The horrors documented in the film just went on and on, in an appalling laundry list that stretched from environmental destruction in Colorado, to abuse of garment workers in Bangladesh. You would not believe the depths this corporate scum-bag would stoop to, to maximize profits. Or maybe you would.

Two things.

In Wal-Mart's damage-control efforts, in the wake of this expose, they've bought time from my local public radio station, KQED, as corporations have routinely done in recent years. Wal-Mart is getting its uniquely tainted corporate message out to listeners of public radio, in 'This program brought to you by...' segments. I plan to call up, very next time I hear canned Wal-Mart garbage about being a 'great place to work' and a 'community builder,' and let this 'public' station know just how offended I am.

(Correction: I just found out this morning that it isn't KQED, but NPR, that has been selling advertising to Wal-Mart. If you're an NPR listener, and concerned about this practice, I urge you to contact NPR, at ombudsman@npr.org, or call Jeffrey Dvorkin at 202-513-2093, to register your complaint.)

The second thing concerns the phenomenon of the backlash. Any time a significant cultural movement is launched, in proportion to its cultural resonance and the threat it poses to the status quo, you have a counter-insurgence, or backlash. You could argue that the film itself represents a form of backlash, a response to Wal-Mart's enormous success in recent decades--as one Wal-Mart executive quoted in the film put it, the anti-Wal-Mart press 'is sign of envy.' You can take or leave his analysis, obviously, but its origins aren't puzzling.

By contrast, at least one grassroots film has been made in defense of Wal-Mart, since 'High Cost' hit. I find this significantly more puzzling.

To use an example, I recall in the 90s, when we had a plethora of retro-man-pleasing advice aimed at women. In particular, we had an earnest, best-selling tract on dating, called 'The Rules.' (No link, because I can't recall its authors and can't find the work online. Apologies.) Never call him, let him call you. Dress the part. This kind of thing.

The book was direct response to in-roads made by feminism in previous decades. Suddenly, gender roles were in flux, and nobody knew how to act anymore. The book, about preserving cultural entitlements for men, as route to personal fulfillment for women, arose as a response to new insecurities.

In regards to the new grassroots-funded, pro-Wal-Mart movie, however, just what upsetting notes would anti-Wal-Mart publicity sound in the American consciousness? Would it offend 'main street family values'? 'Allegiance to God and country'? Not likely; we had several self-described 'free-market Republican conservatives' interviewed in the movie, who decried Wal-Mart tactics.

It got me to wondering, does the corporation, itself, occupy a special place as a 'parent' in some authoritarian part of the middle-American psyche? Are challenges to Wal-Mart, its ubiquity, in the mind of the film-maker, like insults to one's mother? She may be a bad mother. She may be an alcoholic, and none too concerned with your welfare--but she's still your mama. You defend her, and you cleave to the harsh and punitive Old-Testament deity of your religion, trying to fathom his will.
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