This being said, it is not a question of becoming fashion atheists, nonbelievers, and
dropping out of fashion. Instead we should learn from the theology of liberation
how to organize our own base communities, reinterpret the faith, plug-in and use
fashion’s intensities for self-enhancement, even if we cannot access fashion through
the formal, commodity channels. We must turn fashion from a phenomenon of
top-down dictations and anxiety to a collective experience of shared praxis and
empowerment.
Throughout this chapter we will see the abstract machine of hacktivism run in
several different settings and effect organizational structures. We will set off by
examining two models of organization, popularly called the “cathedral” and the
“bazaar”, two helpful models that will resonate with much of what is discussed.
Following this we will examine closer the relations between rituals of fashion and
religion. We will also look at the role of clothing in relation to self-enhancement
and from this approach fashion with the aim of understanding it from within,
from a believer’s point of view, as through a theology of fashion. We will then ex-
amine some lines of practice within the theology of liberation, to see how they
“hack” into the belief system and make it run in new ways, yet preserving the faith
intact, keeping the power on.
When applying this mindset to fashion we will see how a fashion heresy evolves
where fashion heretics could be compared to how the liberation theologists “steals”
the right of exegesis from the official channels of the Vatican, and “giving” it to the
poor. We will then examine the Spanish YOMANGO movement and look at two of
my projects, the Italyan Avlusu, a brand of recycled garments and histories, and the
Merimetsa project, a joint endeavour run at rehabilitation centre in Tallinn. At the
end I will shortly discuss where this type of reorganization can take us, as not all
forms of participation is considered as positive for the people involved.
As we proceed some things are important to keep in mind. Heresy is an act of com-
munal devotion, it is a religious practice engaged in social change. It is not an act
of enmity with the aim of overthrowing the faith. In this sense heresy is like hack-
ing, not like cracking. Heresy is an act of love, not an act of hate.
the cathedral and the bazaar
Among a group of people sharing a goal organization often seems to emerge “spon-
taneously”. But even more it often requires a lot of effort to get a group to coordi-
nate their energy, skills and intentions and to start to work together.
Throughout the industrial age the western world has become very efficient in using
hierarchical models of organization, especially within production of scale and
large bureaucratic organizations. Within these sectors the military model of Fre-
drik the Great’s Prussian army, modelled after his beloved toy-automata, has been
refined into perfection (DeLanda 1991). With standardized parts, discipline, uni-
forms and perfectly executed orders the organization became an automatic ma-
chine, be it an army, bureaucracy, school or factory (Morgan 1986). Through high-
ly developed scientific management methods of discipline and surveillance, like
Fordism and Taylorism, the automaton worked predictably like a trouble-free mo-
tor, as in the ideas of Michel Serres that we have discussed earlier. All throughout
industrialism we learned to master this type of hierarchical organization, and this
model has come to look natural for us.