| Sin, Salvation and Shopping in Times Square |
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 The Rev. Billy greets his adoring faithful "TODAY IS A GOOD DAY NOT TO BUY!" cried the Reverend Billy. "TODAY IS A GOOD DAY NOT TO BUY!" the faithful chanted back. Around the Rev, a set of similarly dressed folks, distinguished by being in off-white and beige rather than in the Rev's blinding pure white, clapped hands, shouting "Amen!" and "Peaceallulah!" These were the deacons, and after they helped the Rev. Billy spread the gospel of Buy Nothing Day to the busy holiday crowds of Times Square, they were headed to points all over Manhattan to confront sin in its most decadent dens—otherwise known as Starbuck's Coffee locations. Here they would lay hands on cash registers in order to exorcise them. Clearly, this was no ordinary evangelist and no ordinary church. In fact, the Rev. Billy and his Church of Stop Shopping isn't an obscure denomination but a vehicle for performance art and social activism. That doesn't mean Billy and his deacons don't want another Great Awakening: only that the slumber they want arouse folks from isn't sin, but corporate hegemony and soulless materialism. The Rev. Billy—known in lay life as Bill Talen—has become the terror of corporate store managers, thanks to his guerilla theatre tactics: he even took the title for his recent book from an internal Starbucks memo: "What Should I Do If the Reverend Billy is in My Store?"  Protesters gather in front of Loews in Times Square But what made the Rev. Billy and his flock's protest on Buy Nothing Day so poignant was precisely that tension between the square and their call for a dose of non-materialism on the busiest shopping day of the year. Just as Times Square has always reflected the dominating paradigm of whatever the American cultural moment might be, there have always been those in opposition to it—from the morals groups who tried to ban brothels in the early part of the square's century to the crusaders against obscenity who tried to eradicate its pornographic theatres. In this sense, Times Square, with its Virgin Megastore and MTV and McDonald's signs looming over the mass of visitors who flow through it every day, is the perfect backdrop for the Rev. Billy's protest against corporate encroachment.  Rev. Billy routinely gets in hot water with the NYPD Later in the day, Billy was once again arrested by the NYPD for trying to exorcise one of those Starbucks cash registers. By then the Times Square Tide—that ebb and flow that fills the sidewalks of the square day and night—had all but forgotten the agit-prop antics that had filled the air for an hour or so. But the Rev. Billy will have his second (and third and fourth and fifth) coming, so long as Times Square's billboards trumpet the corporate culture of which he is a most implacable and entertaining enemy. |
