Wall Street Protests

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by Cyber Wolf

The Tea Party got that part right about their movement at least... most of the people who are associated with the Tea Party who got elected into regional/state rep offices last year were brought up from local grassroots to where they are now.

I agree and disagree with this. First of all, the influences of both the Tea Party and OWS must be recognized.

The tea party was created by a group of older conservative Americans who strongly believed in the idea of a republic and getting change by electing officials who represent your viewpoints, which makes sense from their background. Unfortunately for them, once elections get brought into the mix, so do money and politicians. As we have seen, the "Tea Party" largely got bought out by a numerous number of extremist politicians who brought social issues into the mix and that is where they failed (I am talking about the Tea Party on a national level, not smaller grassroots movements).

OWS was created by a group of people that were influenced by the labor movements, civil rights movements, and Arab Spring, where street movements and disobedience were used to bring about change. But, it can be strongly argued, in many situations, that these movements are only successful when their message correlates with the interests of the people in power, possibly giving a false sense of power to the people protesting. Street protests will bring attention to causes, but I do not believe that they alone are influential enough to bring about any significant change.

Even though I do agree that OWS needs to change its tactics, I wouldn't recommend they centralized or completely switch over to the Tea Party tactics. They need to diversify their strategy. They need to keep a presence protesting but they also need to organize in ways that can influence politics as well. They need to convince politicians, the rich, and other Americans that our current financial setup is unsustainable, or at least inefficient, and something needs to be done about it or else everyone suffers. Witty and emotional cardboard signs will just not cut it. I do agree with their decentralized setup, OWS will not get hijacked this way, but there needs to be a few respectable influential people that will speak out and agree with the OWS movement but not claim to represent it.

[Cyber Wolf]

Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45

Even though I do agree that OWS needs to change its tactics, I wouldn't recommend they centralized or completely switch over to the Tea Party tactics.

I wasn't suggesting they centralize. They shouldn't. But at the same time, they shouldn't be entirely rudderless. The people they raise up or the ones who step up to do this aren't supposed to be leaders, per se. Their mission would be to play the game of politics on a level the ones they're after will actually pay close attention to. It's fairly easy for elected officials to belittle and dismiss a street march and get on with getting on, but it's a bit harder when the voice of that street march is sitting next to you in the Senate chamber with the same 'powers' you have. What would be even more powerful is if they can manage to put people in office registered as both parties so it's harder to pull party politics (for either party) and will have to focus more on content than rhetoric. Dunno how likely THAT would be but, how strong a message would that send if they managed it?

Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45

They need to diversify their strategy. They need to keep a presence protesting but they also need to organize in ways that can influence politics as well. They need to convince politicians, the rich, and other Americans that our current financial setup is unsustainable, or at least inefficient, and something needs to be done about it or else everyone suffers. Witty and emotional cardboard signs will just not cut it. I do agree with their decentralized setup, OWS will not get hijacked this way, but there needs to be a few respectable influential people that will speak out and agree with the OWS movement but not claim to represent it.

This is exactly the point I was making. They should have a contingent that is doing what they're currently doing to keep things motivated. Without motivation on a large scale, this movement would drift into nothing. But, at the same time, they need another contingent that can direct that motivation into feasible action, a group of people who are doing this because this is what they truly believe in*. They have the former, but not the latter. And each city can have its own and that would be the best way to do it. Each Occupy group with its own corp of legal/politic savvy people who know who to talk to, how to talk to people and get the business of this business done... if they pull it off, it would be winning on the enemy's terms and be that satisfying kick inna fork that these movements seem to want to deliver.



*This is why I suggested those protester law students could step up and better help their cause instead of being on KP... they're already out there without getting paid because they want to be there for this, they can use their law school experience for the cause the same way too. Besides the OWS movement has raised over $450,000 so there's money for filing fees, making copies, little things like that that may need to be done. And if this movement turns into something really great, then 20 years later, they will legitimately have that notoriety, which is like gold for lawyers.