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occupy - what now?

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Unionist
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Joined: Dec 11 2005

There's nothing more vomit-inducing than a scrawny troll. Feed 'em, say I.

Or was that a Tawny™ Scroll™?


Caissa
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Joined: Jun 14 2006

I presume Oldgoat will be along in due course.


Slumberjack
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Joined: Aug 8 2005

The place teams with enough incivility as it is between leftist people and the NDP/Liberal factions.  Just how are we supposed to fit the Harperite crowd in amongst all of that.


Albertaborn
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Joined: Dec 20 2011

I'm really not sure what you guys have for a goal, but that appears to be your problem.  Lack of a tangible goal.

Hear me out for a minute:  When this first started, I thought, here we go, viva la revelution!  In the US I saw an opportunity for supporters of Ron Paul to push common sense to the forefront and save their country from impending insolvency and a massive shift in worldwide policy.

Here in Canada I thought this could be something that in the long run would truly unite our country.

Unfortunately from where I sit all I saw was a bunch of people hanging around doing nothing.  Anyone can bitch.  You want people to pay attention, you come up with a solution.

If you do?  People will listen.  ALL people.

By the way, I remember seeing on the news how when it was time to clean up, the, "occupiers" were nowhere to be found.  Only the big bad corporations  were around to clean up the mess.  You missed your chance to earn respect there as well.

Sorry people, you don't want to be treated like useless punks?  Don't act like useless punks.


Slumberjack
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Joined: Aug 8 2005

Albertaborn wrote:
Sorry people, you don't want to be treated like useless punks?  Don't act like useless punks.

I don't really care for anything you said; except could I use this as part a motivational screed over at NDP Leadership number whatever.


Slumberjack
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Joined: Aug 8 2005

yup, did it again.


chowder
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Joined: Dec 21 2011

The 3 key concepts for any successful movement are unity, communication, and non-violence. The only thing that ows had completely was communication.


RevolutionPlease
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Joined: Oct 15 2007
Where's the non-unity and violence, chowder? Oh, you mean the cops. Right. Got it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uiraDbcx14c

chowder
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Joined: Dec 21 2011

There were assaults and sexual assaults that were committed by some OWS protesters. It doesn't matter if the majority were non-violent, the few will be picked out by the media and spotlighted. There was a huge lack of unity. There were numerous messages people wanted known and they weren't the same from protest to protest. They started to drown each other out. That is why I said OWS only had communication COMPLETELY


wage zombie
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Joined: Dec 8 2004

Albertaborn wrote:

By the way, I remember seeing on the news how when it was time to clean up, the, "occupiers" were nowhere to be found.  Only the big bad corporations  were around to clean up the mess.  You missed your chance to earn respect there as well.

That's absolute BULLSHIT.  As some who was there the day of the move cleaning up I can tell you that you have no clue what you're talking about.


Caissa
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Joined: Jun 14 2006

Is this an attempt to occupy Babble?


Slumberjack
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Joined: Aug 8 2005

Seems like it.  Anyone get a fix on the rock they poured out from under?


NDPP
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Joined: Dec 28 2008

'US Media Pretend OWS No Longer Exists' (and vid)

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/217959.html

"The US eviction of Occupy encampments is in coordination with the country's corporate media which just treats the Occupy movement as if it no longer exists..." Interview with Sara Flounders


epaulo13
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Joined: Dec 13 2009
Starhawk: Interview with Occupy Vancouver Starhawk speaks with Occupy Vancouver on the accomplishments of the movement so far, the biggest challenges we face right now, and a potential vision for the future.

epaulo13
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Joined: Dec 13 2009
..an important part of this interview is her description of the struggle we are facing as our econmic situation deteriates.
Naomi Klein: Interview with Occupy Vancouver

epaulo13
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Joined: Dec 13 2009
Occupations in winter
Protesters nationwide link up through large-scale conference calls and plan what's next

Local occupations around the country are linking up through frequent, massive conference calls, tightening what is now an extremely loose national network that operates under the Occupy banner into a more focused force.

The effort, now known as InterOccupy, started out of Occupy Wall Street in New York in mid-October. It has since grown into an elaborate website with multiple weekly phone calls during which occupiers trade ideas, coordinate multistate actions, and plan for the future. Participants at about 150 occupations around the country (and a few internationally) have now participated in the calls, organizers tell me....


epaulo13
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Joined: Dec 13 2009
Barcelona 28D We have lost the innocence!

This December 28th, the day of the innocent, we no longer believe the lies of politicians. Therefore, under the slogan “We’ve lost the innocence!” We have convened several indignant actions taking place throughout the day: morning, there will be performances and decentralized actions in neighborhoods, and there will be a puppets workshop in Plaza Catalunya at 7pm.

Politicians, bankers and other unsavory people think they can fool us, but …

We have lost the innocence!

Therefore, the 28D, from assemblies to action groups we will performance from the morning  what is obvious, expose their lies.

We will use public transportation to hang puppets and do performances, conveying our loss of  innocence and calling for joint action in the streets....

http://takethesquare.net/2011/12/27/barcelona-28d-we-have-lost-the-innoc...


jerrym
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Joined: May 30 2009

People have and are fighting and dying in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, Yemen and Syria because they have had enough of getting squashed by simply ignoring the situation. At some point you realize that you will not get anywhere unless you fight and that includes for a better government. My great-great-great grandmother was one of the few survivors of a famine village in Ireland in the 1840s when the free market policies of English economists, such as Malthus and Senior, and English government, who saw the famine as an "act of providence" that would clear the land of much of the Irish peasantry so that it could be exploited by the new capitalist class, said that the Irish deserved to starve because they had not adapted to the new economic conditions. Oh and by the way Malthus added that that the Irish were "not human". It took more than 700 years and many defeats to win Ireland's freedom. My uncle didn't give up and led the liberation of his village from the Irish. My father, who went through the Depression and fought in the Second World War, did not give up because he did not believe that a Nazi government was the same as a democratic government, even though his own economic system meant he never got a regular job until he was 33 years of age. He fought for better living standards. The lesson of the Irish Tiger and the Canadian economy is that after social conditions have improved you must continue to fight against those forces that would and have stripped away the gains that we have made. There is an Irish saying for this "No surrender".

However, that we need to move beyond occupying things and start proposing and taking actions personally and with respect to government, to improve the situation. If the 1% are always allowed to write the rules of the ballgame by always being allowed to control the government, then they will always win. We need to change that starting now.


epaulo13
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Joined: Dec 13 2009
Occupy Geeks Are Building a Facebook for the 99%

“I don’t want to say we’re making our own Facebook. But, we’re making our own Facebook,” said Ed Knutson, a web and mobile app developer who joined a team of activist-geeks redesigning social networking for the era of global protest.

They hope the technology they are developing can go well beyond Occupy Wall Street to help establish more distributed social networks, better online business collaboration and perhaps even add to the long-dreamed-of semantic web — an internet made not of messy text, but one unified by underlying meta-data that computers can easily parse.....

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/12/occupy-facebook/all/1


epaulo13
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Joined: Dec 13 2009
Occupy Sheffield has Taken Possession of the Former Salvation Army Citadel – 28th December 2011 Statement

Occupy Sheffield has taken possession of the former Salvation Army Citadel (at Cross Burgess Street, Sheffield) on the basis of a so-called ‘Section 6′ notice [1]. The building has lain idle since 1999, and has been open and unsecured for over two months. Occupy Sheffield will make the building safe and secure and will then open it for public use. Occupy Sheffield will be inviting any community groups that have lost the ability to pay for a space due to funding cuts to come and make use of the building. The building has been renamed ‘The Citadel of Hope’.....

https://occupysheffield.org/2011/12/29/statement-28th-december-2011/


epaulo13
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Joined: Dec 13 2009
Small Occupy Movements Across the Country Accumulate Victories

quote:

Here in California, the movement is exploding. In a recent study called "Diffusion of the Occupy Movement in California," UC Riverside researchers surveyed 482 incorporated towns and cities in California and found that 143 - nearly 30 percent - had Occupy sites on Facebook between December 1 and December 8.

According to the study, many of the small and medium-sized towns are active with likes, posts and events on their Facebook pages. For example, the town of Arcata has about 17,000 people and 2,950 subscriptions on their page.

"The Occupy Barstow website proclaimed that Barstow is 'about as far from Wall Street as you can get.' But the Barstow occupiers probably did not know that there were also Occupy actions in Weaverville, Idyllwild, Calistoga, El Centro and many other small California towns, even in very remote areas," write professor of sociology Christopher Chase-Dunn and graduate student Michaela Curran-Strange.

And the majority of Occupy cities are not in the Northern, more liberal, part of the state. They are almost equally divided between the north and south.....

http://www.truth-out.org/small-occupy-movements-across-country-accumulate-victories/1324565239


NDPP
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Joined: Dec 28 2008

The Campaign to 'Decolonize' Oakland

http://www.truth-out.org/campaign-decolonize-native-americans-say-occupy...

"...there's an effort by Native American activists in Oakland to get rid of 'Occupy' and replace it with 'Decolonize' as in 'Decolonize Oakland'. They say the term 'occupy' is offensive in light of the brutal history of occupation by early colonizers and the US government..."


M. Spector
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Joined: Feb 19 2005

NDPP wrote:

The Campaign to 'Decolonize' Oakland

What horseshit. Do these people have no concept at all of strategy? Not only do they want to kill the Occupy "brand" which is so well known all over the world, but they want to change the whole movement into a single issue campaign — to "decolonize" Oakland, whatever the fuck that means.

I'm 100% behind those who are resisting the efforts of these ignorant hijackers.


RevolutionPlease
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Joined: Oct 15 2007
Thanks for the news.

Slumberjack
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Joined: Aug 8 2005

M. Spector wrote:
What horseshit. Do these people have no concept at all of strategy? Not only do they want to kill the Occupy "brand" which is so well known all over the world, but they want to change the whole movement into a single issue campaign — to "decolonize" Oakland, whatever the fuck that means.

I'm 100% behind those who are resisting the efforts of these ignorant hijackers.

I guess certain types needn't apply for 99% membership if they're just out to make an inconvenience of themselves.  These rather unfortunate remarks of yours are one thing, but they're inconsistent as well in the face of everyone standing outside looking in at the NDP banquet, where the membership on the inside continues repeating the same thing, with a wink and a nudge, that some people simply have no concept of strategy.


NDPP
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Joined: Dec 28 2008

The 'ignorant hijackers' have a completely legitimate basis for opposing occupation. They are also well used to being told by settler movements that their long outstanding issues of  colonization, ecocide and genocide are strategically inconvenient. Decolonizing the occupation is an ongoing campaign of more than 500 years. Once it is apprehended and implemented we will truly be on our way to freedom. Not until.


M. Spector
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Joined: Feb 19 2005

Utter, condescending nonsense, based on white liberal guilt feelings.

It's exactly analogous to the sectarian left groups who stand on the sidelines of popular struggles, refusing to take part unless and until those popular struggles agree to march under their particular banner and slogans alone.


wage zombie
Online
Joined: Dec 8 2004

I think if "Occupy" is viewed as a problematic term, then there are better alternatives than "Decolonize".  I agree that "Decolonize" does take the focus off economic injustice and the 99%.


epaulo13
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Joined: Dec 13 2009

quote:

Recently, Native American activists put forward a proposal to change the name to "Decolonize Oakland" in a general assembly meeting that lasted three hours. The proposal received 68 percent of the vote, but failed to get the 90 percent approval needed to pass. Native Americans have been holding teach-ins on the subject and say they'll put the proposal up for a vote again.

..the movement as a whole is mature enough to see this for what it is. a legitimate discussion that challenges our views on how the world is seen. changing the name to decolonize came up in vancouver but was rejected by the majority. the main reason given at that assembly was “what does decolonize mean?”. someone asked if this meant that we now have to pack up and leave vancouver to go who knows where? i though it too complicated a term to explain and that it could easily be twisted in order to divide people. so i voted against the change. if some other name was presented i would have conciderd it.

..it's a bit hazy as to where the concern over the “occupy” name went but collaborations and participation continued with the native community. inclusion is key here and if this hinges on a name change at some occupies what's the big deal? this would not alienate that occupy from the broader movement, but, i would think, begin a discussion in other occupies. like the article points out there are other concerns with language and i see this as healthy.


NDPP
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Joined: Dec 28 2008

and in terms of an answer to the question as to whether 'decolonize' means 'pack up and leave', this was best answered by Haida elder Lavina White, who said: "you haven't left us enough timber to build boats to send you all back." Undecided


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