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Occupy First. Demands Come Later
Critics say the Occupy cause is nebulous. Protesters will need to address what comes next – but beware a debate on enemy turf
What to do after the occupations of Wall Street and beyond – the protests that started far away, reached the centre and are now, reinforced, rolling back around the world? One of the great dangers the protesters face is that they will fall in love with themselves. In a San Francisco echo of the Wall Street occupation this week, a man addressed the crowd with an invitation to participate as if it was a happening in the hippy style of the 60s: "They are asking us what is our programme. We have no programme. We are here to have a good time."
'The protesters should fall in love with hard and patient work – they are the beginning, not the end.' (Photograph: Timothy A Clary/AFP/Getty Images)
Carnivals come cheap – the true test of their worth is what remains the day after, how our normal daily life will be changed. The protesters should fall in love with hard and patient work – they are the beginning, not the end. Their basic message is: the taboo is broken; we do not live in the best possible world; we are allowed, obliged even, to think about alternatives.
In a kind of Hegelian triad, the western left has come full circle: after abandoning the so-called "class struggle essentialism" for the plurality of anti-racist, feminist, and other struggles, capitalism is now clearly re-emerging as the name of the problem. So the first lesson to be taken is: do not blame people and their attitudes. The problem is not corruption or greed, the problem is the system that pushes you to be corrupt. The solution is not "Main Street, not Wall Street", but to change the system where Main Street cannot function without Wall Street.
There is a long road ahead, and soon we will have to address the truly difficult questions – not questions of what we do not want, but about what we do want. What social organisation can replace the existing capitalism? What type of new leaders do we need? What organs, including those of control and repression? The 20th-century alternatives obviously did not work.
While it is thrilling to enjoy the pleasures of the "horizontal organisation" of protesting crowds with egalitarian solidarity and open-ended free debates, we should also bear in mind what GK Chesterton wrote: "Merely having an open mind is nothing; the object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid." This holds also for politics in times of uncertainty: the open-ended debates will have to coalesce not only in some new master-signifiers, but also in concrete answers to the old Leninist question, "What is to be done?"
The direct conservative attacks are easy to answer. Are the protests un-American? When conservative fundamentalists claim that America is a Christian nation, one should remember what Christianity is: the Holy Spirit, the free egalitarian community of believers united by love. It is the protesters who are the Holy Spirit, while on Wall Street pagans worship false idols.
Are the protesters violent? True, their very language may appear violent (occupation, and so on), but they are violent only in the sense in which Mahatma Gandhi was violent. They are violent because they want to put a stop to the way things are – but what is this violence compared with the violence needed to sustain the smooth functioning of the global capitalist system?
They are called losers – but are the true losers not there on Wall Street, who received massive bailouts? They are called socialists – but in the US, there already is socialism for the rich. They are accused of not respecting private property – but the Wall Street speculations that led to the crash of 2008 erased more hard-earned private property than if the protesters were to be destroying it night and day – just think of thousands of homes repossessed.
They are not communists, if communism means the system that deservedly collapsed in 1990 – and remember that communists who are still in power run today the most ruthless capitalism. The success of Chinese communist-run capitalism is an ominous sign that the marriage between capitalism and democracy is approaching a divorce. The only sense in which the protesters are communists is that they care for the commons – the commons of nature, of knowledge – which are threatened by the system.
They are dismissed as dreamers, but the true dreamers are those who think things can go on indefinitely the way they are, just with some cosmetic changes. They are not dreamers; they are the awakening from a dream that is turning into a nightmare. They are not destroying anything, but reacting to how the system is gradually destroying itself. We all know the classic scene from cartoons: the cat reaches a precipice but goes on walking; it starts to fall only when it looks down and notices the abyss. The protesters are just reminding those in power to look down.
This is the easy part. The protesters should beware not only of enemies, but also of false friends who pretend to support them but are already working hard to dilute the protest. In the same way we get coffee without caffeine, beer without alcohol, ice-cream without fat, those in power will try to make the protests into a harmless moralistic gesture.
In boxing, to clinch means to hold the opponent's body with one or both arms in order to prevent or hinder punches. Bill Clinton's reaction to the Wall Street protests is a perfect case of political clinching. Clinton thinks that the protests are "on balance … a positive thing", but he is worried about the nebulousness of the cause: "They need to be for something specific, and not just against something because if you're just against something, someone else will fill the vacuum you create," he said. Clinton suggested the protesters get behind President Obama's jobs plan, which he claimed would create "a couple million jobs in the next year and a half".
What one should resist at this stage is precisely such a quick translation of the energy of the protest into a set of concrete pragmatic demands. Yes, the protests did create a vacuum – a vacuum in the field of hegemonic ideology, and time is needed to fill this vacuum in a proper way, as it is a pregnant vacuum, an opening for the truly new.
The reason protesters went out is that they had enough of the world where recycling your Coke cans, giving a couple of dollars to charity, or buying a cappuccino where 1% goes towards developing world troubles, is enough to make them feel good. After outsourcing work and torture, after the marriage agencies started to outsource even our dating, they saw that for a long time they were also allowing their political engagements to be outsourced – and they want them back.
The art of politics is also to insist on a particular demand that, while thoroughly "realist", disturbs the very core of the hegemonic ideology: ie one that, while definitely feasible and legitimate, is de facto impossible (universal healthcare in the US was such a case). In the aftermath of the Wall Street protests, we should definitely mobilise people to make such demands – however, it is no less important to simultaneously remain subtracted from the pragmatic field of negotiations and "realist" proposals.
What one should always bear in mind is that any debate here and now necessarily remains a debate on enemy's turf; time is needed to deploy the new content. All we say now can be taken from us – everything except our silence. This silence, this rejection of dialogue, of all forms of clinching, is our "terror", ominous and threatening as it should be.
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101 Comments so far
Show AllEverywhere I hear the sound of marching, charging feet, boy
'Cause summer's here and the time is right for fighting in the street, boy
Hey! Think the time is right for a palace revolution
'Cause where I live the game to play is compromise solution
Hey! Said my name is called disturbance
I'll shout and scream, I'll kill the king, I'll rail at all his servants
From Street Fighting Man by The Rolling Stones [1970]
"Talkin' 'bout a revolution, yeah you know..."
Revolutionary talk in the late '60's and early '70's (USA) was just that: talk. While the various movements were very important, none of them were revolutionary. The main reason is that this period was an economic boom time, not one of austerity like now. White working class people had never had (and never would have) it better. The majority of the population, that is, the working class, was not largely in solidarity with the various movements. Then it was easy for the 1% to divide and rule the 99%.
This is why the Occupy movement is different. It can unite all the movements. It has real revolutionary potential.
OWS's biggest challenge will be to cure the tens of millions of working class Americans afflicted with denial syndrome who are acting like it is still the summer of love (1967) and are not ready to dump the corporate myths they have been falling for.
Damn few of the actual participants in the counterculture - from '67 thru most of the 70's - think it's 1967 again.
In fact "The Establishment," as they liked to call it back then, are still have positions of great influence, and they've been waiting for those troublesome huppies to finally die off so that they could completelete their takeover. The new generation at OWS is a big disappointment for the NWO, international financial class, MIC - many ways of describing the capitalist imperialist association, now experiencing a lot of growth making profitable commodities out of torture, murder and poison
It's also a roaring example of stunning growth in the privatization of these commodities, and also many intelligence functions., that are "sold" to the State and to corporations with quasi State sanction.
Queue old folk song about anti-union thugs, Pinkertons and other "militias," Fade to blackwater and today's vast web of capitlaist militarist empire, brought to you with bipartisan support!
There's alwys money for the suppression of the People's movement, even amidst all the financial cutbacks in Oakland, money can be found to fund violent oppression of the masses, But Occupy is gaining unprecedented support for a non-corporatist People's movement. In that sense the country is less divided because mass economic suffering is so much more widespread, The greed freaks have peaked out and are on a fast train going down! Our mission is to wrest control of the train or at least an important switch!
The problem is that the 1% and their fnancial Christo-Fascist allies have gained control of large segments of the officers corps, both the military and the police.
Scott Olsen and the many other occupy vets serve as a kind popular counterpoint from the ranks. The brutal and nurderous assault on Scott is an extremely dramatic and powerful symbol. If the People have a deity or archetype, that force sent the Occupy movement a powerful hero.
None of the organizations dominated by upper middle class white folks were revolutionary, that is true. But that does not comprise the complete picture.
I want equality. Otherwise, keep them guessing.
"This silence, this rejection of dialogue, of all forms of clinching, is our "terror", ominous and threatening as it should be."
It should be ominous and threatening? That's what you're doing, threatening people that unless you get your way...what? You'll kill and destroy and harm people who don't agree, or don't give you what you demand ?
You really know how to jump to the wrong conclusion.
Who said anything about killing and harming? For that you'll have to go to right wing website comment sections where they are currently writing openly about taking up arms should Obama win the next election.
The "ominous and threatening aspect of OWS is that the movement refuses to be relegated to the veal pen of powerless reformiists begging for a minor system modification. Instead OWS makes fundamental demands for systemic change. That's what's ominous and threatening.
Try to understand what you read before jumping to idiotic right wing conclusions.
Oh, w're supposed to read the words ominous and threatening as unthreatening? I suggest choosing words which do not intentionally contain implications of harm and violence.
And I notice there was no answer to one of my point...which is telling. I'll ask again more clear.
If your demands are not met....then what?
You certainly are lacking in understanding. "Ominous and threatening" is a function of the systemic nature of the demands! Any threats of violence on the part of OWS pale in comparison with the gun toting Teabag demonstrators.
The general response of the Left to unresponsive government and banks is the boycott or the strike, and to point out that riots are very likely if the economic disparity in the US is not turned around. OWS won't be organizing riots. Rioting will be a natural social reaction to banker and corporate tyranny.
OWS is trying to find a peaceful alternative to violent social unrest, but when the riots start, they won't be caused by OWS, but rather by the fundamental social and economic injustice and mass sufferring resulting from the crisis of Western Capitalism.
" The protesters should beware of not only enemies, but also of false friends who pretend to support them but are already working hard to dilute the protests ".
How true! That is exactly what happened in Egypt. Murbarak was no use to the West anymore, so they used the protesters to stage a coup d' etat and the same corrupt people that Mubarak was a quisling for are still in control of Egypt.
Demands for better treatment from the rich and powerful is not exactly supporting radical and fundamental socio and economic change.
Re-read the second to last paragraph of Zizek's article.
While we work toward revolution we should also struggle for concrete reforms in the here and now that make a real difference to people that are suffering. (Was the struggle for the 8-hr day a bad idea since it wasn't revolutionary?)
You might look in to "ultra-leftism." Those radicals that say the "revolution or nothing" are actually anti-revolutionaries. A revolution means that the mass of the population are with you. Lenin correctly saw these types as childish. See "Left-Wing" Communism: An Infantile Disorder."
the term "ultra-leftism" is just an unintentional tell, relating the fact that the Bolsheviks were to the right of the revolution they tailed (the soviets), mimicked (state and revolution), and finally destroyed. To this day, the self styled Trotskyist and Lenininst parties are the same ones who constantly warn us that "the people aren't ready yet." They're the ones that side with cops and bureaucrats, and who enter into electoral politics becoming entrenched in the capitalist system, running their Second Internationalist playbook, the one Marx despised. See Critique of the Gotha Program. Marx saw the working class as the only ones who could free themselves, not some vanguard party or some group of intellectuals. The Left Communists were right about the dead end of trade unions and parliamentarianism in Germany. See Pannekoek's "Open Letter to Comrade Lenin."
Well, that's a lot of arcana that doesn't amount to much.
Ultra-leftism has a meaning today and is a real problem now. The self-emancipation of the working class does not mean that the working class is disorganized, without theory, strategy, tactics and leadership - all of which are necessary to win against capital. At any given moment, including now, there are members of the working class whose activism, political awareness and leadership are beyond most. This is essentially what Lenin meant by vanguard. He also thought that they should be organized. There is nothing contradictory here with Marx. It may not matter to you but Zizek is a Marxist-Leninist.
We should be looking for ideas that unify us, as well as make us more independent from capitalist ideology. This is a difficult task. There are modes of thought that will help the self-emancipation of the working class (the 99%) and those that will hinder it. Ultra-leftist purism (the flip side of liberal reformism), will hinder it.
Arcana? That's pretty funny coming from someone who brought up Lenin's Infantile Communist tract, as if it were totally central to all activists today. And its an easy way for you to weasel out of admitting you never read any of the counter arguments to Lenin's flatly wrong analysis. Lenin, like Kautsky, wrongly believed, against Marx, that class consciousness would be brought to the proletariat from the outside. This is explained succinctly by Jean Barrot here:
It is also necessary to bring about what Kautsky calls the union of the working class movement and socialism. Now: "Socialist consciousness today (?!) can only arise on the basis of deep scientific knowledge (...) But the bearer of science is not the proletariat but the bourgeois intellectuals; (...) so then socialist consciousness is something brought into the class struggle of the proletariat from outside and not something that arises spontaneously within it." These words of Kautsky's are according to Lenin "profoundly true."
source:http://www.geocities.com/~johngray/barrotk.htm
The problem with the vanguard theory is that the self-appointed "advanced section of the working class" always seem to be highly centralized authoritarians with all the answers, a failed blueprint for revolution, and a cadre of inexperienced well intentioned followers too scared to question the orders emanating from the democratic centralist ego-crats at the top of their hierarchy.
So stop your B.S. about "ideology" since you obviously parrot positions you yourself have not examined. You come here to hit "ultra-leftists" over the head with the Russian Revolution, but you have nothing to offer people in the actual unfolding situation. It is you who are the sectarian, despite the disingenuous rhetoric about unity.
RE: That's pretty funny coming from someone who brought up Lenin's Infantile Communist tractas if it were totally central to all activists today.
A straw-man argument. I was responding to another poster.
You made the box that you are trying to fit me into.
Tom, I'm not misrepresenting your posts so get your fallacies straight rather than just aping argument zinger styles you like.
You came in wielding the "infantile leftist" card as a way of making your own boilerplate watered down social democratic leninism sound legit. Now I am going to utilize a "guilt by association" argument, because in your case it explains a lot, so feel free to cry fallacy.
You're a member of the International Socialist Organization, which has a long and disturbing record as one of the most opportunist and counter-revolutionary outfits going. I think, and this is a bit lazy, but I think this explains your zombie like prose, boring Leninist talking points, and general appearance of being completely in another chat room when you "respond" to other posters.
Heads up people; the ISO are no more our friends than the police or union bureaucrats are. In fact many union bureaucrats are ISO cadre, and they are known for carrying out anti-working class actions. See but one of hundreds of examples online:
http://lrp-cofi.org/statements/iso_043011.html
The ISO will move on your organization and attempt to "bore from within" to control it, all the while reigning in militancy and demoralizing the rank and file. That's what they do. This downer halo, like you see in Tom's writing, is a sure sign by which you can identify their members.
OWS has little or nothing to do with this pro-Kronstadt-crushing outfit and their rigid democratic centralism.
Another here:"ISO covers for unions’ betrayal of Verizon strike"
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2011/aug2011/sust-a23.shtml
Wow, I've never been the target of such sectarian venom before. Note that I made no ad hominem statements or arguments directed at you. ("Guilt by association" is a form of ad hominem.)
RE: You're a member of the International Socialist Organization
How is it that you know that? Did we encounter each other before on CD, you under a different moniker? BTW, I am not hiding behind any handle as you are.
RE: ...which has a long and disturbing record as one of the most opportunist and counter-revolutionary outfits going.
That's quite a statement to make with the paltry evidence presented. It seems you are more interested in tearing down than building up. How are the hundreds of millions that have never read the "Critique of the Gotha Program" gonna measure up to your standards?
Even if the criticisms of Jesse Sharkey (who I have never heard of before) are true (which I would have to do a lot more research to conclude) the ISO is not monolithic. The editorial board does not control its members at the branch level. To hold the entire organization responsible for the actions of its volunteer members seems a bar that no volunteer organization could meet, even yours, whatever that is.
The ISO is the largest and most highly functioning socialist organization in the US. It is totally funded by its members and the selling of its newspapers, magazines and books (Socialist Worker, International Socialist Review and Haymarket books respectively.) The ISO people I have met are the most dedicated, hardworking and effective of any activist organization I have been a part of. Are they perfect? No, and I make no such claim.
As you know unions in the US have a mixed record in defending their members. They have won important battles and made devastating compromises for their members and the working class as whole. To insinuate that a the actions of a member (who hasn't been a contributor to SW since 2009 by my search) allows you to paint the entire ISO as "the most opportunist and counter-revolutionary outfits going" says more about you, than me or the ISO in my view.
The WSWS seems to have a hard on for the ISO. I have investigated other claims made by WSWS of "sell-out" by the ISO. The WSWS has quoted ISO member statements out of context, used distortion and otherwise used journalistic tactics more reminiscent of Fox News.
Maybe you have, but I never forget, the enemy is capitalism. Not unions and not the ISO.
Elegant frilly ...
Is the word your ellipsis leaves out: Elegant frilly nightie?
Elegant frilly powder blue panties. I chose something sensual and alluring because no one ever does that. Maybe it's fetishistic though.
And cut the act Tom, you know damn well your a sectarian hack. You came in strong on the sectarianism, damning all ultra-lefts to hell.
Are you really so unaware of the world wide resentment of ISO betrayal and opportunism by communists, anarchists, and others on the left? You should do some web searching for critiques of the ISO. There are no communist groupings that take them seriously.
I'm sorry that you're in the ISO (I guessed you were from your writing, but googled you to confirm) as that will alienate you from any communist, radical, and or authentic revolutionary activity. I wish you luck in your development and hope you will some day break free of the far Right cult you're in now.
I have always enjoyed this Chomsky clip in which he replies to an ISO cadre explaining to her a short history of communist theory which she obviously had no access to or knowledge of having been in the ISO.
Here's that Chomsky clip. I hope you watch it if you have not yet seen it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nz9fRHnKRFg
RE: ...you know damn well your a sectarian hack.
You assume a lot.
I began to develop my politic awareness in anarchist circles 25 years ago. After years of being criticized for not eating the right food or wearing the right shoes I asked myself the question: what does this have to do with creating a revolution of the majority?
Where do anarchists stand on the following questions?
Key questions that separate real revolutionaries from those that pose as revolutionaries:
“How can the desire to advance toward human liberation be balanced against the need to confront the enemy of that goal?”
“How can a movement that wants to end violence and repression combat an adversary that employs violence and repression?”
“How, in winning freedom for the mass of the population, can opponents be prevented from using that freedom to destroy the gains that are being made?”
~~~
So you think you know where I stand. Where do you stand?
Not sure what your personal history has to do with anything I wrote, since I never claimed to be an anarchist or anything else. But look at what your own writing says about your Kautskyan Second Internationalism:
"what does this have to do with creating a revolution of the majority?"
And
“How, in winning freedom for the mass of the population,"
You have that ass backwards "let's bring the class consciousness to the masses with our vanguard" attitude that CLR James, among others, dismantled so well.
As to where I stand, I was hoping you might be able to tell from what I wrote, but since you instead went on an unrelated tangent about anarchist eating habits and footwear, I guess you don't have much of a background in the history of Marxism. I don't claim to be an expert either, but you're really not hooking into any of the references I've given.
That wouldn't matter if you had not come in guns blazing against the heretic "infantile left." I assume you know who Lenin was referring to but maybe not. Again, that would be fine if you had not made such a stink about it. But you don't seem to know what you're talking about. That has ISO written all over it.
Since you mentioned Noam Chomsky, would I assume too much if I suggested that you are an admirer (as am I on many things)? And, that you consider NC to be on the left (maybe even radical left)?
Then, answer me this question:
Why did Chomsky have, not one, but two of his books (“Hopes and Prospects” and “Gaza in Crisis”) published in 2010 by Haymarket books - the book publishing wing of the “right wing”, "opportunistic" and “counter-revolutionary outfit” so despised any " authentic revolutionary": the ISO?
(In addition, David Barsamian, the greatest chronicler of Chomsky interviews, regularly contributes to the International Socialist Review (ISR), the periodical that propagates the ISO's "right wing counter-revolutionary" theories.)
"Guilt by association" anyone? Is Chomsky therefore, really a counter-revolutionary, a capitalist champion, in the best disguise ever?
frilly:
I think I have a solid foundation for the assertion (ie. no cheep shot) that you are intellectually dishonest.
Tom, who cares? Either deal with Chomsky's devastating critique of Lenin and Trotsky or don't.
I listened to the Chomsky piece. I have heard it before. He provided very little factual information. This is Chomsky's opinion. Chomksy is not all-knowing. He is no "authority" on Lenin or Marx (Chomsky said in an interview that he was "no Marxist scholar" - then why does feel free to make authoritative pronouncements on Marx that I have seen elsewhere).
NC has written very little on radical theory, there's no reason to see him as an expert on that vast subject. He's an authority on US foreign policy and media. Chomsky is so well known, such a towering figure, because most of his audience are progressives (formally known as liberals), not radicals.
The descriptions Chomsky made of Lenin (as "right wing", authoritarian", "elitist" etc. ) are the standard Liberal (capitalist) denunciations. (Typically trotted out for people that have never read Lenin except for strategic quotations taken out of context to portray Lenin as the "evil genius").
Just to address one issue: the accusation of "elitism." Lenin argued repeatedly with the Social Democrats to open up the party.
Quoting Lenin:
"At the third congress of the party I suggested that there that there be about 8 workers to every two intellectuals in the party committees. How obsolete that suggestion seems today! Now we must wish for the party organizations one Social Democratic intellectual to several hundred Social Democratic workers."
- Lenin, Collected Works, Vol 10, p.36
If Chomsky wasn't using Lenin's name I would not have known he was talking about the same person. That's how different his portrayal of Lenin in the video was from what I have read. Of course you're going to say that I am reading propaganda. But maybe it is you that is reading propaganda? The issue that you seem unable to entertain is might there be another interpretation than what Chomsky presents?
BTW: You have been avoiding the substance of my arguments by dismissing them with ad hominems. I asked where you stand. Instead of answering the question, you denounce me for not being able to guess. So I guessed wrong about anarchism (or did I?) Most socialists see Trotsky as a hero - as does WSWS - your source of anti-ISO info. So you're not in the SEP, not a 4th Internationalist. So, forgive me for not figuring out where you stand.
I use my real name; you use pseudonym. I state my positions clearly and ask clear questions; you are vague and dodge the issues.
I mistyped. I meant Gorter's Open Letter obviously. Not Pannekoek's.
Tom, demands just won't be enough any more. This is end stage capitalism and there is absolutely no benefit to capital/finance to give liberal concessions to the masses. There are no cities that need to be built, no one needs to be educated, there is no return to be made in investing in the community.
Because seriously, that's the only reason anyone got anything in the past, healthy literate workers make more profit than unhealthy illiterates.
It's not a call for revolution or nothing, it's that demands will fall on deaf ears.
Odd how the article oscillates between 'the protesters' and 'we'.
Here's an easy way to support Occupy Wall Street with your junk mail.
Check out this youtube video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2JlxbKtBkGM&feature=youtu.be
This youtube video is great! A businessman explains how to Keep Wall Street Occupied. The prepaid envelopes they send us with all those credit card offers that flood our mailboxes are truly a gift--the more that we can stuff into them before sealing them and returning them, the more the credit card companies will have to pay for that return postage. The heavier, the better, and remember, postage for inflexible letters is higher, too.
This video is very funny, and also inspiring. In fact, I was VERY disappointed when I didn't get any credit card offers today--can't wait until Monday!
Sending it back is a really good idea. Thanks for sharing the tip!
Fancy words, but doesn't make a lick of sense to me. I see no point in protesting without specific demands, and without backing those demands with specific threats if they are not met, and without backing those threats with armed force. I presume the pacifists have never studied any human history. Our rights and freedoms were won in violent revolutions, such as the American, French, Russian and Chinese ones. Slavery in the US was abolished by the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands of people who took up arms to end it. Not by speeches. Unions in this country had to fight in the streets for the rights to unionize and to get their demands met. The Nazis would not have been defeated without violence. The Vietnam War wasn't ended by demonstrations. It was ended by courageous Vietnamese who took up arms. Are the pacifists claiming that all those who fought and died were idiots? Not to me they weren't. I am very grateful for their sacrifices. Pacifism is the major source of the 1 percent's power. As long as they know people won't fight back they will continue to get away with murder. If you think they are going to give up trillions of dollars voluntarily you are living in a fantasy. There is no possible way that you can defeat the Democrats and Republicans through the electoral process. It's been tried repeatedly and doesn't work. The Democrats and Republicans control the elections; they will never, ever, allow changes to occur that way. Not in a million years. Wake up and grow up, for crissakes.
There's quite a mixture amongst the 99-ers, from dedicated, self-sacrificing pacifists, to hard-core revolutionaries, and EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN. Seems to me like the situation is like that sub-theme in the movie "Gladiator", where the imperial and republican factions absolutely NEEDED to win the hearts & minds of "the Mob", because THAT is where the power lays. OWS and wallstreet (actually the "servants" of the wallstreet oligarchs, bought politicians, MIC, police forces, media intelligentsia, etc...) must "duel" with each other, to win the hearts & minds of the 99-ers. It also must CLEARLY be seen WHO draws first blood. You are right in thinking this is a war, IMO, but not ALL weapons-of-war are lethal and go "bang"(anyway, the 99-ers own hundreds of millions of those kind of weapons and I'm sure they'll be deployed if needed). Let us pursue the nonlethal "weapons-of-war" first. BTW, wallstreet has deployed, literally, financial "weapons of mass destruction" that, through the collapsing of politico-economic systems (leading to bailouts/austerities), WILL KILL billions of people by starvation, plagues (lack of healthcare), breakdown of social order leading to chaos, crime, & riots due to desperation, and rage at this betrayal of the 99-ers by the 1%-ers & their enabling lackeys. THIS case MUST be thoroughly made, in the minds of the 99-ers first. It would render a potential world war into a mere series of "palace counter-coups", where the 99-ers oust the 1% from our institutions of democracy.
System change, and consensus process and cooperation of examples of the new society, ARE the demands. This article was above your head, read it again SLOWLY.
RE: I see no point in protesting without specific demands, and without backing those demands with specific threats if they are not met, and without backing those threats with armed force.
It is better to have unformulated demands than it is to have concrete demands that undermine your goals. For many in the Occupy movement this is their first engagement in protest. What they are doing and what they are up against is still being formulated. Most people, including progressives, have limited their analysis and solutions to various reforms. But what is needed is a SYSTEMIC analysis of capitalism. This is new for most people (though not new for Zizek).
To be taken seriously by those in power, demands and threats need to have teeth. The Occupy movement is still too small to pull off a general strike of, say, NYC or multiple cities. This would be a real demonstration of strength. The 99% don't express our real power through "force"; that is how the 1% do it. We express our strength through collectively withholding our labor. It is us that makes the economy work for the 1%.
A true revolution would mean that the majority of a society would rise up to change the social, political and economic relations that currently benefit the 1%. The revolutions you cite were not true social revolutions. They were revolutions that transferred power from one minority ruling class to another minority ruling class. Our "rights" did not come from fighting in those revolutions, they came as accommodations from the new ruling class to the 99% - who did the fighting and dying for that new ruling class under the banner of "liberty". ("Reforms" like the Bill of Rights were used to quell the unrest when the 99% found that their lives were little improved after the revolution.) And when push comes to shove, those "rights" are more rhetorical than real. (E.g. Obama recently assassinated a US citizen without any due process.)
Zizek's piece was not about pacifism. He was not defending pacifism. He cited "What Is To Be Done" - no pacifist screed - after all. He was saying that violence is built into the capitalist system itself. Marx noted, violence comes from above. It's not that revolutions and revolutionaries are so violent, it is rather, the counter revolution.
Without first building a mass movement, any violence on "our" side would be crushed by far greater violence by the state. It would be suicide. Non-violent protest is no guarantee against violence by the state. Just ask Iraq vet Scott Olsen about violence.
The most important thing for the Occupy movement now is to GROW!
RE: Unions in this country had to fight in the streets for the rights to unionize and to get their demands met. The Nazis would not have been defeated without violence.
Yes, the unions fought, but by far and away most of the violence was perpetrated by corporate thugs (like Pinkertons), or the state acting in the interests of corporate power with the national guard or police.
Yes, the Nazi's wouldn't have been defeated without violence. But WWII was not a war between democracy and fascism. It was an inter-capitalist rivalry for domination.
It was a war between ruling classes, 1% competing with another 1%, but of course it is the 99% propped up by "patriotism" that do the dying. Capitalism is very compatible with totalitarian governments, whether they describe themselves "communist" or "democratic", whether they are called USSR or USA, National Socialists (Nazis) or Soviet Socialists.
Great post, Tom Larsen, and nicely complements the article by Žižek.
You are right about the most important thing for the Occupy movement, and that is to GROW! "Growth, IMO, means, more and more people explicitly rejecting the lies and the myths that prop up the current system. And I imagine that would be a terrifying prospect for the 1%-ers when they can count on fewer and fewer people, most of whom would be only paid lackeys, to continue to buy their lies.
Without the lies and the myths being accepted, and defended, by a sufficiently large enough number of people (and not just the paid lackeys), what would it take to maintain the system? When propaganda no longer works, what would it take to maintain the system? Outright violence, of course. And outright violence cannot be sustained indefinitely.
So, yes, GROWTH of the movement is key. And not just in the U.S. I am waiting for the movement to take off in other countries where much of the manufacturing jobs have been offshored to. This growth need not all be gradual. There can be quantum jumps in the numbers and awareness.
Pacifists do fight back. Ghandi's and the unions' progress did not depend on violence, violence was used on them. The demonstrations against the Vietnam War did have great effect to end the war. It is common to confuse conflict and confrontation with violence, but it is critical to distinguish the difference. Violence is a t_a_c_t_i_c that has many serious negative side effects such as getting out of control, you are much less likely to suffer from it if you don't use it. Fighting non violently takes many great qualities that are found lacking in the violent opposer, courage, self control, compassion, intelligent response, reverence for life... Ignorance, apathy, and authoritarianism, not pacifism, are the 1%'s biggest powers. OWS counters that with knowledge, activism, and democracy. We should have learned these things by the second grade: keep your hands to yourself, sharing, clean up after yourself. We are waking up, we are growing up.
Your logic evades me on a number of points. So the Russians won "rights and freedoms" after their revolution in 1917? Like under Stalin and Khrushchev? And the Chinese won "rights and freedoms" after 1949 under Mao? News to me.
Like other posters above point out, the threat doesn't have to be violence. Withholding of labor is a good tactic, or mass noncooperation.
New wine in new bottles!
There is this maxim: "Negotiate from a position of Strength". It is the job of the protesters to know what is their position of strength. Non-violence can give you strength if you know how to use it. You know you are in a position of strength only when the other side and their system is paralysed and they beg to negotiate.
Not making specific demand does not mean not having specific goal. This goal must be formulated and articulated in words and messages clearly understood by our comrades and our adversaries.The important thing to remember is that this goal must be big. It must not be half measure, a quarter measure or a twentieth-measure. This is the crux of a successful revolution as compared to making a demand for better working condition or higher wages. My position is that if the OWSters do not have a revolution in mind they might as well "fall in" with the Dems or the begging-on-their-knees progressives.
As long as you do not have a revolutionary goal your movement can be dissolved by crumps from your masters' tables or promises of such crumps. So if they want to get anywhere with their movement they must have slogans like "Power to the People", "democracy for the people" and mean it.
After laying down your goal and your slogan you then carry on the protest until the opposition is paralysed. Civil disobediece can be refusing to pay or collect taxes, work to rule carried out on the scale of an entire city, get the children to stay away from school and occupy all the churches 24/7, transfer your money out of the banks, get the police to "down tools",
Just as the protesters should know where their strength comes from, they should also know the weaknesses of the powers they are up against. One of the strong pillars propping up the system is the various myths that allow the system to continue without using outright violence.
It is clear that more and more people are refusing to believe the lies, but there are still a lot of people who cannot imagine questioning the validity of the system, let alone summon the courage to imagine another way of life. The more the lies and myths get exposed, the more people reject the propaganda and become smart enough to spot it whenever and wherever propaganda is used and whatever form it takes, the weaker the system would become.
I suspect those at the top already know this, and they probably know that they cannot count on large numbers of people joining the military to fight the empire's wars out of patriotism alone. That is probably one reason to develop certain insanely dangerous and intrusive technologies that can be controlled by fewer number of psychopaths while allowing them to target larger populations when it becomes necessary in the future. So it is important that a sufficiently large majority of the population wakes up soon enough, and not just in the U.S.
>>nakli wrote: "The important thing to remember is that this goal must be big. It must not be half measure, a quarter measure or a twentieth-measure."<<
I agree. And that is why I am somewhat irritated that people are using the term "Robin Hood tax" for a financial transactions tax, whereas a little thought should make it clear that this tax would do nothing to bring about any real wealth redistribution. At best, it would only reduce the profit margins of traders and speculators by a minuscule amount and it will not affect the other 1%-ers who do not engage in frequent trading. Such as those like Bill Gates and that is probably why he lends his support for this tax. If the protesters want to invoke the legend of Robin Hood, they should do so only for a truly progressive tax system that seriously attempts to reduce this extreme inequality. Calling a lame tax of 0.05% on financial transactions as "Robin Hood tax" is MORONIC and counterproductive. Because I expect that this tax would be implemented and everyone would hail the implementation of a "Robin Hood tax", whereas this tax would be no such thing. Yes, a few billions may accrue, but that would be fiat money and chump change for the big guys and will NOT touch the real extreme wealth in their possession. But the danger is that the media would be shouting the message that a Robin Hood tax is now in place.
The people's goal is universal equity/justice. And it's not a gift the 1% can give. It's a gift the 99% give to themselves. Occupying Wall Struck is simply the opening festivities in the campaign.
Finally people are asking the right questions, this passage was key in the essay IMO:
"In a kind of Hegelian triad, the western left has come full circle: after abandoning the so-called "class struggle essentialism" for the plurality of anti-racist, feminist, and other struggles, capitalism is now clearly re-emerging as the name of the problem. So the first lesson to be taken is: do not blame people and their attitudes. The problem is not corruption or greed, the problem is the system that pushes you to be corrupt. The solution is not "Main Street, not Wall Street", but to change the system where Main Street cannot function without Wall Street.
There is a long road ahead, and soon we will have to address the truly difficult questions – not questions of what we do not want, but about what we do want. What social organisation can replace the existing capitalism? What type of new leaders do we need? What organs, including those of control and repression? The 20th-century alternatives obviously did not work."
No, we went off that cliff not "them." They were handed trillions to allow them to get to the other side of the abyss. We are the ones now falling into the void. Why should they care what happens to us? The system worked great for them. When they're bets crapped out they ( the banksters) simply called their employees in DC and had them write a very big check from us to them. This was the ultimate hedged position they had been systemically buying in chunks for the last 40 yrs. Here's their problem now. We get it. We see the BIG picture now and they can no longer as easily pull the wool over our eyes. Now they will pull the next rabbit out of the hat. They will move the goal posts again but in doing so they will need to crack down on the new Occupiers. They will close the public debate ( space.) They will close it brutally and finally leaving us no other options then REVOLUTIONARY force. Thus will start the "real" REVOLUTION and their is absolutely no guarantee we ( the 99% AKA the people) will win. Remember Spartacus and all his rebels were caught and crucified. For the next 500 yrs. no slave revolt was successful till the Barbarians over ran ROME from without. History is littered with the dead bodies of failed REVOLUTIONARIES.
Yes, terror its is and that's exactly how Bill and Barak and the Retardicans and their Corp. bosses will see it. Some of us have broken out of the gladiator camp and are now organizing our slave revolt in their plan view. They will eventually send in the troops to break it all up and re-atomize the ants. They've been successfully doing this for thousands of yrs. Only a few times have they failed.
i hope people will rally when needed
The shit IS starting to come down, keep your ears up!
Nashville, Raleigh, Oakland, Denver, and NYC have all faced police repression in the last couple of days. Rochester NYC coming tonight, and Eureka California has faced increased police harassment:
http://occupybulletin.org/
If I had my way, two action plans would come out of OWS. One is political, one is economic. The political one would be to put the power of OWS behind a movement to remove from office anyone who signed on to Grover Norquist's no new tax pledge. Why? Because in so doing, these Reps to Congress and Senators forfeited their duty to work to do the peoples' business in Congress, which by definition includes compromise. By holding to an ideological position which allows no compromise, they effectively undermined their dutyto do the peoples' business for which they were elected to do! This ipso facto makes them unqualified to hold office!
My recommendation for an economic action plan for OWS would be launch and support a national campaign to unionize the USA's largest private employer, WalMart. Not only would union contracts cut off the nonsense about gender discrimination, but more importantly would lead to a living wage and good benefits for service and retail workers across the country. Once Walmart falls, the rest would have to follow. This campaign would be hard and need to be national with boycotts against WM until they agree. It could also be a litmus test for politicians in the 2012 elections.
WAY too specific, this is a broad based movement that encompasses everyone from Trots to Libertarians and everyone in between, The idea is to grow the movement, non violently overthrow the system, and then meet in our local communities and decide AS SEPARATE COMMUNITIES how we want to deal with the rebuilding the wreckage of post empire, post police state, post finance capitalist America. If you think you or any little click of insular people is setting the agenda for a movement that will encompass millions of people you are kidding yourself. Each occupy will set IT'S OWN agenda using the consensus process, which is ALREADY happening despite an MSM blackout as local self rule terrifies the oligarchy. So get over yourself as having a plan that will fit millions of people, and come down to your local occupy and WATCH the general assembly and learn something.
As for "2012" elections many of us see the U.S. political system as being as viable as the Soviet system was circa 1988.