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ground zero players
in the streets since 1987
Saturday, May 24
Rounding the White House: Butoh
Sunday, May 25
Code Pink Impeachment PickNick: Preacher George and the Raptures
Bussboys and Poets: Preacher George and the Raptures
Preacher George script
IMPEACH NOW, Downtown demonstration, January 14, 2007
Aliens Invade Republican Party
Jan. 31, 2006 La Jolla, CA
Just as San Diego County Republicans settled in to watch Bush's State of the
Union Address in a private room in a La Jolla restaurant, party crashers invaded.
A Delegation from Planet Zero, created by Ground Zero Players, had worked their
way through the middle of shocked and excited diners in the downstairs restaurant
and upstairs to the Republican stronghold.
The Illegal Aliens, with flashing antennae, carried silver shields imprinted
with: Military Spending is a Black Hole/Illegal Aliens for Impeachment/Vaporize
Bush/Bush Out of Uranus/We Come in Peace/Save the Universe Impeach Bush.With
their purple-gloved probers at the ready and Impeach Now signs displayed on
their floor-length white tunics, they came to deliver an urgent message, The
State of the Universe Address.
The Delegation announced, "People of the Earth: you have suffered greatly
and we have come to save you. Do not be afraid. We arrive in the pulsing light
of peace and harmony. After an internal probe of the Bush cabinet, we have
discovered the presence of large sticks which ostensibly function to compensate
for their jelled vertebrae."
Earthling Republican Neo-Cons reacted to the infiltration of their nest in
a predictable war-like manner with pushing, shouting, name-calling, choke-holds,
threats and chaos.
Mission Disruption accomplished, the Planet Zero Delegates then set up an outside
staging area. They delivered their bullhorn-amplified Address to the gathered
Republicans, as well as stopped traffic at the LJ Village Dr. intersection,
three squad cars of SDPD, one overwrought property security guard, a restaurant
employee in need of anger management classes, the property manager, restaurant
patrons and many interested bystanders.
THE STATE OF THE UNIVERSE
From the Interplanetary Governing Alliance to Planet Earth via Planet Zero
Delegation The George W. Bush Administration has violated the Universal Standards
of Decency and the Space Pollution Protocol. These crimes have now passed beyond
the limits of your solar system, endangered the collective whole and become
subject to Universal Sanctions. It is ordered that Bush must now resign or
be removed from office. He has egregiously defied and betrayed the following
Judicial Oversight Mandates:
We do not torture
We do not brutally slaughter or falsely imprison other beings
We do not wage preemptive war
We do not ignore or create environmental threats, including global warming
and the extinction of species
We do not allow any leader who suppresses, attacks or criminalizes dissent
Our order to you is non-negotiable. If you do not take immediate action to
remove the perpetrators, we will be forced to deal with Planet Earth directly.
Ground Zero Players Shut Down Military Recruitment Stations
The Ground Zero Players direct action street theater group performed a traditional
Butoh Dance at several Military Recruiting Offices in San Diego on Saturday,
effectively shutting down military recruitment efforts in the South Bay. Butoh,
often called "the dance of darkness" or "the dance of death" is
said to have come from the ashes of the bombing of Hiroshima.
Dressed all in white and charred gauze, the Ground Zero Players perform Butoh
by expressing deep inner despair, anger, and pain through slow & deliberate
physical action. To observers, the dance can look like anything from ghosts emerging
from the grave or mothers searching for their dead children. Performers turn
their emotions inward & do not converse with passersby.
The GZP's intensive street theater action left a lasting impression about the
needless suffering occurring in Iraq and elsewhere around the world where the
Bush/Cheney/Rice imperialist war machine is wreaking havoc. They stood in solidarity
with all those effected by recent violence -- a mother in Fallujah, orphaned
Sunni, Shi'ite, and Kurdish children, an Iraqi resistance fighter, and countless
U.S. military personnel enslaved to a greedy foreign policy that couldn't care
less about their well being or rights.
The world is suffering tremendous grief, and Butoh captures that energy and channels
it toward change through direct action.
Four recruitment centers were targeted, with three shutting their doors in response
to the GZP. Some recruiters threatened the GZP with violence. Others hid or tried
to ignore them. None of them succeeded. The GZP held its ground.
The GZP's action started at the Naval Reserve/Coast Guard Recruiting Office on
H Street in Chula Vista, adjacent the H Street trolley station. The office stayed
open only twenty minutes before the recruiter emerged with a potential recruit & locked
the door behind him. A Latino businessman nearby acknowledged the financial basis
for the U.S.'s war on Iraq.
Next the troupe targeted a recruitment station down H St near Broadway that recruits
for all four major branches of the military. This time the GZP entered the office.
They found themselves surrounded by slick government propaganda designed to attract
the poor and people of color, as evidenced by the wall full of photos of recent
recruits. Two recruiters stared in dumbfounded silence while the GZP Butoh performers
shuffled throughout the office in silent grief. One actor slouched in a chair.
Another stood with palms turned upward in questioning anger. Shortly, the recruiters
nervously announced the office was closing.
The GZP made their way next door to the Marines office where, upon entering,
their presence was questioned by a lone recruiter with a young child in tow.
The GZP remained silent. After about ten minutes the recruiter closed the office.
The GZP's final stop was at a recruitment station in National City, on Plaza
Blvd between Highland and the 805.
Not even threats of violence managed to stop the performance. As the troupe entered
the office where three recruiters sat staring at computers, one muscle-bound
recruiter leapt toward the GZP yelling commands like a drill sergeant. He threatened
to "smack" the GZP Butoh performer nearest him. He then said he'd take
a camera away from the GZP's photographer, explaining that this was private government
property.
Two other recruiters shook visibly as they urged the GZP to leave or they'd "call
the cops."
When asked to leave, the GZP slowly exited, writhing in the pain and grief that
the victims of war suffer. They then stood at the window and gazed in, ringing
the office doorbell incessantly as the recruiters demanded they stop. They were
told every time they pushed the button, a hidden camera recorded their identity.
The GZP then endured the recruiters‚ long-winded claims about freedom.
As they struggled to moralize about war and military service, one of their motorcycles
sat close by with a plate-holder declaring, "If it's naked, ride it!" As
the Butoh performance ended and the GZP drove away, their license plates were
photographed.
Military recruitment stations shut down by the Ground Zero Players? Recruiters
made fearful by nonviolent action designed to call U.S. militarism into question?
Potential recruits with no place to enlist?
Where will the GZP strike next?
by Star
Performers notes:
Butoh rose out of the ashes of Hiroshima,
and is often called "the dance of darkness."
Mime = External
Butoh = Internal journey
Emotions to work with: Grief – Anger - Suffering
and Pain (physical and emotional)
Tips for performing in the Butoh style:
*
Don’t be overly dramatic
*
Contain the noise – bring it inward
*
Expose your feeling and let it express itself
through your body
*
Ask yourself: how would it feel if the emotion was only in your center? Only
in your chest?
Possible visualizations for this M19 action:
*
in slow motion a piece of shrapnel enters a spot on your body and works it
way through you.
*
you are carrying depleted uranium and you can feel the heat of the radiation
spreading through your body.
*
you are a prisoner in Abu Ghraib being forced to stand in an awkward position
and you feel an itch start in one part of your body, and spread.
*
you are a suicide bomber waiting in a crowded marketplace and the bomb strapped
to you begins to leak acid.
*
you are waiting in the sun at a checkpoint as a suspicious car full of potential
terrorists drives slowly towards you and a rivulet of sweat runs slowly down
your body, and then another.
*
a missile hit your house at night and woke you from a vague dream, and now
you are dragging a dying relative from the rubble with one hand, and you realize
the child in your hand is dead, and you can feel it becoming colder, and colder.
*
etc.
When working with someone else, try being the shrapnel, depleted uranium, itch,
acid, sweat, dying relative, the cold, etc.
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saturday march 19 5 - 7 PM
Gather at 5 PM on Sat. March 19 at the steps leading
to the Fashion Valley Trolley Station.
WEAR torn, ragged or burned white clothing.
We will bring ashes for your face and clothing. Bring trolley fare ($5 or so
if possible, although we do anticipate getting the $1.25 Centre City 2 hour
special).
flyer variation, "Soweth, also repeath"
[page edited 4-24-08]
