Saturday, October 1, 2011

Opinion on #occupywallstreet - UPDATED + Again

I've heard many of the critiques of the movement, saying everything from:
"They need a unified message"
to
"They need a list of demands"

But, I see those critiques and requests as nothing more than a way to figure out how to pacify the people and make this movement just 'go away'.

#OccupyWallStreet will never "Go Away", I guarantee you that.

Well, then, what is this about?
Everything.
That's the thing about the movement, it includes everyone, regardless of race, gender, age, political orientation, sexual orientation or what-have-you. Everyone has an opinion, everyone has a grievance, and everyone has a reason for their voice to be heard.
EVERYONE has one demand.

Who is everyone?
Everyone is the 99% of people who have received the short end of the stick. The people who pay too much in taxes, people whose homes have been foreclosed, people who have lost their retirement in Ponzi schemes and Enron scandals, people who have no food to put on the table for their kids, people who work 60 hours a week for minimum wage with no health insurance and people who are just plain sick and tired of not being heard. We are the 99% who have to split a very small amount of monetary pie. It includes everyone from
Grannies for peace
to Pilot Unions, Teachers Unions, and Mass Transit Unions.
To even our most recent Middle-East war Vet's
(on a side-note, my sister is being deployed to Afghanistan in the next two weeks. God-speed sis, I love you. Come back safe.)

and...
Where are you?

Facts are:
There isn't just one demand - that is what makes this beautiful.
There isn't just one person - that is what makes this powerful.
There isn't just one place - it is spreading.
This is why the movement is growing. This is why the movement will not go away.
The power is the people.

United We Stand!

It is not longer about race, gender, position, age or sexual orientation. It is about all of us. It is about humanity.
It is about existence.
It is about democracy.

An un-defined, un-leadered, un-organized, beautiful, organically growing movement that is history in the making.

Are you going to be a part of it?

UPDATE:
I found this great article on Inequality in America (p.s. it is greater than Egypt, Tunisia or Yemen).
And another great article published in Vanity Fair.

A great article in Huffington Post
"Occupy Wall Street may expose the Achilles' heel of many other civil protests. Occupy Wall Street has no repeated cheer to stop coal mining, or to grant civil rights, or even to end a war. This protest cannot be boiled down to a simple soundbite because this protest is ambitiously seeking a complex, fundamental, philosophical change in the social, political, and economic infrastructure of our country. (Try feeding that line to Katie Couric before she goes on the air and see what kind of terrified, vacuous stare you get in return.)"


“Education is a human right with immense power to transform. On its foundation rest the cornerstones of freedom, democracy and sustainable human development.” ~ Kofi Annan

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