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November 21, 2007

“What Would Jesus Buy?”: As Holiday Buying Frenzy Begins, New Film Tracks Anti-Consumerism Gospel of Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping

The holiday shopping season kicks off this week with Black Friday, the busiest shopping day of the year. The new documentary “What Would Jesus Buy?” follows Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping gospel choir on a cross-country tour, preaching their message in such destinations as the Mall of America, Wal-mart headquarters, Starbucks and Disneyland. We speak to Rev. Billy, and the film’s producer Morgan Spurlock, who gained fame with his documentary “Super Size Me.”

As we kick off this Thanksgiving holiday, retailers are looking forward to Black Friday, the busiest shopping day of the entire year. Millions of Americans around the country are expected to flock to malls and shopping centers, eager for discounts in a buying frenzy that kicks of the Christmas shopping season.

But a group of people are trying to convince Americans that there’s more to Christmas than the next best toy. They’re called the Church of Stop Shopping and their led by anti-consumerism activist, Reverend Billy. He is the subject of a new feature-length documentary hitting theaters this week called “What Would Jesus Buy?” The film follows Reverend Billy with the Church of Stop Shopping gospel choir in tow on a cross-country tour as they preach their Stop Shopping message in such destinations as the Mall of America, Wal-mart headquarters, Starbucks and Disneyland.

• Excerpt of “What Would Jesus Buy?”

“What Would Jesus Buy” is produced by Morgan Spurlock, who gained fame with his documentary “Super Size Me.” Reverend Billy joins us now in our firehouse studio and Morgan Spurlock joins us from Los Angeles.

Reverend Billy, Founder of the Church of Stop Shopping. His latest book is “What Would Jesus Buy?: Fabulous Prayers in the Face of the Shopocalypse.”

Morgan Spurlock, Producer of “What Would Jesus Buy?” He is the director of the 2004 Oscar-nominated film, “Super Size Me.”

AMY GOODMAN: As we kick off this Thanksgiving holiday, retailers are looking forward to Black Friday. That is the busiest shopping day of the entire year – it’s in two days. Millions of Americans around the country are expected to flock to the malls, shopping centers, eager for discounts, in a buying frenzy that kicks off the Christmas shopping season. But a group of people are trying to convince Americans there is more to Christmas than the next buy. They’re called the Church Of Stop Shopping and they’re led by anti-consumerism activist Reverend Billy. He’s the subject of a new feature-length documentary hitting the theaters this week called “What Would Jesus Buy?” The film follows Reverend Billy and his Church Of Stop Shopping Gospel Choir around the country as they preach their stop-shopping message in such destinations as the Mall of America, Wal-Mart headquarters, Starbucks and Disneyland. This is an excerpt of “What Would Jesus Buy?".

VOICEOVER: The once-sleepy town of Bloomington, Minnesota. A monument for the ages has risen, with their own police force, an amusement park, a wedding chapel, and the first ever college campus built inside of a mall. Over 4 miles of storefront with more than 42 million visitors per year. Thats more visits than to the Capitol, Mount Rushmore, the Grand Canyon, and Disneyland combined. Behold, the Mall of America.

REVEREND BILLY: We’re going to spread the good gospel through the Mall of America. Drive the moneychangers out of the temple. Walk away from the products. We are all ending up inside these super malls. These products are taking over our lives. Stop shopping. Alleluia. Change-a-luia. Let’s change. Right here in front of the Mall of America I want you to join us and many other Americans in saving Christmas from the Shopocolypse.

SECURITY: You will either have to stop protesting, or you’ll have to leave, ok? You’ve got to walk off-property, OK? You’re not allowed to be on-property.

REVEREND BILLY: We’re just everywhere. You never know when we are going to show up.

SECURITY: That’s fine, but you can’t be here today.

REVEREND BILLY: You have to stop shopping. Your consumption’s getting out of control. Alleluia, that was not nice. I’m sorry I yelled at you. I get angry at police pretty easily.

AMY GOODMAN: An excerpt of What Would Jesus Buy?, following Reverend Billy around the country, produced by Morgan Spurlock, who gained fame with his documentary Super Size Me. Reverend Billy joins us here in the Firehouse studio and Morgan Spurlock in Los Angeles. We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Morgan Spurlock, your decision to follow your neighbor, Reverend Billy, around?

MORGAN SPURLOCK: I think that it’s just such an important issue to talk about. The Christmas season has become this massive orgy of consumption where it’s just buy, buy, buy. We live in a time where this whole concept of buy more, pay less is just really, like Billy says, just taken over our lives. And I think there’s no better time to get a message out there of, we should spend less, but give more during the holiday season.

AMY GOODMAN: Reverend Billy, when did you start doing this?

REVEREND BILLY: When did I start getting involved with this film?

AMY GOODMAN: No, doing your crusade around the country. Are you banned from every Starbucks in the world?

REVEREND BILLY: Yes, we are very proud of that. It is like winning the Oscar. Morgan might argue that, but for us, in our value system, in our sub-culture … We got a letter from Starbucks saying that we were not invited in anymore into any of their emporiums of five-dollar latte-ventes ever again, amen.

AMY GOODMAN: What did you do?

REVEREND BILLY: We exorcise the cash registers, we drive the demon monoculture out of that cash register, sister Amy. You’ve got a billionaire at the top of that company and impoverished, as Charlie would tell you, impoverished coffee families at the bottom. We just ask that some of those dollars start blowing in the other direction. Amen.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to turn to another excerpt of What Would Jesus Buy?. In this clip, you Reverend Billy enter a local store in the small town of Traer, Iowa.

FILM CLIP

REVEREND BILLY: The whole store was empty.

OWNER: I am here. I did not want to be in your way.

REVEREND BILLY: I’m Bill. What is your name?

OWNER: Mike.

REVEREND BILLY: This is my wife, Savitri D.

OWNER: Hello.

REVEREND BILLY: We just came up from Des Moines and we are freezing. I need a good sweater. Can I try it on?

OWNER: Sure.

REVEREND BILLY: Then if I don’t like it you have to fold it again.

OWNER: That’s right. That’s what it’s for.

REVEREND BILLY: Is this made in America, do you think, or is that too much to ask?

OWNER: Are you going to take it back off?

REVEREND BILLY: No, I will never take it off.

OWNER: Made in the USA.

SAVITRI D: Some gentlemen next door said there were Wal-Mart stores 20 miles in either direction. Has that affected your store at all?

OWNER: Oh, yes. Wal-Mart is killing small-town America. Seriously it is. Saturday nights, everybody came to town and we would be busy until 11:00 or 12:00 at night. We have got two sons and I have not encouraged either one to come back to the store. There is no future. That is sad. When you think of business that has been in a community for over 125 years and it is just, it’s going to be gone. It all goes back to the mindset of the people and the Wal-Mart mentality of we have to buy this just as cheap as we can buy it. We do not care where it is made. We don’t care if they’re not paying the employees anything. As long as I bought that pair of socks for 50 cents instead of $2, I am happy.

REVEREND BILLY: Lots of folks think is inevitable that we’re going to disappear into the big stores.

SAVITRI D: We don’t have to.

REVEREND BILLY: We don’t have to feel that way.

OWNER: I hope not.

REVEREND BILLY: We need to put our money back into our own community.

CUSTOMER: As long as I get a good deal, it does not matter where is made in. [INDECIPHERABLE]

CUSTOMER: It does not really matter to me where things are made because I just get them. Its pretty much the price. I think everyone just looks for the price. I don’t really wonder where they are made. That takes too much mindboggling for me.

CUSTOMER: They go to other countries to make cheaper stuff. Then we get jobs at K-Marts, Wal-Marts, Targets—We get paid less – cause you know cashiers don’t make a lot of money and stockers don’t make a lot of money. And it’s an evil cycle, what are we going to do? What are we going to do? The truth, I mean there is nothing we can do.

CUSTOMER: I cannot boycott everything, say I’m not going to buy anything. I really do not know what to tell you, I am sorry.

ANDREW YOUNG: People have a choice. Are they going to choose low prices or high wages? That is not a choice that I can make for them. Jesus said, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, heal the sick. There are more people being fed by Wal-Mart than any government in the world. Globalization doesn’t mean that America is losing. It means that America is shifting its vocations. It means that maybe that the workers are not making as much in salary, but, and they are losing insurance and they’re losing retirement benefits, which always says that nothing is guaranteed anymore.

AMY GOODMAN: That was the former mayor of Atlanta, Andrew Young, also former Ambassador to the United Nations for the United States, working for Wal-Mart when you did this interview. Morgan Spurlock, your response?

MORGAN SPURLOCK: I think his answer sums everything up. Things aren’t guaranteed any more and that is a shame, especially when you have a giant corporation such as a Wal-Mart, that does employ so many people and they don’t have health insurance and they aren’t taking care of their employees. They’re importing goods from overseas that have questionable reliability. There are so many product recalls happening now. I think there’s no better time than right now to start asking ourselves, where do our products come from? Why am I buying this? Is there a better way to shop and live? I am in full agreement with a lot of people who say there are some people that need to shop there, that make a choice because they have to, based on their income. Most of us choose to shop at places like this out of convenience more than anything else. I think we have to take that step back from rushing in to make a purchase somewhere just because it is cheap and easy and quick, and saying what does this purchase really mean? Who is affected? How is it affecting my life, my community, the world at large? Who made this product? We don’t do that enough.

AMY GOODMAN: Reverend Billy, you are calling on people not to shop on Friday, what’s supposed to be the biggest shopping day of the year.

REVEREND BILLY: We call it buy-nothing day. We will be out at Macy’s front door. We call it the high holy moment of our theological calendar, sister Amy. We will be there with the Stop Shopping Gospel Choir, and with scores of striking elves that have come forward to volunteer. They think that Santa is abusive. [laughter] I think he is, too. Christmas after hundreds of billions of dollars and decades of corporate imagery has become this nostalgic, this passive, certainly not political in any way, but that moment in late December when daylight gets longer and the darkness less, that is a sea of change. That is the promise of spring. All religions and all kinds of people regard it as an important and exciting moment. This year, especially, with the world at war and the climate crisis, our neighborhoods and families in trouble, this year, it really needs to be a different kind of Christmas.

AMY GOODMAN: We’re going to a break, which is a medley from What Would Jesus Buy?. Stay with us.

[music break]

AMY GOODMAN: That was an excerpt of What Would Jesus Buy?, here on Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, the war and peace report. I’m Amy Goodman. As we go to our final excerpt, where the Church Of Stop Shopping Cross-Country Tour ends on Christmas day in Disneyland.

FILM CLIP

VOICEOVER: In just 10 minutes, Disneyland will present a Christmas fantasy parade. …[iINDECIPHERABLE] the place where dreams come true.

CHARACTER VOICE: Hello, everyone. Yoo-hoo. Go mickey, go.

CROWD: Go Mickey, go. Go, Mickey, go.

REVEREND BILLY: This is amazing. Christmas time in Disneyland. We got what Santa gave us and it was what we wanted. We are so lucky. Christmas time on Main Street in Disneyland—wait a minute. This amazing Main Street is so prosperous, it’s so beautiful, it’s so healthy-– the main streets across America are not this prosperous, not this amazing. They’re empty. They’re shattered. They’re outsourced. Everything here, Main Street, U.S.A., it’s made in China.

SECURITY: Sir.

REVEREND BILLY: Something is wrong. Let’s take our magic back to America. Let’s go shop at home. We can change.

SECURITY: Sir, you need to relax. You need to stop.

REVEREND BILLY: Hallelujah. Stop shopping here. We have the magic. The corporation stole Christmas. We should take it back.

SECURITY: Stop it. You will be arrested. You are going to jail.

REVEREND BILLY: Stop shopping. Stop shopping here. Merry Christmas. Stop. Leave Disneyland. Stop.

SECURITY: We basically have control of this place. This is not like the United States on public land where you are free to … sing.

SECURITY: Your preacher back there, he is going to jail. Everybody here will go to jail if you don’t stop what you are doing.

AMY GOODMAN: An excerpt of “What Would Jesus Buy?” Reverend Billy, you were arrested at Disneyland on Christmas day.

REVEREND BILLY: Yes, and the place was packed with people. The holy day was just jammed with folks. They used to be closed on Christmas. Christmas used to be something we the citizens used to find our own way to celebrate, this change, this coming spring, this rising light. But of course, Wal-Mart is open all through Thanksgiving. They’re taking over the time that we should be thinking about what life is.

AMY GOODMAN: Morgan Spurlock, repeat with the guard said. It was quiet and actually on the film, you had the words written on the bottom so people could hear.

MORGAN SPURLOCK: He says, this is not America were you can just do whatever you want, like sing. I think that Billy, who has been a incredible proponent of the First Amendment, charges in New York were dropped as he was reciting the First Amendment out on the streets of New York City. I think it is challenging this idea of what you can say and what you can do, and this idea of quote-unquote public space that has been corporatized. We are told that malls and these types of retail outlets are public space where people can gather but at the same time they tell you don’t have the rights as an American citizen. We’re really trying to get this word out there in a multitude of ways and this film does a great job if challenging the viewing, of making us think, of making us laugh. The one thing I love about Reverend Billy that I loved from the beginning is that he, much like myself, believes if you can make people laugh, you can make them listen. I think there is a very important message in this movie about what is important during the holidays, and what should we be thinking about and what really matters.

AMY GOODMAN: Morgan Spurlock, you almost literally exploded on the scene with your film Super Size Me, which documented your only eating MacDonalds’ for thirty days. Do you think things have changed since then, and what was the reaction after that?

MORGAN SPURLOCK: Well I think that for me, this is the same way I would gauge the success of this movie—while you did see a reaction from corporate America and from many of the fast food chains and retail outlets, the greater change for me came from the consumers, the normal people, the parents who came up to me and told me they started cooking at home; the school boards that changed their entire school lunch program after they saw the film. The students—the phys ed instructors who said they pushed to get more physical education in schools. Those were real triumphs for me. And I think that if you can start to affect one person at a time, which that movie did, and this movie hopefully will do the same thing, then I think you can really have a success. But at the end of the day, especially when it comes to something as massive as shopping, it is up to you and I. The voting in the 21st century is not where we go pull the handle, but where we spend the dollar. That’s where the real power is in America.

AMY GOODMAN: One of the moving moments of the film, Reverend Billy was the kids, the kids finding out where they could find out about where the gifts they were buying, the clothes they were wearing, was made. They’re talking about learning about kids making their clothes.

REVEREND BILLY: It’s a wonderful moment in the movie that our director Rob VanAlkemade caught just following these three young women, teenagers, fourteen, fifteen-year-olds, as they explore where Abercrombie & Fitch, the supply of their textiles comes from. They go to the internet, they go to responsibleshopper.org, they do an entire a step-by-step investigation. They become amazed at the conditions in which these children are making the clothing that’s on their back.

AMY GOODMAN: Have you been to the movie, Reverend Billy?

REVEREND BILLY: Have I been to the movie?

AMY GOODMAN: I mean, what kind of response have you gotten since?

REVEREND BILLY: It just opened this past weekend in New York, it opens the next couple of days in Los Angeles and San Fransisco.

AMY GOODMAN: In New York, has the response to you changed?

REVEREND BILLY: People still call across the street, Reverend, keep it up, are you out of jail, how are things? People have a protective attitude toward me, which I appreciate. I’m very happy about the film, this extraordinary privilege that we have, that our neighbor in the east village walked over, found us in a community garden preaching and said—I want my next movie to be about your work.

AMY GOODMAN: Are there warnings that stores have about you and the Stop Shopping Gospel Choir making your way in wherever it may be?

REVEREND BILLY: We would like to see some of the mug shots that are back in the bowels of Wal-Mart and Starbucks and Disney. We have not seen them yet. A couple of singers in the choir first encountered us as baristas in Starbucks. So we hope to infiltrate. I think there is a big red circle with a line through it with Billy’s face on it on most retail outlets – no Billy allowed.

AMY GOODMAN: Thank you to you both for being with us, Morgan Spurlock produced What Would Jesus Buy?, the director of the 2004 Oscar-nominated Super Size Me and Reverend Billy himself, the star on stage and screen and the streets of New York.What Would Jesus Buy? is the film. thanks for joining us.

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