Supermarket Psychosis

By Emma Holister

This series of images is close to my heart because of its visually emotional revolt against the madness of consumerism.



Its place on the Net has always been on my art website but I feel that it belongs as much these days on my natural health blog as I focus increasingly on permaculture and removing from my life the remaining vestiges of dependence on supermarkets.

In fact I have developed the perverse pleasure of going on unshopping-sprees, where I walk through the radioactively luminous corridors of products and count all the things that I used to think essential and that I have now gleefully banished from my life.

Growing my own organic foods has been a bit scary, being of the non-green-fingered sector of the population, but much of this anxiety has been assuaged by learning about wild perennial (grows back from roots each year) foods and forest gardening; albeit in the small enclosure of my courtyard. All I can say is thank goodness for wild roquette (creeping yellow cress), plantains and jerusalem artichokes (sunroots), that seem to be indestructible and require virtually no gardening skills whatsoever. However, being the brave gardening Amazon I am, I have continued to battle it out with the slugs and snails forever lusting after my precious sunflowers, the seeds of which I use throughout the year to grow microgreen salads in my kitchen window. And I have valiantly embarked upon new projects each year, be it Welsh onions (like giant chives), courgettes and runner beans. All very useful for their generous yield per plant and simplicity for growing and harvesting seeds, not to mention the fact that they are marvellous anti-candida foods. So the food autonomy side of things is going quite well really.

Although I have to admit that striking sanitary towels from my shopping list was a challenge. But even those have now been replaced by nifty washable ones that I sew by hand, the pattern for which I will soon be putting up in the Permaculture Design section along with patterns for simple home-made clothes from sheets, blankets and curtains. I may sound like the contents of a laundry basket but you'd be surprised how normal I look despite this recent eccentricity in my wardrobe's contents. It has certainly helped to learn how to crochet, nothing like a bit of home-made lace to make those sheets look extra fancy! And I am particularly looking forward to the day I never buy underwear again . . . because yes, knickers and bras, you can make them yourself, even frilly ones!

Anyway, back to Supermarket Psychosis, the first sketches of this series were done many eons ago in 1991. I finally did the drawings with the first round of colour prints in 2004. I have since redone the colour prints and the three main images are soon to become paintings as well.

Artwork by Emma Holister www.art-margin.com

Martin J Walker 'Science is the New Politics'

Martin J Walker's latest essay Science is the New Politics reads like an encyclopedia of juicy (if rather unappetising) facts on the relationship between government organisations and pharmaceutical/chemical companies.

It also reads like a horror story from the diaries of Dr Frankenstein.

It is an essential body of research for anyone wishing to back up their opinions on political corruption and corporate science with minutely detailed references.

When I wrote my last piece: Controlled Opposition, Twenty Questions You Never Dared to Ask, I deliberately refrained from naming names and pointing fingers because such volatile accusations of corruption require the most rigorous investigation and evidence of the sort to be found in hair-raising abundance in this latest essay of Martin Walker's.

Basically, for those wishing to understand who is who and who does what with what dirty money and how, this is a must read.

The following three paragraphs are a small sample of this hefty opus, that can be found in full on his website www.slingshotpublications.com


(p.50 Science is the New Politics)

In the nineteen nineties, science education and policy came under the wing of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and from that time, corporate science and its organisations breached the boundaries of government and took control themselves of educating both MPs and the public about science. In 1998 with the New Labour's emplacement of the billionaire shopping magnet Lord Salisbury in the DTI, industry took over science policy. In Britain, greedy corporations met irresponsible government and together both parties began a campaign to deny all adverse reactions or other failings to the techniques or products of corporate science.

With government and corporations organised against the laity, the legal system is often the people's first defence. The United States of America is a large diverse country with a legal system that appears to be able to be used on behalf of the people. On the other hand, Britain is two small islands with a tightly unified and controlling class, and a legal system populated with men and women who can no longer find the word principle in their dictionaries. In the US lawyers have fought for claimants against corporations,88 while in Britain lawyers and other powerful sectors have simply chosen to agree with the opposition that corporate science has never harmed anyone while doing under the table deals with government. In Britain health consumers have been deprived not only of their right to chose health therapies and produce, but also their right to defend themselves against harm from corporate science and its products.

The pharmaceutical industry specifically, and the allopathic health industry generally, are worth billions, and along with the bio-agricultural industry they represent the apex of corporate science and the carry round with them a new ideology. It is then hardly surprising, that amongst the industrial and post-industrial lobbies, the 'quackbusting' movement, funded by the pharmaceutical industry, became one of the first to come out publicly in conflict with what the industry considered competitive alternative health therapies and products. This lobby was building on firm foundations, with lobbies and PR fronts having been well established in industries like the asbestos and chemical industries in the 1950s and 1960s.

Controlled Opposition : Twenty Questions You Never Dared to Ask

By Emma Holister



1) What is a controlled opposition group ?

A controlled opposition group is one that claims to be fighting the multinational drug and chemical cartels but that is in fact controlled by the very industries it alleges to be fighting, usually via funding or shared board members from those same industries.

Although the links can be obvious in many cases, in others they may be more deeply embedded, taking the more subtle form of 'common interests', be they ideological, political or legislative. Grassroots campaigns that could potentially achieve a profound and positive effect against the industrial giants are therefore diverted or derailed into actions that will either fail or be subsumed into the established channels in compliance with industry needs.

In most cases such groups maintain that their actions are not hindered by the funding or compliance with their mortal foes. The relative merits of this line of reasoning can be discussed ad nauseam, usually over cocktails in the executive lounge of some five star hotel during the board of directors annual meeting.

2) Is there such a thing as a controlled opposition individual ?

Yes.

3) How do I recognise a controlled opposition group ?

Most of the time you can spot them by visiting their website’s partners and funders page. If a group claiming to represent the interests of the natural health movement is sponsored by the pharmaceutical or pesticide industry this may give you a clue as to whether or not you can trust them.

Often doing research on the board members’ CVs can provide useful pointers. If they worked for major pharmaceutical companies or were formerly directors of military intelligence, that is also a strong clue.

Unfortunately not all companies are known to the general public and so it can be a challenge to figure out which are the ones with strong ties to the drug cartels. Becoming familiar with the industry at large is useful, finding out which giant company owns this or that company, asking around, doing research on companies’ histories and campaigns.

4) Are there other names for controlled opposition ?

Sometimes they are called controlled interest groups, Trojan horses, Astroturf, front groups, or simply traitorous scum-bags or scabs.

5) Is denouncing controlled opposition counter-productive and divisive ?

Divisive yes, counter-productive no.

6) If I denounce a controlled opposition group will they retaliate by accusing me of being controlled opposition myself ?

Yes. This usually goes along the lines of ‘You’re a controlled opposition group !’ . . . ‘No I’m not, you are !’ . . . ‘No, you are’, etc.

7) How can I best oppose controlled opposition efforts ?

Denouncing them and warning people about their subversively destructive methods is the only thing to do. Often directing people to internet pages setting a good example of how to denounce fake or corrupt activist groups that are derailing true grassroots activism is a good way to start.

8) Can good, honest activists be working for the cause of controlled opposition without even knowing it ?

Yes, and this is often the case. Therefore, when someone manages to pull off a truly devastating piece of sabotage on an anti-drug-cartel activist movement, more often than not this individual may not be in the pay of the drug industry at all. However, the likelihood that they have been brushing shoulders for many years with individuals whose financial ties are less irreproachable than their own is inevitable in a movement that is saturated with industry concerns, whether directly or indirectly.

The Health Freedom Movement is kept moving as much by doctors, scientists and company directors as it is by ex-patients. To what extent any individual can get through nearly a decade of conventional medical or industrial training and not absorb at least part of the industry’s ethical blindness is always going to be a grey area.

However, the innocent, well-meaning individuals are not necessarily the most common or useful instruments of controlled opposition. It is usually those individuals with egos on the rather large side, eager for finding ways to get a little more glory (or money), who are the most likely candidates to be gently guided into doing the dirty work of industry concerns. Even if it is simply a case of those individuals wishing to gain more public acceptance by espousing views that are more palatable to the establishment at large.

From this we can therefore conclude that controlled opposition is not only a form of industrial sabotage of a grassroots movement, but literally a force of nature.

9) Can I have a controlled opposition thought ?

Yes. These are quite common and most frequently take the form of thoughts such as ‘Fighting amongst ourselves is exactly what They want, we all have to get along, work together and be friends if we’re going to beat the enemy’. This type of woolly thinking can be remedied by reading the history of the Nazis and their symbiotic relationship with the French Vichy government, as well as taking a shower and scrubbing vigorously all over with 100% organic soap.

10) What can I do if my friends support a controlled opposition group ?

Educate them by showing them the work of activists denouncing controlled opposition groups and general saboteurs. If that doesn’t work just call them a traitorous scumbag, that usually sorts most issues out quite effectively.

11) Do controlled opposition groups always appear to fight the enemy ?

No. In fact the most accomplished controlled opposition efforts result in brandishing brazen support of the enemy's views and labelling it alternative. This can best be illustrated by the Complementary Alternative Medicine Industry : CAM (not to be confused with the original Alternative Medicine movement). CAM is the establishment’s answer to dealing with grassroots activism. Whilst appearing on the surface to be representing Alternative Medicine, they are a watered-down version preaching subservience to conventional allopathic practices first and foremost, and only using natural therapies as a nice way to make you feel good while you're doing your chemo or taking antiretrovirals. In fact, most of the time prominent members of the CAM industry like to put the public straight on Alternative Medicine and make it perfectly clear that it probably has no therapeutic benefits whatsoever.

12) How common is it to fall into a controlled opposition trap ?

Falling into a controlled opposition trap is as easy as walking into doggy-doo. Don’t despair, no activist can say with any degree of honesty that they have never crossed the path of controlled opposition or supported one of their campaigns. The advice in number 9 is equally applicable to this situation. Basically, they are everywhere and we are all contaminated . . .



13) If I want to denounce a controlled opposition effort but don’t want to use the words controlled opposition, is that OK ?

Yes, this is fine, and is generally the preferred method of grown-ups.

14) Will fighting controlled opposition cause conflict and confusion amongst my friends and family ?

Yes.

15) If I denounce a group for being controlled opposition, will they threaten me with a lawsuit ?

Quite likely. That and calling you the spawn of the devil. However, rather than being downcast, you should take it as a compliment.

16) I have been told that fighting controlled opposition is giving them what they want because they wish to divide and conquer. Is this true ?

‘United we stand, divided we fall’ is a controlled opposition slogan. Simply replace it with ‘Divided we stand, united we fall’ and you’ll have gone a long way to resolving the problem.

17) If I wear a deodorant that says ‘100 percent natural’, but on reading the ingredients I discover this to be a total lie, does this make it a controlled opposition deodorant ?

Yes. Fortunately however, ceasing to use it and denouncing the company that manufactures it is the type of daily civil disobedience that can be practised freely without fear of losing one’s friends.

18) Are controlled opposition individuals under electronic mind control ?

Not necessarily, although there is always a chance. One way of jamming mind control chips is to apply a magnet to the forehead of the person you suspect. This will block the electronic signal of the microchip implanted in their brain. If you cannot find a magnet in your local hardware store, children’s magnetised plastic alphabet letters for sticking on fridges are quite as effective.


Coming soon . . . questions 19 and 20