The first sign of something called “Occupiers” was in an ad in a little Canadian — that’s right, Canadian — magazine called Adbusters and published in Vancouver, British Columbia. It displayed a picture of the bronze figure of a bull which decorates Wall Street, with a ballet dancer posed on it. The only text said, “What is our one demand? Occupy Wall Street. September 17th, Bring tent.”
And on September 17th, a hundred and fifty people showed, then each day more and more until it peaked at 20,000 physically present on Zuccoti Park in lower Manhattan, and similar demonstrations were spring up all over the country — indeed in other countries, too. What do these crowds do at these meetings? Many of them listen to speeches. Who are the speakers? Anyone who wants to. If you are standing in the crowd for a while and have a sudden urge to support — or opp — something that’s been said, you go to the “stackkeeper,” who adds it to the stack of those who got there before you. When all of them have said their piece, you get to climb up onto whatever they are using for a soapbox.
That is the freest of free speech, but there are handicaps. The police won’t allow electronic microphones. Therefore, when you speak you have the same range as the famous orators of Athens and Rome, and not an inch more. What the Occupiers do when technology is forbidden and the crowd stretches more than a couple of yards away is to use the same technology as was available to Marc Antony eulogizing Caesar. That is, the human voice. Those nearest the speaker turn around and repeat what he said, then the job is repeated by those farther away. It isn’t perfect. People in the fringes are unlikely to get a reliable understanding of what some of the speeches are about. But it is certainly democratic and the police can’t take it away.
The tents and sleeping bags were hauled away in a midnight raid, so that technically the NYPD is not violating the Bill of Rights’ Constitutional guarantees of freedom of speech and assembly, though clearly the police are going out of their way to make it tough. Still, New York police have been markedly less hostile than those of, say, Berkley, California, where one policeman was filmed strolling down a long line of seated and unresisting Occupiers and methodically directing his pepper spray into their eyes and faces.
(Simultaneously, though not connected, FBI agents in Connecticut moved in and arrested four local police, allegedly for discriminating against Latin-Americans. The policemen were described as “bullies with badges.” Some police certainly deserve that name.)
(Most of this data was gleaned from reports published in the monthly newsletter The Washington Spectator. Each issue features a different subject. $18 for a year’s subscription, at The Public Concern Foundation, P.O. Box 241, Oregon IL 61061.)
Grego says:
The incident where University of California-Davis Police officer and former Marine Sargent Lieutenant John Pike pepper sprayed the seated, nonviolent students happened on the UC Davis campus on Nov 18, 2011.
Wikipedia has a summary of police epic fails with regard to the Occupy movement, but they miss some lovely stuff like the officer purposely running over a guy and parking his motorcycle on the man’s foot and the police in Berkeley, CA beating peacefully protesting students, professors and Nobel Laureates.
February 2, 2012, 2:23 amRobert Nowall says:
I’m gonna say what I should’a said the last time you brought this up. The next time the Occupy Wall Streeters get caught defecating on someone’s car, may it be yours.
February 2, 2012, 8:29 amMo says:
Robert: the next time the regular denizens of Wall St get caught defecating on someone’s economy, may it be yours.
Oh, but that already happened, didn’t it?
February 3, 2012, 10:44 amSteven says:
Of course Robert, ALL Occupy members do that, right? And no one on the other side bombs abortion clinics, shoots doctors, or government buildings. Remember Timothy McVeigh?–and yes, these all represent extreme actions and/or views that do not represent that of the right as a whole, nor even that of the militia or Pro Life movements, but just comparing apples to apples here.
February 3, 2012, 11:25 amDan Gollub says:
All power to the party. All power to our revolutionary leaders. All power to our revolutionary followers. Together we shall use our electric toothbrushes and take vitamin C. And then the party will be over.
February 3, 2012, 2:29 pmBruce Arthurs says:
Robert, the person most likely to shit on your car or other property is a rich person.
I mean that literally. For the last three years, I’ve worked security at a very upscale shopping/office development in Scottsdale, AZ. The customers there are one-percenters and wanna-be one-percenters. Previous to working there, I did security at mid-range shopping centers, with big-box stores, WalMarts, etc.
The upscale place is the ONLY place where public defecation has been a problem. Frequently enough that I call the late-night sweep on the parking garages’ roof levels “The Turd Patrol”.
I’ve also had to deal with public urination (four times in two hours, one bad night), public sex acts, and way too many drunkfights.
Again, these are things I never saw, or saw a lot less frequently, at the middle-range properties.
It’s an attitude I’ve come to call Scottsdale Syndrome: “I drive a BMW, so fuck you.” Too much money, too much privilege = too much bad behavior.
The property management there is moving to an in-house security team, rather than the contracted service I’m part of, so tonight will actually be the last night I’ll be working there. Don’t know where my next job will be, or when my next paycheck will be, but the strongest feeling I have about leaving there is relief.
February 5, 2012, 12:22 pmRichard says:
Robert, someone disagrees with you politically and you literally wish that person excrement. What’s more, you come around to the blog of someone you disdain purely to harass him and the rest of us. If this is your attempt to persuade anyone that your views are intelligent and thoughtful, or to persuade us not to dismiss you as a ranting crank, may I suggest you are not your own best advocate?
(And there ends my first and last feeding of the troll.)
For the record, anyone else, that guy who took a dump on a police car was almost certainly a mentally ill homeless person hanging around the park at the time — something tragically common in New York City parks. (Mentally ill people were in fact directed to Zuccotti Park by the police to increase the aggravation factor and to spark conflicts.) There was never anything linking him to OWS and no one there seems to have known of him, but a conveniently well-timed photo provided a useful visual with which to slur the Occupy movement. And that’s really all there was to that.
February 6, 2012, 1:59 amRobert Nowall says:
“Of course Robert, ALL Occupy members do that, right?”
And just how many is enough?
“Robert, someone disagrees with you politically and you literally wish that person excrement.”
Don’t hand me an opening like that, then. If you—any of you—insist on supporting such nonsense as the Occupy Wall Street movement, don’t be surprised if it comes back to bite you.
(Of course, you, and those who agree with you, are free to call somebody who disagrees with you “the troll”…)
February 7, 2012, 6:06 am