Frankenfoods

As it happened, the Chandler letter had little immediate effect on the paper’s handling of the Staples controversy. Hours before Otis’ phone call, editor Michael Parks had reversed course and agreed to assign media writer David Shaw to write an exhaustive piece on the magazine deal. Still, Chandler succeeded in putting the question of journalistic ethics front and center — earning the Times a rare appearance on the editorial page of The New York Times, which labeled Willes’ efforts in pursuit of new profits "radical and journalistically dangerous." Willes can’t have liked that much — but then, Willes can’t so easily call New York Timesedit-page editor Howell Raines out to the woodshed.

ANTI-XMAS SPREE

One holiday you won’t find on the Hallmark calendar is Buy Nothing Day, which falls the Friday after Thanksgiving — the busiest shopping day of the year. Created eight years ago by anti-consumerist and Adbusters magazine founder Kalle Lasn, Buy Nothing is a holiday from the "shop till you drop" madness that is synonymous with the U.$. of A. Organizers hope to convince you that your mom doesn’t really need that Ann Taylor scarf (it’s 70 degrees in December); instead, buy her an acre of salvaged rain forest, or sign a Gift Exemption Voucher agreeing not to exchange gifts this year, they suggest. (See Adbusters’ Web site at http://www.adbusters.org/campaigns/bnd/.)

The Buy Nothing Day campaign has triggered headlines in 15 countries and inspired antics worldwide. "In Australia they dressed up as pigs and invaded the malls," Lasn says. Local guerilla art and cultural provocateur groups such as the Ruckus Society and the L.A. Cacophony Society (http://la.cacophony.org/thismonth.html) have traditionally been in on the action. L.A. Cacophony has a gathering slated November 26 at 2 p.m. at the Farmers Market (at Third and Fairfax). Anti-shoppers are urged to bring poster board and markers for sign making ("Shop Till the Earth Drops"), kazoos and concertinas for noisemaking, demented Christmas-carol lyric sheets ("Deck the Malls" or "Charge! The Hilfiger Angels Sing"), and old Visas for the "credit-card cut-up pool." In a world where 20 percent of the population controls 80 percent of its natural resources, Lasn proposes that we stop and ask ourselves: "How much is enough in my life?"