 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(July 2012) |
The Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army (also known as CIRCA and Clown Army [1] ) is an anti-authoritarian left-wing activist group that uses clowning and non-violent tactics to act against corporate globalisation, war, and on other issues. The group originated circa 2003 in the United Kingdom.
CIRCA emerged from the direct action movement and has participated in protests against George W. Bush's visit to the UK in 2003 and demonstrations against the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
The group was particularly prominent in many of the actions organised around the 31st G8 summit held in Gleneagles during July 2005. [2] Members of CIRCA entertained children in Auchterarder while waiting for permission to march near the summit. [1]
CIRCA has active groups in the United Kingdom, Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Denmark, Germany, and Israel, and many other groups have appeared that have been inspired by the work of the original group.[ citation needed ]
Those participating in CIRCA actions typically dress in military-style camouflage clothing supplemented with brightly coloured trimmings and political logos. The costumes both create a comical atmosphere and serve to maintain anonymity during protests. 'Armaments' are usually limited to feather dusters, although some carry water pistols. The complete ensemble of the costume and traditional clown make-up (usually consisting of a white face and red nose) creates a sense of ridiculousness which seeks to challenge preconceptions of radical activists.
CIRCA claims that there is more to the group than simply dressing up and being playful. There is also a psychology which informs its actions: the clown persona can be used to defuse tense situations and engage with police in public order situations. In order to learn this 'recruits' must participate in a training workshop aka Big Shoe Camp before deployment. [3]
In an article about the G8 protests, the Edinburgh Evening News described CIRCA as "an anarchist splinter group," but a member denied this, saying that while some members would describe themselves as anarchists "...most would consider themselves 'horizontalists' where we engage people without the need for leaders." [4]
In 2020, the Yorkshire Evening Post reported that CIRCA had been infiltrated by undercover police in the early 2000s, with one officer having trained as a clown in order to infiltrate the group. [5]
 | Wikiquote has quotations related to: Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army |
The WOMBLES were a loosely aligned anarchist and anti-capitalist group based in London. They gained prominence in the early 2000s for wearing white overalls with padding and helmets at May Day protests, mimicking the Italian group Tute Bianche.
Tactical frivolity is a form of public protest involving humour; often including peaceful non-compliance with authorities, carnival and whimsical antics. Humour has played a role in political protests at least as far back as the Classical period in ancient Greece. Yet it is only since the 1990s that the term tactical frivolity gained common currency for describing the use of humour in opposing perceived political injustice. Generally the term is used to denote a whimsical, nonconfrontational approach rather than aggressive mocking or cutting jokes.
A black bloc is a tactic used by protesters who wear black clothing, ski masks, scarves, sunglasses, motorcycle helmets with padding, or other face-concealing and face-protecting items. The clothing is used to conceal wearers' identities and hinder criminal prosecution by making it difficult to distinguish between participants. It is also used to protect their faces and eyes from pepper spray, which is used by police during protests or civil unrest. The tactic allows the group to appear as one large unified mass. Black bloc participants are often associated with anarchism, anarcho-communism, communism, libertarian socialism or the anti-globalization movement.
The 1999 Seattle WTO protests, sometimes referred to as the Battle of Seattle, were a series of protests surrounding the WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999, when members of the World Trade Organization (WTO) convened at the Washington State Convention and Trade Center in Seattle, Washington on November 30, 1999. The Conference was to be the launch of a new millennial round of trade negotiations.
An agent provocateur is a person who commits or who acts to entice another person to commit an illegal or rash act or falsely implicate them in partaking in an illegal act, so as to ruin the reputation or entice legal action against the target or a group they belong to or are perceived to belong to. They may target any group, such as a peaceful protest or demonstration, a union, a political party or a company.
Billionaires for Bush was a culture jamming political street theater organization that satirically purported to support George W. Bush, drawing attention to policies which were perceived to benefit corporations and the super-wealthy. The group would typically dress as parodies of wealthy "establishment" figures in tuxedos while proclaiming slogans such as "Two Million Jobs Lost—It's a Start".
The Mischief Makers are a group of activists and artists based in Nottingham, UK, who formed early 2005 as a creative response to the G8 Summit, held at Gleneagles Hotel, Scotland, in July that year. The collective uses creativity to support community, environmental and social justice campaigns, and activist groups. The group's aim is "to inspire people and empower them to identify challenges and take action in their local environment".
National-anarchism is a right-wing nationalist ideology which advocates racial separatism, racial nationalism, ethnonationalism and racial purity. National-anarchists claim to syncretize neotribal ethnic nationalism with philosophical anarchism, mainly in their support for a stateless society while rejecting anarchist social philosophy. The main ideological innovation of national-anarchism is its anti-state palingenetic ultranationalism. National-anarchists advocate homogeneous communities in place of the nation state. National-anarchists claim that those of different ethnic or racial groups would be free to develop separately in their own tribal communes while striving to be politically meritocratic, economically non-capitalist, ecologically sustainable and socially and culturally traditional.
Security culture is a set of practices used by activists, notably contemporary anarchists, to avoid, or mitigate the effects of, police surveillance and harassment and state control.
Makhnovshchina or Makhnovia, also known as the Free Territory, resulted from an attempt to form a stateless anarchist society in parts of Ukraine during the Russian Revolution of 1917–1923. It existed from 1918 to 1921, during which time free soviets and libertarian communes operated under the protection of Nestor Makhno's Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army. The area had a population of around seven million.
The Carnival Against Capital took place on Friday 18 June 1999. It was an international day of protest timed to coincide with the 25th G8 summit in Cologne, Germany. The carnival was inspired by the 1980s Stop the City protests, Peoples' Global Action and the Global Street Party, which happened at the same time as the 1998 24th G8 Summit in Birmingham. The rallying slogan was Our Resistance is as Transnational as Capital.
Circa is a Latin word meaning "about" or "around".
London Greenpeace was an anarchist environmentalist activist collective that existed between 1972 and 2001. They were based in London, and came to international prominence when two of their activists refused to capitulate to McDonald's in the landmark libel case known as "McLibel". It was not affiliated with Greenpeace International or with Greenpeace UK.
Covert policing in the United Kingdom are the practices of the British police that are hidden to the public, usually employed in order that an officer can gather intelligence and approach an offender without prompting escape.
The National Public Order Intelligence Unit (NPOIU) was run by the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), a private company connected to United Kingdom police intelligence, and was set up in 1999 to track green activists and public demonstrations. There are links between NPOIU, ACPO, National Domestic Extremism Unit (NDEU), National Extremism Tactical Co-ordination Unit (NETCU) and the Welsh Extremism and Counter Terrorism Unit (WECTU).
Mark Kennedy, undercover name Mark Stone, is a former London Metropolitan Police officer who, whilst attached to the police service's National Public Order Intelligence Unit, (NPOIU) infiltrated many protest groups between 2003 and 2010 before he was unmasked by political activists as an undercover policeman on 21 October 2010 and his identity was confirmed by the media three days later.
Around the end of 2010 and during 2011, it was disclosed in UK media that a number of undercover police officers had, as part of their 'false persona', entered into intimate relationships with members of targeted groups and in some cases proposed marriage or fathered children with protesters who were unaware their partner was a police officer in a role as part of their official duties. Various legal actions followed, including eight women who took action against the Metropolitan Police and the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), stating they were deceived into long-term intimate relationships by five officers, including Mark Kennedy, the first officer to be identified as such, who was publicly identified on 21 October 2010 as infiltrating social and environmental justice campaigns, and Mark Kennedy himself who claimed in turn that he had been incompetently handled by his superiors and denied psychological counselling. According to The Guardian, Kennedy sued the police for ruining his life and failing to "protect" him from falling in love with one of the environmental activists whose movement he infiltrated.
Loldiers of Odin are a Finnish activist group who dress as clowns, parodying the anti-immigration Soldiers of Odin. The group first appeared on the streets in Tampere in January 2016, dancing and singing alongside a silent march by the Soldiers of Odin.
DisruptJ20 was an organization that protested and attempted to disrupt events of the presidential inauguration of the 45th U.S. President, Donald Trump, which occurred on January 20, 2017. The group was founded in July 2016 and publicly launched on November 11 after Trump won the 2016 United States presidential election. DisruptJ20's inauguration protests were a part of a wider array of protests organized both locally and nationally from a more extensive initial plan. The protests included efforts to blockade one bridge and to shut down security checkpoints. James O'Keefe and Project Veritas had some success infiltrating DisruptJ20's planned inauguration efforts.
Anarchism in Belarus refers to anarchist movements in the Republic of Belarus and its historically associated territories within the Russian Empire. Anarchists in Belarus began in the 18th century when multiple anarchist organizations organizing separately against the Tsarist Russia. During the Russian Civil War anarchists organized into multiple anarchist federations and fought against the Red Army and seized control over sections of Belarus. Anarchists and other leftists across the former Russian Empire began an uprising against the Bolshevik government called by anarchists as the "Third Russian Revolution" most prominently in the uprising Russian and Belorussians staged a revolt during the Kronstadt rebellion. Belorussian and Russian anarchists would seize control over the Soviet Navy and nearly overthrow the Bolshevik government. However, Bolshevik repression and inability for the movement to organize effectively would lead to the uprisings' failing.