales — two at the fair trade price and five at the free trade
rate. Just as business was picking up, however, a young lady
approached us, read the sign, and promptly threw a hissy fit.
“You can’t be here; you’re misrepresenting what fair trade is!
It doesn’t involve products from multi-national corporations; you
have to have local diversity!” she seethed, while clutching her
Sony Handycam.
This drew the attention of the anarchist section of the parade.
Unlike the Nirvana cheerleaders, these lads, toting spray paint and
broom handles, didn’t seem too amused with our little beverage
stand. They formed a human trade barrier by encircling our booth,
holding hands, and glowering at us. At this point, we decided it
best to leave rather than risk reprisal.
Once we disbursed, I spent the rest of the day trailing the
march and the attack on the barricades. The anarchists had prepared
two battering rams, consisting of a telephone pole strapped to a
trash dumpster and a palm tree mounted on a Wal-Mart shopping cart.
However, the Koreans had brought a much more effective tool: ropes.
Like some kind of medieval army, they used the lines to pull down
the barricades and then the feces-tossing began. Activists
literally began hurling buckets of liquid waste at police officers,
and the scene, as they say, got ugly. And I got out of there.
Later, I saw a Mexican taxi with, “Visitors: Cancun is our home.
Please treat it with respect” stenciled on the rear window, and
they might have done well to heed that advice. The self-proclaimed
defenders of local peoples and supporters of fairness demonstrated
their love for the locals by trashing part of the city and spray
painting anti-WTO slogans all over homes and small businesses near
the parade route. One read “dinero = mierda.”
That the breakdown in this round of WTO talks coincided with the
fracas in the streets created a great sense of accomplishment for
the protesters but, in truth, the anti-globalization movement does
not garner nearly the support that it once did. In Seattle, it was
explosive. At the protests against the Free Trade Area of the
Americas Summit in Quebec, in the Spring of 2001, it was less
imposing but still impressive. But now it has been reduced to
ridiculous clichés, self-immolation, and the worst sort of
potty humor. That’s not a movement, it’s a cry for help.
