Cool Stuff:
The Hypocrisy to Explore
By Abe Haim (Diablito)I see a commercial for Cool Stuff. As usual, Arnie (the owner) is acting really eccentric, throwing candles over his shoulder and talking about how he's slashing prices. I decide to head down there and check it out.
After walking the few blocks from my house to downtown I start to see all the cutesy little boutiques and other such stores designed to sell overpriced junk to yuppies and rich folks (whose owners work hard to push the homeless people out of the downtown area so that their customers won't be offended). But not Arnie Fagan, he's not like that. He's not a money grubber - he's that eccentric hippie guy who wears funny hats and has really low prices so that everyone can afford his stuff.
I get to the store and there are three big signs on the front windows. "GREAT GIFTS UNDER $20," "GREAT GIFTS UNDER $10," and "GREAT GIFTS UNDER $5." I walk in, and the first thing I see is a wagon with "INDONESIA" painted on it in big letters. I had talked to Arnie before about glorifying this U.S.-backed military dictatorship. Under Suharto, the Indonesian government has committed numerous acts of genocide and political repression, such as the 1976 invasion of East Timor (see Jabberwocky's article in this issue), and helps repress Nike's sweatshop workers. He told me that Suharto was president and that Indonesia was a democracy. Some democracy - Suharto has been president for over thirty years and his government has continually repressed the opposition.
I walk in and see the usual over priced stuff - small rocks and beads, most priced at $1 each, candles for around $20, and those big statues for over $1000. (Yeah, I think, they have slashed prices - I can give someone the great gift of a single bead for under $5!) I walk past pipes that supposedly are for smoking tobacco, and a few feet away I see marijuana grower's guides and several issues of High Times. And then I see something unexpected, about thirty copies of the Anarchist Cookbook for $25. On the back of the book it talks about empowering people to fight back against the system and what not. There are rumors that the Anarchist Cookbook was really written by a CIA agent and that all the "recipes" are phony. Whatever the case may be, shopping at Cool Stuff is not going to bring down the system but just the opposite.
Arnie, you can sell expensive junk to yuppies and posers - but don't try to sell anarchy - I take that personally.
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