Well, as I recollect the story, Ms. Parks' path to becoming someone whose spirit might be invoked in a struggle for social justice began with her being just a tired working-class woman who got pissed off enough to start "slowing things down" for people.Rosa Parks was a trained activist engaged in planned civil disobedience. Anyway, Occupy wallstreet is clearly in continuity with the stuff Martin Luther King Jr was talking about when he was assassinated.
Is miccheck a US expression? I get what it means, but I don't think I've ever heard it used before, or, if so, I assumed it meant 'checking the microphone' in the time-honoured "check 2" fashion. Maybe I just live under a rock.It's something people say into microphones so that sound guys can adjust the levels and so on. But with the 'human microphone' thing people say it to get people synched up.
If the cops hurl tear gas canisters at peaceful protesters, the protesters win, because they were peaceful and the cops were not. If Occupy protesters shout down somebody else's assembly, they lose, because the assembly was peaceful but the protesters were not.In what sense is Obama an "Occupy Supporter"? He's raised more from Wallstreet banks so far then all the republican candidates combined so far this cycle.
It's tactically stupid for OWS to piss off its own supporters, which is most of us, by being a minority that tries to overwhelm the majority.
Sadly, I think the most responsible thing an American voter can do next year is to talk loudly about the mistakes Obama is making, vote for Obama, then continue to talk loudly about the mistakes Obama is making.Which is exactly what OWS is about. People are sick of the idea of voting for democrats, then watching them sell out to Wallstreet and the hyper-wealthy in order to fund their campaigns. It doesn't matter who you vote for, you get the same shit when it comes to economic policy.
And then we get a Republican president. Can't we agree that would probably be significantly worse for the OWS cause? That would suck.I've always found the "We have to support Obama because the republicans are completely evil" meme to be somewhat nonsensical. Obama always claims that he's reaching out and trying to compromise with the republicans, which in practice means giving them almost everything they want. He seems to think that's a good way to govern the country.
Obama got healthcare, green energy subsidies, high speed rail and mass transit subsidies, financial reform and two liberal female justices on the Supreme Court.A highly watered down healthcare reform, Green energy subsidies that are way to small to matter, a small amount of high-speed rail lines, financial reform that barely did much in the form it was passed in, followed by massive watering down in it's implementation and destroyed by republicans who refused to confirm anyone to run the consumer protection beuro.
My biggest issue with this movement is that they keep getting media attention (great!) and then they don't know what to do with it. There is no clear, defined lists of demands or solutions.Seriously? This again? People want jobs, they want a fix for income inequality. There are lots and lots of viable solutions for these things: Tax hikes for the rich, and massive stimulus. Let's not pretend the Occupyer's demands are impossible to figure out somehow.
And many of the people at my school involved in the movement (tangentially, anyway) can't seem to vocalize what it's all about or what they specifically want to change.So, people going to school are most concerned with issues relating to students? Is that really suprising?
OK, I understand that OWS represents anger. But what's the message? Do ... something ...Seriously? Fixing unemployment, fixing the corrupt influence of megabanks and huge corporations (actually corporate leaders) have on our political process, fixing income inequality.
He's A) Not doing much to stop it (Check out HAMP which Tim Geithner said, rather then actually trying to modify loans was really only about stringing people along in order to 'space out' the mortgages) and B) he's taking millions in campaign contributions from the banks that are doing this. Raking in More Wallstreet cash then all GOP candidates combined combined.You know what is a lot less civil? Throwing millions of people out of their homes through fraudulent means. Putting tens of millions into poverty because you refuse to pay your fair share of taxes.Yeah, that's typical Obama behavior.
Please see my post re: Occupy Toronto.Who cares about Occupy Toronto? This post is about US Candidates getting mic-checked. Whatever is going on in Canada is kind of beside the point here.
This kind of response doesn't actually address the issue at hand. Being uncivil is, at best, an annoyance to the very people OWS wants firmly on their side.Yeah well, maybe the time to worry about possibly annoying people is kind of over? You don't need everyone on your side, just enough.
angry mobs don't achieve shit.Tell that to the Egyptian protesters who started out holding "Days of Rage"
Incivility is surely the way to get just enough on your side? Call me skeptical. Unless your position is that Americans appreciate and respect a good old fashioned ass kicking, from liberals no less.Was the Montgomery bus boycott civil? It shut down the bus system for months. I guarantee you it annoyed people.
ISTR they were not sometimes. Were you convinced with their message? No? Would you have been convinced had they been less civil?What does it matter if they convinced me? They convinced enough people to take congress.
Except when they were. Taking the high ground is what made the civil rights movement into something other than an annoyance. It became a noble cause.The Civil Rights movement looks heroic in retrospect because they won, and winners write the history books. If OWS succeeds then history will look back on them as being noble. If they fail not much will be written about them. There were certainly people back then who were deathly opposed to it and there were probably tons of 'concern trolls' wringing their hands about how dreadfully disruptive the whole thing was.
i see it as a kind of progressive stack. the people who constantly get to speak, based on various levels of class,race,gender,etc privilege, should step back. if they don't, and especially if they are being accusatory, violent, or dismissive, they need to be silenced in some way. a group chant is a non-violent way of calling someone out.I no longer feel ambivalent. Go get 'em.
Sadly, I think the most responsible thing an American voter can do next year is to talk loudly about the mistakes Obama is making, vote for Obama, then continue to talk loudly about the mistakes Obama is making.Could some time be spared to talk loudly about Duverger's law? It's tempting to imagine that "listen to us or we'll vote for you more ruefully" is going to work this time, but I suspect that "listen to us or we'll vote for someone better who will" would be more effective.
I think you give the Tea Party an awful lot of credit. I look at their record, and I see a whole lot of failure. And they may be the key to Obama's prospects of getting reelected.posted by delmoi at 10:39 PM on November 22, 2011 [3 favorites]
Depends on what you think their goal was. If it was to politically damage Obama, it worked pretty well. If it was massive cuts to government spending ... also worked. So what's left? What were their failures? They're not politically popular? You realize that's not the point right?
They got progress on their agenda. They lost a lot of political capital in acting so crazyIt's not only that they won. It's how they won that gets extra mention in the history books.Last I checked, Ghengis Khan and Napoleon get a lot of copy as well. So did King Henry the Henry VIII.Well, I don't know what "fixing" means here.Huh? Are you unfamiliar with the concept of an unemployment rate? Higher numbers are worse, lower numbers are better.f there were universal conscription, would that "fix" unemployment? How about a compulsory 3-day work week? Or a few more years of mandatory schooling? Forced retirement at 55? There are lots of potential solutions. Which ones are OWS in favor of?This may be a surprise, but the government can actually hire people. One of the biggest drops in employment has actually been from state and local government that had to cut back due to people losing their jobs and therefore no longer paying local taxes. Unlike the federal government their borrowing costs are pretty high.
One of the tactics of the stimulus was to give money to state and local governments so they could afford not to lay people off, but it wasn't close to enough to cover the gaps, and lots of state and local employees got laid off.
Beyond helping state and local governments maintain or even increase payroll, the government can start infrastructure projects, build hospitals, hire nurses, train doctors and so on to help create more employment.
There are million things the government can do to boost employment.
Another key lever is monetary policy. The fed can alter monetary policy to boost inflation to keep in line with where it would be had the depression not hit. That would force companies to invest money rather then hoarding cash like they're doing now (something like 2 trillion in dollars is being held by corporations right now in the U.S)
Do you seriously not realize there are policies that the government can implement that affect the unemployment rate?Fixing the corrupt influence of corporate leaders - can you be specific? Do you mean banning political donations? Or restricting political advertising? There are arguments both in favor and against each of those, but somebody has to make those arguments.This is more complex due to the first amendment. But a constitutional amendment overturning Citizens United would be a good start. Another option would be public financing of campaigns. The federal government would pay for campaigns. They would have to make a system that kept the system open: candidates could get funding if they get enough signatures, or people could each get $X each year to allocate themselves or transfer to some group to allocate.
Personally, I just can't get enough of people telling us what we should be doing as a movement to win over their support. So many discussions about OWS have started with "Well, what they need to do is..."Yeah it's not like you guys haven't had an opportunity to start your own mass political movements. So did I. I didn't do shit and neither did you. So I don't think it's very fair for me to nit-pick the people who are actually doing something even if sometimes they seem ridiculous (which they totally do).
I was referring to my earlier reference (now so far above that I'll repeat the link.) In that reference, it is explained that Occupy Seattle protesters arrived at a panel discussion in support of OWS, and demanded that the process conform to the normal form of dialogue used by Occupy Seattle, which involves using the People's Mic instead of the usual panel discussion with questions.Well, there is a lot of concern about co-option, as there should be. Look what happened to the Tea-party. You could argue that it was started by AstroTurfers, but a lot of people actually thought they were in a grass roots movement, when really they were being lead, to a large extent, by fox news.
Learn your Rules for Radicals, especially #4 (Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules)Huh? Looking at your link 4 is something about "The education of the organizer" it says "The organizer knows that the real action is in the reaction of the opposition. To realistically appraise and anticipate the probable reactions of the enemy, he must be able to identify with them, too, in his imagination, and foresee their reactions to his actions...." and then a bunch of stuff about conflict. And honestly this page is kind of incoherent.
My biggest issue with this movement is that they keep getting media attention (great!) and then they don't know what to do with itThe revolution no longer needs to be televised.
I can't believe it took until Bartonius' comment to educate mefites on what the word 'civil' in the phrase 'civil disobedience' means. Civil disobedience is not by its nature polite and obsequious any more than civil engineers have impeccable table manners or a civil war is noted for its politesse.Well, it's interesting and so noted, but it's kind of missing the point.
Flunkie, are you actually saying that the interruption of a speech disturbs you more than the closure of public infrastructure? Really? Even if it was you who couldn't get to work that morning?As far as I know I've never been prevented from getting somewhere by protesters of any sort, so I don't know how I'd react if it happened to me, but yes, seeing a video of this use of mic checking gives me an immediate and strongly negative reaction, whereas seeing a video of people shutting down infrastructure does not (and in fact in many cases gives me the opposite reaction).
Neither would have opposed it. Here's a nice summery of their approach to nonviolent direct action:Where does that page say anything about shouting people down, Bunny Ultramod? Or, for that matter, anything at all about Gandhi?
I didn't realize you were being exceptionally literal, and that you were so unfamiliar with Ghandi and Martin Luther King Junior to need a remedial class in direct action, and how King was influenced by Ghandi. I am not here to offer, that, sorry.Um, wow?
I will say that if you want to take some time to educate yourself, you will save yourself a lot of embarrassment by using both men as stand-ins for stuff you personally do not like, saying they NEVER DID THAT, when the stuff they actually did, by your standards, were directly, and intentionally, in violation of what many people considered civil at the time, and you are not echoing their positions, but accidentally parroting those who opposed them.
I don't feel like spending three hours doing your researchI didn't ask you to.
Well, then, hop to it and tell us what you find out.Yeah, OK, I'm done with this thread; this is getting too bizarrely confrontational. I did not make an assertion; I asked if anyone knew the answer to a question. And I did not ask anyone to figure it out if they didn't already know. I fail to see what's so horrible about that. Goodbye.
... I listed some of them. You listed some more. Now, what position does OWS take on them? Does it want massive government work schemes? Does it want high inflation? I hear that this is what you want. Is it what OWS wants?No, you listed a bunch of insane strawmen. I assumed they were sarcastic examples you gave because you didn't think the government can do anything about the unemployment rate. If you're saying know you were serious you're either completely ignorant about public policy, completely delusional, trolling, or all three. Either way, not really possible to have a productive discussion.
Does it want high inflation? I hear that this is what you want.Uh, yeah? Higher then the record low inflation we've had for years, far below what the fed is supposed to be targeting.
Maybe I'm just not jaded enough, but I think that with enough popular support, Democrats could push an amendment through Congress. Getting it past the cadre of hyper-Republican state legislatures might post more difficulty, but again, with enough popular support and enough protesting, it could get done.The problem here is that you're assuming that corruption is a republican core principle, but not a democratic one. In reality, there are probably lots of dems unhappy with deep corruption, but they don't run the party. The people who do run the party are in bed with lobbyists and the hyper-wealthy just as much as the republicans. I would imagine there might be some republican rank and file who are upset about the situation as well.
I can't believe it took until Bartonius' comment to educate mefites on what the word 'civil' in the phrase 'civil disobedience' means. Civil disobedience is not by its nature polite and obsequious any more than civil engineers have impeccable table manners or a civil war is noted for its politesse.It didn't occur to me that people might misunderstand that.
Show me one person saying people shouldn't vote.
1. Protest!
2. Don't vote!
3. ???
4. Social Change! (Profit)
Did MLK ever show up at someone else's speech, wait until they got a while into it, and then at some random point halfway through a sentence suddenly start shouting over the speaker? Did Gandhi? Did they advocate that the people they were leading do it? Or did they let people who were speaking speak? I don't know, they might have shouted people down; do you know? I do know that I have a hard time imagining them having done so.If you don't think the Civil Rights movement didn't do things that irritated people you're really ignorant of history. Like I said, the Montgomery bus boycott shut down the entire bus system for months, that's what Rosa Parks was involved in. The sit-ins prevented people from using facilities. Strikes prevented services from happening. Come on.
In any case, this "we can shout louder than you" stuff gives me a very visceral "assholes" reaction, in a way that shutting down a bridge or whatever absolutely does not. Maybe I'm atypical with respect to that, but if not, I think this isn't a particularly good strategy.Yes, I think you're atypical.
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posted by Trurl at 4:59 PM on November 22, 2011 [1 favorite]