Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army
anti-authoritarian left-wing activist group
The Clandestine Insurgent Rebel Clown Army (or CIRCA or Smile LiberAtion Front) is an anti-authoritarian left-wing activist group that uses clowning and other non-violent actions to challenge corporate globalisation, war and similar issues. The group originated circa 2003 in the United Kingdom.
Quotes about CIRCAEdit
- The clowns may look ridiculous — and they vow they are non-violent — but their mission is serious: to provide diversions to more vigorous protests and highlight what they see as the nonsense of non-thinking actions likely to damage the environment.
- We played game after game and at times it was almost impossible not to feel ludicrous. But they were all designed to help protesters defeat barriers — and police.
Even the staunchest environmental protesters — some of whom come from the most far-flung fringes of society — regard the clowns with suspicion, as slightly untrustworthy anarchists. But then, almost everybody else was so earnest.
There was a smattering of middle-aged, grey-haired folk, but many were cliches of "Swampy" — thin, vegan and humourless.- Jo Knowsley in "The day I joined the Heathrow Climate Camp's Rebel Clown Army" in The Daily Mail (18 August 2007)
