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This text was written collectively by Actiongirls, a student and community group based out of the University of Windsor in Southwestern Ontario, Canada. This action has consumed us for the past month and we need your help. Please read through to the end and help us in our campaign however you can. There are some ideas to get you started at the end of the post.

Thank you from Candace & Actiongirls

Background:

In recent weeks, posters could be seen all over Windsor, Ontario, claiming that three women were Missing. The posters included photographs of three local women, along with their names, ages and identifying features, but were not in fact a Missing persons report or alert and instead were an advertisement calling for a mock ‘Search Party’ at a downtown nightclub to ‘celebrate’ a local band’s single and video release there.

The three women featured on the Missing poster are actually actors in the band’s video. Both the poster campaign and video were created by a media consultancy company in Windsor, Mimetic
Productions.

The video featured at the release party, is made in the genre of a snuff film – the women featured in the Missing posters are each violently kidnapped, and held captive, bound and gagged in a basement. Each woman represents a former girlfriend of the lead vocalist, and he blames each for his present mental state. He attempts to possess them, stroking and fondling them while they are terrified and physically captive and restrained, unable to defend themselves or escape. Following this torture, he leaves and a heavy steel door slams. He leaves the women to their fates – death from starvation and dehydration. As he leaves, we see the man carrying a rose for his next victim.

An awareness campaign was launched in Windsor soon after discovering this Missing poster marketing gimmick and its association with a violent misogynist video. This campaign – launched by a local feminist collective Actiongirls – aims to highlight the reality of missing women and the role of media violence in perpetuating the victimization of women. This reality is callously disregarded in this advertising campaign and video.

Actions so far have included a march at night through Windsor’s nightclub district, with a small group of women activists carrying noisemakers and signs protesting profit from tragedy, media violence against women and calling for ethics in advertising. This march was met by a small counter-protest. Two women from Actiongirls were also interviewed on local CBC television news (Friday, 10 February, 2006).

The backlash:

Activists from Actiongirls have been continually harassed since their campaign against these fake Missing posters and the video began. Continual attempts are being made to intimidate us and silence our protest – whether in the form of letters to the University of Windsor hierarchy (the group is based on campus) alleging that protest activity is slanderous and calling for Actiongirls to be reprimanded; or in the form of derogatory online anti-feminist backlash; or ingenuous and insulting plays at placation – for example, coffee and cake with the director of the video! We do NOT take candy from strangers,

and

WE WILL NOT BE SILENT!

The kidnapping, beating, rape, torture, and killing of women is a real horror – one that should not be exploited for profit by anyone. With more than 500 Aboriginal women missing in Canada alone, and thousands of women kidnapped for use in the sex trade or worse, the use of an advertising campaign depicting women as falsely Missing is a dismissal of real pain and terror. Depicting this pain and terror in a music video goes further to justify the continuance of violence against women and especially to justify this kind of treatment of women by men.

THIS ISSUE IS BIGGER THAN
ONE SMALL CITY,
ONE VIDEO
PRODUCED BY
ONE COMPANY.

What can you do to support this activism against media violence and the use of missing women as a marketing tool?

• Contact the company and tell them what you think of their Actions:
  Mimetic Productions:1677 Albert Road, Windsor,
  Ontario, N8Y 3R4; Fax: 519-254-3904;
  email gavin@mimeticonline.com
• Contact MuchMusic and voice your concerns about the gratuitous depiction of violence against women in this video before the video is added to their rotation:

  Craig Halket, Senior Music Programmer,
  Much Music, 299 Queen Street West,
  Toronto, Ontario, M5V 2Z5; Fax: 416-
  591-6824; email:
  craigh@muchmusic.com

• Contact your local media outlets to alert them to our awareness campaign and the subsequent attempts to silence it, or contact The Windsor Star, who continues to support this company and refuses to publish community complaints:
  The Windsor Star Group Inc., 167 Ferry
  Street, Windsor, Ontario, N9A 4M5; Fax:
  519-255-5515; email:
  letters@thestar.canwest.com
• Come out and join us for a march to express community solidarity in opposition to media violence, violence against women and profiting off REAL missing women!

  We will not be silent!

  Saturday March 25th, 2006
  6pm
  Dieppe Park
  (corner of Riverside Drive and Ouellette)
  Windsor, Ontario

• Create anchor text on your own site or blog that links Mimetic Productions to this post. Use this code if you want a quick and easy cut and paste:
  

  <p>Media Violence Against Women Must End! What you should know about <em><a href="http://www.femilicious.com/blog/2006/03/08/missing/" title="We will not be silenced">Mimetic Productions</a></em>.</p>

For more information contact: Actiongirls@femilicious.com