Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army
CIRCA emerged from the direct action movement in London in November 2003 in response to U.S. President George W. Bush's visit to the United Kingdom.
[2][3] The Clown Army was founded by Lawrence M. Bogad (Colonel Oftruth[4]), Jay [formerly John[5]] Jordan (Kolonel Klepto[6]), Hilary Ramsden (General Confusion[7]), Theo Price, Matthew Trevelyan, Jennifer Version, and Zoe Young (Private Individual[6]).
[9] The Clown Army occupied the Leeds BBC HQ, the Labour Party offices, the Menwith Hill spy base, and the local armed forces recruitment centre, causing a scene and refusing to leave.
[7] Prior to the 31st G8 Summit in Scotland, CIRCA travelled to London, Bristol, Manchester, Birmingham, Sheffield, Aberdeen, Edinburgh, Newcastle, and Glasgow in a caravan pulled by a biodiesel-fueled van, courtesy of the Laboratory of Insurrectionary Imagination.
[2] After their performance, CIRCA would lead two day Big Shoe Camps for any locals who may be interested in enlisting in the Clown Army.
[11] On 1 July 2005, the day before the Make Poverty History march in Edinburgh, CIRCA held a press conference in Bristo Square and released the communique #8.86, “Re: Operation BROWN-NOSE”.
Filling the streets with festivities, the Carnival disrupted daily corporate proceedings and aimed to provide a free space for imagination to run wild.
[8] In another, more frivolous, instance, clowns atop a bridge convince the police to play a game of ‘Dwarfs, Wizards, and Giants’ (a variant on paper-scissors-stone involving teams and full body movements) with them.
[11] Each gaggle consisted of roughly ten to fifteen clowns, identified by monikers such as Glasgow Kiss, Group Sex, or Backward Intelligence.
Individual rebel clown names typically parody military ranks, such as General Confusion, Major Disaster, or Private Parts.
[14] This exercise is a modified version of the classic hot potato game, in which the players pass a red clown nose while singing a song.
[3] The costumes and clown personae helped create a barrier between the members of CIRCA and the emotional or verbal abuse that they may endure.
[3] Second-hand military fatigues were cut up, decorated, and trimmed with pink and green faux fur, the signature colors of the Clown Army.
[7] Clownbattant’s pockets were stuffed to the brim with absurd things such as strings of sausages, rubber ducks, flower petals, and sex toys.
[10] It is an offshoot of tactical frivolity and is inspired by Bakhtin’s Rabelaisian carnival, Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed, bouffon, and historical fools.
[15][14][11] CIRCA’s beliefs, as demonstrated by their actions and press releases, most closely align with post-anarchist ideology, with an emphasis on anti-authoritarianism and anti-capitalism.
[16] We are clandestine because we refuse the spectacle of celebrity, and without real names, faces or noses, we show that our words, dreams, and desires are more important than our biographies.
We are an army because a war that gorges itself on death and blood and shits money and toxins, deserves an obscene body of deviant soldiers.
The clownbattants seemed perpetually happy and energetic, and this can inspire others, who may have been turned off from the solemnity and outrage associated with protests, to participate in social justice.
[11] In NYC in the early 2020's a man tried to implement a similar concept he called a "clownzone" consisting of an extreme and unrelenting pursuit of mirth and comedy to alleviate emotional grief in the face of overwhelming social injustice, it was met with widespread disapproval and rejection.
This approach can help avoid activist burn-out and serve as emotional rejuvenation while still staying active in social justice causes.
[1] CIRCA engaged in prefigurative politics, not only through its non-hierarchical structure, but also through its work to produce spaces in which there is no authoritative leader or social rules.
[2] One of the key goals of the Clown Army was to subvert the expected behaviors and concept of protestors, to activists, authorities, and the media alike.
One of the most famous images to come out of CIRCA’s actions is a rebel clown known as Trixie smearing a lipstick-covered kiss on the riot shield of a police officer during the Carnival for Full Enjoyment.
[3] Since an integral part of the Clown Army’s operations is humour, one of the duties it assumed is diffusing tense situations, which could cause a non-violent protest to escalate through protestors’ frustration or police brutality.
[11] Similarly, if one of the clownbattants is arrested, the rest of the army would surround the police station, decorating the exterior and celebrating wildly until the clown is released to them.
The inquiry asserted that CIRCA had been infiltrated by undercover police in the early 2000s, with one officer, known as EN34, having joined and participated in the group under the fake name of 'Lynn Watson'.
