Occupy Wall Street Protest: 12 Days and Little Sign of Slowing Down

[steve2470]

http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/09/29/occupy-wall-street-12-days-and-little-sign-of-slowing-down/

Nearly two weeks ago, an estimated 3,000 people assembled at Battery Park with the intention of occupying Wall Street. They were an eclectic group, mostly young, some with beards and tattoos, other dressed in shorts and sneakers; a few even wore suits for the occasion. But nearly everyone was angry at what they saw as a culture of out-of-control greed. They didn't succeed — at least not geographically, forgoing Wall Street for nearby Zuccotti Park, just around the corner from Ground Zero.

News outlets put the crowd there at several thousand, but that seemed to overestimate its true numbers. When I visited the park on Sept. 17, I counted backpacks and sleeping bags, trying to differentiate the tourists and casual marchers from those who were in it for the long haul. I came up with about 200 people.

Over the past 12 days, however, those numbers have grown. On a late-night visit to Zuccotti Park on Tuesday, the fecklessness and disorganization reported earlier in the New York Times seemed largely absent. A protest that began in utter dysfunction has given way to a fairly organized movement with a base camp for its most stalwart members, now numbering more than 300 people, who have slept in the park for 12 nights straight–and who say they intend to stay.

Perhaps no incident galvanized the protesters more than their march north to Union Square on Sept. 24. Police arrested nearly 80 people whom they say were blocking traffic, and video of a penned-in female protester being pepper sprayed by a police officer went viral on the web. The protesters have posted the video on their website and a picture of the woman adorns the board at the entrance to the park, at what's now become the groups quasi-official information booth. At small table, posterboards lay out the schedule for the day, which includes marches down to Wall Street for the stock exchange's opening and closing bells, each followed by a "General Assembly" where the various groups gather to discuss their goals, their current status and what might come next.

[TomClash]

1. This is true

There are more protesters here today than yesterday. And the numbers have grown since the march to Union Square.

Quite a few tourists, residents and workers stop to read the signs and talk with the protesters, who are peaceful and polite.

[Common Sense Party]

2. What are their goals?

It says they meet every day in a General Assembly to discuss their goals.

What are they wanting to accomplish?

Do they want to shut down Wall Street? Temporarily or permanently?
Do they expect the wealthy to just hand over their filthy lucre?
Do they want a complete overhaul of the economy and an end to capitalism?

Or is it just venting and blowing off steam?

12 days...any sign of accomplishing anything?

[xchrom]

3. an end to corporate governance of our lives?

or is that too much common sense?

[Common Sense Party]

7. And how are they accomplishing that?

By getting arrested?

I don't quite follow the plan here.

[Fire Walk With Me]

8. By protesting what is wrong and must be changed. It draws attention and foments activism.

It also must be done.

[roguevalley]

9. you must be young. :) That is how a war was ended, the day in

and day out of being there, getting arrested and raising consciousness. I remember the picketing outside of the S. African Embassy in London. Riot every night. A sign had the consecutive days in attendance. over 800 when I last saw it. South Africa fell. This is how change and revolution begin.

[icymist]

11. By changeling the tyranny of monied corporatist interests.

If you don't think that by speaking up and actually protesting the taking over of our country by corporations and monied interests to be worthy, then I don't know what to say to ya, except that such takeovers havn't worked in the past.

[starroute]

5. They're rebuilding the left -- and that takes time

This is a self-organizing phenomenon. It isn't that it started out "dysfunctional" and is gradually getting its act together. It's that it started as a bunch of people who shared only a general awareness that the system is broken and have been working intensively -- largely through the General Assembly, but also through acts of self-definition -- to arrive at an analysis and set of principles.

That isn't easy. The left has been coasting for decades on the remains of 19th century ideology, which is effectively bankrupt. The fragmentation and self-indulgence of the identity politics of recent years is a sign of that.

What's needed now is for people to come together in new ways, to figure out what they have in common and what unifying factors underlie their varied grievances, and to arrive at modes of action that are in harmony with their ideals and their goals.

The process underway at Liberty Plaza is an incredible hothouse. An enormous amount of ground is being covered under pressure cooker conditions -- and the people who are there and the ideas that are being formulated will become the basis of the left for decades to come.

So don't expect too much too soon -- and don't impose the ideology of a hundred years ago on what is happening now. They'll get there, but in their own time and in their own way.

[Common Sense Party]

6. Again, you speak of their goals...but what are their goals?

They'll get there...they'll get where?

Being mad because the system is broken is understandable. But that's no better than the Tea Party people. They're mad as hell and they're not gonna take it anymore. ... And...? Those crazies don't have a clue, don't have a plan, don't have clearly defined short-term, intermediate-term and long-term goals.

Without a clear picture of what the Occupy folks want, they're not going to accomplish much, other than get arrested.

[Luminous Animal]

12. I don't know how people can be any clearer. They are in the process of establishing goals.

It is really quite simple.

Today they have a workshop on taxing millionaires and another on the housing crisis. They've got well-informed people running these workshops.

You continuing to whine, "what are their goals?" won't get them there any faster.

Open Source Solutions—Ted. Today they started a process to start addressing what their demands might be. It was very successful. They are adopting a tried and true process of visioning, strategizing, exciting actions. We will be sharing this with the group tomorrow. They have a statement that they are drafting currently to give to the outside world, that we will ask for consensus on with everybody. The other thing they are working on is an independent cell phone infrastructure. If anybody has a ham radio license, let him know so they can use that.

Labor Working Group—Jackie. Labor is under attack! They want our support! The problem is… not that we can’t connect, but we’d be up all night every day if we made all the connections being offered! Some of you have heard that we had a very successful march yesterday from here to the postal workers’ rally at a congressman’s office. When people marched in even though the police had tried to stop them, they received an extremely enthusiastic response from the workers. As a result, the political director of one of the postal unions came and joined our labor committee with the goal of bringing the postal workers here.

[gratuitous]

4. But they aren't wearing the right clothes

And they haven't distilled their message down to a primitive-brain aphorism like "taxed enough already." So it's clearly a failure by the standards of people who would rather criticize their rescuers than extract themselves from a perilous situation.

Yet, for all these deficiencies in the eyes of critics (devil's definition being that a critic is someone who knows the cost of everything and the value of nothing), the protest continues to be a thorn in the side of business as usual robber baroncy. Uppity little peons, ruining things for everybody, perpetrator and victim alike.

[roguevalley]

10. they are a spark that lights the revolution. every day they are seen

is a chance for PISSED OFF people to know what to do. Mother Jones started alone. Ghandi did too. These people are heroes for they are the living embodiment of freedom and hope. I love them all terribly.