The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by VF5SS »

Civil War Man wrote:5 Ways We Ruined the Occupy Wall Street Generation

This is a post from a Cracked columnist apologizing to the younger generations for all the things that are screwed up.
I find this article to be rather offensively simplistic given the range of topics it is trying to cover. While I don't disagree with some of its points, the tone and research seems rather inconsistent with the material. For something supposedly written by a middle-aged man, it looks like another 20-something rant from the usual Cracked writing crew.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

Stravo's deceit-filled post is exactly why schools should not be government controlled because millions of schoolchildren will be fed any 'propaganda' in the schools controlled by the government. He is the ultimate result of a Boston Public turned lieberal homobortionist jizz and pot empornium slash shariatheistalibanazislamocommunistic FEMAdrassa.

It is a sad day to see a man who wrote such a great work as Star Crossed reduced to writing snippets of Leninist agitprop for the lieberal Politburo in OWS.

(just kidding mang, good to see someone sensible rebuke these hystrionic parkinsonian cerebro-alzheimersing ronald von reaganoids) ;)
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Count Chocula »

Stravo, you puked up a link to a fucking table of rates, then spunked unsupported allegations about high tax rates not being the end of the world in the '50s and '60s. Didja ever wonder why so many wealthy families, especially those with multi-generational wealth, have trusts? The existence of a 90% tax rate does not mean the wealthy living under those codes actually paid 90% of their income to Uncle Sam. Prove you're right, Sparky.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

Glourious
Karl Rove Flips Out At Protesters: ‘Who Gave You The Right To Occupy America?’

Last night, former Bush official Karl Rove appeared at Johns Hopkins University to speak as a part of the annual Milton S. Eisenhower Symposium. Rove soon discovered that he wasn’t going to deliver his right-wing rhetoric unopposed, as a cry of “Mic Check!” rang out among the audience.

“Karl Rove is the architect of Occupy Iraq, the architect of Occupy Afghanistan!” yelled the demonstrators. Occupy Baltimore had infiltrated the crowd and began chanting against Rove. “Who gave you the right to occupy America?” asked Rove to the protesters, apparently unaware of the Bill of Rights. As they repeated their slogan, “We are the 99 percent!” Rove petulantly responded, “No you’re not!” He snidely added, “You wanna keep jumping up and yelling that you’re the 99 percent? How presumptuous and arrogant can you think are!” Watch Occupy Baltimore confront Rove:



About 15 protesters were asked to leave and some were forcibly removed. No one was arrested.
Who the hell gave these clowns the right to occupy America? They have no right! If they don't love it, they can LEAVE! And if they resist by not leaving, by violently holding their hands or singing songs or some shit, then by god we're gonna fuck them with all the white phosphorus-coated bayonets the Arsenal of Democracy can muster. Traitorous fuckers.

Seriously though, Karl Rove can give his land back to a native American and he can be placed in a reservation where he can drink and be miserable forever. :lol:

Here is a good youtubule comment:
"Who gave you the right to occupy America?"

Well, that depends. Who gave you the right to occupy Afghanistan and Iraq, you neo-con son of a bitch?
Like, the best comment ever, in honor of these great United States.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Count Chocula »

Losonti Tokash wrote:I'd like to thank Chewbacca and Chocula for reposting an conservative email forward as if it was representative of OWS and also for discovering that OWS was initially organized by Adbusters, a fact revealed on the first page of this thread. Clearly, the movement has now been exposed as a sham and we can all go home.
Yes, revealed in post #1 with one word, then NOT MENTIONED AT ALL until Page 35 of this trainwreck. They're a non-profit corporation. Who else is behind OWS? I know; do you? By the way, dumbass, that "conservative email forward" is what I pulled FROM THE OWS WEBSITE. Gee, where do they get the money to have a Web site? Who makes their computers? Isn't Twitter a corporation? How many Dells, Droids and iPhones are in OWS protestors' hands? Shit, I hope their tents and sleeping bags weren't made by Gander Mountain or purchased at Big 5 or Wal Mart! And those sons of bitches better not be wearing Levi's! Oh, the irony.

I find the entire OWS (bowel) movement laughable and irrelevant for the following partial list of reasons:
  • No message
  • No objectives
  • Disruption of "99 percenter" businesses
  • Unreported rape as a matter of policy
  • Shitting in public
  • Pissing in public
  • Masturbating in public
  • Felony assaults against police officers and media
  • Theft and vandalism, even among their own
  • Promises of violence
  • Desire to literally eat the rich
  • Rampant medieval diseases at camps
  • Litter and filth so bad that occupiers are forced out by police so sanitation workers can clean their literal shit so they can squat some more
  • Rebellion without a cause
  • Did I mention no objectives?
You're welcome.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by loomer »

I won't engage the rest since I don't really care, but show me one person seriously advocating literally eating the rich. Like sitting down with a knife and fork and just chomping down on a nice slice of Donald Trump. Go ahead and show me - because I'd like to see it.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Connor MacLeod »

PeZook wrote:I am reading the "we are the 53%" website, and I am amazed at how effective the US establishment was at inducing stockholm's syndrome in its citizens.

These are testimonials of people who have no time for leisure ; Who have to work three jobs just to get by ; Who do not participate in nor create culture, and who are one accident away from poverty.

And they're proud that's the way things are in their country.
It's quite possible that it's people simply not looking beyond their own little local enviroments - conditions are hardly going to be uniform across the US, and some people could be better off or have an easier time of "getting a job and contributing" than people elsewhere. It may simply not even occur to these people that things in other states or cities would work differently from what they are used to. Short sighted, short-term thinking is something of a trademark for us I would say.

There may also be a dose of pride or stubborness involved - they may be the sort of people who would still choose to do things the hard way, or inconvenience themselves, rather than admit the truth. That is a mindset that I think is not exactly rare in the US either.

Shroom Man 777 wrote: Who the hell gave these clowns the right to occupy America? They have no right! If they don't love it, they can LEAVE! And if they resist by not leaving, by violently holding their hands or singing songs or some shit, then by god we're gonna fuck them with all the white phosphorus-coated bayonets the Arsenal of Democracy can muster. Traitorous fuckers.
Maybe he's just mad that they're not occupying it in properly American terms - I mean I dont think anything has been blown up by aerial bombing yet, has it?
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Count Chocula »

loomer wrote:I won't engage the rest since I don't really care, but show me one person seriously advocating literally eating the rich. Like sitting down with a knife and fork and just chomping down on a nice slice of Donald Trump. Go ahead and show me - because I'd like to see it.
Okay, here you go:
Braddy Boy wrote:Brad Blanton of Luray, Va. had one of the more extreme messages of the protest, saying it was time to literally start eating the wealthy in order to fix economic inequality.

Brad Blanton of Luray, Va. advocated cannibalism and wore an expletive-laden T-shirt. Madeleine Morgenstern/The Blaze
“They‘re devouring us and now it’s time we start devouring them back,” Blanton said. “I’m advocating cannibalism.”

But actual cannibalism? Apparently so.

“We ought to cut ‘em up and have a little ritual where we call it communion,” Blanton said. “We’re all cannibals, all human beings are cannibals. What we need to do is start eating from the top instead of the bottom.”

And again, just so there was no mistake:

“First we ought to kill them and eat them. I think cannibalism is the answer. Second to that, just regulate the hell out of them, that’d be okay,” Blanton said.
Good times, indeed.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by madd0ct0r »

Count Chocula wrote: Yes, revealed in post #1 with one word, then NOT MENTIONED AT ALL until Page 35 of this trainwreck. They're a non-profit corporation. Who else is behind OWS? I know; do you? By the way, dumbass, that "conservative email forward" is what I pulled FROM THE OWS WEBSITE. Gee, where do they get the money to have a Web site? Who makes their computers? Isn't Twitter a corporation? How many Dells, Droids and iPhones are in OWS protestors' hands? Shit, I hope their tents and sleeping bags weren't made by Gander Mountain or purchased at Big 5 or Wal Mart! And those sons of bitches better not be wearing Levi's! Oh, the irony.

I find the entire OWS (bowel) movement laughable and irrelevant for the following partial list of reasons:
  • No message
  • No objectives
  • Disruption of "99 percenter" businesses
  • Unreported rape as a matter of policy
  • Shitting in public
  • Pissing in public
  • Masturbating in public
  • Felony assaults against police officers and media
  • Theft and vandalism, even among their own
  • Promises of violence
  • Desire to literally eat the rich
  • Rampant medieval diseases at camps
  • Litter and filth so bad that occupiers are forced out by police so sanitation workers can clean their literal shit so they can squat some more
  • Rebellion without a cause
  • Did I mention no objectives?
You're welcome.

what a sack of shit.
I'm going to assume your account has been hacked, because there's no way you'd not have been banned if you produce such dishonest rubbish on a daily basis.

You got the 'quote' from 'the ows website' - you got it from one of a number of forums, where it was posted by some anonymous person. It had 294 comments when i last looked, with everyone deciding the OP was a troll, a plant or a fruitcake. Non of these items are known for being admired intelligences.

Followed by - where do they get the money for a website? WTF?
Where does Darth Wong get his money for the Website? I mean SDnet is big and rambling and full of opinionated posters too! Oh My GOD. Darth Wong is a multinational banking evil! it's so obvious now.
AS FOR OWNING STUFF! MY GOD, THEY"VE FAILED THE FIRST TEST OF COMMUNAZIANYKIST SCUM!
Ratcheting back the sarcasm and shrooms for a moment, lets look at your complaints.

No message, no objectives - for someone who claims to have been on THE OWS WEBSITE, you clearly didn't look very hard.

Disruption of 99-center business - fair cop, at least 12 cafes around wall street must have been hard hit.

Unreported rape as a matter of policy? You mean the rape is the policy or not reporting it is? going for the marginally more coherent latter option, coff. prove it. coff.

Shitting, pissing and masturbating in public, two things. Do you mean in full view of others? if so prove it. Are you just using weasel words that since they're in a public space, they must be doing it 'in public'?

FELONY assaults against police and media. prove it. examples please. I'd honestly like to know, because it's not come up on here or elsewhere that I've seen. Or are we talking about felonially getting in the way of a gas grenade?

Theft and vandalism, even amongst their own? examples? and not some homeless crack head who's turned up to the camp kitchen please.

Promises of violence? where? Promises to violently hold hands?

Desire to literally eat the rich? really? i mean really? wow. source?

Rampant Medieval flu at camp - leprosy, cholera, rebellion - which disease?

Litter and filth so bad ect - partialy conceded, although I'd note most of the trucks of stuff taken by the NYPD in zuccoti park were more possessons, although by the time they'd been chucked about a bit by the police then I guess litter's about as accurate. Does that make the police litterers? or are they just cleaning up their own trash?

Rebellion without a cause - what, you mean you've still not managed o figure this out in two months of discussing it here? really? wow.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Count Chocula »

^
Not hacked.

Fuck off.

Google every bullet point if you doubt. Okay, maybe Zucchotti Cough isn't exclusively a medieval disease.

Take your snark and shove it in your piehole.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by madd0ct0r »

you make the assertation, you provide the evidence.

I'm sorry, snark is my current medieval illness, brought on by exposure to excessive bullshit.
It was first observed in the Renaissance I believe.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by CaptainChewbacca »

Sexual assault in Philadelphia, url=http://blogs.wsj.com/metropolis/2011/11 ... ll-street/]New York[/url], and Dallas. In Seattle a man at their protest was arrested for exposing himself to children.

The urination/defecation in public was stated by the mayor of Philadelphia here
In Philadelphia, Mayor Michael Nutter has increased the uniformed police patrol near the city's camp because of safety concerns including combustible structures, lack of an emergency fire lane and growing problems with litter, public urination, defecation and graffiti. "These conditions are intolerable. Occupy Philly is not acting in good faith," Nutter says.
Similar allegations were made in St. Louis

If you want a felony assault against the police, how about in Denver where two men knocked a cop off his motorcycle and started kicking him? Then in Boston protestors were arrested for selling crack.

I could go on, but here's a listing of TWO HUNDRED FIFTY SIX separate instances of criminal acts, disease outbreaks, and acts of public concern committed by occupation protestors. Its even got one protestor knifing another in Atlanta, the reports go from Los Angeles to Glasgow.
Rampant Medieval flu at camp - leprosy, cholera, rebellion - which disease?
I know they had TB outbreaks in a few places.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

Man, it'd be cool instead if there were proper toilet arrangements provided to prevent public shittings. And if cops freely walked around these OWS sites and did normal cop things as if these OWS sites were normal things too.

OWS guys should assign their own members to do latrine duties and shit.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Bakustra »

Count Chocula wrote: Yes, revealed in post #1 with one word, then NOT MENTIONED AT ALL until Page 35 of this trainwreck. They're a non-profit corporation. Who else is behind OWS? I know; do you? By the way, dumbass, that "conservative email forward" is what I pulled FROM THE OWS WEBSITE. Gee, where do they get the money to have a Web site? Who makes their computers? Isn't Twitter a corporation? How many Dells, Droids and iPhones are in OWS protestors' hands? Shit, I hope their tents and sleeping bags weren't made by Gander Mountain or purchased at Big 5 or Wal Mart! And those sons of bitches better not be wearing Levi's! Oh, the irony.
The OWS movement is not anti-corporate in the sense of "destroy all corporations" you stupid fuck. This is what you're saying:
Count Choculol wrote:How can they criticize wealth distribution when they themselves are made of capitalism??? Image
You are making exactly as much sense as that. The organization is criticizing wealth distribution. If you really think that the alternatives are "exactly as today" and "destroy all corporations", then you're literally too stupid to understand OWS and you should stop trying to.

Furthermore, even if they were anti-corporate, society in America is so heavily corporate that you cannot escape benefiting from it without significantly reducing your ability to thrive. All you're doing is, well all you're doing is repeating talking points, but all your bosses are doing is trying to delegitimize any form of dissent. In other words, you are trying to crush and kill freedom of expression by destroying people's ability to express themselves. If you actually understood and believed anything about American
freedoms, you would be kicking yourself right now for being such a fuckin' idiot. But you don't, so you can advocate denying any form of criticism that comes from within, and with the shield of American exceptionalism at your side, you can deny any criticism that comes from without. I'm reminded of a Beatles song at this point.
I find the entire OWS (bowel) movement laughable and irrelevant for the following partial list of reasons:
  • No message
  • No objectives
  • Disruption of "99 percenter" businesses
  • Unreported rape as a matter of policy
  • Shitting in public
  • Pissing in public
  • Masturbating in public
  • Felony assaults against police officers and media
  • Theft and vandalism, even among their own
  • Promises of violence
  • Desire to literally eat the rich
  • Rampant medieval diseases at camps
  • Litter and filth so bad that occupiers are forced out by police so sanitation workers can clean their literal shit so they can squat some more
  • Rebellion without a cause
  • Did I mention no objectives?
You're welcome.
I'll actually address these in order.

1-2) Wrong. There's no point into going into why you're wrong, because you'd just ignore it and clap your hands over your ears.
3) Protests are designed to be inconvenient, you stupid fuck! That's the whole point of civil disobedience- it doesn't work if people can ignore you!
4) Prove that this is "a matter of policy". Do you realize that this is an accusation of facilitating rape directed at the whole of the movement? Do you realize that you just accused Losonti of facilitating rape? Oh, no, but you didn't actually mean that because you type words and sentences without understanding them.
5-7) Oh my god! It's almost as though they were doing this strange thing called "occupying" which requires that you "live" in the "area" you're "occupying" and when nobody provides you with any assistance in setting up proper sanitation, your options are limited. Oh wait, this is literally "pee pee doo doo they are bad people."
8 ) Your only source for this is a right-wing blog. In fact, I bet all of your sources are right-wing blogs or maybe Fox News, the New York Post, and other extensions of the will of Rupert Murdoch. But even then, the only source from within the blog is a police spokesperson who said that some officers got hurt while they were pepper-spraying and shooting the crowd with rubber bullets. So were these people all Snidely Whiplash and trying to kill cops, or were they flailing out after getting their eyes filled with pepper spray, or were these accidental results of trying to push past a police line? We may never know, and so it's ridiculous to treat all OWS protesters as "cop-beating menaces". But you love to be ridiculous, though you're never ridiculous for the reasons you think.
9) N-no! A few people have committed crimes when in crowded areas? These monsters should all be hanged!!!! This is just the latest expression of the criminal mind, which absolves good, decent folks, (like yourself) from ever being considered... criminals.
10-11) From significant proportions of the OWS protesters? Yeah, that never happened and you're taking cranks as emblematic of the movement. I'm willing to bet that higher proportions of Tea Partiers called Obama a nigger than OWS protesters seriously advocated cannibalism. Oh dear!
12) "Medieval diseases", huh? What, are those just regular diseases but spelled differently? "Fevre" is much more dangerous than "fever"? Or is this some real St. Vitus' Dance action going on here? Oh, wait, it's just another talking point where people try to score points with "pee pee doo doo they are smelly hippies." I see now that it's tuberculosis. One goddamned third of the world's fucking population is infected with TB right now you shitheads! A tenth of the American population has it! It's not a fucking "medieval disease" you smug, ignorant fucks! Stop rimming out Andrew Breitbart and Tucker Carlson and look at the real world for a fucking change.
13) No, that's not why they were forced out. They were forced out because the people in power are worried enough about the movement that they tried to kill it. New York didn't even bother to try and work out deals with OWS- because their goal was never to clean the park, but to use that as an excuse to try and kill the movement. So "pee pee doo doo they are smelly hippies" is getting a bit tiresome at this point.
14-15) Still wrong, still unwilling to listen.
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I mean, how often am I to enter a game of riddles with the author, where they challenge me with some strange and confusing and distracting device, and I'm supposed to unravel it and go "I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE" and take great personal satisfaction and pride in our mutual cleverness?
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Simon_Jester »

I have heard it said that the city of New York tried to work out a cleaning schedule with the OWS protestors in Zuccotti Park. I have heard it said that they didn't try. I'm not sure which is true- does anyone have ideas about unbiased sources to point to?

One problem I can see coming a mile away is that because of the decentralized nature of the protest, there is no one person who can say "Okay, everyone, let's move out of the park for twelve hours and then move back." Assuming (hypothetically) a city government with the best will in the world, who would they negotiate with?
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Bakustra »

They could call for a meeting, talk with representatives, and then the OWS representatives could put it to a vote among the general population, like pretty much every other decision that's been made.
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I mean, how often am I to enter a game of riddles with the author, where they challenge me with some strange and confusing and distracting device, and I'm supposed to unravel it and go "I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE" and take great personal satisfaction and pride in our mutual cleverness?
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Bakustra »

Live source for the current OWS ongoing protest in NYC:

Stream
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I mean, how often am I to enter a game of riddles with the author, where they challenge me with some strange and confusing and distracting device, and I'm supposed to unravel it and go "I SEE WHAT YOU DID THERE" and take great personal satisfaction and pride in our mutual cleverness?
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Simon_Jester »

Bakustra wrote:They could call for a meeting, talk with representatives, and then the OWS representatives could put it to a vote among the general population, like pretty much every other decision that's been made.
And I take it this never happened? What broke down- did the city fail to call for a meeting? Did the protestors not appoint representatives? Were the representatives' proposals not accepted by the general protest population?

I mean, you can see how this is a problem from the point of view of someone who needs the protestors to do something, if there's no one who can make binding agreements on behalf of the protestors. When you're negotiating the end of a strike, you talk to the union and the union leadership can say "the strike will end if you do X, Y, and Z," and that agreement will be honored.

If you're trying to get a park cleaned and all the protestors' representatives can say is "well, I'll see if I can convince people to leave, but maybe some of them won't want to, and we can't afford to let you split us from them..." well, even with the best will in the world you are still left with a park in need of cleaning. What do you do next?

Again, this is not to say that the City of New York has the best will in the world, not by a long shot- but it's an issue where the lack of concrete leadership structure in OWS does create a problem for people trying to deal with them in a friendly manner, and I'm not sure how to resolve it.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Terralthra »

CaptainChewbacca wrote:I could go on, but here's a listing of TWO HUNDRED FIFTY SIX separate instances of criminal acts, disease outbreaks, and acts of public concern committed by occupation protestors. Its even got one protestor knifing another in Atlanta, the reports go from Los Angeles to Glasgow.
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.

On top of that, you're quoting Andrew fucking Breitbart. The "criminal acts" do list some actual criminal acts, but are interspersed with horrifying outrageous acts like "Bill Ayers was at an Occupy Camp" (listed as two separate acts for reasons existing only in the mind of Andrew Breitbart), "Communist Leader cheered" (Oh no!), "Occupy Wall Street Launching First Nationwide General Strike in America Since 1946" (Striking is a crime now?), "Occupiers Announce Plans to Disrupt Rose Bowl Parade" (Dear God, not the parade!).

A large number of those incidents are listed as only "x Occupy protesters arrested," not giving any details on why. If you follow the links, you find that they were arrested for "resisting arrest," when police attempted to unconstitutionally violate their rights to assembly and speech by shutting down a peaceful protest, and they didn't meekly go along with it.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Zinegata »

Bakustra wrote:You're claiming that the average person looks on the OWS protesters with disfavor. You haven't proved that, instead pretending that a long-term occupation movement can be treated exactly the same as a one-day rally so that you can assume that it's marginal and failing.
No, what I said is this:
the main reason peaceful protests fail in democractic countries is because the mainstream population simply does not support the movement - either because they don't like what the movement is proposing, or it's too unclear for them to support it - and that the major decisions are ultimately decided by the ballot box.
And I have shown indicators that OWS is not getting enough traction. But the main point remains that peaceful protests need to get enough critical mass.
You're also wrong with point b), and indeed I wasn't lying at all- you are still treating protest as inferior to voting by assuming that the end-stage is a vote. Votes are part of democracy, but there are so many reasons that you might vote for someone that you can't translate your opinions into anything particularly concrete unless you're an actual single-issue voter. Protest, on the other hand, allows you to articulate positions and communicate them to the power-holders. They are equally important as a means of seizing the reins of power and trying to direct the state.
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.
You are a fucking idiot. Are you really suggesting that the average Indian had to be convinced into supporting independence?
Actually, yes. And you're ignorant and infantile to think otherwise.

Independence movements take a while to develop and coalesce. Your reference to the Philippine-American War in particular demonstrates your patent ignorance about independence movements. Philippine Independence didn't happen in the 40 year American colonial period. Before that the Philippines took over 300 years before launching a true independence movement.

Revolts occured during the 300 year Spanish colonial period, but a true independence movement only emerged in the 1890s that resulted in an attempted nationwide revolution.

The reasons for this are manyfold, but the fact of the matter is that a significant minority of the native population often benefits from the colonial masters - usually by acting as mediators between the local population and the colonial masters. The presence of this minority also helps placate the local population into accepting the status quo - as it minimizes the amount of violence needed to keep them in check (since the mediators also help to curb the worst excesses, albeit they also pocket a share of the profits). In addition, it offers members of the native population prospects for advancement - if they think that they can someday break into the minority and be relatively rich, the population is less likely to revolt.

Significantly, in the case of the Philippines, the independence movement really got rolling when the privelaged minority ("Illustrados") began to resent the power of the colonial masters themselves and agitated for more power to be transferred to them.

In the case of India, the British likewise relied on a complex network of different tribal loyalties to maintain power by favoring certain minorities in exchange for policing the rest. What Gandhi achieved was to force the Indian forces loyal to Britain to rethink their position through his non-violent protests.

Please note though, that not all Empires operated under this model. Some (i.e. Mongols under Genghis Khan) relied almost entirely on fear. But most successful empires did what they could to reduce the possibility of revolt not by simply using fear, but also by making sure that the natives played at least SOME part in the political process, and hence a significant number of them would have a stake in defending the current imperial system.
You're measuring OWS, which is based on long-term occupation and protest, by the numbers of single events. Of course each individual group is going to have lower numbers! That's the point- they're people who are willing to, day in and day out, go on down and protest! And you still haven't shown that support is 'low' for OWS. In fact, I'm not sure why you think you know American politics better than actual Americans who live in this god-damned country. Are you presuming that support is low because the media isn't covering it constantly? There are a variety of reasons for that which have little to do with its active support, and if you aren't, then what are you basing it on? The fact that posters you've deemed "fringe radicals" support it? Tell me where you're getting this from, apart from a downright insane investment in the status quo.
Your argument isn't demonstrating broad support: What you're saying is that OWS has smaller numbers, but fanatical members. That again does not bode well for a true populist movement, but falls much more strongly into anarchist and extremist tendencies. And again, anarchy and violence are not seen as valid solutions by the American public at large.

Huge Protests can be sustained long-term by the populace. See the Arab Spring. It did not happen overnight.
Last edited by Zinegata on 2011-11-17 01:44pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by ZOmegaZ »

How exactly can you be arrested for resisting arrest? Doesn't there have to be the reason for the original attempted arrest on the record as well? If not, that's a significant hole in our justice system.
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Terralthra
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Terralthra »

ZOmegaZ wrote:How exactly can you be arrested for resisting arrest? Doesn't there have to be the reason for the original attempted arrest on the record as well? If not, that's a significant hole in our justice system.
There should be, but in many cases, there is not, and has not been. Essentially, if protesters don't disperse whenever police feel like not letting them protest, the police arrest them for the charge of not being easily intimidated by authority, and if protesters link arms or chant, they're "resisting arrest."

Edit: spelling.
Last edited by Terralthra on 2011-11-17 02:10pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Losonti Tokash »

Chocula, whenever you feel like actually engaging in an honest dialogue with me or someone else about OWS, I would be 100% willing to do so. No insults, no poisoning the well, just an honest conversation. But if you're going to list absurd shit like "literally wanting to eat the rich" as if it were a legitimate reason to criticize the movement, then there is no point talking with you.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by DarkSilver »

ZOmegaZ wrote:How exactly can you be arrested for resisting arrest? Doesn't there have to be the reason for the original attempted arrest on the record as well? If not, that's a significant hole in our justice system.

According to a Deputy friend of mine in Terrebonne Parish, Resisting Arrest is always a "tacked on" charge, you cannot be arrested for just "resisting arrest" or "suspicion of resisting arrest". His words "Either they resisted arrest, or they didn't. You need another criminal charge to back up the resisting of arrest charge" - I.E. "He resisted when I went to arrest him for simple battery".

He does make the caveat that this is the law for Louisiana, and may be different from the rest of the country. The charge could also be something as simple as "remaining after forbidden" but the police would then have burden of proof for a conviction (which would be difficult and a misdemeanor).



Take that as you will, I'm not a professional on the subject, just what I was told when I asked.
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Re: The Occupation of Wall Street Spreads

Post by Losonti Tokash »

Not like it matters, the NYPD and City of New York have shown they are above the law so a mere technicality like "you can't arrest a person for resisting arrest" isn't going to stop them.
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