Buy Nothing Day 1998:
Shoppers Urged to "Buy Nothing"
600 square-foot banner hung inside the Mall of America

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Adbusters Media Foundation

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

November 27, 1998

Minneapolis -- Challenging the season of consumption on its opening day in its largest stadium, two activists daringly climbed to the top of the Mall of America this morning and unfurled a huge banner with a political cartoon of the Earth falling through a hole in a broken shopping bag. The banner's caption read, "Shop 'til we drop?" The confrontation is just one component of an international day of action known as Buy Nothing Day.

High angle protester Marin Goldstein said, "it would take 86 hours to spend just 10 minutes in each of the mall's 500+ stores. There couldn't be a more appropriate location to challenge our society's runaway consumerism." Marin's climbing partner, Han Shan, added, "Our consumption is the mother of all environmental problems. Is this responsible use of our planet's finite resources?"

Launched in 1992 - the same year the country's largest mall opened for business - by the media activist organization, Adbusters, Buy Nothing Day is an international one-day effort to curb consumption and expose its environmental impact. What began as a small action in the Pacific Northwest is now celebrated in 15 countries around the world. It is estimated that last year over a million people joined the 24-hour consumer fast.

Past year's Buy Nothing Day actions have included credit card "cut ups", street theater, poster campaigns and anti-consumer Christmas caroling. Adbusters' founder, Kalle Lasn, felt that this was the year to up the political ante. "Our voracious appetite for consumer goods is threatening the carrying capacity of the planet," he says. "The fact that we do our greatest consuming to show our children we love them is a bitter irony. It's antithetical to the true spirit of the holiday season."

SVHS Video and stills of the event are available upon request.
Adbusters contact: Jonathan Priddle: 604-736-9401

Celebrate BUY NOTHING DAY, November 27
PARTICIPATE BY NOT PARTICIPATING!
WWW.ADBUSTERS.ORG

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