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Occupy Wall Street protests spread
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Kai Ryssdal: It's the 3rd of October, which makes this week number three of the protests that've come to be called Occupy Wall Street. A small-ish group of activists camped out in a New York City park has become a string of bigger street protests; there were hundreds of arrests this weekend on the Brooklyn Bridge, there are new encampments all over the country today.
Marketplace's Eve Troeh explains how it got started.
Eve Troeh: The genesis of Occupy Wall Street might be an email from the anti-consumer magazine Adbusters; it called for actions starting September 17th. That is when activists like Isham Christie gathered. Their goal?
Isham Christie: A blossoming social movement in the United States to fight economic, political and cultural injustices.
General assembly meetings happen daily, ideally to crystallize one set of demands. But as more political and labor groups jump in, their specific goals have to get added to the mix. The group's now so big, meetings lean toward logistics: food, dry socks, legal aid for those arrested.
No amplifiers allowed in the park, so messages go through a system called the human microphone.
Crowd: Please come to the outreach table, to the outreach table, to the...
Dozens more cities have sprouted protests. In Los Angeles, about 100 people camped near City Hall. They had to move once -- due to a Hollywood film shoot. Film student Joe Briones is coordinating camera crews for the protest.
Joe Brionas: A lot of people here are the disenfranchised. They don't have the means to get to New York -- how are they gonna get there?
Which is why the name "Wall Street" might be dropped, and the movement shortened to, simply: Occupy.
In Los Angeles, I'm Eve Troeh for Marketplace.
When comparing the "Occupy Wall Street" protests and the Tea Party protests, I find the coverage of each to be very revealing. The Tea Party comes together with a varied and incoherent message about the bailouts, Government Spending, the Federal Reserve, Obama's birth certificate, Health Care Reform, Taking their country back (from whom is never really established), etc. and the Tea Party receives a great deal of coverage and media support to this very day. A presidential debate co-sponsored by CNN anyone? The Occupy Wall Street protests come out and say they are going to democratically discuss their issues and come up with their goals democratically while giving some generic ideas about corporate power, the struggle between the monied elites, money's influence on our political process, etc., yet the Occupy Wall Street protests are dismissed essentially as being unsubstantial while the Tea Party continues to get inordinate coverage and support. Let alone the fact the Occupy Wall Street protests are harassed and have violence perpetrated against them by the police. (When did any of the Tea Partiers get tazered or pepper sprayed). Why is this?
Kai Ryssdal apparently has a very stereotypical view of the "downtrodden." Four years ago I was a solidly middle class, middle aged woman with a good paying job. Fast forward 4 years, and after the death of a spouse, long term unemployment, a foreclosure, and the destruction of my credit, yet during the last 2 years I've been homeless 3 times. Including right now. If Mr. Ryssdal saw me on the street, he'd think I looked like a middle aged, middle class woman.
This kind of glib,condescending commentary has no place on public radio. Mr. Ryssdal would do well to remove himself from the rarified air of Wall St. and start breathing in the same toxic fumes we "downtrodden" are inhaling.
Kai Ryssdal's comments about the people participating in the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations were so snide and condescending. He said that the only people who can participate in such demonstrations are those with "the means" (i.e., money) to be on the streets. Did he ever think about the fact that those who can be on the streets on a weekday are people who are unemployed, maybe homeless, lost homes, jobs etc. Those who still have jobs can only participate on days off. So the people out do represent those whose lives are affected by the crimes of Wall Street and bankers.
I'm glad I didn't listen to Marketplace today. I've been avoiding NPR for the first time in 30 years, afraid that, again, Occupy Wall Street would not be addressed, and, or just added as an afterthought as was the case last week. Readers, you'll find the many comments to last Friday’s segment heartening.
Kai doesn't get it, or is he just posing as the village idiot to draww ppl out? Of course there's no one demand - the superrich who own the government have screwed the rest of us with their wars based on lies, which makes them profit while the 99% rot. Get with it please.
Joe Brionas compares the Occupy movement to Karl Marx? Explaining with the fine accuracy of a rubber sledgehammer how some ideas take many years to sink into society in general, as in :Ahem: Marx?
May as well have mentioned Martin Luther, Jesus Christ, Galileo, Copernicus, Socrates, or the inventors of vaccines for polio, diphtheria, and smallpox. I mean, really. How about a little honest discussion without the innuendo and over-simplification, Briones?
Kai Ryssdal asks, “Where have we (the disgruntled 99%?) been?†We've been waiting patiently for congress to do something – and they haven’t. In fact, they’ve made it worse.
I'd join the protesters in N.Y. if I could, but I'll do everything I can to support them, and others who are absolutely fed-up with Congress, Wall Street, unscrupulous corporate executives and banks.
The big Wall Street banks are just the fattened cows who's growing girth is enabled by our Federal Reserve system. They just take advantage of the circumstances. If the largest risk takers in their ranks had been permitted to fail, people wouldn't be so P.O.'d about Wall Street today. We'd be on our way to recovery, a real recovery, by now.
Again, use your contacts, all your friends, have them call their elected representatives (include your city council and mayor) and make them aware that 2% of the nation's population must not make the decisions for the rest of us. Explain to them that they will not be able to hold their offices if they choose to not listen and work with you. Engage and enact changes to the current laws that enable the powerful and wealthy to influence all of us in the majority. This is not socialism, this is a represented democracy and remind them of that. Whatever you do, do not engage in violence, it will be wrongly protrayed as "domestic terrorism" the media is also part of the problem and will report it as domestic terrorism. The media moguls hope that you will all just go away after a few weeks. This must not happen! It is your future that is at stake!
