I learned quite a few interesting things. In the game Sim Coptor there would be times when scantilay clad muscle men would run around on the ground and hug and kiss each other, or as close to hugging and kissing as such poor graphics could mimic. I remember it myself, and thought it was funny, but I wasn't aware it was in fact an act of cultural terrorism. A maxis employee had been paid by an organization called RTMark to put this into the game as a way to mock and criticize restrictive social norms and gain media attention doing so.
"My job was to make the little people with a body and animation editor," says Servin. "The artist who used my editor to make the bodies ... was aggressively heterosexual, and made several 'bimbos,' which was my boss's term," recalls Servin, who is gay. "At a certain point I wondered, 'Bimbos - why not studs?'"
I have since become curious about RTMark, an anti-corporate group that finances the Yes Men, as well as many other projects. So I started browsing the RTMark site trying to find out exactly what they were and what they did. Apparently, what RTMark is is a corporation that takes money from "investors" who invest in general areas of interest so you are not necessarily aware of what is done with the money when RTMark redistributes it to activists working in that area. It leaves the investor liability free and the activists are unaware of who is funding their projects. They provide a sort of legal protection. Reading through their suggested projects was interesting, some are fairly simple things I could probably accomplish with enough man power. Others are high risk/high cost projects. These risks and costs are supported by donations from investors, and directed via RTMark. So higher risk jobs get higher money benefits. Some of these ideas are really cool. They range widely, from public protests, to cyber crime, to ad campaigns, to education projects. Very neat ideas. What is really cool is that RTMark as an organization is protected by the same corporate protection laws they are fighting against.
-Brandon
