Black Friday and Cyber Monday faced global anti-advertising protests – as did Amazon

Hundreds of protest actions against the advertising industry and Amazon have taken place across Europe and the US this week, as concerns grow over the human and environmental costs of Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Formed in 2017, Subvertisers International is a global movement of individuals and organisations concerned with how advertising affects society. It is made up of local and national groups of activists, artists, NGOs, not-for-profits, teachers, parents, scientists and doctors. Subvertisers International has over 18 active groups in Belgium, France, Germany, UK, Spain, Portugal, Argentina, the US, and Australia.

Recently, it turned its attention to Black Friday and Cyber Monday.

Anti-ad actions worldwide – as well as #MakeAmazonPay

Over 100 actions specifically targeting the advertising industry have already taken place in Brussels, Paris, London, San Francisco, Hamburg, Liverpool, Birmingham and Bristol in the last two weeks.

On Black Friday itself, 150 strikes and protests took place as part of the ‘Make Amazon Pay’ campaign in 30 countries:

Today is the largest day of industrial disruption in Amazon’s history.

We will #MakeAmazonPay its workers, its taxes, and for the damage it inflicts on our natural world.pic.twitter.com/yrQEpJQ4UK

— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) November 24, 2023

Meanwhile, the protests against advertising included:

• Over 600 billboards hacked or replaced in Brussels, Liège, Namur in Belgium:

• Large billboards taken over in London in solidarity with striking Amazon workers #MakeAmazonPay:

• Protests outside a London advertising agency which promotes polluting products:

• Digital screens covered in Reading with protest signs that read “Blackout Friday”:

• Environmentalists re-purposing bus stop advertising spaces in Birmingham with anti-consumerist messages such as “Don’t Buy Stuff, Enjoy Your Friends”:

• Artists in Brussels replacing Black Friday posters (without permission) with paintings with appeals such as: “I wish for a city free of advertising”

Actions were timed to precede Black Friday, which campaigners argue is a relatively new, unnecessary, and unwelcome pressure to consume beyond our needs. The ‘ZAP Games’ are “two weeks of affinity group actions”, coordinated by the Subvertisers’ International network of groups, encouraging activists to intervene in advertising sites, remove adverts, and replace them with art and creative messages promoting a world “beyond consumerism”.

An annual targeting of Black Friday and Cyber Monday

‘ZAP’ (Zone Anti-Publicité, or “anti-advertising zone” in French) began in Brussels in 2020 and has since spread to become an annual event ahead of Black Friday and Cyber Monday. Activists target outdoor advertising such as bus stops, billboards, and digital screens – repurposing them for artistic purposes “to hush the relentless noise of consumerism”.

Activists held ‘Award Ceremonies’ in London and Brussels on evening of 25 November with trophies distributed to winners of eight Action Categories for their protest interventions.

Subvertisers International argue that Black Friday, as championed by Amazon, is the ultimate symbol of an economy dominated by large corporations, who dodge taxes, exploit their workers and are accelerating the climate and ecological collapse through a system of hyper-consumerism. Set against its current growth-based model, it will take Amazon until the year 2378 to reach its stated 2040 target of net zero emissions, according to the Make Amazon Pay coalition.

Also in London, activists replaced ads on the Tube, highlighting the environmental cost of the industry:

Over the last decade, outdoor advertising has shifted from traditional paper and paste to digital screens. A smaller double-sided “six-sheet” screen such as is seen on many high streets today consumes as much electricity as three average UK homes, whilst larger digital billboards can consume as much as 11 times.

As well as artistic protest actions, campaign groups in Subvertisers International are making progress in removing and banning new advertising screens in European cities.

Ban them now

In June 2023, the city government of Lyon, France approved plans to ban new digital advertising screens and remove 120 digital screens from the subway in Spring 2024. Large-format wrap-around tarp advertising on buildings and roof-top advertising will also be prohibited, as well as a reduction in the number and maximum size of advertising boards. This followed a five-year campaign from Résistance À L’Agression Publicitaire and Collectif Plein La Vue.

In Bristol, England, a local anti-advertising group welcomed new planning measures in Bristol Council’s Local Plan which should make it harder for billboard companies to receive planning permission for digital ad screens.

Last March, the city of Geneva in Switzerland came very close to fully banning commercial outdoor advertising in public space in a referendum. 48.1% voted in favour of the ban, with 51.9% against.

Robbie Gillett from Adfree Cities which campaigns to remove corporate outdoor advertising from public spaces said:

In the run up to Black Friday, our streets become filled with advertising messages compelling us to buy ever more things. But this relatively new festival on the consumerism calendar masks the human costs on workers for corporations like Amazon, who are also failing to pay their taxes and hastening the over-extraction of the planetary resources. And this is all just before the Christmas mega-marketing machine gets going.

Black Friday should act as a warning sign of a world in overdrive. Sustainable production and consumption must become the new goal of our economy in the 21st century – and that means moving beyond the blinkered target of economic growth-for-growth’s sake, redistributing the amassed wealth of multinational corporations – and at a local level freeing our public spaces from the advertising industry’s pressure to consume.

When we confront the outdoor advertising industry, we’re calling for system change, a new economy, a better world and a liveable future.

Featured image and additional images via Subvertisers International