Occupy Everything: A shot across the bow
It is with my sincerest apologies that I cannot demonstrate in person as often as I’d like to offer my personal presence. I can, however, offer my words, and I hope that some people will find meaning in them. I hope you will share them, and help others find meaning and purpose as well. To each according to his ability.
Thank you, -Gabriel S.
“I’ve been following the occupy protest for some time now, from before the media was in blackout mode to the full-on circus surrounding it today. It’s gone from a very small movement to something very real, something larger than we probably could have imagined almost a month ago. There is a growing sense that the masses of the disenfranchised, the working poor, the increasingly destitute and those who have found themselves thrust out of the middle class my finally be collecting together and crying out: “Enough!”
Success comes with some unfortunate side effects, however. I’ve heard from several friends that the Occupy Tucson planning meeting turned into a circus, with every group with a grievance against the government and corporations vying to make Occupy Tucson about their specific source of grief.
Occupy Everything is not the war. It is, in fact, barely the first battle! It is a shot across the bow of the corporate institutions that have hijacked the checks and balances that our government relies on to operate fairly for its own citizens. The United States has a long and often times embarrassing history, as any country does. On the other hand, we’ve made a lot of progress as a country towards making things fair for everybody. There’s no doubt that there’s still progress that could be made, and some historical grievances that merit some sort of compensation, or at the least, an honest admission of culpability. But I would wager that nobody alive today who is participating in Occupy Everything has ever owned a slave, taken the land of a Native American, forced anybody into indentured servitude, annexed part of another country, exploited a group to build a railroad, or any other number of very real grievances against the United States.
Occupy needs to remain a movement with a united purpose towards reestablishing rules of fairness in terms of corporate regulation, tax reform, campaign finance reform, and the growing chasm between the emerging oligarchy of the wealthy over the huddled masses.
The wealthy elite have been throwing around the charge of “class warfare” now for several weeks. I say we have been in class warfare for decades, and by keeping the masses distracted and fractured, the class war has been terribly one-sided! It is tempting for every person with a grievance against the ruling elite to use Occupy Everything as their personal platform to get that message out there, and the inclusiveness of the Occupy Movement has encouraged discussion of a number of social ills that have caused very real harm to all of us, admittedly some worse than others. But in order for our voices to be heard, we must all cry out in unison, as one people!
Let’s not forget that this isn’t a movement to an end. This is the beginning of a more honest democratic process that strives to succeed where corporate oligarchy have taken advantage of all of us. There will always be injustice, there will always be some wrong that needs righted. We have now before us a very real opportunity to effect real change, to right the corruption of a political system taken hostage by corporate greed. Steady your guns, and help send this shot across the bow.”
Gabriel S.
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