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10 Ways to Support the Occupy Movement
There are many things you can do to be part of this growing movement—and only some of them involve sleeping outside.
The #OccupyWallStreet movement continues to spread with more than 1,500 sites. More and more people are speaking up for a society that works for the 99 percent, not just the 1 percent.
Here are 10 recommendations from the YES! Magazine staff for ways to build the power and momentum of this movement. Only two of them involve sleeping outside:
1. Show up at the occupied space near you.
Use this link to find the Facebook page of an occupation near you. If you can, bring a tent or tarp and sleeping bag, and stay. Or just come for a few hours. Talk to people, participate in a General Assembly, hold a sign, help serve food. Learn about the new world being created in the occupied spaces.
2. Start your own occupation.
Use this Meetup site. Or call together friends, members of your faith group, school, or community group. Reach out to people from parts of your community you don’t normally work with. Unexpected alliances keep the movement from getting labeled as partisan or representing only some people.
3. Support those who are occupying.
Most sites need food, warm clothes, blankets, tarps, sleeping bags, communications gear, and money. Many need people to do loads of laundry, to help with medical care, to provide legal support, to serve food, and to spread the word. Some people call in pizza orders from nearby vendors. Support the folks at Liberty Square in New York here, or check in with your local occupiers to see what they need.
4. Speak out. Get into the debates and the teach-ins.
Many occupation sites have workshops and discussions on critical issues of our time. Get into the discussion. Bring your expertise and reading materials to share. YES! Magazine is offering free copies of the current New Livelihood issue to occupied sites (request them by emailing JobsIssue@yesmagazine.org). Bring the discussions to other groups you are part of. Listen to perspectives you haven’t heard before. This process represents a critical, but under-reported side of the movement: People are shifting from being passive, frustrated observers of politics to active, powerful players. Instead of waiting for our leaders to do the right thing, people from all walks of life are becoming leaders. It makes us unstoppable.
5. Share your story.
Post how you’re part of the 99 percent on Facebook, Twitter, blogs, or in print. Through this movement, people are discovering others who are also losing jobs and homes, who are overwhelmed by debt or working a dead-end job. Through this sharing, humiliation turns into compassion and self-respect. And it builds understanding of the sources and the impacts of our crisis: A Wall Street system that funnels wealth to the top 1 percent is leaving the rest of us behind. Community plus insight makes us powerful.
6. Be the media.
Show up with your video recorder, camera phone, or laptop and share the stories of the occupation. You can download a selection of posters donated by graphic designers and spread them around. Highlight the human dimension of the protests. It is harder for critics to disparage a movement when people see the faces of those involved.
7. Name the meaning of this moment.
What will make the world better for the 99 percent? How has the power of the 1 percent gotten in the way of your hopes and dreams? Make a sign, write a blog, update your Facebook page, or speak out on the issue that means the most to you. Include the phrase, “I am the 99 percent.”
8. Insist that public officials treat the occupations with respect.
The eviction of the Liberty Square occupation on Wall Street was averted by massive public resistance from those in the square and from others. Other occupations also need support. The 99 percent don’t have the money, political access, and media empires of the 1 percent; the occupations are one of the few ways we are building power. Ask your local officials to respect people's right to assembly.
9. Study and teach nonviolent techniques.
There are many examples of outside provocateurs who spark violent incidents that can discredit nonviolent movements such as this. The corporate media is hungry for violent images. (There’s already been an example of an admitted provocateur from the right-wing "American Spectator" who provoked pepper spraying at the National Air & Space Museum). Learn how to lovingly and firmly interrupt and contain violence, and teach what you know. Here are some resources.
10. Be resilient.
This movement is here for the long term. Some efforts may fade because of cold weather or harsh police responses. Others may self-destruct through faulty process or violent outbreaks. The movement may be idealistic, but it won’t be ideal. Don’t get disillusioned; the demand for a society that serves the 99 percent won’t go away. The movement may morph, but it has become unstoppable. Help it evolve.
The genie is out of the bottle. People will no longer accept the systematic transfer of wealth and power from we the people to the 1 percent. In this remarkable, leaderless movement, each one of the 99 percent who gets involved helps shape history.
YES! Magazine encourages you to make free use of this article by taking these easy steps. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License
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73 Comments so far
Show All11). Move your money out of the big banks...
"NC-Tom"
I think number 11 could be number 1. Money is all the banks and their tools in Washington really want.
I know otherwise well-meaning (typical democrats) liberals who still do business with some of these sadistic predators and I tell them they should stop.
How about the murderous government, did you stop doing business with them?
Just saw a video on buzzflash.com showing people being arrested for trying to take their money out of Citi Bank. A young woman was manhandled for trying to get into the bank and was shoved into a corner, with cops all over her, while others kept the crowd away from them. Another video showed guards standing in front of Bank of America keeping people out.
Boycott, boycott boycott.
We must stop buying. Stop buying anything that is unnecessary. Move our money. Study the corporations and what they sell and try to stop them by using our 70% consumer power to bankrupt them. It is the most powerful weapon we have. They use their money to give to the NY police dept. ($4.6 million). We need to put up resistance using our economic power. By putting pressure on the corps that will put pressure on the banks.
You're so right! I've avoided buying anything except food and bare necessities for over a year now. If I need something, I'd rather buy something that's used so that I don't feed the supply chain for new items. I use the local credit union although I found out recently that they too rely on big banks and the Fed. I use my automobile a lot less and use public transportation. I don't take out any loans. If we all bought a lot less and used less resources, the banks and mega corps will lose business and maybe we can break them.
Definitely - there is no better way to hurt the banks and big money than to take your money out of banks. Your money is what they use to buy politicians and build their financial empires. Take your money out of the banks and put it in local credit unions. Then get involved in the credit union and make sure the money is being used locally!. BTW credit unions give you a better return on your money anyway:)
Right on Larry,
The credit unions, and especially the co-op credit unions, should station people at all the occupations and in front of the big banks, and sign up new depositors.
I plan to call my own co-op credit union and ask them if they want to do that.
Exactly. Skip every one of these sentimental platitudes by van Gelder and do just what NC-Tom says. THIS hits them the only place it hurts. Ms van Gelder, go catch up up on your re-runs of "My Little Pony."
12). Stop listening, reading or watching any mainstream media. Watch Democracy Now and The Real News. Read antiwar.com, truthdig and truthout.
I would also add one of the most well written anti-MIC web sites on the Internet and that would Chris Floyd's Empire Burlesque.
Thanks for the site. There are many good sources including aljazeera and anything by Chomsky, Zinn, Ray Mcgovern, Larry Wilkerson, Robert Fisk, Juan Cole, Cynthia McKinney, Bernie Sanders,....
Read Griftopia by Matt Taibbi and everything he has written about Wall Street and big finance in the last few years. Watch Inside Job.
I watched Michael Moore's CAPITALISM, A LOVE STORY last night.
Its Moore's best work yet...gets to the root of the problem.
Be wary of MoveOn or ActBlue, DFA, or any of the other Dem shill groups. Check out MoveOn's website and Facebook page. They've been busy little bees over there.
There are original tea partiers in OWS and they are talking about what happened to their movement, in the hopes that OWS will remain a movement of the 99%. Very few remember what the tea party was originally -- they only remember the hijacked tea party from HCR forward. And, you know, the Dems are very wily next to the GOP. They'll do it with progressive words and good grammar and there won't be any nutty hats.
Absolutely! MoveOn had a table here (Santa Fe, NM) and were telling people they were non-partisan. Saw 2 people with anti-corporate signs and Obama 2012 buttons. The Dems are lurking, trying to hijack this movement. Saw an article somewhere yesterday: "Can Obama Benifit from Occupy Demonstrations?"
That's how they see it. Can they use it to re-energize their dispirited base. Beware!
For those who complain that the Dems are ineffectual and won't fight. Watch how effectual and ruthless they will be trying to co-opt Occupy. That's their job. Take the steam out of authentic grass roots leftism.
MoveOn has to engage the OWS movement. That's where the people are. To them and the usual suspects, its politically fashionable. At heart, they're leeches, hijackers. They (the democrats) will be the be the death knell of the movement. When Obama the Loser goes down a year from now, he'll take it all with him. Al Sharpton drove the second nail in the coffin yesterday, unions the first. It was inevitable this bunch would get deeply involved.
They're really starting to stink-up the joint. Obama must be jettisoned soon.
http://blackagendareport.com/content/operation-cooptation-dems-try-seduce-occupation-movement
I am going to propose to our Ann Arbor Occupy general assembly that political parties of ANY stripe or their cover groups like MOVEON not be allowed to table or campaign at the Occupy sites. One of the beauties of Occupy is real people unmediated by talking points telling their stories and exchanging views. Once it becomes about campaigners and people can retreat behind tables with glossy literature that dialog ceases, and ideologies become more rigid and the 1% has a much greater chance of co-opting the movement.
We had a very successful first rally for OccupySylva yesterday due in large part to piggy-backing on Move-on's "American Dream". Without them we would have numbered maybe 5 or 6 whereas we had over 100 participants. We can use the organizational resources of Move-on to inform and gather momentum. I don't agree that Move-on or the democrats as a whole are necessarily enemies to the movement. Most all participants were, in some way shape or form associated with Move-on, and yet were supportive of the main trusts of the 99%. They understand at a rudimentary level that Wall Street and the Banksters have cooped our government. I think that is basically the bottom-line for most involved in the 99% occupy.
If we truly believe this is a movement for and by the 99% that means that republicans, democrats, independents, greens, and all other political interest groups are all part and parcel of a unifying movement. Shunning groups that are putting forth parallel messages seems like undermining the movement rather than moving it forward.
Comparing what happened to the Tea Party to what could happen to the 99% seems like a senseless use of good energy. The Tea Party format was never a universal 99%. From its inception,the whole premise has been curtailment of government rather than empowerment of people to govern themselves. The Tea Party advocates the elimination of public services through privatization while giving completely free rein for private enterprise including massive corporations. There is little that compares the 99% to the Tea Party. The Tea Party may have had a grass roots beginning but it was a very uninformed grass roots that congealed exclusively around anger and frustration rather than information and empowerment.
MoveOn is part of the problem.
Exactly Oily Bomber is funded by Goldman Sachs the archetypal 1%ers and is their tool and toy:
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contrib.php?cid=N00009638
http://my.firedoglake.com/fflambeau/2010/05/08/an-updated-list-of-goldman-sachs-ties-to-the-obama-admin-including-elena-kagan/
Fuck the MOVEON co-opeters!
The usual DIm party talking points that the whole problem is the "tea party," and NOT the bipartisan support for the state/bank/military combine, in other words the Dims AND Repiglicons are part of the 1% oligarchy. In fact I'd go as far to say that i can have a far more interesting conversation with one of the original "tea party," Ron Paul supporters about "ending the Fed," (while disagreeing with the Palulies support for predatory capitalism) than I can with a Dim party sycophant who supports corporate capitalism AND the Federal Reserve bank state combine. MOVEONE is the just the center right "liberal" version of the Koch brothers astroturf is all.
Oh come on, the "original" tea party sprang into existence on inaguration day 2009. The first events organizers were trained and supported by Dick Army's FreedomWorks. The point was to deflect anger over Bush's 2008 TARP bail out onto the new administration and conflate it with the stimulus plan, torpedoing any hope of a quick economic turn around lead by a Democrat. It was the opening gambit in the Republican 2012 campaign from day one.
Did it ensnare a lot of honestly upset people? Sure. But were they the driving force behind it? No.
Actually there was a Ron Paul grassroots "tea party" "liberty campaign" since 2008. Now I have a lot of disagreements with them as well, but they ARE grassroots and sincere and not the Cock bros. astroturf b.s. you are talking about. Matt Tabbibi lays out in a funny fashion what happened here pretty well:
"The original Tea Party was launched by a real opponent of the political establishment — Rand Paul's father, Ron, whose grass-roots rallies for his 2008 presidential run were called by that name. The elder Paul will object to this characterization, but what he represents is something of a sacred role in American culture: the principled crackpot. He's a libertarian, but he means it. Sure, he takes typical, if exaggerated, Republican stances against taxes and regulation, but he also opposes federal drug laws ("The War on Drugs is totally out of control" and "All drugs should be decriminalized"), Bush's interventionist wars in the Middle East ("We cannot spread our greatness and our goodness through the barrel of a gun") and the Patriot Act; he even called for legalized prostitution and online gambling.
Paul had a surprisingly good showing as a fringe candidate in 2008, and he may run again, but he'll never get any further than the million primary votes he got last time for one simple reason, which happens to be the same reason many campaign-trail reporters like me liked him: He's honest. An anti- war, pro-legalization Republican won't ever play in Peoria, which is why in 2008 Paul's supporters were literally outside the tent at most GOP events, their candidate pissed on by a party hierarchy that preferred Wall Street-friendly phonies like Mitt Romney and John McCain. Paul returned the favor, blasting both parties as indistinguishable "Republicrats" in his presciently titled book, The Revolution. The pre-Obama "Tea Parties" were therefore peopled by young anti-war types and libertarian intellectuals who were as turned off by George W. Bush and Karl Rove as they were by liberals and Democrats.
The failure of the Republican Party to invite the elder Paul into the tent of power did not mean, however, that it didn't see the utility of borrowing his insurgent rhetoric and parts of his platform for Tea Party 2.0. This second-generation Tea Party came into being a month after Barack Obama moved into the Oval Office, when CNBC windbag Rick Santelli went on the air to denounce one of Obama's bailout programs and called for "tea parties" to protest. The impetus for Santelli's rant wasn't the billions in taxpayer money being spent to prop up the bad mortgage debts and unsecured derivatives losses of irresponsible investors like Goldman Sachs and AIG — massive government bailouts supported, incidentally, by Sarah Palin and many other prominent Republicans. No, what had Santelli all worked up was Obama's "Homeowner Affordability and Stability Plan," a $75 billion program less than a hundredth the size of all the bank bailouts. This was one of the few bailout programs designed to directly benefit individual victims of the financial crisis; the money went to homeowners, many of whom were minorities, who were close to foreclosure. While the big bank bailouts may have been incomprehensible to ordinary voters, here was something that Middle America had no problem grasping: The financial crisis was caused by those lazy minorities next door who bought houses they couldn't afford — and now the government was going to bail them out."
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/matt-taibbi-on-the-tea-party-20100928?page=2
To all occupiers and supporters. " We are America ", that should be our chant.
We should carry little flags whenever we march and plant large flags in all our camps.
We are America and we are taking back our Country from the kings of Wall Street.
Nah, no jingoism.
Totally agree, we are our members of our local communities, the American empire has outlived it's usefulness and nationalism sucks.
13. Stop giving Big Corporations your money whenever and wherever possible. Shop local small businesses at every opportunity.
14. Use as little gasoline as you can. Drive less, walk/bike more, get a scooter, etc.
15. Swear off fast-food.
16. Spread the word.
17. Start worker's co-ops with people who share your skills and interests. Work without bosses!!!
Contact: http://www.usworker.coop/about/memberlist/ ... (US Federation of Worker Cooperatives), and see a list of the nearby co-ops & collectives in every region.
Could someone please post the phone numbers for the pizza places near the protestors. Not a lot, one or two would be helpful. I will check online right now tho, seems logical.
The web site http://nycga.cc/donate describes how you can help the OWS protesters. The "Order us food" section includes a link to Liberato's Pizza with a link to an online ordering form, and links to other local restaurants that deliver food to the protesters (e.g., Panini & Co., which is directly across from Zuccotti Park).
Liberatos Pizza & Parmigiana
17 CEDAR STREET (Cedar St. between William St. & Pearl St.)
(212) 344-3464
By the way, I wasn't able to use Panini & Co.'s online ordering form with the Firefox browser, but I was able to order food from them (for the protesters) by phone.
Note that the http://nycga.cc website asks those ordering food to include some vegan and vegetarian choices if possible.
Know that OWS will be infiltrated by FBI/CIA, etc. Learn about COINTELPRO. The Power now in charge will not go lightly away and will stop at nothing to stay in power. They will infiltrate, disseminate misinformation, plant drugs/guns as pretext for arrest, invade personal spaces and take files and computers, "disappear" people ..........
Be prepared for anything, but never assume that governmental law enforcement works for the 99%
And let us rebrand ourselves "the Ninety-Nine Percenters," or 99% Movement, which is true, and more effective than "The Occupy Movement."
Very good point. The two terms have already become synonymous in my mind but you are correct in pointing out that they are different terms. Occupy has little meaning other than to define the origins of this massively growing movement, which in truth is all about the empowerment of the 99%.
I like Occupation though as it implies we are STAYING until the system radically changes.
Two more suggestions:
When you patronize a small business, pay cash. "Swipe fees" bring in about $48 billion a year for banks, well over the actual cost of processing the transactions.
Think NOW about running for office. Many states have early deadlines for petitions. When Nov.2012 rolls around, we need to have lots of people ready to take over the legislative agenda of the 99%. Being leaderless now must turn into emerging leaders taking the necessary steps to be in a position to effect policy in Washington. We all know how ineffective it is to write, call and "hold our reps feet to the fire".
Good advice about paying in cash. I started doing that (with a few exceptions here and there) after Visa/Mastercard decided not to let their customers make perfectly legal donations to Wikileaks. I haven't donated to Wikileaks, but Visa let us all know which side they're on, and it's not the side of the 99%.
I could be wrong, but as I understand it, debit purchases do not entail a swipe fee, only credit purchases.
Interesting. Is this correct.
If CD is listening, could we get an article? Gread advice all around tonight.
Check out this video from Occupy Toronto, a brilliant 4 min explanation of why we Occupy: http://youtu.be/cG_7aGsCArE
Fantastic!
Great.
We should all make it viral on our Facebook pages.
Bank Transfer Day, November 5th: https://www.facebook.com/Nov.Fifth
Suggestion is that the transfers are done quietly, individually, not as a protest group. Step by step guide at the FB page.
I was in liberty square and times square yesterday. It felt quite strange to me. And i have been in countless protests, etc. I will have to process more.....
The revolution will not (cannot) be televised or mediaized. If it is the real thing. I happened to see a tv screen in a store front on broadway and 42nd last evening and cnn was broadcasting it live. It didn't feel too real to me. More to process.
Process, exactly! This is not about static lists of demands this about modeling the process of direct democratic local self rule itself in the occupation. That's why it is NOT about tabling, or chanting slogans like a traditional protest.
Know what you mean, readytotransform - - As a 60's, 70's, and onward citizen activist trying to help create a better world, OWS feels unformed as yet. Process discussion cannot sustain a movement.
Process, per se, is not the point, once settled, as it appears to be. The point is to BUILD THE MOVEMENT so that it is a force to reckon with, so that the current rulers understand their tenure is threatened if they do not accede to some important reforms (which are.........?), upon which we can build to demand more needed reforms.
I've seen groups and movements fail because they got stuck in "process" and simply couldn't come to decisions because people (provocateurs?) kept insisting that the "process" wasn't correct. I'm watching and hoping this doesn't happen to OWS.
Now it's time to discuss and DECIDE WHAT'S NEXT? for OWS so the movement will keep growing. That's what's important - building the movement so it becomes truly EFFECTIVE in bringing about change.
This needs to be done before winter Occupies us all.
Brave and willing though they be, OWSers sleeping on concrete through the winter isn't building the movement. Activists need to keep their good health for the long struggle ahead. Going into the holiday seasons, I've always found most non-activist people pretty unresponsive to protests and activism, even in bad times.
We need plans for the new year, 2012, starting as soon as reasonable, given winter's hand. Perhaps calling for a one-day mass demonstration on, say, Guy Fawkes birthday, Friday, April 13, which is the Friday after Easter (April 8 in 2012)..
Student breaks and the weather would be cooperating to allow many more people than now to Occupy and stay in places of current power for many months.
Okay, some OWSers believe they don't need or want advice from older activists who led struggles in the 60's and 70's when we were their age. However, I cannot in good conscience not tell people how we made decisions in the antiwar movement because it may help.
After each major demonstration--and we had some in the millions all in one place on one day-- we would have national meetings, rather like the General Assemblies, of 2,000-3,000 in one auditorium somewhere in the country.
Everyone was welcome and everyone who wanted to got to speak (time-limited, of course). Then we would make decisions by voting, where we, all present, would vote on which actions the movement would organize next to stop the war.
Yes, we VOTED. The gatherings were chaired by a group of people representing the wide spectrum of political groupings in the antiwar movement. They would decide amongst themselves who would chair and would keep close watch on process and decision-making. It did work.
Building the movement ever-larger so it can be EFFECTIVE is the goal. OWS people can spread out around the country talking, speaking, writing, testifying to others about the sins of Wall Street and gathering regular people's ideas on how we could order our society instead.
Alternatives to the big Monopoly game being played by Goldman-Sachs et al need to be discussed around the country, world. A good, clear, concise fact sheet which explains what's going on with Wall Street, along with some suggestions for alternative economies can be handed out everywhere.
All right, rant over. ONWARD!
You don't get what this about, it's not about a static list of demands, it's about a non violent revolution against the system as whole. PROCESS is central to this revolution because we as local communities are going to determine using this process what we want to see after empire and finance capitalism collapses. If your mind is too ossified to get this, come to a local Occupy general assembly and watch how the process works and maybe you will start to grasp it, once you have seen direct democracy in action you won't settle for mediated faux democracy ever again. This is going on way past this winter, from now on out the empire/finance oligarchy is facing rebellion before it falls, count on it! It may take years, but it will happen, the system isn't just or sustainable and people have had enough!
Here is another hint your generation didn't win, you were too busy smoking weed, and having be ins and thinking maybe the next "hip" guru or movement will save you, so maybe, just maybe Gen X and younger doesn't want to hear it, and wants YOU to listen for a change!
13. Study the way in which the 1% have ripped off the 99%. A good site is the 'automatic earth' site. For example: did you know that between them, JP Morgan and Citibank own $134 trillion in derivatives contracts? Now, that is either
A) the Gross Domestic Product of Planet Earth, or
B) a Sledgehammer poised over Central Bankers heads.
Three years ago, the Sledgehammer talked to Ben Bernanke: 'if AIG falls, then JP Morgan falls, and if JP Morgan fall, I fall!' And Bernanke wrote a trillion dollar check, diluting the earnings of every American who works for a living.
Three weeks ago, the Sledgehammer talked to the European Central Bankers: 'if Greece falls, then French banks fall, then JP Morgan falls, then I fall!' And, natch, they wrote a trillion dollar check (with Geithner there to insist), diluting the earnings of every European who works for a living.
I remember a sign in 2008, outside WallStreet, which I am paraphrasing for politeness, which said: "JUMP! You suckers!" And that's the problem: WallStreet has joined hands with every other financial entity on the planet, and they are ALL threatening to jump together if MainStreet doesn't cut another check to WallStreet. It's time to say: "JUMP! You Suckers! We in the REAL economy will do just fine." They've been playing fantasy football over there and insisting its real. Its not. Its time to let them fall.
Reminding me of the anti-car billboard advert,
"You're not stuck in traffic, you ARE traffic"
I am in equal measure keen to join in the 99% movement and also remaining humbly accepting of the fact that as an average UK salary earner, on a global scale I'm probably still in the top 5% who needs to start caring more about the 95%.
Let's be pissed at the bankers with an attitude of taking the log out of our own eye while we're at it.
- written on my "only possible because of globalisation and cheap labour" piece of technology.