Nike Can't Just Say It, Court Rules
Law: Firms can be found liable for deceptive public statements, justices decide. Critics call the decision a blow to free speech.

By MAURA DOLAN, Times Staff Writer

SAN FRANCISCO -- Corporations can be found liable for deceptive advertising if they make misleading public statements about their operations and conduct, the California Supreme Court ruled Thursday.
    In its 4-3 decision, the court said Nike and other corporations are not protected by the First Amendment when they present as fact statements about their labor policies or company operations in advertisements, press releases, letters to the editor or public statements.
    "If a company is going to issue press releases or any information to the consumer about their factories, they are going to have to tell the truth," said Alan Caplan, the plaintiff's attorney in the case. "That shouldn't upset any corporation."
    The ruling is expected to increase public scrutiny of corporate image campaigns. But critics said it also will prevent businesses from engaging in pubic debate on isues that affect them.
    No other state high court is believed to have ruled in such a case, and a Nike lawyer said the firm is likely to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.
    The decision "sets a dangerous precedent by restraining companies, such as Nike, from making public statements about their business practices when challenged in the arena of public debate," the company said in a statement.
    The court's ruling came as a result of statements Nike made to defend itself against charges that its products were made in Third World sweatshops.
    Several media outlets published critical stories about working conditions in Asian factories where Nike's athletic shoes are made, prompting Nike's response. A San Francisco activist contended that Nike lied in its press releases and letters to newspapers and athletic directors, and sued the company for false advertising.
    The corporation argued that its statements were protected by constitutional guarantees of free speech. Lower courts agreed and dismissed the lawsuit.
    The state high court, however, said Thursday that the statements were commercial in nature and subject to a broad California law that prohibits misleading advertising.
    When a corporation makes "factual representations about its own products or its own operations, it must speak truthfully," Justice Joyce L. Kennard wrote for the majority.
    Without deciding whether the athletic shoe and apparel maker lied in its statements, the court revived the lawsuit, which could lead to a trial and possible restitution.
    ...Labor and environmental groups presented arguments against Nike in the case, Kasky vs. Nike, while the American Civil Liberties Union sided with the corporation.
    The case arose in 1996 with a report on "48 Hours," the CBS television news program, about conditions in factories under contract with Nike in Southeast Asia. Articles about the workers who make Nike shoes also appeared in several newspapers.
    The stories cited claims that the workers were paid less than the applicable minimum wage, required to work overtime, subject to physical, verbal and sexual abuse and exposed to toxic chemicals.
    Nike countered in public statements, ads and letters that the factory workers were paid in accordance with local labor laws and on average received double the minimum wage plus free meals and health care.
    Marc Kasky, 57, who has managed a foundation that preserves San Francisco's Ft. Mason, decided to sue Nike after reading an article in the New York Times about the company's contract factories.
    If Kasky ultimately prevails at trial, Nike could be ordered to turn over an unknown amount of profits it has made in California. The money then could be distributed either to charities or to consumers who bought Nike products, lawyers said.
    The state high court relied on U.S. Supreme Court precedents to distinguish speech that is protected by the 1st Amendment from commercial speech, which government can regulate and ban if it is false.
    The California court said speech can be commercial even if it is not in the form of an advertisement.
    Communications are subject to government regulation if they are made by a commercial speaker, such as an officer of a company, intended for a commercial audience and contain representations of fact that are commercial in nature, Justice Kennard wrote for the majority.
    "Speech is commercial in its content if it is likely to influence consumers in their commercial decisions," Kennard wrote. "For a significant segment of the buying public, labor practices do matter in making consumer choices."
    At the same time, she said, the ruling "in no way prohibits any business enterprise from speaking out on issues of public importance or from vigorously defending its own labor practices."
    Nike, in a press release, said it was "extremely disappointed" by the ruling and stressed that the accusations are unproven.
    The manufacturer also said it has made significant progress in its contract factories since the lawsuit was filed in 1998.
    The company, which has contracts with more than 700 factories in more than 50 countries, said it forbids child labor and has raised wages by more than 40% over the last several years for entry-level workers in Indonesian shoe factories.
    Caplan, an attorney for Kasky, said the ruling will affect corporate public relations across the country.
    "They can't say, 'We are issuing this for everybody's ears except those people under California Supreme Court jurisdiction,'" Caplan said.
    Al Meyerhoff, a plaintiffs' lawyer who also worked on the Kasky case, said corporations should be held accountable if they lie.
    "If companies are claiming their goods are manufactured under certain conditions--no clear cutting or organic food or free from child labor--if those statements are being made, they should be true," Meyerhoff said.
...

Justin Broadrick of Godflesh/Final/Techno Animal recently suffered a nervous breakdown [see April 30], causing him to cancel an entire US tour and ultimately to end Godflesh the band. The following is from an interview he conducted sometime in the months prior to his breakdown :

"You look at Streetcleaner which is, I think, still one of the most nihilistic albums ever made. You look at the frame of mind I had then -- I was fairly young when we made that record, 19 or so when we wrote most of that material -- and there is a pure nihilism in there. Totally anti-everything. I couldn't come to terms with anything. It was all a struggle, and I just wanted to lash out at every target I possibly could.
    I've grown up a fair amount since that record and what I can tell is that, like everyone, I was just searching for some truth, some form of spirituality. Searching for some answer to that big fucking emptiness that is part of most people's lives. For me, it's a lot of soul-searching stuff, desperately trying to find something beyond the flesh, beyond just everyday life. The Soul. Energy. Everything. I'm still not coming up with any answers and there is that frustration of not coming up with any answers. [Laughs]
    I've always maintained that -- for a lot of people and particularly me -- music is just a catalyst. I really do find that it is some form of energy and I'm just trying to be very pure about it, to not think about anything and let the music just come out of your soul. You have to try not to force anything. Using the sort of sounds that we do -- the dirt and the filth of the sound -- is really intentional. The whole texture of Godflesh is premeditated and highly thought about and always has been since day one. I have always found Godflesh to be a very spiritual sort of thing. Particularly in a live situation -- because, obviously, it is all about volume again -- what I'm looking for is transcendence. Definitely. That's what I hope people get from it as well. But not in any dogmatic fashion. The whole context is free. That's the sort of energy I draw from music. It's the one medium that does transcend everything, and I can really feel like I can not be "me" anymore through music and really be outside the mere mortal human being that I am. Godflesh is definitely a way of escaping myself. Sometimes that is what I'm searching for: going beyond myself. [Laughs] Particularly myself.
    But it is not just about escape; it's about trying to find more, knowing that there is more. Music of this sort of power -- this sort of abstraction -- is a weapon. It's a vehicle for all these sorts of energies.

What about something like your really minimal work under the Final moniker?

Final is, for me, just as emotional as Godflesh, but obviously stripped of virtually everything. It's just trying to get down to the sounds you hear everywhere. It's the soundtrack to existence, basically -- the silences and the spaces between things. That's almost what I'm searching for there: super minimal, super self-exploratory. It's very personal, but also mood music, you know? It's music that can be applied to situations or certain moods.
    This is why I make so much music, so much different stuff. It reflects my listening tastes, really. The way I use music for different moods myself is how I sort of make music. I want to hear things that fit my moods. Everything I do has that function. Music for me is very functional as well as being very spiritual and ritualistic. It's the only sort of magical process that I can use. I'm an intensely ritualized person anyway. Everything for me is about ritual. Music has to have the same sort of function.

Do you think the kids are missing that sort of element in their lives?

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I think people generally do anyway. Or, if they do search for it or find it, they end up with some sort of shitty religion or something. Essentially people are sheep; they want something to believe in. And I guess, to some extent, I do as well. I know ultimately that any sort of truth is in you, in yourself, as opposed to some great deity. I think people miss spirituality. I actually detest any sort of organized religion. It has fucked mankind since way back. Before that, when people were writing on rocks and worshipping the sun and the moon and the planets, they had it more sorted. I think people got it then. Once people started to dominate other people, it all turned to shit.

Looking at any of your work and the repetitive nature of it -- well, what has been classified as repetitive -- the "looped" nature of it, you can see that it is an attempt to push the listener outside themselves.

That's it. Most of the music that I do -- and Godflesh being the most important of all that -- is extremely mantra-like. They have that element -- almost a meditative element -- a very trance-like element and you either get it or you don't. I think that is how you can lose yourself in it. That is what I am looking for. I don't really talk in rock and roll terms and I don't think what I do is rock and roll no matter how much Godflesh is really just, essentially, a rock band. It's not about the celebration of rock and roll. That means nothing to me. Music is purely a vehicle.

"Rock and roll" is an entertainment lifestyle.

Yeah, and I think it has its point and its purpose. It is just not something that I am a part or that I want to be a part of. What I was saying earlier about people missing spirituality is that I think they need religion. Without it, they are utterly lost and would probably end up killing people or killing themselves. I used to be very anti-control and anti-dictatorship -- a very libertarian sort of attitude -- and what I've come to realize over the years is that people need this sort of thing. People are mostly herd-like, and they need to be filed away into little corners or they'll just be killing each other. Before we made Streetcleaner and even when I was in Napalm Death, we had this notion that we could change the world. This naïve sort of crap. But with Streetcleaner we sort of went to the other extreme: to the idea of cleaning the streets of all of us. It was about wiping everything out and being happy about it. [Laughs]

[28th April] - Late Update - Confirmed News
"If the tour cancellation wasn't enough, I am now able to confirm the following bad news that's been kicking around...

Godflesh Is No More
Over, finished, done, gone, out...
    Justin suffered a nervous breakdown prior to boarding his flight to the US. Unable to make the trip, nevermind perform a 2 month long tour, Justin has decided to call it quits. Godflesh is done for.
    How this affects other projects, tours and recordings is not known. It seems likely that everything will be shelved until a later date. Again, this is official and confirms some of the rumors floating around.
    As always, our thoughts are with Justin and we all hope for a swift recovery."

(Dudley Young, Origins of the Sacred:The Ecstasies of Love and War)

from Forced Exposure:

WOBBLE & TEMPLE OF SOUND, JAH: Shout At The Devil CD (30HZCD 17).
"Shout At The Devil wisely colours its Arabic dub soundtrack with the
addition of vocal contributions from the world recognised Natasha
Atlas, Nina Miranda and Prodigy's Shahin. This rich tapestry of
collaborators are at the heart of this tasteful brew of exotic and
entrancing music. Unlike Wobble's other recent collaborations, all of
a similar ilk, Shout At The Devil contains a sinister underbelly,
whereby the hypnotic melodies wind around the listener like a hissing
cobra. As usual, Wobble can be found bass in hand, scoring out the
songs which are then given their meat and bones via Count Dubulah's
occasional springy guitar and full-blooded programming. The title
track, with Natacha Atlas on vocals takes you into the heart of the
tribe like never before, delivering a healthy does of mystical
eastern authenticity."  $14.00

A CERTAIN RATIO: Early 2CD (SJR 60 CD). Double CD for the price of 1,
the "definitive anthology of ACR recordings from 1978-85". Well
packaged per the Soul Jazz standard, with a 36 booklet of historical
photos and a long interview the band. "A Certain Ratio were the first
group (alongside Joy Division) to sign to Manchester's infamous
Factory Records in 1978, future home of New Order, Happy Mondays. As
purveyors of dance music in the aftermath of Punk, A Certain Ratio
led the field. After Punk, a new set of groups emerged who wanted to
mix Dance music -- Funk, Soul, Reggae, Disco with the spirit of Punk:
Groups such as A Certain Ratio, Cabaret Voltaire, 23 Skidoo and The
Pop Group were the first UK groups to bring Dance music into their
sound. In New York's dance clubs ACR's 'Shack Up' became an
underground Dance hit in places like Paradise Garage and The Roxy,
leading to them playing live in New York's Danceteria with seminal
New York group ESG and their first album being recorded in New Jersey
mixed by legendary Factory producer Martin Hannett.. Here ACR first
encountered Nu Yorican Latin percussion/street music in Central Park.
The following day ACR bought Bongos, Whistles and Congas and didn't
look back! Mixing Punk, Funk and Latin percussion together to make a
unique sound. Their sets often ended in ten-minute percussion jams,
occasionally dressed in Brazilian Football gear! When Factory opened
their new nightclub, The Hacienda, ACR played at the opening night
along with ESG. A Certain Ratio were a band ahead of their time
mixing Dance music with Punk spirit. When asked by Tony Wilson
(founder of Factory) what ACR sounded like, style guru Peter York
replied that they sounded 'Early'. 'Early what?' asked Wilson. 'No,
just Early' came the reply.  Soul Jazz Records are releasing a
definitive compilation (2xCD, 2xLP) of ACR featuring classic tracks
along with lots of rare stuff, interviews and original photos."  $15.00

HIGH RISE: Destination -- Best Of CD (TKCU 77105). "Unbelievably,
High Rise are celebrating their twentieth anniversary this year.
Strictly speaking, they started out as Psychedelic Speed Freaks, only
taking the High Rise name in 1983. But, whatever -- the will to a
state where uber-heaviness and uber-speed merge into one
all-enveloping bliss haze has been their one shining goal for a full
two decades now. Acceleration, motor-burn, and blinding forward
motion encapsulated through guitar, bass and drums. What you get is
twelve remastered tracks of totally thrilling, full on, heads down,
speed-psych-metal mayhem taken from their classic PSF releases. The
album also includes two previously unreleased tracks: a studio
version of live favourite 'Ikon', and a new piece called 'Heavenly
Power'. For once the superlatives are fully deserved. High Rise are
the band that kick-started a label and a scene. They're the
power-trio to end all power-trios." -- Alan Cummings.  $18

FROM PETE RELIC:

"I went to the Indians game last night
and it was freezing rain,
with multidirectional wind
(blowing in yer face and at your back same time!)
 but somehow the game was not called
(even after it turned to snow) and the Tribe won.

A classic vendor walking up our section yelling:
'NOT THE GAAAAAASMAN!!
NOT THE MAAAAAILMAN!
NOT THE CAAAAAABLEMAN!
THE BEEEEEEEERMAN!!!!!'

Well hey, why not! Nothing like an ice cold beer when you can't feel your
toes!"

Lightning strikes over Old Mission Peninsula in Traverse City, Mich., on the morning of April 18 as a strong storm front moves across northwestern Michigan.   Photographer: "...the storm front was coming right at me."

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