I came across this site last year, while doing some research for an essay on New Social Movements. The general pattern I was trying to outline was that there was an ongoing competition between these protest groups and capitalism; for every attempt of these movements to escape consumerism would be, after a while, exploited by the market to express a new `lifestyle choice` and thus, become, yet again, a commercial product.
YoMango, a Catalan shoplifting movement uses intense self-irony to try and counter this. The lesson that new social movements have taught in the 60s and 70s has been that of art and difference as essential components of the self and of self-expression. Yet, these ideas have been internalised and neutralised by capitalism and translated into the concept of the `lifestyle choice` , which is only to say, express yourself through what you buy. So, because it is about buying, and also because protest groups are still associated with artistic movements and happenings, YoMango plays the card of irony by describing `mangar` (shoplifting) as more than an act of sabotage: in a wonderfully ironic twist of art de-sublimation it associates it with the excitement of a creative endeavour.
The look of the site seems to poke fun of yet another clichè: the DIY. Again, the idea of self-management, of manufacturing, of doing it yourself in order to feel both liberated from the clutches of big business and empowered by being involved in the whole process of creating something has been used to open up a new market niche.
YoMango are taking the irony a step further, presenting their manifesto as a Communist Red Book with the insides of a DIY book.
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