Occupy 101
It seems to me that many of the people criticizing
the Occupy movement are all saying the same
thing, that they lack a fundamental message, and
they don’t have a direction.
But what I see when I look at the movement as
a whole is a large group of people who know there
are problems in this country, perhaps
even more than can be vocalized.
Though getting money out of
politics seems to be a broad statement,
many occupiers would give a
simple solution.
Overturn citizens united, disband
the American Legislative Exchange
Council, and see to it that corporate
campaign fi nance is either recapped
or done away with all together.
The Occupy Phoenix movement
shows a huge amount of resilience by
spending the last 48 days and counting
in Cesar Chavez Plaza, without the comforts of
tents, sleeping bags, pillows, or blankets.
The brave souls occupying Tucson, after having
two of their three camps closed down, spend their
nights facing $1,000 tickets for urban camping.
In Seattle, after spending a few weeks in the
Westlake Plaza, the occupation upped and moved
and took over Seattle Central Community College,
which did not have any rules regarding the use of
the campus as an assembly site.
The governing body of the school quickly tried
to enact rules against the guerrilla assembly, but
the occupiers were able to hit them with an injunction
to fi ght the possible eviction.
Occupy LA, the biggest of the occupations I
visited, had its assembly site raided by the LAPD
in the early morning hours of Nov. 30.
Occupy LA had been occupying
City Hall with more than 200 tents for
over a month when the “Man” decided
to crack down and trample all over the
First Amendment rights of the protestors.
LA is fi nding its biggest issue to be sustainability.
With more than 200 present,
feeding the occupation alone is a logistical
nightmare.
Phoenix sees big issues in recruiting.
Try as they might, Occupy Phoenix
remains a regular assembly of about 25 to
30 people, which sees minimal spikes for
big events, and numbers of occupiers often drop to
single digits in the wee hours of the morning.
Staying dry is obviously one of the biggest
struggles of Occupy Seattle, as well as pepper
spray-happy cops who recently sprayed an 84-
year-old woman, a 4-year-old girl, and a priest.
Though the occupations all struggle differently,
they struggle in solidarity, and maintain that
regardless of what they have to say, they will be
heard.
