really a mayor caught on camera during a very unstatesman-like rampage to punish a parking violator? or is this another work of viral fiction? well, let s ask the man himself. arturas zuokas, the mayor of vilnius, the capital of lithuania. you know, what is real in our life? writer dostoevsky, he wrote when you think about a crime is already a crime. okay. that might be a little deep. let s just say it s a little of both. the video s real. all right? there s nothing being faked. like the car being crushed is not being faked. it s not a cgi tank. this guy actually got into an armored vehicle that actually
of provocation or social campaign just to start to talk about illegal parking. that campaign comes in the form of a youtube video where mayor zuokas taps into humankind s most primal urges. if you see a car that will block exit, for example, from your house or office, what usually you think? usually you think i would like maybe to crash this car. with this in mind, they hit the streets of vilnius with a used mercedes they purchased for the video and an armored personnel carrier borrowed from the local military museum. it is a model 60. very popular was in the soviet union. even now they use this but a more modern version. the filmmakers park the mercedes illegally in a bike lane and then have only one chance of getting the perfect shot. we have only one shot because as you can see. but we were prepared very well.
we succeeded easily, quite easily. as for the owner of the mercedes, he s played by a local actor. we tried to find a guy who looks like the real owner of a mercedes. you could see similar like this guy with a mercedes quite often in the city of vilnius. with all forgiven, the mayor cleans up after his mess. i like how they have this little scene with the mayor sweeping bits of crushed glass off the highway to advertise his sense of civic responsibility and duty after crushing a mercedes. on august 2nd, 2011, mayor zuokas launches the clip on his youtube page. in just a few days, it goes viral, getting millions of hits and petrifying parking perpetrators worldwide. i was, of course, surprised
of such popularity of this film. the reaction was so huge everywhere in the world. videos of destruction have a tendency to really be fascinating to people. that s sort of almost like destruction porn of watching a building collapse or a car be smashed. the video is a huge hit, but does it really deter parking scofflaws? the video reduced this problem, for sure, because the people now have an image of tank which maybe will come and crush their car. after watching mayor zuokas and his car crushing adventures, many wonder if a u.s. politician could pull off the same stunt. michael dukakis, presidential candidate in 1988, he got in the tank, put on a helmet and he looked silly. we live in a how do i say this less soviet country. here city officials try to look less oppressive. whereas there, apparently, they want to look more oppressive.
vilnius. but everything about it i suspect is just completely staged. that is correct. there s no trickery or special effects, but the smashing of the mercedes a setup. but why? in vilnius, lithuania, wealthy citizens flout the law and park their luxury automobiles wherever they want. i could see fancy cars parked in bike lane, for example. and i don t like that. if you are wealthy and you own big and expensive cars, this doesn t mean you have more rights in the city. these scofflaws are fined, but it doesn t dissuade them from breaking the law. it s quite cheap in lithuania. the first fine will be $5. the second will be much bigger. and the third one just could be $200, $300. mayor zuokas decides to take matters into his own hands. he comes up with a plan that he thinks will have a bigger impact than fines. my idea was to create a kind