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Whether in Egypt or America, It Takes Organization to Win
In 1981, my brother, John Zogby, ran for Mayor of Utica, New York. Like other factory towns across New England, the Mid-Atlantic and Mid-Western states, Utica was in decline. The factories that had employed tens of thousands had closed and gone south. With the loss of these jobs, the city was in the beginning of a steep decline.
In 1950, Utica had a population of 100,000. By 1980, it had dropped to 80,000 (today Utica hovers around 60,000). Loss of employment meant that neighborhoods were in decline, families were breaking up under the pressures of unemployment, and urban blight had set in, with once family-friendly neighborhoods now in decay.
Despite this troubling state of affairs, politics in the city had not changed. Machine politicians that had once fed off prosperity, now scrambled to feed off the spoils of a dying community.
John had a plan to revitalize this downsized city. He had written a creative study entitled "Utica 2000 ", projecting an economic plan that could lead Utica into the next century. His work captured the imagination of many intellectuals, civic organizations, and progressives across the city, spurring his bid to run for mayor. John's candidacy won the endorsement of Utica's television station and its newspaper. He had a cohort of professors at the city's college in his braintrust, but Utica's Democratic Party machine was threatened by this upstart campaign, and mobilized against this upstart movement. In that year's Democratic primary contest, John lost decisively.
I remember a conversation between John and former Senator James Abourezk, shortly after the election, in which John explained to the Senator how the machine had defeated him. He related how they had hired drivers to take people to the polls, provided them with marked sample ballots indicating their endorsed candidates, and, when needed, how they had used "walking around money" to sway voters to their camp.
Abourezk's take on the election was quite direct. "So what you're telling me", he said, "was that you were out-organized". It was not what we wanted to hear, but it was the truth, plain and simple.
In its purest form, politics in a democracy is about the contest for power. The best ideas don't always win, nor do the most deserving candidates or causes. It is the side that organizes the best and mobilizes its voters most effectively that carries the day and takes power.
This is a lesson we learned in 1981, and it is lesson that is being learned in the Arab Spring states of Tunisia and Egypt where elections will soon decide which side initially takes power and reaps the benefits of the popular mobilizations that led to the downfall of the regimes that governed for decades.
The uprisings in both countries have been called "Facebook Revolutions", but they will not have "Facebook Elections." Social media was but a communication vehicle that enabled young revolutionaries to break the regime's monopoly on information, to communicate with each other, and to mobilize demonstrations. They were able to brilliantly use these tools not only to organize in the streets, but to send powerful images to the outside world revealing their government's abusive and brutal use of power and to generate support for their valiant efforts to make change.
What remains to be seen is whether these same young revolutionaries, using these same tools, can organize voters and win elections, or will the older more established organizations with broad based support ultimately triumph?
An early indication of the limits of social media as an organizing tool came with the national referendum on "Constitutional Reform" held in Egypt in March of this year.
In that contest the sides were clearly demarcated. The young revolutionaries and many progressive reformers opposed the reforms being proposed by the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces that had retained power after the departure of President Mubarak. The Muslim Brotherhood and other older established parties supported the military's proposal, since they saw the process outlined in that reform favoring their chances to win the next election putting them in the driver's seat to write the new constitution and consolidate their power.
A survey of social media posts in the period immediately preceding the vote, saw the revolutionaries clearly winning the Facebook war by a wide margin of tens of thousands opposed to the proposed reforms to a mere few thousands in favor. Friends associated with the progressive parties, with whom I spoke in the lead up to the vote, were confident of victory. In addition to being buoyed by the public support of the best known presidential candidates, former Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa and Mohamed el Baradei, they had been talking to each other and checking Facebook and were convinced they had majority support. The final tally showed how wrong they had been. The reforms won by a sweeping margin of 77 percent in favor to a mere 23 percent opposed. The revolutionaries had been out-organized.
Further evidence of the effectiveness of the Muslim Brotherhood's organizing ability came with their recent victories winning elections and consolidating their hold over Egypt's doctors' and teachers' syndicates.
With elections in Tunisia happening this week, and with Egypt's just around the corner, we need to be prepared to accept an outcome that may be disappointing to some, but should not be surprising to anyone. The new parties being formed by those who led the revolts have not yet jelled, nor are their roots deep enough or broad based enough to compete effectively.
But the final chapters of both revolutions will not be written by the outcomes of their first post-Arab Spring elections. If the young revolutionaries stay the course, build organizations strong enough to compete, and retain their commitment to freedom and democratic rights, they can be a permanent fixture on the political scene. Their time will come.
This was the view expressed by Ahmad Maher, one of the founders of Egypt's April 6th Movement, which played a central role in the Tahrir Square revolt. On my weekly Abu Dhabi TV program, Viewpoint, Maher discussed a long term plan of direct engagement and organization. April 6, he said, had not finished its work of bringing real change and social justice to Egypt. Social media had been a useful tool for organizers to maintain communication, but what was needed now was "to find new ways to reach people" on the streets where they live. And this will take, he noted, several more years of hard work. Maher was confident, however, that whatever the outcome of the election, change has occurred. The next President and Parliament will not be able to operate as Presidents and Parliaments of the past. An empowered and organized public, Maher observed, will now serve as a check on power and a voice seeking social justice.
That, incidentally, was the story that played out on a smaller scale in Utica. John bounced back from defeat. Not only did he build a nationally recognized polling company, becoming a major employer in Utica, but he and his allies also set about to revitalize a citizen's lobby to continue to push for change in the city. Today, the old "political machine" is gone and many of the ideas that were advocated in "Utica 2000" have been implemented. Utica, once dying, has stabilized with new immigrants coming to the city bringing new vitality and energy, creating jobs and rebuilding old neighborhoods.
The lesson here is clear. Victory doesn't come easy and it doesn't go to the side with the best ideas, or even to the one that expresses its ideas best, the most frequently, or to the largest audience. Whether in a small city or a big country, change will only come through organization and ability to mobilize people to press for change.
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99 Comments so far
Show AllI don't think passing out "walking around" money constitutes anything but buying votes. There was a time when "organized" crime ruled the cities. Boss Tweed ruled Tammany Hall with his organization. Is that what we really want?
I don't think that is a fair characterization of what Zogby is saying. His brother lost the election by being out-organized, he says. He should have learned what he was up against - that people would be bribed for their votes - and made plans on how to counter this, not by giving bribes but using other means of attracting votes and getting voters to the polls. In general stepping up his efforts.
Stepping up his efforts how? Throwing a little "walking around money" around as well?
"The lesson here is clear. Victory doesn't come easy and it doesn't go to the side with the best ideas, or even to the one that expresses its ideas best, the most frequently, or to the largest audience. Whether in a small city or a big country, change will only come through organization and ability to mobilize people to press for change."
the international chamber of commerce, citizens united, have one simplistic non-life goal; continuously maximising profits. those who reach the top policy making positions have learned to ignore any and all urgings from their sense of morality. his loyalty to the vampire-hydra brings him great rewards, mansions, yachts, young girls, young boys or whatever fleeting self-indulgence his heart may desire--as long as the corporation get more, ever more. also, this vicious, voracious monster, this paper contractual doll receives for his unquestioning service protection from the negative repercussions of korporate-kriminal-krimes. should one suffer a sudden onset pang of conscience in a momentary lapse of greed prompting him to speak the truth, he can be expunged. after all, "ambition should be made of sterner stuff!!"
PURE EVIL! do not presume we can appeal to their better self.
If the Occupy is viewed as merely global, coordinated protests, as opposed to the rumblings of a revolution and a new world order, then yes, Zogby is correct: It is about winning the next election, which would lead to the same delusional cheers, tears and hopes that greeted Obama when he won. But, in a note of reality, turning the Egyptian revolution over to a caretaker government headed by the military was the same as... well, as, bringing down the fed with an Occupy & Surround DC and then turning the revolution over to the US military.
www.earthens.net - Animation for the 99%
It's good to have the voice of James Zogby here. James states, "The lesson here is clear. Victory doesn't come easy and it doesn't go to the side with the best ideas, or even to the one that expresses its ideas best, the most frequently, or to the largest audience. Whether in a small city or a big country, change will only come through organization and ability to mobilize people to press for change."
The fault does not lie in lack of organization. The failure lies in the decentralized development of a strong VISION. The dynamics in play in each country are different; but, the solutions are clear. The VISION developed in Egypt was not TRANSFORMATIONAL. The development of a new Egyption MYTHOS, which by definition is transformational, .requires TIME to broaden the participation and to ferment new lifeways. Transformational change cannot be rushed, it is patient, it cooks and simmers until the right consistency is reached. Political elections are not the be all and end all of transformational change. POLITICS is ONE means of change but it is not the exclusive means of change. More important, in my opinion, is building the new MYTHOS. When adequate numbers of people define and adopt the new MYTHOS, it will consist of many different visions, large and small. They will differ by place and local circumstance. , yet, they will achieve new outcomes that are a part of the MYTHOS. In developing the new MYTHOS, we are learning to deal with the realities of the world in new ways.
FIRST WE MUST STABILIZE OUR SITUATION AND KEEP IT FROM DETERIORATING. Then the process of building a new MYTHOS can begin.
Find ways to stop job losses, stop foreclosures, stop the flow of wealth to the top, and to break up the big banks and greatly decrease the number of our foreign military bases (currently 750+) so that the money saved can be used at home..
The way to accomplish these things is through the use of creative methodologies developed in the minds of the enormous talent pool available to us through decentralized communications. There are more solutions absent government than there are governmental solutions.
TRUST THE PROCESS, and be patient.
There is much wisdom in what you say, especially the idea that political victories can only bring transformational change if accompanied by a larger vision - what you call mythos - of what society should be and do. The Occupy movement appears to be working on elucidating such a vision or mythos, a new conception of relations between people and their society that is far less mediated by large institutions - whether government or corporate power - that is more face to face, more communal and personally connected, than we have now. Another article here, on Occupy Miami, shows this in action, through the eyes of one of the participants, a woman who spent her childhood in foster care, who already considers the Occupy group her family.
"The way to accomplish these things is through the use of creative methodologies developed in the minds of the enormous talent pool available to us through decentralized communications."
But that is just a very long way of saying : "We need organization." ;)
This Occupation thing is not anything new -and that is only to the good. This tendency to want to make it new -often wholly new, often without reason- needs to fade aware as this thing matures.
Federal and State Administrations' actions could fill in the job losses. Federal and Local government actions could halt foreclosures. Stopping the flow of wealth to the top would involve wholly changing the Capitalist system. Slowing it could be done by re-regulation (i.e. Federal and State Legislative and Administration action). Breaking up the big banks could be done by nationalization then re-sale in smaller bits (which should have been done in 2008, actually). Closing the bases is easily in the hands of the Federal Administration and Congress.
There ya go. There are some methods for doing all that you ask. Consider them found. All of them have been done before. All of them would work -have worked- before with popular backing.
All of them require a Movement with real organization to push them through.
Nothing exiting like a new MYTHOS.
Just boring stuff like get-out-the-vote rallies, neighborhood discussion groups, information circulation, and even MORE boring stuff like tax forms for staffers and bulk orders of phones and choosing a letterhead.
Now, I believe that all of these old, tired-and-true methods can be given an updated, millienial generation skin.
But at some point talk of "methodologies" and "decentralized communications" has to turn into choosing particular methods and getting them working.
I haven't personally seen much of this from the Occupiers. Though I am only here, not on their sites. ;)
And trusting this sort of chaos-meets-consensus process would be easier for me to trust if:
a) it had ever worked before.
b) it hadn't already proven a problem multiple times.
c) any of the folks I see repeatedly telling me to trust it seemed to be at all aware of a) or b).
"But at some point talk of "methodologies" and "decentralized communications" has to turn into choosing particular methods and getting them working."
The decentralized Occupy City's will decide how to best approach their most pressing issues. From the great number of City's participating, different solutions will be tested. Those bearing the most fruit will be communicated to other groups in other City's. In that way the most effective methods will .become widely used. Yes, there may be circumstances when groups decide to act in more centralized ways as necessary; but, the fundamental overall structure of communications and decision making will remain in place. Dissent CAN be manufactured and revolutions COLORED by outside influences. See http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=27053
By maintaining a relatively strict adherence to decentralized participation, absent the influence of big money, or centralization, a movement can be sustainable. However, we must be aware of the methodologies used by others to attempt to derail the movement. Some big financial money has already made it's way into the New Your Occupy movement. See: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=27113
There will likely be no Kent State type shootings; but their will be clandestine efforts to derail the movement. They have already begun. If the more passive efforts fail there will be more shocking efforts designed to destabilize the movement. By maintaining the decentralized nature of the movement, the shocks can be absorbed and countered because the adopted vision rests in each participant, active or passive.
The vision will remain fluid and change to fit the circumstances. Multiple visions depending upon place will be adopted to keep the movement living so that an attack on any one vision can be survived. This is a fluid movement not a rigid one.
This is a tale from Theoryland.
That's great, for what its worth.
But the vast potential of whatever-language-you-dress-this-thing-in better start showing results soon.
The People are too angry to wait long, and Winter is coming.
I want this thing to turn real as much as I wanted and worked for the same in the last iteration a decade ago.
But right now it is becoming the political version of Vaporware.
Self-congratulatory and defensive cocooning in theory will doom this process.
What you seem to be ignoring -willfully, since I have brought it to your attention- is that folks like me have seen such high hopes and big notions collapse once already, and folks like Zogby have seen them crumble several times.
I don't give a crap about theory any more, I want to see actual organization of people to achieve coherent goals. You are right that this Movement has the potential to make this happen. But your conviction that it will do so is faith-based not observation-based.
Or am I wrong?
Which Occupation should I go to to enquire about the regular participant who writes on CD under the handle "Stone"?
I would love to be wrong BTW.
It would please me immensely to see my doubts assuaged by your recitation of actual, observed, examples of Occupations organizing beyond practicalities and protests.
"I would love to be wrong BTW."
Reading your posts makes me doubt that. It sounds more like you would like the Movement to succeed, but only on your terms. The Occupiers are going to do it on their terms. You can grumble on the sidelines if you wish, but it doesn't seem a very productive course of action. Could you perhaps give them your support and try working with them?
You are wrong and Stone is right, this process of rebuilding society from the bottom up may take years, it is NOT going to happen before winter, there will be occupations again in the north next spring, but we WILL win because our ideas of local citizen empowerment and cooperatives replacing greed driven finance capitalism are what desperate people are looking for to rebuild our lives, and our empowering process being more important than a static list of reformist ideas, is our key idea.
Someone posted this on my facebook wall today to give you an idea of what in it for the long haul means:
"Our local occupy meetings have challenged ourselves to empower each member of our community to live without big corporations. Our bike co-op is discussing a shift to our local currency. We grow an ever increasing portion of our own food and make sure everybody in our community gets enough to eat."
I would call it social theory, and not mythos, otherwise right on!
zogby seems to imply that the lessons of his brother's efforts and accomplishments over many years represents the best chance for change.
we don't have the luxury of that kind of time anymore. not to mention that traditional partisan politics is a cadaver, an empty shell. kool aid squared.
Why do we not have time?
We have time. ;)
'"So what you're telling me", he said, "was that you were out-organized". It was not what we wanted to hear, but it was the truth, plain and simple.'
Zogby doesn't get that what's new and different about today is people are finally giving up on the old, tired message that Zogby conveys in this article.
He and others will try to claim that the rules of yesterday apply to today. That is given organization was needed last decade, last century, last millennium, then organization is needed today. But today is different, because the world's people are intellectually connected, and able to transcend myth and folklore. Today we know the way to utopia is to discover our own personal needs and act on them. And in doing so we find we act in harmony with everyone else, and such a collective action can overcome elite oppression and set us free.
Granted, at a later point, when elitevil "ups the ante", we will have to build organization upon this foundation, to thwart the thugs. But this foundation of mass enlightenment/empowerment has to be built first.
Without the foundation of mass enlightenment/empowerment, what happens to your organization? It is quickly co-opted/corrupted. Yesterday, not so quickly. But today, VERY quickly. Think of organization as the icing on the cake. Try baking the cake first, then see if it needs icing, or not.
I think both you and James Zogby are correct. The internet and intellectual connections like those taking place at Occupy Wall Street are so very needed here in the US where we have been stupefied, smothered and poisoned by layers and layers of BS. We are breathing, alive. The Park serves as a nerve center, a gathering place where people march to and from every form of resistance, rally, hearing and event taking place in the city.
At the same time while the ideas and the almost miraculous embryonic development of social systems take place, for instance at Zuccotti Park, the scope, the intellectual goals and fervor can outgrow the organizational capabilities of the group. I have spent time on two occasions going down to the Park for an event, wandering around the park looking for the event that was listed on the bulletin board, and nobody knew where it was. I think that is a sniffle in the body politic that signals something coming on that needs attention.
So, I predict that some better organization will develop to go along with the intellectual awakening. It is not always time to throw out the old, the door knocking, the personal discussion, although I think we can do without the bribes.
On facebook, thousands of people can advise you about what color to paint your house, but how many will show up for the painting party?
The problem with this post, rtdrury, is that thousands of people said virtually the same thing in 1967, and many times before that in the past.
Hell we said it just over a decade ago in the previous iteration of the Global Movement.
We were wrong, they were wrong.
Couldn't you be wrong?
And you seem not to be aware that the systems that allow people to be "intellectually connected" ARE AN ORGANIZATION. An organization set up by the Occupiers' enemies for their own purposes.
Wow, it's like an acid flashback, seriously. Do you really think what you're saying is new? It's not! This is what we did in the 60s and the fuckers CRUSHED US. Maybe the Fates are on our side now, but we were often disorganized and very naive back then and it did not serve us in the end.
Yes, they killed all our leaders, and so people now say, let's not have leaders! But those leaders were leaders for a reason -- they were incredible, powerful, visionary people whose words helped voice the Movement, give it focus and strength. From King to John Lennon. That's why they were killed.
You sound starry eyed over this new renewal of the Movement, almost like a person in love, who only wants to see the beauty and immediacy of the new energetic connection.
Unless the Rapture is coming tomorrow, I don't think we're all that much closer to real mass enlightenment than we were in 69, and I don't think our enemies are any more inclined to let us succeed now than they were back then. Now, in fact, they are much more powerful.
We need to organize against them. If everything is going to be decentralized, I'd still like to hear the plan.
What you say about the Fates is true. The living breathing Zeitgeist is on the move, been broadcasting it in the crop circles and the clouds. THAT is what is different THIS time. The Fates, indeed, are real, and they are coming like screaming Banshees for the 1%-ers THIS time. Stay tuned.
Wow, comments increasingly show an enlightened understanding of the change process in the 21st Century. It's great to visit each persons perspectives and sample the creative dimensions of this movement. We are each different yet we are one. Mr. Zogby is receiving a great education here.
Arrogant and self-congratulatory.
Nothing new about that.
18 comments are here before I post mine,
6 of them are yours, all replies, all critical,
2 of which are directed at Stone.
Neither of which he deserved imho.
"Arrogant" you call him?
No.
I call the notion that someone with more experience is receiving an "education" from a cluster of net-comments uncritically defending a Movement that has yet to net any actual results "Arrogant" AND "self-congratulatory".
If you think that criticism = arrogance then any grouping you involve yourself with will be hindered by you in achieving its fruition. ;)
Forget what you think I think about myself.
Let's talk about what you think about something that matters.
Why would you say that Stone's posts' (not Stone, by the way) did not "deserve(d)" my critique?
Was not he critiquing Zogby's thesis?
You remind me of the "quiet people" I have interacted with in collegiate "seminars". You complain that the "noisy people" such as myself dominate things, but forget that the rules of the forum allow each to be as "noisy" as he wishes to.
You can hide your annoyance at my greater use of the forum behind B.S. if you want, or you can just use the forum as much as I do. In doing so you would both enable your desire to express yourself over me -which is so deep in us as to be inescapable- AND increase the complexity and utility of the discourse -which is why the forum was structured this way in the first place.
The idea that it is "Arrogant" to fully utilize one's rights is a reflection of self-repressing mentality.
So think of me what you want, just think of yourself as critically.
Otherwise, I am not alone in my arrogance, am I? ;)
Where would more and better ideas be generated and distilled, in an organization led by one person or a committee, or in an organization of millions generating and distilling the best ideas?
Direct democracy
The second one.
Now, where is such a thing?
The Occupation Movement COULD be such.
But it isn't right now.
The "older more established organizations" usually take pains to control the counting of the votes.
Which -by Zogby's extension- means they were better organized, yes?
Every person has a voice and each should be respected. Every set of circumstances are different. Every response a test. We must keep an open mind and be capable of shaping a response. What is generally true however is that an organization with limited numbers of intellectual talent will fail confronted with a decentralized organization with millions of participants exercising their creative talents. The best methodologies will emerge and be communicated. Trust the process, and don't forget to enjoy life along the way. Help and share with those in need. It's working so just keep it going and trust our young people for the future is theirs.
"An empowered and organized public, Maher observed, will now serve as a check on power and a voice seeking social justice."
Empowered yes, organized no. Organization is the red herring that diverts attention from the need to empower the people. Empower the people first. Then take a look and see what's missing. Stop pretending thats organization is sufficient. It's not.
Organizing is the necessary prerequisite to obtaining power. Of course it is not sufficient, but it is necessary.
What do you mean, exactly, when you say "empower the people" ?
Actually I disagree, I think we WILL have in essence "Facebook elections," as I think the occupy movement is modeling a more humane AND efficient society that will replace top down structures like (un)representative pseudo democracy, and finance capitalism. This is what I wrote up about that on Facebook this morning:
"OWS as a gathering of individuals unconstrained by ideology, talking points, or static lists of demands, allows for individual intiative being a from of parallel simultaneous creativity in formulating ideas as opposed to the static uniformity seen in a social movement with static demands. Parallel simultaneous creativity creates an eco-system of ideas, and the general assembly consensus process is the selection pressure to select for the best ideas. Thus the combination of parallel simultaneous creativity and the general assembly process harnesses the power of evolution in meme section which is much more powerful in generating complexity and adaptability than static lists of demands. Because we are as diverse as the 99% we are in essence creating a new society, and this is the way societies generate their best ideas is through individual initiative, and then societies dialog and debate to select the best new ideas.
We wouldn't ask society to have a static list of demands, and neither should we ask the occupy movement to have one as that would kill the PROCESS we are using to evolve ideas quickly of high complexity, and high quality that are adapted to our local circumstances. Once people see how effective this model of an idea ecosystem, or alternately an idea economy is, they will want it in their communities to replace the more cumbersome slower moving slower pseudo democracy known as “representative” democracy. Just as Hayek said that markets will set prices efficiently without top down regulation, so to can local communities evolve ideas appropriate to their context quickly using the power of parallel creativity and the consensus process. Until people understand that the occupy movement is not merely a reform movement looking to petition government with a static list of demands, but rather a more humane, empowering for all individuals social process, AND an idea eco-system/economy looking to wholly replace cumbersome top down political and economic structures, they are not going to understand the movement. Unmediated direct consensus democracy combined with self organized cooperation is thus not only a more just, fair, and humane way to live (and more fun), but actually is a social process that generates more complex and high quality ideas than top down processes like finance capitalism, and representative democracy. Our high quality complex ideas combined with the humane decency of addressing ALL peoples needs in general assemblies means we will win in the long run as top down empire is brittle as seen in the work of Joseph Tainter in how complex societies collapse,
http://campfire.theoildrum.com/node/6942
where as we are adaptable through the harnessing of parallel creativity and rapidly evolving ideas through the consensus process selecting the best ideas quickly compered to top down processes that have slower feedback loops. One could even posit that only a process of evolving ideas rapidly like the occupy model is the only thing that will allow us to survive in a time of ecology and economic turbulence that is going to demand the rapid generation of ideas to to adapt to changing local conditions both social and ecological we have brought upon ourselves in western society."
https://www.facebook.com/notes/matthew-stephen-rogers/the-occupy-movement-is-not-a-static-list-of-demands-but-rather-a-process-for-gen/10150330213732927
The Egyptians need to finish their revolution for sure and many are working on just that despite a paucity of MSM coverage.
Well then why, for Godsake, don't we organize to TAKE BACK OUR ELECTIONS??
Get the money out of democracy, no more campaign control by corporations, force the media to give full access to all candidates, and throw all the corporate controlled computerized voting machines into the Boston harbor???
Then the 99% could run real candidates who have an actual chance of winning.
If you talk to actual occupiers most of us have no interest in engaging with the rotten failed system of U.S. top down faux mediated democracy.
That's good to know, because then I and many others will have no interest in engaging with you, and will withdraw our interest and support -- won't be sending you money, sleeping bags, food, or forwarding your articles and posts all around as we have been.
Why? Because you sound like a totally naive child playing games -- closing your eyes and pretending you can make representative democracy -- what MILLIONS of people have fought and died for -- go away.
As I posted here, that rotten failed system -- which is not going away any time soon, btw -- failed FOR A REASON. And if you are unwilling or incapable of looking at that, discussing it intelligently and thoughtfully, you are not creating a movement based in reality, but just in little extremist compounds, which are historically ALWAYS marginalized and DESTROYED by more powerful forces.
I hope other people in the Occupy movement have more interest in discussing reality even if it's not easy or simple for them. You come across as a close-minded ideologue, and that is not good as a spokesperson for Occupy.
You are like a Soviet bureaucrat drone Shilling for the Soviet Union in 1988. I don't believe you would have ever supported protestors against this rotten system you are just looking for someone to brand the bunch of assholes you support in this rotten system in the desperate hope that you can maintain your middle class lifestyle. Well guess what people sleeping out in the rain and cold AREN'T doing it to become the DIm's tea party.
And the Occupy movement doesn't have spokespeople we reject the failed "leadership," model embraced by FOLLOWERS with no personal initiative, or collective solidarity courage of your ilk. Ask someone else they will tell you something else, and it is my hope that cowards like you will not be able to convince occupiers to give up their core beliefs and compromise with "lesser evil," within the system. You know the system is rotten and should opposed at a fundamental level when even its advocates admit the best that can be done within that system is "lesser evil." Guess what being a little bit evil, is like being a little bit pregnant, if you don't believe me ask Oily Bomber the peace prize winner who revels in murdering people around the world including American citizens. Martin Luther King knew better he was getting ready to organize an occupation of Washington D.C. before he was assassinated.
"Martin Luther King, Jr. announced the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) plans for the campaign following his testimony before the National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders in October 1967. Speaking to the commission he insisted that news coverage of the recent urban uprisings failed to acknowledge the “greater crimes of white society” and everyday violence of poverty. At a press conference afterwards, King declared that “The time has come if we can’t get anything done otherwise to camp right here in Washington… and stay here by the thousands and thousands until the Congress of our nation and the federal government will do something to deal with the problem [of poverty].”
The campaign that followed built a coalition propelled by the energy and diverse concerns of grassroots organizers and poor people across the country. Significant internal conflicts persisted and many participants explicitly transgressed the boundaries of the SCLC’s own reformist goals. But even after King’s assassination on April 4, 1968, the momentum continued. Welfare rights, Chicano, Native American, Puerto Rican, Hispano land grant, and labor movements joined forces, arriving in Washington, DC in May 1968, and assembled a vast shanty town called “Resurrection City, USA” near the Lincoln Memorial.
Resurrection City housed more than three thousand people, and demonstrations and solidarity visits drew many thousands more to the encampment during its six weeks of existence. Residents braved torrential rains, interminable mud, undercover informants, and hostile police. Resurrection City programs included a child-care center, health and social services, a Poor People’s University with ongoing seminars and lectures, free meals, a daily newspaper, cultural activities in the Soul Center, a city council, a finance committee, and a public relations center. More than 55,000 people gathered on Solidarity Day, held on June 19th in commemoration of the infamous day in 1865 when slaves in Texas learned of the Emancipation Proclamation—two and a half years after its passage.
Throughout the campaign, participants maintained a frenetic schedule of demonstrations and meetings with legislators and federal agencies to present their broad array of demands.
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The disparate circumstances that motivated people to participate in the campaign produced multiple perspectives that could not be adequately expressed in a single set of demands—something that perhaps the New York Times today would deride as a “lack of clear messaging.” But the form of the campaign itself—with its multiple contingents and numerous demands—underscored the irreducibility of its parts to a unified whole. Indeed, this was as much the message as the insistence that the expropriation and poverty that were a consequence of racism, capitalism, colonial dispossession, and imperialist militarism would not go uncontested.
On June 24, 1968, Resurrection City was shut down by an immense show of paramilitary force, following two evenings of violent confrontation and escalated tension between residents and police.
And, in the sense that every protest “event” ends sometime and exit strategies require something more than a list of demands, the most radical gesture of Occupy Wall Street would be to regroup with the insights of the indigenous critique of the imperial language of “occupation” and an understanding that for many the economic crisis began long before 2008. Because, as the Lenape scholar Joanne Barker points out, “not all 99%-ers are created equal.” Broad coalitions are necessarily fraught, but such tensions can potentially be the source of a more expansively antiracist, anticolonial, antiwar, and anticapitalist movement to come."
http://www.counterpunch.org/2011/10/21/from-the-1968-poor-people’s-campaign-to-occupy-wall-street/
It's people like you who told MLK to take the "tranquilizing drug of gradualism," he rejected in his "I have a dream speech," shame on you, sellouts like you are in actuality the people who destroy movements for social and economic justice. YOU are the people who refuse to non violently oppose powerful evil forces and merely snicker at people trying to do real good when they are attacked by the states' goons. So far "liberal" people like have been told you ARE NOT WELCOME TO CO-OPT OUR LOCAL OCCUPATION, GOOD!!!!!
You assume that anyone wants your interest or support. You are not needed and the views you are expressing here are held by a small minority of people. I for one would just as soon you never show any interest or offer any support or ever join. Why should anyone spend the sort of time and energy on you that you are demanding? That is not practical.
If you would withhold support - or threaten to - over what one person posts on the Internet, you were never serious and were never going to join.
You are couching that which you desire - the crushing of the Left - as though you were merely making an observation.
No one needs to "make representative democracy go away." It is long gone. Since "representative democracy" is simply a euphemism for rule by the wealthy few, I assume that it is that which you are fighting for. What other explanation could there possibly be?
I have your back on this one TA.
I thought you were smarter than this. Oh well. If you can look at everything I've written and think I'm advocating for the crushing of the Left, your brain is a muddled fog. Good luck.
But your best line here is definitely that the views I'm expressing are held by a small minority of people. The views I'm expressing are held by the VAST MAJORITY of people in democratic societies around the world. Are you suffering from delusions? Are you under the impression that the majority of the world wants the end of representative democracy -- what do you think the Arab uprisings were about? What do you think people have gone to war over for hundreds of years? Hint: it ain't direct democracy, or anarchism.
Representative democracy is not "long gone" and it's also not going anywhere -- to think otherwise is really insane. And is NOT a euphemism for rule by the wealthy few if money doesn't control the process, which is a structural change that the Occupy movement could demand and accomplish if it put its efforts toward it. You could make that incredible change in the world, and what a fucking tragedy if instead you turn away from that opportunity and naively declare the system dead and unfixable and focus on your very small scale direct democracy models that can never work on the large scale.
Representative democracy in the U.S. HAS always been rule by the wealthy few, if you really fail to understand that read Howard Zinn's Peoples' History of The U.S., and then get back to us, mmmK?
I am not advocating an end to democracy, I am pointing out that it has long been dead in this country.
You keep talking about direct democracy, and how it won't work. It occurs to me that the rebels in the colonies, before they were betrayed by the "founding fathers" and excluded from politics, were practicing direct democracy in their meetings and organizations.
Good point.
In my opinion, the original article is dishonest in that it talks about the results of several elections without once mentioning the role of money. No one could have that much experiience without noticing the overwhelming role of money in US and probably most other elections--he has to have deliberately excluded mention of that elephant in the room. Astonishingly, there was only one bare mention so far in the comments.
Organization is surely important, but to say that a grassroots group should be able to win elections against power structures entrenched in a long-standing web of favors and revolving doors and lobbying, a group tied to the owners of all the "mainstream" (corporate) media, which still largely control public opinion...and when they of course lose the election, it's because they weren't sufficiently ORGANIZED...bullshit. It's hard to win a card game when your opponent is allowed to mark the cards and is the dealer. Aside from the role of money, these days elections can be, and have been, stolen via electronic hanky-panky. This has been essentially proven but is regularly ignored, as though it didn't matter. I suppose if the grassroots group is sufficiently ORGANIZED, they should have money sufficient to compete with multinational corporations and have their own hackers to pull back the stolen votes...
Incidentally, I DO think the movement needs to be better organized. I just disagree that lack of organization is why we can't win elections in a rigged system.
Organization hasn't changed down through the ages. Today we are blessed with electronic means, but the Gaul's could send news from one end of the country to the other by shouting from one person to another. Semaphores did it during the Napoleonic wars. Information exchange and dissemination is great, but what he is saying is what do you do with it when you get it. So don't get too carried away with the "new" age. And while money is important, it doesn't define the winner everytime.
Are there problems with elections? With voting fraud? With behind the door deals? Sure. But what we have sure beats the hell out of second place. Insular thinking and lack of real knowledge of the real world will allow claims to the contrary, but those claims are frivolous.
Violent revolution? No chance in the US. Protesting in the streets till the protestors are given what they want? Not happening. Many don't like the Tea Party path, but watch how effective they are during this election. Watch how effective the voters who turn out are in determining what happens to all of us. Beating a drum in a park may be fun, but if you don't organize, don't convince middle America that you are right, just forget it. If you can't take over the Democratic party and repair the damage the Pelosi Congress and Obama have done to Progressives, Liberals and the less wealthy there is little chance of effecting change,
Unless we counter the "Tea Party" ( nothing really but a euphemism for middle Americas anger with TARP, bank, corporate and union bail outs plus uncontrolled over spending and financial deregulation that is wiping out their savings, the sell out and destruction of their jobs and their children's education), especially at the local level (and fast) we will be standing on the corner with our protest signs and a tin cup.
Flat out, unless the anger and attention is "organized" and channeled into political action using the two party venue (there is little hope of a viable third party, except from the Right at this point) the results of all the dissatisfaction will be the repair of some of our complaints, but it will be paired with the elimination of many others we wanted.
Not a popular thought I'm sure, but the truth and backed up by reality and historical continuity.
Different people are wired differently by Mother Nature to create a balance. Sometimes when one type becomes too dominant the balance becomes skewed. When one calls for "organization," that is a reflection of the 20th Century Model, the model that failed us in this 21st Century. In times of change, especially rapid change, some people become uncomfortable and seek a more ordered process. Alvin Toffler in his book, Future Shock, describes this discomfort as a psycho-biological condition where reality becomes blurred by change. Many people feel this way because that is how their brains are wired. Creative people however thrive in blurred or fast changing environments,. They are wired to be more changeable. It is the needs of the particular times that we are living in that demands the type of persons needed to make order out of chaos. Creativity us up to the challenge, as it has always been. The 20th Century ordered mind is now out of fashion. It cannot cope with hyper change. Creative minds will cope with hyper change and create the new MYTHOS. Once created, the more ordered minds will again come into fashion to administer the new system. We are all needed, we are just not needed in the same way or at the same time. The predominant need now is for Creative People to step up to the challenge and to resist being misled by the calls for more centrist action or more organization and order. To meet the challenge of hyper change every last cell of the creative mind is needed. The old centralist mindset will not die easily and creative minds must anticipate their actions and move to block them in advance. I am thinking in particular of WW III in the Middle East. If the economic elites are allowed to initiate that War, and the propaganda machine gets behind it, then the Occupy efforts may be offset or ended. We need people to buy into the reality that soldiers are fighting for the 1%, not the 99%. And we need to get that done quickly. Government must have the consent of the governed to govern. There can be no war without the consent of the governed and the soldiers.
Organization for cooperative effort is the only way that human beings have ever accomplished anything, starting with obtaining food, shelter and clothing, That is not "20th century thinking," it is human thinking.
Promoting individualism is defending the current system, not offering a radical alternative.