Drunken Pumpkin

Oh, I am not going to die, am I? He will not separate us, we have been so happy.

Spoken to her husband of 9 months, Rev. Arthur Nicholls
Died March 31, 1855

I remember last year a big to do about someone getting arrested during a zombie march. I’m far too lazy to go looking for the actual article, but trust me, it happened.

Now after looking at Zombie March.org and the various flickr sets from zombie marches around the country world I have but one question: what the hell is the point?

I admit, it looks like fun dressing up like a zombie and shambling around town, but I get the feeling that there is something deeper going on here. At least, it looks like there should be. On one of the websites they’re selling stickers and taking donations to raise money, but I can’t figure out what for.

I did find one group of zombie marchers that made some kind of statement. The Anti-Capitalist Convergence scheduled a march of zombies to protest the FTAA. I’m not sure how the zombie theme fits there, or if it’s really just a variant on the rationale of clown protesters. I wish their site had some follow up, and maybe some pictures. I like the zombie pictures. What can I say?

But when you think about it, what is a good issue for a zombie to get behind? Unless you’re Reg Shoe and are campaigning for undead rights, nothing really springs to mind. Perhaps for the FDA to lift its sanctions on brains? You know, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a good brain at the supermarket. And that includes in the folks behind the register.

I think the world needs more themed protests. It isn’t good enough to just dress like a clown or a zombie and protest any old thing. Make it fit for crying out loud. Send us some suggestions of possible movements and what they should be wearing as they go out to hassle their political candidate or corporation of choice.

and based on the site’s gallery it’s catching on. Click on the picture to visit SorryEverybody.com.

1. You believe in Santa Claus.
2. You don’t believe in Santa Claus.
3. You are Santa Claus.
4. You look like Santa Claus.

No, this isn’t about protesting clowns, although that idea does have a little merit.

There seems to be a growing phenomenon of people protesting as clowns. I found a site for the Clown Army and one with pics of Clown Anarchy. And while I looked for it, I couldn’t find, a group called Clownarchy that I heard about from U. Utah Phillips.

The Clown Army, from their site seems to commonly protest Military Recruitment, I think. I think I got distracted by all the pictures of clowns in bad make-up acting silly. There is truly nothing creepier than a poorly made-up clown. Unless the clown has tentacles, that would be worse. But in the course of surfing the Clown Army page I encountered no tentacles, but I did finally notice that they seem to be from the UK. Clown protester doesn’t really fit with my general opinion of the British. Maybe they’re Welsh. Or, perhaps, Scottish. Yeah, I can definitely see the Scots dressing odd and giving people a hard time.

If you look at the top of the photo page for Clown Anarchy you can see it says, “The Magazine for Witchcraft and Magical Activism.” That just screams “clown” to me. Yeah. That’s as far as I’m going to go with that one.

Of course, the most famous of clown protesters is Patch Adams. I have a bit more respect for Adams as a clown protester than I do these other folks. First off, Adams is a Doctor, and that takes some dedication and smarts. And secondly, he’s a real clown. It takes a little more than a stick of greasepaint to be a clown. And last, he has melded his vision of medicine with his vision of clowning. All of the stuff he does may appear random, but if you’ve read either of his books you can see there is a definite method to his madness. I’m truly amazed by his Russian trips can you imagine the Soviets being descended upon by 30+ clowns bearing medical supplies? Too awesome.

I think the clown protester thing has something to do with people in flashy clothes doing stupid things tends to attract attention. And when you have a point you want to make, then you need attention. I just wish these people would learn how to juggle.

Tune in tomorrow for more work in the streets. Or something like that, anyway.

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For those who don’t understand this sign, enclosing certain statements inside of
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Yesterday I posted a notice about John McCain’s MySpace page having been pranked by one of the founders of NewsVine.com because McCain’s MySpace page was using server bandwidth that was not theirs (aka stealing).

Today on surfing about, found this notice on NewsVine.com:

Dear Newsvine Users,

We are currently experiencing a possible Distributed Denial of Service Attack (DDOS), possibly in connection with the John McCain MySpace prank on Monday. We do not suspect the McCain camp has anything to do with this, and Newsvine will be back in service as soon as things are under control. Hopefully within minutes.

Apologies for the outage,

The Newsvine Team