#title Christmas at King Mob’s
#author Liverpool Anarchist
#date December 2019
#source Retrieved on November 20 2025 from https://files.libcom.org/files/Liverpool%20Anarchist%20-%20Issue%203%20-%20Dec%2719.pdf
#lang en
#pubdate 2025-11-21T07:18:05
#topics Christmas, holidays



Public holidays are a real spectacle of mass consumerism - that's no secret. A few subversive minded individuals, going by the name 'King Mob', decided to unsettle the programme a little one Christmas. December 1968 found them turning up at the flagship Selfridges store on Oxford Street, London, with mischievous intentions. Led by Father Christmas himself, in full costume, the group made their way around the store handing out stupidly expensive sweets and toys to overjoyed children - picked right from the shelf! Christmas is not about commodity exchange, it's about gifting and loving, they tell us with a smile. Well the store management and Met police didn't seem to think so. After a bit of a scuffle, Father Christmas was unceremoniously arrested - suspected of revolutionary sympathies - while the children were rounded up and forced to return their gifts.

I'd like to take this not as an exceptional story, but as a practical guide to Christmas shopping.

Okay, maybe drop the costume, avoid the CCTV, and have a little more discretion; but a five-finger-discount might just bring us a few real gifts for the holidays.