The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

[Simon_Jester]

256 instances of "criminal acts, disease outbreaks, and acts of public concern" over the course of two months across some 50 encampments listed works out to one act per camp every 10-12 days. That's significantly less than the median rate of crime in public parks in most major cities. When taking into account how many more people are occupying the public parks and for how long, the crime rate in Occupy encampments is staggeringly low.

It must also be pointed out that there's no reason to blame the protestors for the background rate of crime in the area.

I mean, as I understand it, the Occupy protestors will let pretty much anyone come in to talk to them, take fliers, or whatever. There's nothing stopping a would-be pickpocket or mugger from committing their crime against one of the protestors, or against a random person near the protest. But that same criminal would do the same thing whether the protestors were there or not- the crime cannot be blamed on the presence of the protest. That wouldn't make any sense.

In short, you support anarchy; because you are advocating going outside of pre-defined peaceful means of resolving issues and instead make up new rules are you go along.

There is also no widespread clamour in America to solve its internal problems via anarchy. Therefore, even bringing it up is stupid.

Zinegata, I must be missing some part of your argument. Let me explain my difficulty.

I know of two basic models for how to run a legal system and a society. One is "everything which is not permitted is forbidden:" the authoritarian 'closed society' described by Karl Popper, in which all ideas, activities, and forms of expression not sanctioned by the state are considered subversive and therefore banned.

The other is "everything which is not forbidden is permitted:" the 'open society.' In an open society, you are allowed to do as you please, unless someone can come up with a specific reason to write a particular law that bans what you do. Ideas, activities, and forms of expression can exist without the state's permission.

In the West, people mostly like to think they live in open societies, and mostly think closed societies are a bad thing. I know I think those things. I imagine you do, too.

But I'm not sure whether you're drawing a distinction between "anarchy" and "open society." In an open society, it makes no sense to say "OWS's actions are not state sanctioned, therefore they are anarchist." Because there are all sorts of things the state doesn't sanction which are not anarchist. LARPers' actions aren't state-sanctioned; that doesn't make LARPers anarchists. Church ice cream socials aren't state sanctioned, nor are roller derbies, bachelor parties, nor meetings of the Rotary club. But all these things are legal even without express permission from the state, and participating in them does not make you an anarchist.

Nor does it make sense to say "OWS is not a political campaign aimed at making you vote for a specific candidate, therefore their actions are extra-legal and they are a pack of anarchists." They are not, by and large, anarchists. The proof of this is simple: they want there to be laws and government.

Nor are their actions automatically somehow extra-legal. It is legal to express your political opinions in America in ways that are not part of a presidential campaign. And these modes of expression can be perfectly peaceful, as well as being legal... but they are not pre-defined. There is no central agency in the US that gets to decide which ways you're allowed to try to achieve your political goals, with some methods (TV ads saying "vote for Smith!") being allowed while other methods (stand in a park chanting "down with Brown!") being not allowed.

So if I engage in peaceful, legal means of expression that are not on the menu of "pre-defined" traditional ways to achieve political power, how is that going outside the law, or being anarchist? If TV ads and mass mailings are "pre-defined," but rallies and protests are not, then how does that make protests and rallies inferior to mass mailings and TV ads?

I'm not one of Bakustra's biggest fans, but I don't get why you were calling him an anarchist.

[K. A. Pital]

Advocating popular protest to change the system via other means than a vote is now anarchism? Are you being serious, Zinegata, or just trolling?

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

Advocating popular protest to change the system via other means than a vote is now anarchism? Are you being serious, Zinegata, or just trolling?

Or he doesn't want the problems we face fixed. Somehow protesters are invariably worse than the intentional dynamiting of the whole economy and criminalization of the whole population so a few rich people get even richer.

[Skgoa]

[madd0ct0r]

now that was 8 minutes of beautiful ranting.

going back a bit:

[ Who else is behind OWS? I know; do you?

any takers?

[Ritterin Sophia]

That Jew hating George Soros? Iran? The New Soviet Union? The Chicoms? Al Qaeda? Nazis? One of those has to be right.

[Alerik the Fortunate]

According to conservative websites, they're all supporters, along with the KKK and Planned Parenthood.

[Losonti Tokash]

I am. So is Scott Olsen. And Ray Lewis. And Dorli Rainey. And a million other people around the country who are tired of being economically and now physically brutalized by the 1% and their tools.

I spent an hour listening to a first hand account of what happened at Occupy Denver from a friend. Protesters given 20 seconds notice before being attacked with weaponized fire extinguishers. People being tackled to the ground by half a dozen cops for sitting in front of a cruiser. Peaceful protesters vomiting blood the next day from their treatment at the hands of riot police.

Sorry, no footage. The police smashed every camera they could get so most of the stuff available are confused 10 second clips of people running.

Given this and the absurd bullshit going on in New York right now, the patience and restraint shown by protesters all over the country is fucking legendary.

[loomer]

Hell, even I'm funding the Occupy movements from all the way over in Australia, having kicked in some money to buy food and such for the Wall Street guys. Does that make the Occupy movement a foreign funded plot to subvert America, Choc?

[Losonti Tokash]

It makes you a goddamn hero. Thank you.

[madd0ct0r]

nah, I just tried typing who is behind OWS into google and read the first page of results (for my version of google, at that time, in my location yadda yadda yadda)

1. first up is the wikipedia article, which lists a huge number of academics, celebs ect who 'are behind' OWS in terms of agreeing with it. As is commonly known, the first rally is traced to an email put out by Canadian group Ad-busters.

2. Next was a FOXnews article, claiming a charity called ACORN was paying people to protest.

3. Next was an unrelated article detailing the use of the V mask

4. then a forbes interview with the leader of Ad-busters, who take credit for kicking it off but reaffirms the movement is leaderless and consensus driven.

5. Then we get an interesting article about David Graber, an academic who described the first protest as 'typical boilerplate workers rally' and describes Ad-busters as 'marketeers who have gone over to the other side'. He takes partial credit for the 99% idea, and is much more keen to emphasize his role in 'facilitating' the new consensus method for discussion and development of goals. He also notes that, as you'd expect, natural leaders ARE emerging within movement, although they describe themselves as 'organizers'. again, the message is helping the discussions happen, not leading them. (I'd note here this is exactly the same role that a committee chairman should play, and it's this sort of work that builds enough reputation and credit for a person that they get listened to more. classic leadership style basically, leading by example)

Number 6 on the list claims Soros is financing it, along with financing Obama, American Socialists and a few more 'progressive' charities/organizations via his nefarious Tides foundation.
They seem to especially dislike a banker funding lobby groups.

number 7 is Graeber again. See 5.

8 is an expose that progressive, liberal or RADICAL lawyers are helping OWS. Who'd a thunk it?

9 Yahoo question. Sadly, no incisive political commentary in the answers section

10 is another forum, seemingly with a forum culture very similar to here. Theories range from Soros to the Koch brothers (to take the heat off AND galvanize the tea party). at leat two people on the first page point out that there's very little actual cost in what they're doing, since everyone already had a crap tent, cellphone ect. The major running costs seem to be the kitchen, and that's easily done on donations.

So I've wasted an hour, and I'm still non the wiser. Maybe there isn't anyone behind it? Maybe there's lots of people watching trying to figure out how to use the protest now, but had nothing to do with starting it. shucks. maybe there is no conspiracy

[Losonti Tokash]

Fucking ACORN dissolved over a year ago. None of us are being paid shit for this. Where the hell would you get money to pay a million people $600 a day for two months?

[Simon_Jester]

Losonti, IF you were paying people to show up to protests, it would cost a lot less than 600$ a man-day. That said, even if you're only paying about 50$ a day (which is about the minimum I can believe you'd get large groups for), it'd still sum to something like three billion dollars spent on the protest so far.

You could easily buy a whole election cycle with that kind of money, given the size of campaign donations thrown around these days.

So, to all those who think OWS is astroturf... if people are spending that kind of money organizing the protests (a million people times X dollars a day for two months, or on that order of magnitude), why haven't those same people been spending that kind of money buying elections? If they'd done that, they wouldn't need the OWS protests, they'd have the entire goddamn US government as their willing lapdogs.

[Stark]

Probably because it's easier to write off anything ideologically threatening as 'the other' and forget about it. Its remarkable to someone who's listened to years of people support the right of people to protest gay funerals and bring guns to political rallies talk about how some guys sitting down is a violent attack on the true American way of life.

[Shroom Man 777]

On the wire outside my window
There sit 100 swallows
And I suspect that if one flew
Then 99 would follow.

EDIT:

Here, for you fucks. A Harvard graduate in political science, hanging out with the OWS guys, talks about shit.

[ray245]

Losonti, IF you were paying people to show up to protests, it would cost a lot less than 600$ a man-day. That said, even if you're only paying about 50$ a day (which is about the minimum I can believe you'd get large groups for), it'd still sum to something like three billion dollars spent on the protest so far.

You could easily buy a whole election cycle with that kind of money, given the size of campaign donations thrown around these days.

So, to all those who think OWS is astroturf... if people are spending that kind of money organizing the protests (a million people times X dollars a day for two months, or on that order of magnitude), why haven't those same people been spending that kind of money buying elections? If they'd done that, they wouldn't need the OWS protests, they'd have the entire goddamn US government as their willing lapdogs.

It's all nice and dandy to throw money towards a cause but donating your money to a politician that may or may not support your cause once he is elected is a whole different ball game.

Not to mention the OWS movement is not an official organisation, that people can actually speak to and seek donations from.



I'll get a feeling the OWS movement would eventually fade away without making any real change to the US political structure. Right now, the movement doesn't seem able to sent out a clear message to the average Joe just how fucked up things are in the US.

Until we see cases of people burning themselves to death as a result of the political system/corruption/capitalism, I doubt that the OWS movement will gain enough traction.

[Shroom Man 777]

The message, Ray, is that a lot of people are really pissed at the current system and have the conviction to get tear gassed in the face and rubber bulletted, whereas mere years ago you'd think they were all meek mild-mannered eunuchs. There may not be a coherent message, but these guys parading around and showing regrown balls where the castration-scars used to be in their scrotums, and expressing their abject hate towards corporations whose branded imitation gruel they once contentedly ate for breakfast, lunch and dinner, I think, is message enough.

It may not change America today or tomorrow, but someday it will or it might. And it actually shows that there's actually something worthwhile and good in that nation worth fighting for. America has regained its conscience, and these people holding their procession of repentence for the sins of America, feasting on a communion of rubber bullets and batons, and purifying themselves in a baptism of snow and capasaicin is beautiful enough, irregardless of any change in their nation's phoney baloney political system.

You're thinking that OWS in itself will directly achieve something. Instead, think of it as the very first step in an evolutionary process that could possibly change America. Of course, most likely the pigs will eat them. Pigs are an invasive species known to out-compete and out-eat all sorts of native wildlife and drive them into extinction, this is why Steve Irwin fucking hates them. But, who knows? At the end of the day, OWS might evolve into a rampaging political hippopotamus and chase these pigs away with its tusks.

A man can dream.

[ray245]

The message, Ray, is that a lot of people are really pissed at the current system and have the conviction to get tear gassed in the face and rubber bulletted, whereas mere years ago you'd think they were all meek mild-mannered eunuchs. There may not be a coherent message, but these guys parading around and showing regrown balls where the castration-scars used to be in their scrotums, and expressing their abject hate towards corporations whose branded imitation gruel they once contentedly ate for breakfast, lunch and dinner, I think, is message enough.

It is one thing to get tear gassed in the face and shot by rubber bullet, but you can't compare it to people actually killing themselves by self-immolation.

When you have tons of people getting tear gassed and shot by rubber bullets every other month, and seeing it on the news channel on a daily basis, there is going to be a lot of people who are desensitised to that kind of violence. People would just assume that those people deserve what they get, because they are still alive at the end of the day.

It may not change America today or tomorrow, but someday it will or it might. And it actually shows that there's actually something worthwhile and good in that nation worth fighting for.

You're thinking that OWS in itself will directly achieve something. Instead, think of it as the very first step in an evolutionary process that could possibly change America. Of course, most likely the pigs will eat them. Pigs are an invasive species known to out-compete and out-eat all sorts of native wildlife and drive them into extinction, this is why Steve Irwin fucking hates them. But, who knows? At the end of the day, OWS might evolve into a rampaging political hippopotamus and chase these pigs away with its tusks.

A man can dream.

How many of those protest have we seen already, and how many of those protest actually led to anything at all? I've long given up hope that these kind of protest can actually led to anything, unless something terrible happen. ( AKA really horrible things like seeing people killed on live TV).

[Shroom Man 777]

It is one thing to get tear gassed in the face and shot by rubber bullet, but you can't compare it to people actually killing themselves by self-immolation.

When you have tons of people getting tear gassed and shot by rubber bullets every other month, and seeing it on the news channel on a daily basis, there is going to be a lot of people who are desensitised to that kind of violence. People would just assume that those people deserve what they get, because they are still alive at the end of the day.

The fact that thousands of people are willing to get brutalized for their principles speaks highly for them. I don't know about the guys watching the TV, whether they feel sympathy or become dismissive derisive shmucks, whether the rest of these Americans become as indifferent and as insensitive to their own fellow man being brutalized by their government and their corporations as they are to those foreigners being murdered and killed in the lands the USA has occupied. Who the fuck knows.

Just don't dismiss the fact that these people are willing to endure so much for so long due to their outrage. Maybe the rest of America won't care, and the movement will peter down. In that case, fuck it all. But those who went out there and tried to fight the good fight, well, I think they still did the right thing and good on them.

They're doing the right thing, because for the last decade, their nation hasn't been doing it. So they have to do this for America, because no one else will. Even if it amounts to nothing, even if dismissive fucks stop the movement. Fuck it. The fact that they're trying to do it is still a great statement in itself. For the last decade, America's shown the world all its worst aspects, it has made all of us behold its true form. But these people, they are the light at the end of that dark fucked up tunnel.

That light may turn into a new sun, or that light may be snuffed out. But for this one moment, there was light.

Even if the night comes, at least these people - those who took to the streets - will be content in knowing that they tried, that they braved the elements, that they braved physical harm and injury, in a time where no one else would.

How many of those protest have we seen already, and how many of those protest actually led to anything at all? I've long given up hope that these kind of protest can actually led to anything, unless something terrible happen. ( AKA really horrible things like seeing people killed on live TV).

In the past, those protests supposedly led to the ending of the Vietnam War or some shit, and desegregation and other stuff.

[ray245]

They're doing the right thing, because for the last decade, their nation hasn't been doing it. So they have to do this for America, because no one else will. Even if it amounts to nothing, even if dismissive fucks stop the movement. Fuck it. The fact that they're trying to do it is still a great statement in itself. For the last decade, America's shown the world all its worst aspects, it has made all of us behold its true form. But these people, they are the light at the end of that dark fucked up tunnel.

That light may turn into a new sun, or that light may be snuffed out. But for this one moment, there was light.

I'm not dismissing the effort of those protesters. I just believe that their effort would be in vain.

In the past, those protests supposedly led to the ending of the Vietnam War or some shit, and desegregation and other stuff.

Didn't people self-immolate themselves in the Vietnam war protest?

[Losonti Tokash]

Protestors set themselves on fire in front of the capitol building, headline next day reads "Terrorists killed in attempt to burn down Congress"

[Shroom Man 777]

Los, before this thread goes to shit or maybe it already has, or whatever, I just want to say that I admire you and that being a street medic for OWS and participating in the movement and such is a great thing. You are a great person, and god I would be proud to know you. What you are doing is good and noble, and I wish I was half the person you were. Never let the fuckers keep you down. Hold your head high, because no matter what, you are doing a great thing, man.

You and yours deserve praise and encouragement, not scorn or derision or bullshit from those fucks. Keep up the good fight.

[Losonti Tokash]

Shroom, I read out the stuff you write about us. You are an endless supply of morale down here. :p

[The Romulan Republic]

They're doing the right thing, because for the last decade, their nation hasn't been doing it. So they have to do this for America, because no one else will. Even if it amounts to nothing, even if dismissive fucks stop the movement. Fuck it. The fact that they're trying to do it is still a great statement in itself. For the last decade, America's shown the world all its worst aspects, it has made all of us behold its true form. But these people, they are the light at the end of that dark fucked up tunnel.

That light may turn into a new sun, or that light may be snuffed out. But for this one moment, there was light.

I'm not dismissing the effort of those protesters. I just believe that their effort would be in vain.

In the past, those protests supposedly led to the ending of the Vietnam War or some shit, and desegregation and other stuff.

Didn't people self-immolate themselves in the Vietnam war protest?

What is your obsession with self-immolation? You seem to think its the only form of protest that can actually achieve anything. Explain.

[open_sketchbook]

Shroom, I can't read your idealism as geniune. My brain refuses to process that level of optimism as anything but sarcastic. Are you being serious, or are you trolling? I honestly can't tell, but I feel like I'm being left out of a joke.