Occupied

Occupied

If you haven't noticed a uprising of youthful bright eye protesting of wall street has begun taking over the business districts of most major cities. It's a movement called Occupy Wall Street. Which since it is now in many places, it seems like it's just being called Occupy. Oh yeah, and here is their pledge:

"I pledge that if any U.S. troops, contractors, or mercenaries remain in Afghanistan on Thursday, October 6, 2011, as that occupation goes into its 11th year, I will commit to being in Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C., with others on that day or the days immediately following, for as long as I can, with the intention of making it our Tahrir Square, Cairo, our Madison, Wisconsin, where we will NONVIOLENTLY resist the corporate machine by occupying Freedom Plaza to demand that America's resources be invested in human needs and environmental protection instead of war and exploitation. We can do this together. We will be the beginning."

From their fact sheet:

1. We will use our anger at injustice as a positive, nonviolent force for change.
2. We will not carry weapons of any kind.
3. We will not vandalize or destroy property.
4. We will not use or carry alcohol or illegal drugs.
5. We will not run or make threatening motions.
6. We will not insult, swear or attack others.
7. We will protect those who oppose or disagree with us from insult or attack.
8. We will not assault, verbally or physically, those who oppose or disagree with us, even if they assault us.

Guys, guys, guys! This is a civil resistance... We're angry but we have to be civil about it, okay?! A great part of me really can't help but laugh at the whole capitalization of non-violent in there and this fixation with that in true liberal fashion. non-violence is the greatest trick that the ruling class has ever played on the proletarian.

Civil disobedience and disrupting government functions, which is an interesting aspect of this, with either go one of two ways - with them going home with their tails between their legs or suicide by cop happening a whole lot more often.

When it comes down to it, this protest to these people just end up being a vacation. They get to say they did something, think about the lame ass white bread version of the 60's they learned about, go home to their privileged, pretty-bourgeois lives, and maybe even schedule another one after they vote for Obama in 2012. To them this is no different than buying fair trade coffee or organic tomatoes.

"I'm really anxious to re-elect Obama... it's not about Democrats." Fucking seriously? What are these wars you speak of? I don't want to talk to you anymore"

However to people like me it is different. A protest cannot be completely divorced from the realm of politics, and the extreme control of this protest by the FBI plant leaders and the government shows that it has the potential to explode into a revolutionary situation. Go throw some bottles at the police around the are where all these idiots are camped out. Go commit economic violence. Start a riot or go cause a police beatdown under the progressive regime of Obama. Because they sure as shit don't believe they can be touched. This was from a forum on the Occupywallstreet website:

The cops beat down protestors the last time we tried a sit-in that blocked Wall Street. I think the one woman's husband is still spoon-feeding her broccoli and cabbage, as we speak. I saw footage of her head getting split. I have a feeling that this isn't going to go well.

the site admin posts in the thread later and just goes "oh dont worry it'll all be fine the police aren't allowed to beat people who just peacefully protest, its against the rules

I'll join these two characters in laughing at this utterly insane mindset.



It saddens me a little wondering how a mass revolution in the US can even be sparked in terms as the labor rights movement, civil rights or even woman's rights. Because it seems that no one is willing to protest an issue they are willing to die for.

But perhaps I'm being to harsh on them. It's not like the type of people who are organizing this protest would be throwing firebombs at the police anyway if it weren't for the white-washing of Ghandi and MLK. These people are middle class liberals, they like the system, they just want it adjusted a bit and, commensurate with the smallness of their desired modifications, they can only be in favor of small-type protests to begin with.

So I guess I'll have to settle with the idea of "Honk if you want to show the most bloodthirsty imperialistic empire in the history of humanity you disapprove of their actions.."

These people need to realize that a protest is not a fucking social outing. This is the reason none of this shit works or has any lasting impact what-so-ever. They take the words and actions of Gandhi as if he accomplished much. Why yes, let's see

"Hey, lets kick brits out of country so us upper castes can exploit the dalits more"

Boy, Gandhi sure did accomplish a shit ton, didn't he? Or maybe the other aspect is what we should be focused on..

"I hate dalits so much im going to go on a hunger strike to stop a reform favorable to them" - greatest soul on earth mohandras gandhi

On the social networking sites it has spread as well. Twitter and other shitty sites like that have embraced it and you get shit like this popping up:

THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED
#OCCUPYCHI

Oh how I wish that before Gil-Scott Heron had died, he would have said something along the lines of the revolution will not be re-tweeted. Because Jesus, some of these white boy protesters are the worse. Maybe one just needs to shrug their shoulders and do as much minority outreach as possible to mitigate that goofy white boy shit in all of this.

It's all the same boring center-left "don't cause trouble, send good energies" bullshit that never work. Do you know why the hippies failed? It wasn't that their message was wrong. Don't think I'm bashing on peace love and happiness. But the reason the movement failed was because people were too embarrassed to be seen as part of that identity, basically it became uncool to be a hippie and thus the movement died.

One piece of advice about these events, if you do go to them, is to never out yourself as a socialist. It's the worse thing you can possibly do. Even worse than throwing a moltov cocktail at a group of cops. All this is because the word socialism in this country completely discredits anything you could ever say.

It's like all the old folks are still grabbing on to the whole red scare like some comfort blanket. We need them all to die before the word "socialist" becomes less of a boogeyman. Perhaps instead you can just label yourself something like "social and economic justice" as it avoids political labels, yet conveys the strength of the underlying message. Or maybe the American people would take socialism, but they won't take the label of it.

Either way, it's a big matter that a lot of other groups have co-oped the whole Occupy Wall Street movement. It's like when you go to a woman's rights movement protest/march and you see that one guy with the "legalize pot" sign. That's it. A lot of other movements have attached their hitch to this dog and pony show. But hey, maybe that's a topic for another day on this ever growing discussion of what the BBC America is calling the left wing tea party.