| Number 127 | October 5, 2001 |
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This Week:
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Greetings, Although my focus this week is once again mostly on the events of September 11th, I "digress" a bit to comment a little more on a subject I mentioned last week, that of the Hasbro company and its adorable little game called POX. I actually think this story is not that far afield. For one thing, the marketing of violent, xenophobic, battle-oriented "games" to children should give us pause as our leaders—all of them former children—prepare us for a violent, xenophobic battle against somebody-or-other. Secondly, in this highly commodified and consumer-driven culture, the building of a democratic consent to engage in war—perhaps the most important decision a nation, especially an immensely powerful nation, can make—seems to be more and more a process of marketing an idea to the public, with the hope that they will "buy" it. A true democratic process, on the other hand, might involve less emphasis on packaging and "spin" and more appeals to reason and principle. I therefore thought it important to comment on the values being taught to our children by Hasbro and their ilk. Welcome to all the new subscribers this week! I do appreciate feedback—even the mail telling me what an idiot I am!—so please feel free to send along whatever is on your minds. It's been an unusual year for the Notes, with several major personal crises coming in quick succession. I feel like I am slowly getting back on track, although some of you are aware that my response time is still far slower than usual. I will respond to all of you eventually, however, and you should know that I read each and every piece of mail when it comes, and your comments do a lot to shape the content of the Notes. I thank you all! ‘Til next week, Nygaard |
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I want to call attention to an important conference taking place in Minneapolis next week. Called "...and justice for some," the October 13th conference will focus on "Resisting the Criminal Injustice System.." This conference was obviously planned before the events of September 11th, but what good timing. It would have been important to all of us before that date, simply because of the nature of our criminal justice system in the United States. Many of the social problems that plague our society—such as racism, xenophobia, sexism, and a general fear of the "other"—come into stark relief when we are making decisions about crime and punishment, guilt and innocence, and, ultimately, justice. We have an Attorney General now, John Ashcroft, who has never been shy about asking for restrictions on our civil rights, so some of the already-frightening tendencies in the body politic were coming into sharper focus even before September 11th. Since that date, with the threat of "terrorism" being used as an excuse to mount what I would call an all-out attack on civil liberties in this country, this conference takes on even more importance. So far, our public discussion of how to respond to the threat of future attacks has been marked by a mixture of ignorance and fear, and a more dangerous combination I cannot imagine. When one factors in the enormous power that our nation has at its disposal, the danger becomes global, and the scale of the possible consequences almost unimaginable. Since our police, courts, and prisons constitute the "front lines" of our "War Against Terrorism" on the domestic front, what better time than the present to take a hard look at where to stand in these times of "war?" "...and justice for some" will feature sessions on racial profiling, immigration law, the "prison industrial complex," and, perhaps most intriguing at this historical moment, a discussion of "The Criminal Injustice System as a Tool of Repression." Presenters include some important names, sure to bring with them insights that you would be hard-pressed to find in mainstream analyses of the legal system. A couple of names that stick out for me include Eli Rosenblatt, founder and director of the Prison Activist Resource Center in California, Bernardine Dohrn, Director, Children & Family Justice Center, Northwestern University School of Law, and Tanya Bransford, Judge of Minnesota's 4th Judicial District. The conference will be held on Saturday, October 13, from 9 am to 5 pm at the University of Minnesota Law School, 229 19th Ave S, on the West Bank in Minneapolis. For more information, call 612-824-6533, or visit the National Lawyers Guild website at www.nlgminnesota.org. |
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Many citizens of this country take for granted that the United States has the right, should it decide to do so, to go and attack other countries that may be "harboring" or otherwise offering support to the criminals who attacked the Pentagon and World Trade Center. Our leaders claim that they indeed do have the right under international law to mount such an attack if it is in "self defense." It may be instructive in this regard to look at a very similar case from 1985, where the United Nations Security Council considered a closely analogous case, and made an interesting judgement. On October 1, 1985 Israeli planes bombed the headquarters of the Palestine Liberation organization at Hammam-Plage, near Tunis, Tunisia. In explaining its action to the Security Council, Israel argued that the bombing was justified by Tunisia having knowingly harbored terrorists who had targeted Israel. Here is what Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations, Benjamin Netanyahu, said to the Council:
Mr. Netanyahu's words are remarkably similar to words that might be spoken by a United States representative, should we ever be called before the Security Council to justify an attack against Afghanistan. The Security Council rejected Israel's claim and voted in Resolution 573 to condemn the Israeli action by a margin of 14-0. In that resolution, the Security Council condemned "vigorously the act of armed aggression perpetrated by Israel against Tunisian territory in flagrant violation of the Charter of the United Nations, international law and norms of conduct." It described the air raid as a "threat to peace and security in the Mediterranean region." The resolution further requested UN member states "to take measures to dissuade Israel from resorting to such acts against the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all States." Finally, it stated "Tunisia has the right to appropriate reparations as a result of the loss of human life and material damage." In accord with a well-established pattern, the United States was the only nation that disagreed with this resolution, choosing as it often does to be the sole abstention. In a previous example of the United States' attitude to the rule of law, the International Court of Justice ruled against the United States in 1984, upholding Nicaragua's claim that the U.S. was violating international law when it committed "violent, terrorist, subversive, criminal acts" against Nicaragua in the course of attempting to destroy the Sandinista government. The United States ignored the ruling. While this history is completely unknown to the vast majority of Americans, I would guess it is either known or would be entirely unsurprising to many in the Arab world. Relevant International Law As I write this, the United States government is trying to assemble an international "coalition" to participate in its newly-invigorated War on Terrorism. Such a coalition already exists, and it is called the United Nations. Over the years a large body of law has been developed by this organization in an attempt to proactively define the values and responsibilities of the world community in regard to various forms of conflict, crime, and international disputes. If the United States were to decide to consider the September 11th attacks as a crime against humanity rather than as an act of war, then there are several relevant laws on the books that could become very important to us. Laws such as the Tokyo Convention on Offences and Certain Other Acts committed on Board Aircraft of 1963, or the Hague Convention for the Suppression of Unlawful Seizure of Aircraft of 1970. More recently, the 1999 International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism and the 1997 International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings (which the United States has signed but not ratified) may be of interest to those who would like to see the United States cooperate with the rest of the world rather than dominate it. For more information on international law, and specifically on the legal implications of the events of September 11th, I recommend visiting the website of the American Society of International Law at: www.asil.org/. |
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Last week I reported that the Hasbro toy company was having a little trouble marketing its new xenophobic biological warfare game called POX in the wake of the September 11th attacks. But there's more to the story. You will recall that Hasbro had been marketing POX as a "game of alien creation and universal destruction," wherein kids are told that their community is under attack by "aliens" carrying contagious diseases. The only defense against these contagious aliens is to create a new "race" of genetically-engineered "warriors" (called "Alien Infectors") that will do battle with the "aliens." Sounds like fun, doesn't it? The New York Times ("All the News That's Fit to Print") ran an article on the marketing of this game in their magazine of August 5th entitled "Electronic Game Maker Lets Kids Do Their Marketing for Them." Earlier this year it seems that Hasbro market researchers were going around to playgrounds and skate parks in Chicago to find the natural leaders in groups of 9-year-olds, whom they referred to as "alpha pups." When they found these kids—and they found 16,000 of them—they would offer them 30 bucks in exchange for the kids agreeing to come downtown and be taught how to play POX. The kids were then escorted into a conference room in a downtown office building, but were not told that their training session was being watched from behind a one-way mirror by market researchers and executives from Hasbro. I'll quote reporter John Tierney's description of the beginning of the video that the kids were shown, "narrated by a deep male voice:" "‘They're already here, but we can't see them,' the narrator began, explaining that deadly extraterrestrials called Pox had escaped from a laboratory. ‘Mankind's only hope is to enlist a secret army of the world's most skilled hand-held-game players. Their mission is to use advanced R.F. containment units to create a race of new, more powerful hybrid warriors and test them in battle against these alien infectors.' A boy looking like a young Tom Cruise appeared on the screen as the narrator reached a crescendo: ‘A battle to save Earth is about to begin, and only he can save us. Beware the Pox! Pox is contagious!' During the video, the kids were told they were chosen for this free stuff "because you are the coolest, funniest guys in your school" (girls were excluded from any part of this marketing scheme). Then they were given 10 POX games to give to their friends. You probably haven't seen ads for POX on TV (and probably won't, now), since Hasbro has decided that the orchestrated word-of-mouth buzz created by its little unwitting salesmen is more effective. In the spirit of the game, this type of marketing is called "viral marketing." The Lessons of Marketing If Hasbro's approach to marketing resembles child abuse to you—it does to me—you may want to let Hasbro know what you think about their "viral marketing" of this game to children. While you're at it, maybe you could mention that you find it offensive to market a toy in any way that teaches kids some lessons that you'd rather they not learn, such as: how to hate and fear "aliens;" how to rely on biotechnology to save us from threats to our security; how to use their leadership skills to manipulate their friends for money; how to let corporations tell them what games to play; how to respond to violent threats with more violence; and how to be good little consumers. Contact Hasbro at 1-800-327-8264, or write them at Hasbro, Inc, P.O. Box 200, Pawtucket, RI, 02862-0200. |