Ban T-shirts Blog

I sometimes get emails or comments from people berating me for selling “anti-capitalist” shirts. They say, or at least imply, that it is hypocritical to be anti-capitalist and make a profit selling anti-capitalist T-shirts.

One person recently emailed me to say he finds “it ironic that you are enjoying the fruits of capitalism while you put it down”.

There are no anti-capitalist T-shirts on Ban T-shirts. There is one overtly communist T-shirt – the red star T-shirt – and that is pro-communism rather than anti-capitalist. And in any case the shirts that get called “anti-capitalist” are not the red star ones.

The tees some people think are “anti-capitalist” are ones like 21st Century Reich, Corporate Crime and Work Harder. These T-shirts are making a point about corruption, incompetence, greed and the undemocratic distribution of power, NOT about capitalism. Does it make me anti-capitalist if I criticise people who have become rich by making money unethically? And “making money unethically” is really just a euphemism for “theft”. There are a small number of super-rich people who twist and bend what should be democratically formed legislation in order to increase their wealth and power. This has got nothing to do with capitalism and everything to do the weakening of democracy. Right wingers say they do not want the government to “interfere” with market economics. But usually the government is swayed by lobbyists for big business who want things to be weighed in favour of big business. Frequently they practically dictate the legislation themselves. What’s good for business is often not good for the public. I would have thought, that now at least, in this recession, which is the worst since the 1920s, that people would have realised that business is run by an elite that only have their own self interest at heart. But they just don’t seem to get it.

corporate crime t-shirt