BONO COMES TO MARKET

In his never-ending round of public appearances promoting himself, sorry, his AIDS campaign, Bono has posted to the Guardian's Comment Is Free blog explaining his decision to team up with The Gap, Nike, et al:

This is more hip-hop than indie. What does that mean? A certain generation who grew up wearing grey trenchcoats and crying into their beer about how daddy's bedsit wasn't big enough won't like this. But the generation that came through in the early 1990s under Soul II Soul, the Young Disciples and the British soul movement love it.

Big business is not bad. Big bad business is bad. It is strange that it took the continent of Africa to turn an activist onto commerce, but that's what Africans want now - to do business with us, to trade, to have dignity of labour. Of that, more later ... until you find the vaccine.

Interesting... if you find this cosying up to big business and unsettling, it's because you're indie. Is Bono really taunting us that we're not cool enough to feel happy about Nike making profits off the suffering of the poorest in the world?

It says a lot about Vox's social circles that he assumes anyone who lived in shitty accommodation was doing so at their familie's expense, doesn't it? Some of us lived in dodgy flats because our parents couldn't afford to help us out. Some people do make it on their own, you know, Vox.

And how stupid does Bono think we are? "It is strange that it took the continent of Africa to turn an activist onto commerce", eh? The implication here, of course, is that Bono had kept big business at arm's length and only overcame his distrust of the corporate world when he saw the opportunity to help Africa. It's a nice idea, but surely the Bono who was so close to uber-capitalist Warren Buffett, who owns great chunks of real estate in Dublin, who is part of a Wall Street financial company with people with connections to Enron didn't really need very much persuading to sign deals with The Gap and Nike. As Churchill once said, we've already established what you are, we're now just quibbling about your price.

Really the deal is this. These brands are prepared to share their profits with the Global Fund to Fight Aids in the hope that the association with Red will bring them to new and more loyal customers.

Or, as we suspect the company accountants have seen it - the brands are happy to redirect some of their marketing budget to the GFFA as an investment in their corporate image and future sales.

At certain price points a consumer usually has a few choices when it comes to t-shirts, trainers and mobile phones. A product Red partner, such as Gap or Nike, hopes it will give them something else: an emotional attachment. It may reflect the values they already have or the values they aspire to: we don't mind.

So, let's get this straight, Bono: you're using the thousands of Aids orphans around the world as leverage to allow people to feel more kindly towards Nike? And that's something you're not only happy to do, but feel you can offer as a moral positive?

All Red partners have high standards and work practices: if they didn't and were trying to hide something they would be very foolish to bring all this Red attention on themselves.

Oh, really? This would be, say, the Nike who have stolen the logo of Hackney one of the poorest boroughs in the UK and, when caught, didn't offer even an apology? Or the Nike which claims to have banned use of sweatshop labour, but seems uninterested in allowing independent verification?

Bono knows he's got a tough sell on his hands with this one, and he keeps trying, harder and harder to justify the scheme. Perhaps he should try the honest approach: "I'm a multi-millionaire businessman, and it makes sense for me to try and use my friends to solve the problems of the world, regardless of the ethical or moral dimension."

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