Occupy Wallstreet

[McSpunckle]

They were quite clearly on the sidewalk and not trying to break the barricade. They weren't even up against it.

[Achtane]

Also,...here is a slomo of that tattoo girl getting maced in the face.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZ05rWx1pig[/youtube]

I'm sorry but that's fucking hilarious.

How is that hilarious? It's disgusting, and it's helped keep me furious for days.

It's because anything in super slo-mo is always hilarious.
I didn't want to be the one to say it.

[Bellyheart]

I swear, I was waiting for dubkitty....I almost didn't post, but then realized that'd be silly. It's always wrong. Dubkitty this isn't Penn Ave but very close.

http://october2011.org/

I'm not going to argue over this, but if you think that the fight isn't worthwhile then I feel sad for you.

Please everyone maintain a civil mind and respect each other. No need to name call.

[Bassus Sanguinis]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_aUHNgwwNVM[/youtube]
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X2QUHcNbxfw[/youtube]

[wsas3]

they blocked the street, and then tried to break the police barricade. they deserved to get maced. the Civil Rights protestors of the 50s and 60s, who were actually fighting for something worthwhile, had to face cops with clubs, police dogs, tear gas, and terrorist attacks like the Birmingham church bombing and the shootings of Medgar Evers and James Meredith. i'm supposed to get whiny because a handful of yappy college girls got exactly what they provoked just to get attention and posture in a way that HAD no effect, and WILL HAVE absolutely no effect? the notion that people are so fed up with "capitalist hegemony" that they're going to race into the streets to follow a bunch of anarchists who aren't even old enough to drink yet? please. if they want to demonstrate against the cause of the problems in the economy, they need to move from Wall Street to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. nobody cares what fifty socialists say.

They have the right to protest peacefully, which they were, it's the first amendment: freedom of assembly. Whether or not you agree with their ideals, their rights were thrown into the gutter and every single american citizen who values those rights should be furious.

[D.o.S.]

they blocked the street, and then tried to break the police barricade. they deserved to get maced. the Civil Rights protestors of the 50s and 60s, who were actually fighting for something worthwhile, had to face cops with clubs, police dogs, tear gas, and terrorist attacks like the Birmingham church bombing and the shootings of Medgar Evers and James Meredith. i'm supposed to get whiny because a handful of yappy college girls got exactly what they provoked just to get attention and posture in a way that HAD no effect, and WILL HAVE absolutely no effect? the notion that people are so fed up with "capitalist hegemony" that they're going to race into the streets to follow a bunch of anarchists who aren't even old enough to drink yet? please. if they want to demonstrate against the cause of the problems in the economy, they need to move from Wall Street to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. nobody cares what fifty socialists say.

This whole post is well thought out, but the bold part is the most important.

My biggest frustration with the relative Left in this country is how fucking fractionalized we are. The anti-capitalists don't work with the environmentalists who don't work with the anti-nuke people who don't work with the Food Not Bombs types...

And there's no good reason for it, and change isn't going to come from a bunch of assholes camping out in front of Wall Street or running around Seattle kicking in windows. That's going to turn people off.

[Christopher]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wV1lZMTCqf8[/youtube]

[Jwar]

Also,...here is a slomo of that tattoo girl getting maced in the face.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZ05rWx1pig[/youtube]

I'm sorry but that's fucking hilarious.

How is that hilarious? It's disgusting, and it's helped keep me furious for days.

The slow mo duh.

[Jwar]

they blocked the street, and then tried to break the police barricade. they deserved to get maced. the Civil Rights protestors of the 50s and 60s, who were actually fighting for something worthwhile, had to face cops with clubs, police dogs, tear gas, and terrorist attacks like the Birmingham church bombing and the shootings of Medgar Evers and James Meredith. i'm supposed to get whiny because a handful of yappy college girls got exactly what they provoked just to get attention and posture in a way that HAD no effect, and WILL HAVE absolutely no effect? the notion that people are so fed up with "capitalist hegemony" that they're going to race into the streets to follow a bunch of anarchists who aren't even old enough to drink yet? please. if they want to demonstrate against the cause of the problems in the economy, they need to move from Wall Street to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. nobody cares what fifty socialists say.

Agree with this.

[dubkitty]

They were quite clearly on the sidewalk and not trying to break the barricade. They weren't even up against it.

if you look at the background, the other "POLICE LINE" nets are parallel to the curb; this implies that the cops needed to use the barricade in their immediate area to hem in the demonstrators to keep them from jumping out into the street; blocking the street WAS the declared goal of the protest. in the un-slowed video the women at the front/right side of the group, farthest from the camera, are clearly pushing against the barricade and shouting for the entire period from 0:08 until they're maced at ~0:20. they were trying to block the street, and tried to force their way past a police line to do it. that's not "peaceful protest." i'd like to see the 30 to 60 seconds before the carefully-selected clip, which i expect would show two or three warnings to desist/disperse by the police and additional provocative behavior by the protestors, who IMO were clearly trying to make a good propaganda picture by playing the defenseless woman set upon by the Big Bad Male Po-lice. they were probably desperately disappointed they didn't get Tased...that'd make for even better propaganda.

[D.o.S.]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wV1lZMTCqf8[/youtube]

At that point in his life he was angry and disillusioned. Not wrong, but old and pessimistic.

I love Carlin, and that's one of my favorite bits of his, but there's a reason he's "George Carlin, Comedian" and not "George Carlin, Social Activist."

[dubkitty]

and i'm sorry, but the whole going to Washington to hold a Soviet in the park thing--which, rhetoric stripped away, is what the Octoberites propose--is not the answer. whatever your emotions on the matter, "corporate hegemons" feed, employ, and otherwise ameliorate the miseries of life for much of the world's population; people holding Soviets have produced nothing but endless rows of corpses.

[Bassus Sanguinis]

they blocked the street, and then tried to break the police barricade. they deserved to get maced. the Civil Rights protestors of the 50s and 60s, who were actually fighting for something worthwhile, had to face cops with clubs, police dogs, tear gas, and terrorist attacks like the Birmingham church bombing and the shootings of Medgar Evers and James Meredith. i'm supposed to get whiny because a handful of yappy college girls got exactly what they provoked just to get attention and posture in a way that HAD no effect, and WILL HAVE absolutely no effect? the notion that people are so fed up with "capitalist hegemony" that they're going to race into the streets to follow a bunch of anarchists who aren't even old enough to drink yet? please. if they want to demonstrate against the cause of the problems in the economy, they need to move from Wall Street to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. nobody cares what fifty socialists say.

This whole post is well thought out, but the bold part is the most important.

My biggest frustration with the relative Left in this country is how fucking fractionalized we are. The anti-capitalists don't work with the environmentalists who don't work with the anti-nuke people who don't work with the Food Not Bombs types...

And there's no good reason for it, and change isn't going to come from a bunch of assholes camping out in front of Wall Street or running around Seattle kicking in windows. That's going to turn people off.

I, too, believe the fractioned underground is its worst enemy. Like an anti-nuclear anarchist teenager who thinks he's too cool to join in for a demo for the left wing anti-nuclear march because it's organised by an organised political party.

However, even if the camping on Wall St hasn't got the 10.000 heads in there, it has made it easier to make that perhaps happen the next time. And as far as it's going peacefully, the wider audience rather chooses to like them, not the coppers and bankers - who are way harder to relate to anyway.

And Dubsy: I don't know, don't underestimating the impact of even the small cultural underground movements. I wouldn't have myself EVER believed that the Berlin wall would come down. And it did.

The thousand or so socialists (though they're not even that left in my book) can represent a lot bigger body of people just needing encouraging to act on their own. Join demonstrations, spread the gospel, and speak their minds. Cultural and political changes seem inevitable, and I believe the times are right for more regulated global economics. Even the hippies count. They can entertain and draw attention and encourage dissatisfied people to join in the demo, further strengthening each other about the justification of their their cause.

The bastards who dare to dream and genuinely believe in their rights and freedom to try to sell their idea to the wider audience make difference. Not always. And not necessarily right away. But nobody probably thought much of the 102 passangers either, when setting to sail on a ship called Mayflower. Like the people protesting now, they were not the first either to do so either. They turned to be historically relevant group. Just saying. You never know.

And: I'm not waging fires of revolution but showing the need for fixing the broken and prehistoric parts of the machinery, I'm suggesting everybody, everywhere to try re-thinking the attitudes towards their government politics and the economical situation and its backgrounds. And think seriously about if it's time to try to fix the things a bit.

[dubkitty]

the Berlin wall thing is a good point. i'm sure that given your location on the edge of the Warsaw Pact you know, but i'll point out in general, that it took decades of resistance ranging from the 1968 Czech uprisings, the underground bands (most notably the Plastic People of the Universe) and the Chapter 77 activists in Czechoslovakia to the Solidarnosc strikes in Poland and the massive resistance in the southeastern states e.g. Romania to create the climate for the opening of the borders, and still that only happened because Gorbachev chose not to crack down as Brezhnev would have done. but the point is that mass movements are not made overnight. Christianity was once a few bands of people in the desert, despised and persecuted; Marxism was once only words on a page in the British Library; and when Mein Kampf was written the horrors of Naziism were only notions planted in a man's head that would produce their hideous flowers twenty years later. if you want massive social change, keep rowing, but don't expect the boat to get there before you yourself die. it takes a LONG time to change people's ideas, longer to change their minds, and you may never change their hearts.

[Bassus Sanguinis]

Yeah, true, but nothing these guys in the Wall St. are protesting for is new either.

I am myself feeling that general public would like very much to see this sparkle a fix in a few laws. The fact that [i]people should also pay for the nice things[i] like - say - universal health care and free top grade schooling by paying more taxes - that's the killer in between the lines that really put so many off, even if they were offered the benefits of mixed markets.