Occupy Wall Street better defend its identity

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Neally said:
That's just it, who knows what the hell protesting and demanding more jobs is supposed to accomplish?

Yeah, okay we are all pissed that the economy sucks, what is it that they expect wall street to do to fix it, or is the protest just about "we're pissed"?
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As far as I'm aware, no-one is calling for Wall St. to fix anything. You don't call for thieves to fix the problem of burglaries.

Good, about time.
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I'm glad you agree.
 
Imagine there's no breadsticks, see it raise a cry:

Occupy Portland protesters became enraged when Pizza Schmizza ran out of breadsticks to accompany their order. They threatened to assault employees and vandalize the restaurant.
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WildCat said:
Sure it's about jobs. It's about whatever you want it to be.
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Making sarcastic comments is easy, of course, but the movement does clearly have specific points it agrees on. The vast majority of the movement would agree that inequality is too high, for example, and that the rich control too large a share of the wealth. "Job creators" not actually creating jobs, and corporations having too much influence over government are going to be points that the majority agree with as well. There are plenty of side issues, but implying that the movement is completely split and has no central issues seems to me to be deliberately intellectually dishonest, and most likely an attempt to handwave away the genuine greivances these protestors have because discussing possible solutions is politically uncomfortable, or counter to your own ideology.
 
Democracy Simulator said:
Not really, it's certainly not about increasing the influence of money in politics. It's also not about giving Wall St. an easy ride.
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I'm pretty sure that for the Paultards it's about giving Wall Street an easy ride. They'd repeal insider trading laws if they had their way.

It's abut whatever you want it to be!
 
stokes234 said:
Making sarcastic comments is easy, of course, but the movement does clearly have specific points it agrees on.
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The comment is not sarcastic at all, OWS is about whatever you want it to be about. Anyway, I'm eager to hear the specific points you say they agree on!

stokes234 said:
The vast majority of the movement would agree that inequality is too high, for example, and that the rich control too large a share of the wealth. "Job creators" not actually creating jobs, and corporations having too much influence over government are going to be points that the majority agree with as well. There are plenty of side issues, but implying that the movement is completely split and has no central issues seems to me to be deliberately intellectually dishonest, and most likely an attempt to handwave away the genuine greivances these protestors have because discussing possible solutions is politically uncomfortable, or counter to your own ideology.
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And now you disappoint me, you promise specific points and deliver only platitudes.

How does OWS propose to create jobs? How do they propose to reduce corporate influence over government?

Oops, that's where OWS falls apart. Will they do it by communist revolution? Ending capitalism? Ending the fed? Destroying the government in favor of anarchy? More government spending? Less government spending? Depending on who you ask you get a different answer.

The Rosa Parks bus boycott had a specific demand - repeal the law segregating buses. Nice and simple and tidy. OWS? All they agree on is chanting "we are the 99%"!
 
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WildCat said:
Oops, that's where OWS falls apart. Will they do it by communist revolution? Ending capitalism? Ending the fed? Destroying the government in favor of anarchy? More government spending? Less government spending? Depending on who you ask you get a different answer.
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I disagree that in order for a group of people to justify their protesting against something, they need to all agree on a single solution.

The recent student protests in the UK were against the rise in tuition fees, but different factions were in favour of different solutions - raising taxes to pay to keep them at 3k, keeping them at 3k and reducing government spending, eliminating them altogether, some even wanted a new general election simply because the party they had voted for had gone completely back on their word. The point they agreed on was that the new tuition fee rise was bad. The points OWS agree on are that much higher inequality than the rest of the developed world is bad, and that excessive corporate influence on government is bad.

The practical purpose of protests in a democratic system is often to show that there are political brownie points to be won from taking up a cause, since a large enough group of people support that cause. In this case, politicans now know that running with the cause of solving these problems, such as by reducing inequality, or by reigning back corporate influence on elections (i've seen you suggest an individual donations cap), there are votes to be gained. There might be politicians who offer potential solutions that appeal to the majority of OWS demonstraters, and they may do well as a result - if so, the protests will have been at least partially successful. It's also entirely possible that several politicans will propose several solutions and split the demonstraters into bite-sized chunks that are useless alone, but such is the way of the left.
 
Neally said:
Which again is why "occupying wall street" is a retarded protest.
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Wall street is symbolic of the high inequality in the USA, which makes it a good choice of target when attempting to highlight the issue. There's no rule in protesting practice that says you have to protest in the vicinity of the people you are demanding solve the problem, even if that is the norm.
 
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/11/06/MNFB1LQLLD.DTL&tsp=1

"Many, many Oakland residents ... feel that this is disrupting every effort this city has made to have economic development," said Councilwoman Pat Kernighan. "This has set us back 15 years."
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In addition, workers have lost wages as stores have closed for safety reasons or to show support for the marches.
Some companies that might have considered Oakland's downtown, with its lower rents and convenient access to transportation, are looking elsewhere.
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Protests about lack of job creation destroying jobs? This whole childish endeavor will implode before the end of the year.
 
stokes234 said:
I disagree that in order for a group of people to justify their protesting against something, they need to all agree on a single solution.
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I agree, but in the case of OWS they don't even have a single solution. Their declaration is nothing other than a list of corporate activities they believe are wrong, then urging people to "create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions".

Don't like corporations? Well take them over, buy a majority of a stock (actually greenmailers have bought as little as 10%) and transform the corporation into whatever you want it to be. Hostile takeovers to save the world! Nah, that would actually involve doing something. It's more fun to just stand around and hold signs.

https://www.nycga.net/resources/declaration/#comment-3796
 
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Augustine said:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/11/06/MNFB1LQLLD.DTL&tsp=1

Protests about lack of job creation destroying jobs? This whole childish endeavor will implode before the end of the year.
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Gotta love this bit:

Mayor Jean Quan, who grew up around her family's restaurant in Livermore, said such businesses run on a 5 percent profit margin and have a hard time absorbing even one lost day.

She said she knows of two restaurants downtown that are closing because of recent losses.
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Who was it that invited the protestors back after the police had evicted them from Oscar Grant Plaza? Who was it that termed the general strike a "success for the 99%"?

Why yes, it was that same Mayor Jean Quan.
 
stokes234 said:
There's no rule in protesting practice that says you have to protest in the vicinity of the people you are demanding solve the problem, even if that is the norm.
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It's the norm because it makes sense. Highlighting again the foolishness of the occutards.

Augustine said:
Protests about lack of job creation destroying jobs?
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Ironic isn't it? Yet more proof that the immature protesters haven't a clue.
This whole childish endeavor will implode before the end of the year.
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One can only hope...
 
Remember when the OWS crowd looked greedy because they didn't want to share the spaghetti bolognese with the homeless? Well, turns out those folks were downright generous compared to their Boston counterparts:

Occupy Boston has been encouraging protesters to take showers, hot meals and shelter meant for the homeless, prompting a St. Francis House manager to ask the downtown campers to remove directions from their Internet newspaper.

The online publication that calls itself “Occupy Boston Globe” posts meal times and shower hours at St. Francis House on Boylston Street, which runs on private donations and state and federal funding.
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:eek:
 
bikerdruid said:
if only increasing awareness of the sickness in the corporate control of america and its cronies, it is worth while.
people are exercising their right to protest the evils in the system.

do you believe that the status quo is acceptable?
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Well, I don't want to replace the status quo with Lord of the Flies, which is a great analogy for the Occupy movement. If you want to see the harms of deregulation, greed, corruption, classism and incompetence, then go to your local Occupy circus. Its enough to make wall street insiders blush.

here's a comment from a former Occupier at kgw.com:
Hi guys and gals. I am wendy Hamilton, the one they interviewed on this channel. I want to correct the news, I was NOT staying the night there and was not camped out. I do believe in te movement, BUT please listen to me first before you judge. I believe the people who make a lot of money worked for what they have, but I do not believe in the war, the big banks taking your money and lining the pockets with our misery. I have been there from day one, It was peaceful with REAL protesters. Now I wanted to be interviewed because of several reasons. I decided to stay in my friends tent and I woke up as usual at 5 am. There were tweekers everywhere who had not slept, heroin use in teh bathroom.. a place called relaxation station.. which is an actual structure where you can do drugs that police do not know about. I walked to 7-11 just to get some coffee and an "occupier" was beating up the clerk??? what does that prove? i want our parks back for the public.
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If you read the comments, there are many similar comments from folks who have sympathies with the cause generally and were involved in the movement, only to become disillusioned and disgusted with it and have become its critics, no right wing ideology required. The movement is a disgusting train wreck that has not and will not accomplish anything worthwhile. Its costing jobs, tax payer dollars, private property damage and not to mention the thievery and assaults that seem endemic to the movement.
 
Just like the hippies of the sixties, eventually the majority of these people will get a clue and go on to become more or less decent citizens. In fifteen or twenty years they'll be wearing ties, buying seven dollar cups of coffee and stepping over homeless people in the street and the cycle will begin again.

Every generation thinks their revolution is the one that will work.
 
portlandatheist said:
The movement is a disgusting train wreck that has not and will not accomplish anything worthwhile. Its costing jobs, tax payer dollars, private property damage and not to mention the thievery and assaults that seem endemic to the movement.
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That's the inevitable result of a movement which is inherently lawless. And this isn't even like the civil rights movement's civil disobedience. In that case, the civil rights movement broke specific laws which were unjust, and accepted the consequences, in order to get the laws changed. But here, the various laws they're breaking aren't actually the unjust laws they're trying to overturn, merely laws which they find inconvenient to obey. And they flout them because they know they can get away with it. The difference is night and day.

It was naive of that woman to think the protests could have turned out any other way, regardless of her intentions.
 
'Behind the scenes of OWS-INfocus-11-06-2011'

"I am Danny Schechter, known as the News Dissector. I am a blogger (NewsDissector.com) Filmmaker (PlundertheCrimeofOurTime.com) and fellow troublemaker.

I am a former producer for CNN and ABC News and even did a stint at CNBC. But these networks are not open to independent perspectives, even from former employees and award-winning professional producers. I had to go to Iran’s Press TV to find interest to make a short documentary about HOW Occupied Wall Street operates on the ground at Zuccotti Park.

Here’s my program that has already been on TV all over the world — but not in the my own country. What does that say about our media? Most mainstream media, alas, serves the 1%, not the American people."

( http://owsnews.org/new-tv-report-inside-occupy-wall-st-danny-schechter/ )



(25 minutes long)
 
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