Billboard Alteration Salutes U.S. Military in Iraq


Billboard alteration by the “California Department of Corrections”; April 17, 2006

Press Release from the CDC:
As a private institution dedicated to protecting California from the state’s most criminal advertising, the California Department of Corrections salutes the private security firms who have provided invaluable assistance to our colleagues in the U.S. military.
The advertisement is currently at liberty and it seems to have successfully readjusted to public life. However, the billboard will remain under surveillance by department staff to prevent recidivism and any potential lapse into its prior criminal behavior.
The California Department of Corrections is a private institution dedicated to the protection of the public through the alteration, rehabilitation and improvement of California’s most criminal advertising. Initiated in 1994, the department is operated by individuals who feel that California’s correctional facilities have been insufficiently managing the state’s most criminal elements.
For additional information on department programs and operations, please visit the CDC website at www.geocities.com/billboardcorrections or email the Office of Communications at cdc [at] revolutionist.com

(The Geocities site is down.  See more from the hard-to-find CDC below the fold)


(from adiosbarbie.com)

The anonymous folks calling themselves the California Department of Corrections are responsible for this brilliant billboard modification. This prolific and highly skilled band of anticonsumerist havoc-wreakers have an impressive and ever-growing oeuvre that includes “Freshness First. Farmworkers last. Lucky you’re middle class,” which appeared outside a store in the Lucky supermarket chain during last summer’s flap over working conditions for strawberry pickers, and a Maxwell House ad turned police brutality protest.

Some groups affilitated with Billboard Liberation Front:

    Abrupt, Adbusters, The Cacophony Society, The California Department of Corrections, Pedro Carvajal, Freeway Blooger, Guerrilla Girls, The Lesbian Avengers of San Francisco, The Outdoor Advertising Association of America, Inc., Reverand Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping, ®<sup>TM</sup&gtark, Joey Skaggs, Slumber, Inc., Target Market, Tobacco Control Activism Guide #3, Urbanize
  •  Is it legal?  No.  
  •  Is it property damage?  Yes and no.  Sometimes Billboard Liberation Front does not alter existing billboards, but puts up billboards that are a take on familiar advertisements in empty spaces.  
  •  Is it justified?  I found the top example at Discourse.net, the blog of professor of law Michael Froomkin, brother of Dan Froomkin of the Washington Post.

“If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime.”

With great best regards to The Highway Blogger!

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