|
The Yes Men Fix The World |
 |
 |
 |
The Yes Men Fix The World is still coming to Victoria Film Festival, despite enraging the Canadian Government.
Recently, they pulled a ‘prank’ on the government of Canada that saw the creation of a fake website, a fake press secretary by the name of Felix Charelbois and promised a 40 percent reduction in emissions in greenhouse gas emissions. The announcement caused applause from the gathering at the UN climate change negotiations in Copenhagen, and negative reactions from the Canadian Government.
Stephen Harper, who is not known for his sense of humour, called the act a “childish prank” and took action against the host of the parody website and demanded that it be taken down. Germany’s Serverloft did not ask for a warrant or anything else before shutting down the website along with 4500 other websites that were in the same block of IP addresses, just to be extra safe.
"We are sorry to see that the Canadian government will not 'take certain actions' that could help stave off catastrophic climate change," said Mike Bonanno of The Yes Men, one of the groups that performed the "sophisticated hoax" two weeks ago that involved the fake sites. "And we are also sorry to see that they don't care so much for free speech."
"Surely the Canadian government has better things to do than shut down thousands of websites, beg the US for photo ops, and berate NGOs for things they haven't done," said Andy Bichlbaum of The Yes Men. "They could instead figure out reasonable ways of responding to their growing legion of critics."
The debate continues over the effectiveness of such satirical stunts on political process and the legalities behind it. Many who support their antics point out that satire is the only effective way of speaking truth to power. Many others think they should be punished for mis-representation and wasting tax payer dollars.
The drama in Copenhagen with the Canadian government happened post filming the movie, but it should give a pretty good idea of what the Yes Men are trying to accomplish. We’re very excited to be bringing this eye opening film to Victoria. The Yes Men Fix the World screens at the Victoria Film Festival starting January 29, 2010. Watch for the 2010 Program Guide at all Serious Coffee locations.
|
