Category Trouble
UK GOVT SAYS I’M AN “EXTREMIST”
Novara has reported that John Woodcock AKA Lord Walney, the government’s nominally “independent” advisor on political extremism, sent a dossier to the home secretary, following allegations of abuse during the general election, which included my “Vote for Genocide” poster as an example of a “concerted campaign by extremists”. You can still download the poster for free from my website here.
DAILY MAIL / UK LAWYERS FOR ISRAEL
According to the Daily Mail I’ve been reported to the British police by “UK Lawyers for Israel” for designing the BDS supermarket labels (available to download and print here). Y’know how you wait ages for one awful institution full of bastards to have a go and then three come along at once? I only just found out about this today since the Daily Mail article came out on Xmas eve. The police haven’t been in touch yet although I don’t really expect anything to come from it. This “UK Lawyers for Israel” is the same group that campaigned to have artwork made by Gazan children removed from a London hospital (see below). Which apparently they were “delighted to report”. And the same group who invited extremists from pro-illegal settler campaign group Regavim to speak in the UK. According to PSC, Regavim was cofounded by an Israeli government MP who is “notorious for homophobic remarks, describing LGBT+ Jews as “beasts”, defended violence by Jewish settlers against Palestinians and suggested that Ahed Tamimi, then a 17 year old Palestinian girl arrested for preventing an Israeli soldier illegally entering her home, should be shot in the knee caps.” Well they certainly all sound like lovely people have a firm grasp of the difference between right and wrong. This has all given me a nudge to get more labels available for download, which I’ll be doing this week! I’ll post about them in my story. I’m also now posting updates on my artwork and links in my new Telegram channel.
NAUGHTY LIST
It’s nice to know that an evil corporation has to take at least some time out of its busy schedule to deal with my bullshit. Check out my Shell greenwashing work here.
CEASE AND DESIST
I’ve received a cease-and-desist letter from Shell demanding I remove these apocalypse-related products from my website within 7 days. This seems like pretty clear retaliation for the recent Shell greenwashing subvertising campaign my work was in, organised by Brandalism. I’m lucky enough to have free legal support from The Satanic Temple, London & UK so I’m going to see if I can fight it but I’m not optimistic. So I reckon you have a week to buy these up before they disappear from my website forever💀👍. All funds raised will go towards utterly pissing off Shell forever.
TABLOID FURY
On Sunday I had a stall of my work at Momentum’s The World Transformed arts and politics festival at The Black-E in Liverpool. Some of my anti-army recruitment work was on display: ‘Join the Army‘ and my ‘Make Stuff Dead‘ mugs along with flyers for Action Man: Battlefield Casualties. This work is supported and endorsed by 100s of veterans, but why would the right-wing press let that get in the way of an opportunity to smear Jeremy Corbyn?My favourite part of the whole thing was Tory MP Johnny Mercer calling me a “Britain hating anarchist who knows the value for nothing” in The Sun’s online article. The story was originally posted by Guido Fawkes and picked up by the Daily Mail who went fully haywire and claimed the stall was actually at the Labour party conference. But the journamislm required to find out that wasn’t the case would have detracted from the DISGUSTED OUTRAGE. It was also strange to see the press such as The Times claim soldiers were deeply offended by my ‘Make Stuff Dead’ mugs while my twitter feed was full of soldiers asking me where they could buy one. (Here, in case you were wondering) Today Veterans for Peace UK have released a statement about the press reaction to this work. It is a powerful and eleoquent refutation of the media’s use of soldiers for political ends. You can read the full thing on their website. Here’s an excerpt: VETERANS BACK “SICK TOYS” “Let us be clear. The superb ‘Army, Be The Meat’ project and the ‘Action Man: Battlefield Casualties‘ films, which were launched 18 months ago, are nothing to do with Labour or Momentum.The credit belongs to the artist who conceived and created it and, spiritually, to the hundreds of veterans who endorsed it. This work […]
PATRIOTIC PRINTER PROBLEM
The printers have refused to print my anti-army comic “having seen the content of your artwork”. This leaves me in a bit of a situation as they were the only printers I’ve been able to find who can print and fold an A5 20 page concertina booklet. I’m currently looking at French printers, as they’re less likely to refuse a job on the grounds that it insults the British Army. It is of course utterly maddening that a printer would refuse to print something they disagree with politically, but obviously I understand that legally and commercially they have right to decline whichever job they like. I do think however that this incident says something about the way people regard the army as an almost holy institution and therefore what I’m doing as a kind of blasphemy. For now I’ve decided to put back the launch of the comic until the 26th of September. Hopefully I’ll be able to sort something soon even if I have to fold each comic by hand. If you happen to know a large format printer that might be able to help me on this please email me: darren@spellingmistakescostlives.com or leave a message in the comments. Thanks. #Military #BeTheMeat
