Slashdot Mirror
Conflict Between Occupy Wall Street Protestors and NYPD Escalating
phx_zs writes "Today marks the tenth consecutive day that thousands of protesters have flooded the streets of Manhattan, specifically the financial district. ... Sunday marked a change of events as high-ranking NYPD officers exhibited brutal, unprovoked aggression on the peaceful group, reportedly arresting at least 80 people. Many photos and videos have surfaced of NYPD officers slamming protesters on the ground or into parked cars, and in one well-covered incident a NYPD officer (with pending police brutality charges from 2004) maced innocent female protesters point blank for no apparent reason. Many eyewitnesses and several news articles report that the NYPD specifically targeted photographers and media teams streaming the event live on the internet."
Do any Slashdotters have eyewitness reports to share? There seems to be a lot of misinformation originating from all parties involved making it difficult to know how large the protest actually is at this point and whether or not the police are being quite as universally violent as the protestors imply.
I will share this; The natural evolution to a police city-state is complete. The government has put up rigid and repressive controls over the social, economic and political life. There are secret police units aka terrorist units. A lot of people like this type of society. Those coming from outside the city get a bit of a shock, no pun intended, when introduced to the lifestyle of a city-state.
there is a conflict between occupy English and Slashdot, as well.
In Canada at least, there has been a serious lack of news about this protest. It's mentioned in passing sometimes, but that's about it. I don't even really know what it's about. I heard "protesting corporate greed in America", but I mean that's a tough thing to protest.. you're basically protesting capitalism..
Anyways, my question is why is there such a media gap about this protest? Is it on purpose (tin foil hat), or is it just because it's vague and nobody really cares about it, so the media doesn't bother?
At least at the time of this posting.
Everyone should be protesting, and have the right to protest.
Police that don't understand the right to protest should be charged and removed from work ( fired if the attack is unprovoked )
One sad thing that protesters bring upon themselves is when then charge forward and attempt to become menacing, that in the eye's of the police looks like an attack. They will respond with an overwhelming amount of force. Which is sad, since a peaceful protest goal is for the attention of the problem and to have those in power look and find a solution.
if you see me, smile and say hello.
This protest has failed to make headlines in the US as well. The only coverage I've seen is on blogs and Slashdot.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
Is there any reliable coverage outside of these first person blogs?
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Just trying to provoke a similarly violent reaction from the protesters to make their job a lot easier and remove the tension. They're trained to think protests always go awry, and when it doesn't happen in a timely fashion, they create it.
Police violence against civilians is becoming an increasingly expected occurrence. Will the officers involved in these incidents be punished in a way that discourages future abuse? Can the public reasonably expect to see that punishment? Can the public trust police officers? I've been to protests where I've seen officers calm down the situation, and situations where officers escalated or created a dangerous situation (at the same protest!). Couple incidents like these with recent stories involving misuse of tasers and general police brutality, and the issue is the police are moving from our trusted protectors to our abusive jailors in the public eye. That is horribly dangerous for everyone, including the police.
From what I can tell they chose peaceful and leftist. Their organization is terrible.
Given the absence, thus far, of 'heroic cop wounded in line of duty while saving city from anarchist scum' stories, I'm going to go out on a limb and suspect that the protesters represent no meaningful threat to the cops who've been containing them. And, since riot cops never commit, much less revel in, the sort of activity that makes people call 'cops' 'pigs', I can only assume that the heavily equipped and rather illiberal police forces of New York have been defending one of the major local industries from outsiders with considerable zeal...
Because they can. Human nature is such that there are percentage - one hopes a minority - who abuse the power granted to them by a uniform.
The unfortunate truth is that their localised abuse of power also has a much wider reaching effect of undermining the god work that the remainder of the force does.
You could scrap the police, but the same problem would just manifest itself differently. That is a small group of humans would break the social contract as they feel it does not serve their best interests to adhere to it.
Invaders must die
Look at the videos. The Police crossed the line, and not by a little. But not all. In any group of 100 people, there will be some jerks. The problem is the protecting of jerks with badges and guns.
Are you trying to be funny? Or do you really believe that "those kinds of tactics were done away with". Maybe you are both confused and obtuse.
No sigs in BETA. Beta SUCKS.
He excoriates the police.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UHsLccXQUY
And I know I'll probably take a karma hit for this, but I'm still not posting AC, because I am trying to point out what I see as a major hypocrisy in the US protest culture these days: entrapment on the part of police is always decried as immoral, wrong, or illegal, but it is perfectly fine for protestors to entrap police.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
god work!? my, there's a slip and a half!
Invaders must die
Forgive my (lack of) understanding of this, as it's been a while since I took my civics courses. Doesn't requiring permits in order to protest violate our first amendment right to peacefully assemble? Just like 'free speech zones', it seems that these measures tale away from our right to assemble peacefully to protest one thing or another, not just under the American constitution, but under the UN's Declaration of Human Rights as well.
I'm not sure I agree with you, but to pick the 2 that are apropos here: Peaceful and leftist.
This bunch of loosely assembled hippies, anarchists, socialists and new agers doesn't have a coherent voice what-so-ever.
I haven't been down to Wall St. to see the current incarnation, but several dozen camped outside of the my office at the Woolworth building for a couple of weeks while protesting the mayor's budget a month or two ago. They were a nuisance, but certainly not threatening.
Maybe you won't get modded down if you explain your strong statements that seen explicitly designed to offend those who clearly don't think the way you do.
By the way, How can a cause, which is an abstract concept make you uncivil, I don't even know.
Your claim implies that regardless of their actions, you've already judged & condemned them.
"Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world. " - Asimov.
because to do that they'd have to be in Secaucus, NJ.
I was having trouble understanding the title of the summary. Is that really the same as "Conflict between protesters and NYPD occupy Wall Street, and Escalating" ?
Wall Street is a major supporter of this administration, if not every administration before this but this one seems to be heavily stacked in favor of Wall Street this time (and I propose that Wall Street isn't the same as what most people know as Big Business)
So the political machine is not behind it, specifically the unions are not in this. Never under estimate the ability to move people when and how needed. Students don't stand a chance (if this is truly student based) and the really big organizations that would gin up a protest on demand when Bush was in office aren't being given marching orders. Since they aren't giving marching orders their contacts in the press don't have reason to report.
See this is this dirty little secret about protests in America now, they have to be sanctioned by the political parties to receive attention. Sponataneous protesting or groupings of people politically are not favored and about anything that can be done to ignore them is done. If they don't go away then they most be portrayed as a whole as having the very worst traits that can be found in individual members .
So until certain political elements need this protest it doesn't exist.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
Don't fuck with the police/politicians and the source of their bribe money..
How does one protest the requirement of a permit in order to protest?
Something witty.
No real agenda, no real leadership, no real solutions, no real propose.
Frankly just causing more harm than good and now Moore to make things even worse.
He will make a movie about it, his Dittoheads will go and feel all righteously indignant and he will collect another nice paycheck.
If you say it is the Republicans fault you are just a drone.
If you say it is the Democrats fault you are just a drone.
If you say that President Obama is all to blame you are a troll.
If you say that none of it is President Obama's fault you are a mindless fanboi.
If you think that being a Democrate makes you better than a Republican you are a fool.
If you think that being a Republican makes you better than Democrate you are fool.
If you are a Libertarian well your just in fantasy land.
The solution.
Talk less, listen more, stop treating elections like sporting events, stop vilifying those that disagree with you, and vote in the primaries.
Oh and treat the election like this, this is a job interview and you are the boss. Grill them and then pick.
And don't waste your time sitting on the street eating donated pizza and babbling.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
Really? This is what it's come to?
I come here for the nerdy, techy, geeky news items of the day. This story is none of those.
There are plenty of sites that I can go to that cover the activist social ranting scene. There is only one Slashdot. Please don't wreck the latter by trying to make it the former.
I'll tell you what, why don't you tell me who's violent in this video, huh? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9LaAEnB9owY
I don't respond to AC's.
How can a cause, which is an abstract concept make you uncivil, I don't even know.
If the cause is itself destructive (or necessitates destructive outcome), of course.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Why would the police attach peaceful protesters? That doesn't make sense, those kinds of tactics were done away with after they sicced dogs on African Americans fighting for equal rights, that sort of thing just doesn't happen any more so if the police arrested 80 people they must have had good reason. We all know how violent the left can get these days.
Don't invent theories about how you are sure no one would do something.
I am old enough to remember dogs and firehouses being used on civil rights protesters. I also remember people making the same argument you do: The protesters must have done something violent, or be hiding weapons, or planning to loot shops, because the police are civilized people. Don't hypothesize about the morals of a large group of people. Look at what they are doing (there is a video), and judge them by their actions.
Probably whoever the editor of the video wanted to portray as destructive. I did mention that NYPD is not a civil police department. They respond to provocation all too aggressively. If there is provocation which is cut out of the video, it's easy to make the police look like the bad guys. But the job of police is to keep professional cool even in the face of provocation.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
I wonder if the traffic cameras can confirm or dispel police brutality reports. Or if there will be "malfunctions" and footage will disappear.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
You can find links on google's new page, like this one: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-27/wall-street-protesters-joined-by-susan-sarandon.html
The protesters are actually fairly well organized with planned events, a voting process for making immediate decisions, and a goal of getting Obama to acknowledge the wealth gap and appointing a commission to recommend actions for dealing with it.
The "traditional" media is indeed ignoring it. There's an on-going debate on twitter about whether or not the twitter admins are actively suppressing the #occupywallstreet hash-tag from trending.
Not really. What kind of crazy assertion is that? Your warped logic is typical of dictators and tyrants, btw, and their accolytes and apologists.
So, what the hell is wrong with you?
I think this is what we need. Should we hit the MSM news sites and start planting a bug in peoples ear?
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
Having seen too many videos edited to show how the other side was wrong, then finding the full video showing how the first side started shit, I no longer believe pictures, video, etc.
There are just too many people who get their friends to film them starting shit and only post the response to their shit and cry foul.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
The cops are working people. All around the country, police forces are being cut. The cops roughing up protesters could find themselves being laid off when city revenues fall.
It is all too common to see people working against their own interests.
Wansu, th' chinese sailor
I just took my lunch break off from work to check out the protest in Liberty Square. There seems to be about as many people there - staying with sleeping bags - as the small park can hold. It's no bigger than a block, and a small one at that. The estimates of about 200 people staying in the park are likely accurate.
From my understanding after talking with some of the protesters there, the incidents in New York happened when they attempted to march through the streets. In addition, I found out that the numbers of people over the weekend were not just limited to the people staying in the park; there are a lot of people who are not roughing it in the concerete jungle of NYC and are staying with friends or relatives during 'off period times' of the protest.
I can't speak to any police brutality during my brief visit. The protest was extremely peaceful while I was there (unless you consider a drum circle violent), but I did see several of the officers in the YouTube videos present at the square - although noticeably they were not the ones who perpetuated or committed any act of brutality (although you could argue they did nothing to prevent it). In fact, the officers I did recognize were the ones who had doubtful expressions on their faces in most of the videos. The officers were mostly staying out of it. There were also no "white shirts" there - the higher ranking officers whom, over the weekend, seemed to be largely responsible for the more egregious assaults. I also heard that some 100 officers refused to patrol the protest after the incidents over the weekend. I wouldn't be surprised if the commissioner or someone else "gave the department a talking to".
IMHO, it's really hard to discount the video evidence that there was unjustified force, given the multiple angles of the YouTube videos available.
I've heard some people say that some of the protesters' were "over-reacting" to the actions of the police. I think that is ridiculous. I would love to see how anyone would react to being pulled across a concrete street by four armed men. Additionally, one of the women maced in the YouTube video was deaf , and thats why she was screaming at a great volume.
It's not unheard of for police officers to attempt to arrest people videotaping them - and given a recent ruling in a Federal Appeals Court that declared video taping a police officer a constitutional right, the actions of some of those officers was foolish and irresponsible, a fact probably made more evident to not just the public, but their superior officers, by their absence today.
It sounds like you didn't watch it. The police have corralled some people on a sidewalk. The people on the sidewalk are yelling things like "Why are you arresting him?" "Stop". A bunch of people get maced by a cop.
I don't respond to AC's.
They do it because they are authoritarian pigs threatened by someone expressing their constitutional liberties.
If you couldn't have all three, a black man wouldn't be the president. American history is full of occupations of public and private spaces for civil and worker rights, and they worked in the 30s as well as in the 60s. That's why you have a 40 hour workweek and the right to vote regardless of your gender or skin color.
But what would an uneducated crypto fascist like you know about that?
Kids trying to get media attention, but not able to. Thats the worst thing you can do is not give them attention.
They are violating your legal rights, abusing power, judiciary is doing nothing about it, and they are just continuing living their life easily with YOUR tax money.
They shouldnt. you should confront them and hold them accountable for what they are doing with your tax money, since the judiciary is not doing it, city is content with it, and the government doesnt care about it.
an encounter in a back alley can make anyone remember that they are just human beings.
Read radical news here
Yup. Except those knitting grandmas: they seemed pretty organized and leftist, so I'm betting they're ready to stab someone in the eye with those knitting needles at any second!
excoriate was the correct choice of words.
Did you even watch any of the videos? Did you even look into this at all? I can't understand how you could have done so and still hold such an opinion.
As far as I can tell, I don't agree with any of these people protesting. I am pretty much convinced their protests are ineffective and a waste of time, and that the individuals involved may, in fact, be wastes of perfectly good protoplasm.
THAT BEING SAID, there is no excuse for the behavior of the NYPD in this incident. The behavior of the NYPD Commanders during this protest has been disgusting, immoral, illegal, and against everything we as a Nation are supposed to stand for. But what is even more disgusting is how the NYPD immediately closed ranks on this matter, excusing their behavior as completely reasonable. What is even MORE disgusting than that, however, is citizens such as yourself who are willing to give the Police a blank check to do whatever they want to people you dislike or don't agree with.
Shame on you. You aren't worthy to lick the boots of those who shed blood to secure the rights you'd see others denied.
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them
How the hell is their cause violent?
"There seems to be a lot of misinformation originating from all parties involved making it difficult to know how large the protest actually is at this point and whether or not the police are being quite as universally violent as the protestors imply."
Why did I not see any editorializing tags like this for any of the Middle East protests in the last year? Surely protesters there had at least as much motivation to skew the case that they were making (on YouTube and various social networks).
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
I was down there on Day 2 photographing demonstrators and police. This was Sunday, so the NYPD was able to block off Wall Street, the bull, areas near banks, etc. so disruptions by the demonstrators were minimal. An Anon told me they had been forced away from Battery Park and into Zuccotti Park the night before, but there didn't seem to be much tension between demonstrators and police at the time and some of the police seemed friendly with demonstrators. Demonstrators have made it clear time and time again that they are also fighting on behalf of NYPD officers. From reports I've read through Twitter and elsewhere, some NYPD officers have shown at least some support for demonstrators but the "white shirt" commanding officers are the ones who usually instigate trouble. I can't verify this directly, but in many of the photos and videos I've seen of arrests and attacks on demonstrators, "white shirts" appear to have been directly involved. The now-infamous pepper spraying of penned in female demonstrators was done by a white shirt officer who also appears to have sprayed some of his officers as well. I'm planning to head back to Zuccotti Park this week to get more photos, so I'll have a better idea of how much things have changed in the past week or so.
The video was a single continuous shot. Nothing was edited out of it, and anyone can tell this just by watching it, as I did. All your comment proves is that you're an idiot.
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=excoriates
If you watched the clip he linked to you might have picked that up from context clues, even if you weren't aware of the word.
http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html
as of 2005, top 5% of american society takes 72% of everything. bottom 85% (includes YOU), take only 15%.
in medieval western europe, the law of the land was in the below manner :
lord gets 33% of produce from fields>
church gets 33% of produce from fields>
serfs get 33% of produce from fields.
no lord could ever dream of being able to actually take 72% of economy, and a medieval peasant would be pitying a modern 'well to do' person in terms of the share of the wealth he is taking from at a measly 15% - for, he, as a medieval peasant, got double the rate you are currently getting from your society's wealth.
thats what happens when you get a job. you live TWICE worse off than a medieval serf.
moron. the one whose skull should be cracked is you. you are dragging the average level of humanity down. and if you made your name and address available, im sure someone from new york could offer you the courtesy in a back alley.
Read radical news here
Right, cause I've never been to a well-organized, peaceful and leftist protest.. Oh except for pretty much every well-organized protest I've been to.
Stop blowing smoke out of your ass.
An effective "resistance" first needs a coherent definition of what they are actually "resisting" and they need to offer up at least some plausible idea of what will happen after the "resistance" is victorious. All those fabulous protesters in the Arab world spent more time exhorting their glorious revolutions on Facebook and Twitter then they did on actually planning for the future after the revolution ended up succeeding. I am still a little hazy on what the Egyptians think they accomplished. They moved from an autocratic/military ruled government to just the military who is promising elections sometime in the future. One of their main goals was the elimination of the "special laws" that had been in effect for 30 years. These laws were deactivated for a few months but those laws are now being called back into service because of incidents of idiotic mob violence that had nothing to do with forming a new government or creating a better society. Attacking foreign Embassy's or vandalising foreign sponsored Universities was not the most productive or prudent courses of actions they could have embarked on at this point.
Hi, did you even bother to watch the link? The word is "excoriates." Apparently you don't know what it means. The second sentence in O'Donnell's report was "the troublemakers were carrying pepper spray and guns and were wearing badges."
Before you go calling someone a troll, try to at least understand what they're talking about, especially when they're talking about the same thing as you.
Breakfast served all day!
minded eh ?
...
so then, the same should have been applied to american revolutionaries back in 1774, and franklin, jefferson, revere et al should have been all jailed and beaten down
how DARE they revolt against unfairness and suppression.
Read radical news here
Hopefully it will turn out like this:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article515384.ece
I had plenty of experience with anti-CIA recruitment protesters in college, and the charming anti-Republican protesters last year in St Paul. I really couldn't imagine possibly feeling sorry for them. They're repellent self-righteous zealots who are utterly obnoxious regardless of their cause, or even whether they're right or not. Even if I'd agreed with their point of view, I'd want them off my side.
-Styopa
fair enough but I watched a few min of that video as much as I could take, and I don't think that was his meaning. The video berates the protesters & excused the police saying the individuals were dangerous and carrying weapons.
I'm sorry vocab aside the OP is a troll & is just making more excuses for this kind of behavior because in his/her reality things like this don't happen. Well I'm sorry to burst your bubble they do happen, and it happens to innocent people even though the mantra is they must be doing something wrong for the police to act that way.
Its just a lie to tell yourself & make you fell better, till it happens to a loved one or you..
"(I) have this unfortunate condition that causes me not to believe a single thing any politician says when a mic's on.
Once politics become a tug-of-war for shares in the income pie, decent government is impossible.
- Friedrich Hayek
a goal of getting Obama to acknowledge the wealth gap and appointing a commission to recommend actions for dealing with it
Who gets to be Marie Antoinette?
Since you've chosen to partially answer, I'll ask you to clarify: "destructive.." of what?
The British might have argued that Gandhi's non-violent civil disobedience was destructive of a critical colonial bastion in their rightfully-held world-wide empire. They would have been right, and completely wrong. Destructive? Yes, absolutely, when it succeeded. But it destroyed something that desperately needed to be destroyed.
See also the U.S. Civil Rights movement.
That a protest movement may be destructive is not a condemnation, if the thing being destroyed deserves to be.
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
The RealNews has coverage--look at transcript if you can't watch the video. They're an independent news outlet that monitors exactly this type of news.
It appears that the protest, named Occupy Wall Street, is targeted at the corporate influence over politics, the imperialistic foreign policies of the US, and a demand for greater accountability in politics.
It is a small protest. If it happened anywhere else it would be completely "not news". Please remember that people can and do protest things all the time. The only reason this has any traction at all is the people are protesting Wall Street.
If it was hundreds of thousands of people, like you saw protesting the Iraq war, well then that would be major news. This is just not of any real interest to most news networks. It isn't "news" unless it is major, or it is bad. That is just how the news works.
As such all we see are things like this: The protestors and those that support them trying to drum up interest on the Internet.
I watched enough to see him excuse the police and that was enough for me
as I said above:http://news.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2448946&cid=37530818
I'm sorry vocab aside the OP is a troll & is just making more excuses for this kind of behavior because in his/her reality things like this don't happen. Well I'm sorry to burst your bubble they do happen, and it happens to innocent people even though the mantra is they must be doing something wrong for the police to act that way.
Its just a lie to tell yourself & make you fell better, till it happens to a loved one or you..
"(I) have this unfortunate condition that causes me not to believe a single thing any politician says when a mic's on.
So far, doing otherwise provided nothing. we are not in 60s anymore. we are in a period in which the established control mechanisms of government or other interest holders have been worked on suppressing the masses since 1960s. the innovation scale in that area surpasses the innovations made in military technology, ranging from sound weapons to tazer guns.
and the police forces are not the random people who randomly have signed up in force anymore. governments have been taking care to focus recruitment to psychological profiles that will do whatever they are commanded, regardless of ethics, since a long while.
Read radical news here
Excuse the police? Where? O'Donnell calls it "unprovoked police brutality." He calls out the NYPD for "protecting its troublemakers." He says there is "absolutely nothing" in any of the videos that could constitute grounds for arrest. What video were you watching? Or did you even bother?
I'm sorry vocab aside the OP is a troll & is just making more excuses for this kind of behavior
No, I'm sorry... you're acting like a real moron. Is that "vocab" you can understand?
Breakfast served all day!
No excoriate is a real word, it just means something close to the opposite of exonerate.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
I know this is slashdot and facts are irrelevant here, but the NYPD hasn't used mace since 1994: http://www.nyc.gov/html/ccrb/pdf/pepperreport.pdf. There is a difference between mace and pepper spray (most significantly that mace is illegal in most of the civilized world).
And that gives the police the right to pepper spray them. The constitution does not limit freedom of speech to those with a clear message and clear demands that are not angry. It gives everyone the right to speech. The brutality of police is not justified or legal.
No sigs in BETA. Beta SUCKS.
Any form of change is "destructive" to the original form.
While every positive change comes from creative destruction, not every destruction is creative. Some destruction is just that. I assert this protest is just this destructive in its goals.
And both the massive wealth disparity
Wealth disparity is irrelevant. If everyone is lifted up (as has indeed been the case), but those at the bottom are lifted less, than the outcome is positive for everyone (just not for everyone's ego).
regulatory capture in the governmental bodies
Well, employment at regulatory agencies is at all time high (even per capita of the population). So if you are arguing against crony capitalism, then your argument should be against excessive regulation used to raise the barrier of entry into the market place.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
If you watched that video you'd see it was completely unprovoked. If I knew any of those women I'd probably arrange to have him kidnapped and pepper-sprayed repeatedly for about an hour since his identity is known.
It doesn't have to be much. Maybe tie in a baseball theme and have everyone have a bat sticking conspicuously out of a backpack. Nothing too threatening, just enough for them to think "If I try something stupid, someone might be scraping my brains off the asphalt."
404: sig not found.
Whilst it may be very important - this isn't really news for nerds, is it?
you need bastards to protest against bastards.
Read radical news here
That was a brilliant troll. You fished like 8 responses!
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
The OccupyWallStreet activists have, so far (this is Day 11 of the protest), been unable to articulate much their philosophy or objectives. There is no single leader; some of them are undirected anarchists, some are communists, and some seem to have no coherent viewpoint.
The clash with police referenced in the article, during a march from lower Manhattan to Union Square and back, actually occurred on Saturday. On Sunday, the protesters were visited by journalist Chris Hedges, who gave an excellent interview (even if you don't agree with his politics or anything else). The full interview is posted at http://www.rawstory.com/rawreplay/2011/09/chris-hedges-occupy-wall-street-is-where-the-hope-of-america-lies/ [rawstory.com]
Chris Hedges is the first person who has been able to clearly summarize the position of the protesters. Although, it's really just his own viewpoint--some of the activists view Hedges as a "reformer, not a revolutionary" and therefore not a spokesman for their movement--it's the best statement that has emerged from Zuccotti Park since this thing started. Hedges makes it clear that he views the two dominant political parties in the US as equally corrupt and controlled by corporate interests. The corporate media will try to ignore this protest as much as possible, as it does not fit the political agenda of any major news organization.
Personally, I disagree with most, if not all, of what these protesters say, but I emphatically support their right to say it. The behavior of the NYPD was disgusting.
http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html
the system is what creates your corruption. you think when you let 5% of society to get 72% of all wealth, they would use that wealth just to get gold gilded swimming pools to swim in and 12 yachts to water ski behind ? whomever has that much power, uses it to create the corruption you speak about. wherever there is possibility of amassing power, there is corruption.
Read radical news here
excuse me I said.. that is if YOU can read..
I watched a few min of that video as much as I could take, and I don't think that was his meaning. The video berates the protesters & excused the police saying the individuals were dangerous and carrying weapons.
so is that understood or do you want to continue being an asshat?
"(I) have this unfortunate condition that causes me not to believe a single thing any politician says when a mic's on.
I saw some people try to force their way out of an officer's hands... if an officer takes a hold of you to detain you, or even to ask you to move, and you get combative, try to shrug them off, etc, they will take you down. I saw that in one video... guy shrugs and spins on the officer, then other officers move in and pin him down... while the idiot with the camera is screaming "brutality!". They weren't beating the guy with nightsticks, or repeatedly tasing him... he was aggressive towards the officer, and they responded with just force. There's another clip of them walking a guy off in cuffs, and another person appears to run, aggressively, at the officers... which would be an aggressive response generating event.
Now, the pepper spray (it's not fracking mace, damnit!) incident, unless you were there and could see all angles, it *IS* possible that something occurred outside the angle of the camera...not saying this is what happened. I wasn't there, I'll leave that to IAB, who can get more evidence, and other cameras, etc.
Most of the videos I've seen were taken by non-impartial people, who appeared to be there just to either incite something to post, or in hopes of something happening. An actual journalist is not supposed to get involved. Record, write, whatever.. but just having a camera and recording does not make you an independent journalist, or reporter, or a trusted (or supposedly trusted) source.
Sorry, non USA person here. The reports talk about "white shirt police" and "blue shirt police" as if they are different groups (the "white shirt police" seem to come in for criticism for tougher policing) - are they two different organisations / branches / other division in the police forces? Local police and national police? Civil and military? (etc?)
cheers, thanks for info.
Here's the gist:
*) There are no "Wall St" firms on Wall St anymore (nor anywhere close). NYSE trading floor is not that important in grand scheme of things. The neighbourhood became residential about 15 years ago, and now there's 20,000 residents like me.
*) When the protest started (two weeks ago), there were minimal number of protesters (1000) despite the protesters claims to have 20k people.
*) There's "OVER 9000" cops downtown, and it makes getting around quite annoying since I have to navigate police barriers (not a big deal, but just annoying). There's definitely more cops than protesters at any given area. At the beginning of protest, they had a 2-cop shoulder-to-shoulder line blocking Wall St. The only protesters were 6 people dressed in white robes (could pass for either Star Wars freaks or priests), cops were quite bored.
*) Cops are polite and keep to their business (that is, stand there and look serious). I can't say same about the protesters.
*) Protesters themselves...oy. Whatever it is they are protesting, they are an embarassment to their cause. I've chatted to a few, and had a few come over for drinks, and uh...Well, it's exactly what you'd expect, well-meaning but clueless younger people who are looking for attention and "feeling of doing something".
*) They protest evil corporations. Nevertheless, most of them have latest iphone4 (just look at the videos - they are ones taping). It doesn't bother them that Apple is largest corporation in the world who isn't very nice to its users.
*) There's a huge number of DSLRs at the protest - combined with iphone4, means nobody there is really starving.
*) I started speaking to one of protesters about bitcoin. He was very interested in it and buying some if they are likely to appreciate. He was *shocked* when I pointed out that's exactly what "evil bankers" do.
*) Cops don't really give a damn about protesters. They are charged with enforcing certain rules - such as, no "permanent structures". So, every so often, a cop walks through the protest site checking things out. Each time a cop does so, there's 10 people with cameras surrounding said cop to make sure any "brutality" gets videotaped. It gets quite silly since these kids don't really understand they need to move away for a cop to walk through (and since they are looking into their viewfinder, they don't realize that the cop is a foot away, resulting in a cop having to push the photographer out of the way - "omg brutality").
*) Protesters are completely disorganized - there's nobody who is "in charge", which leads to interactions with cops that could go much smoother, if a single person was designated to be liaison to cops. Protesters also can't/won't police their own - so if someone does something illegal, its becomes up to cops to enforce (vs, protesters saying "this is not cool, please do not do it" and avoiding police involvement).
*) When cops walk by, most protesters just ignore them, continuing with conversations etc. However, there are a few who get "in your face" to cops and start shouting/etc - and yes, I'd say that the protesters are trying to provoke conflict, whether they intend to or not.
*) As far as professionalism goes, I'd say cops are generally acting professional, if bored and annoyed at having to deal with hippies who hate their guts.
*) There is serious "victim mentality" among protesters - such as "media is suppressing coverage" (no, its just not important enough - the protest is much smaller than an average union rally).
White shirts are seniors. Blue shirts are low-level cops. The white shirts are under pressure to stop this whole thing and they show it. The blue shirts support OWS.
Grammar nazis are to this community what excrements are to gold.
Looking around, it turns out that there are many places that either already have some people starting occupations (no not jobs), or are planning some to add to Wall St. A list of hashtags are popping up, and at least one protest is being planned in Boston.
It looks like this could be something gaining some steam... whether or not it continues to the point of influence is another question.
Something witty.
It happens every day somewhere in this country. For most of them it's a chance to get their blood up in a charged environment so afterward they can couple up in the afterglow. Think of it as a cotillion for liberal arts majors, or the mating ritual of some bird.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
my my. what's that thing about EQUALITY in politics then ? like, everyone having a right to get elected, everyone having the EXACT same vote ? and that business about challenging king's, the property holder's rights ? it was all his property you know. how dare they challenge a property holder.
these are left principles. dont talk about shit before knowing anything first. ignorant moron.
Read radical news here
> I absolutely categorically do not believe that the protesters are civil. Their cause alone proves that they are violence-prone and violence-minded.
I, on the other hand, believe or disbelieve things based on the evidence.
Whatever hippie. Your issue is you're looking over someone's shoulder and seeing what he has, and looking in your own pocket and you get jealous. Wealth distribution is a lie hippies tell to make other hippies mad.
Here's a clue as to why whining about wealth distribution is so silly. If the top 5% of the country just moved to Canada, suddenly America becomes a much better place, right? No. The point of this thought experiment is to demonstrate that wealth distribution doesn't matter - standard of living matters.
And if you work in the US your standard of living is pretty good. Sure, we need to address unemployment, but I don't feel bad if people who don't _want_ to work can only afford a 42" TV and to eat out at a restaurant twice a week.
It is a couple hundred people protesting. No matter how right you think they are or any of that it just doesn't matter because it is a small group and nobody else seems to care much. If it was a couple hundred thousand, yes that would matter.
There are small protests of various things all the time all over, and they just don't matter much. For a protest to matter, it has to be fairly sizable, at least in relation to the group affected. Since Wall Street, America's investment centre, is being protested it would need to be pretty large.
Now, the pepper spray (it's not fracking mace, damnit!) incident
Yes it is. Mace is a brand name, not just a tear gas spray.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mace_Security_International
Mace first attracted attention during the early 1990s for its manufacture of the less-than-lethal defense spray Mace. Although most of the general public probably still identifies the company with its brand domination in the pepper spray industry
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mace_(spray)
Chemical Mace is a tear gas ... Most Mace branded products sold today by Mace Security International are pepper spray rather than tear gas
Oh look, another guy confusing wealth with income.
Tell me, how much of the gold in the lord's vaults did the peasants get?
And watch it.
thegodmovie.com - watch it
Any time I read crap like that (way too many inflammatory adjectives) I know that I'm not getting the straight scoop from this "unbiased" source.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Here's the gist:
*) Protesters themselves...oy. Whatever it is they are protesting, they are an embarrassment to their cause. I've chatted to a few, and had a few come over for drinks, and uh...Well, it's exactly what you'd expect, well-meaning but clueless younger people who are looking for attention and "feeling of doing something".
*) There is serious "victim mentality" among protesters - such as "media is suppressing coverage" (no, its just not important enough - the protest is much smaller than an average union rally).
This sound a lot more reasoned and objective than the original poster's quoted comments. +2 INFORMATIVE.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
No. Trying to step between a police officer and the person he is trying to arrest would be "interfering". Saying something is exercising your freedom of speech. There is absolutely nothing you could say that would "interfere" with a police officer's ability to arrest someone.
Dont talk as if you know something about what you are talking on when you dont know anything.
economy in middle ages was entirely based on land until high middle ages (1250 and on). trade was limited to various cities in fortunate regions, and other masses entirely lived on land subsistence. naturally, ranging from the requirements for being made a knight to tithes you needed to pay to your lord were all calculated on things related to land. on a sidenote, noone wanted to become a knight, since it incurred great yearly expenses on you. and you automatically became one, if the land you own passed a certain threshold.
Read radical news here
This wouldn't be the first time the mainstream media has ignored a big protest march. They also ignored the FTAA protests in Miami in 2003. According to my friends who went, it stayed peaceful but the protests apparently didn't have much effect on the negotiations since they were a long way from the protest area set up by the police.
The video berates the protesters & excused the police saying the individuals were dangerous and carrying weapons.
No. It doesn't. You're not just a moron, you're a troll.
Breakfast served all day!
hippie ? why thank you. i am not, but i am trying to be.
however, cut the crap about things you dont know zit about. moron. income distribution is directly linked to the percentage of amenities you can enjoy from your society - that is 'standard of living'.
"in u.s. standard of living is pretty good" -> that is because you dont know jack shit .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Development_Index
that is the most detailed index that measures standard of living regarding EVERYthing an INDIVIDUAL needs, from the soft drinks he can buy to his children's safety, and your hellhole can only rank #10 at best times, coming after all the social/social democrat/hippie countries you would curse and cuss about. in retrospect, those countries, especially nordic ones, always rank in the top 5.
compared to them, you are living in a hellhole, and wealth/income distribution is the reason.
really. these things are just a google search away. why you dont know jack shit, and yet talk shit, and do not spare the effort to just type in a 3 word search and actually LEARN what you are going to talk about ?
Read radical news here
As a USA person (not from the East Coast), I imagine those are the colors of certain types of police uniforms native to NYC. I have no idea what they mean because they probably aren't really supposed to mean anything to people not familiar with local uniforms. All the uniforms where I am are either brown or gray.
you can find live streaming video of the event at livestream.com/globalrevolution
Y93D1 Activity, knitting and crocheting
T1500XA Foreign body in cornea, unspecified eye, initial encounter
Bullshit, getting in the way would be interfering. Yelling anything including stop is called free speech. Police should have less leeway than everyone else, they get to carry guns in public.
Wealth disparity is irrelevant. If everyone is lifted up (as has indeed been the case),
That has not been the case. We are the first generation of Americans who cannot expect a better standard of living than our parents.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
If the city gives you a permit to protest, is it really a protest?
DPrivileged white republican spotted.
1) they never claimed to have 20k. that was a goal, not an estimate. 2) smartphones/cameras. what exactly do you suggest they use instead? sketch artists? 3) yes the Cops in general are being professional. but, the protestors, for the most part, don't 'hate' the cops. many are protesting on the behalf of the Cops as well (chants of "we are the 99%, you are the 99%") 4) the Police have said that certain structures are allowed, provided they don't block NYPD line of sight (tents below a certain height, umbrellas, etc.) 5) Major Media is, or at least was, avoiding coverage. 11 days of anywhere from 150 to over 1000 people, often blocking traffic, many camping out, prompting large police presence, in Midtown freaking Manhattan is absolutely newsworthy, whether its 'disorganized' or not.
There is absolutely nothing you could say that would "interfere" with a police officer's ability to arrest someone.
That's really not true. Addressing someone, especially in an imperative fashion, while they are in the middle of an attempt to control an inherently uncontrollable situation is a bona fide distraction. It's like intentionally yelling "stop" when a tennis player tries to serve. You know there is a good chance you'll be removed from the stadium for doing that. And you know that it interferes with the person's ability to concentrate on the situation at hand.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
You speak as if elections matter in the USA. I think you've not been paying close attention, else you are deluded. The two branches of the Money Party each field a candidate, and you get to choose between them. That's effectively one party government. The (mostly) young people protesting in New York have figured this out. I'm surprised you have not.
Also, I'd like to point out that these kids are using the same non-violent resistance techniques that have toppled multiple governments worldwide in the past 12 years. These techniques were pioneered by Gandhi and have been refined considerably since then. They have proven, time and again, to be an effective technique, if and only if there is a free press. While I'm not suggesting that as isolated protest in New York City will cause revolution in the USA, I suspect the powers that be are more concerned than they care to admit. Please recall Gandhi's quote about the use of non-violent direct action techniques, "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."
These protests in New York are largely considered practice by the (non) organizers. I suspect that the protesters will learn, through some unpleasant incidents, that they need to engage in more and better non-violent resistance training. The standard mechanism used to stop protests of this sort is to have agent provocateurs incite violence, which is then used as an excuse to crush the public protest with overwhelming force. The way to avoid this is for all people engaging in non-violent direct actions to first practice, in an organized group training environment, how to respond non-violently when confronted with violence or the threat of violence. I don't believe this first round of protesters have had much training.
Personally, I wish the protesters well, and hope they succeed in raising awareness about just how bad the current US system is. Perhaps, then, some practical ways to deal with the current disaster-in-the-making will be seriously considered. Here is a link to a very mainstream article from the BBC that describes the history of the techniques currently being deployed in New York.
1) Sorry, I did see claim of 20k as an actual number in at least one [clearly misinformed] report. The "projection" was 20-50k. Actual number on Sep 17 was ~2k, including all tourists in the area.
2) I think that having organized video team would be helpful - and educating them on how to stay out of the way of cops being taped.
3) Absolutely, I said so myself. Most protesters are calm and want no trouble.
4) Sorry - thanks for clarification. I wasn't listing the actual rules, I was just pointing out that there *are* rules, cops enforce them, and protesters are not always aware of them.
5) Actually, its not Midtown, its Downtown. And, 150-1000 people protesting here are not *that* unusual - unions routinely bring more, Wall St is their favorite place to protest.
i can't believe i'm having a reasoned discussion on /. anyways...
1) fair enough
2) they have a 'media team' for the livestream, but yah, they tend to get in the middle of it all. i've been thinking the same thing as you about this...
3) another problem with disorganization. the general assemblies held at the campsite are a good start for explaining the rules, but only the people there overnight hear any of that.
4) woops. Downtown. point conceded on the numbers, but still. 11 consecutive days can't be all that common..
I feel like I have to explain this point just because I don't want to be pigeon holed as someone who advocates giving police excessive powers. I have personally been arrested once for denying a police officer's request just because I knew it was extra legal, so I don't exactly want to side on letting the police do "whatever they need to do."
Let me use another analogy. If a doctor's was trying to stop a bleeding of someone laying on the street, would you think that addressing the doctor in the imperative (yelling "what are you doing?", "stop!", etc.) would be interfering with the doctor's attempt to save someone? I hope you would. Well, the act of arresting someone is an inherently dangerous act. A police officer expects that a person (who in his opinion just violated a law) may violate more laws and possibly attempt to do something erratic or even harmful. If the police are not beating the guy down or violating them in some excessive physical way, then I think the bystanders should give the police as much benefit of the doubt (at that point in time) as they would to a doctor who would be trying to stop a bleeding.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
The mainstream media (MSM) is actually covering this. On CNN's page this afternoon in the US section, I saw the following:
* Experts scale Monument for repairs
* Wall Street protests enter 11th day
* Interrupting the cycle of teen violence
* Signs young Christians not waiting
* Skateboarding for cancer
* Walt Disney's story: American Dream
* Translating Shakespeare into... lolz?
Seems to me that the article linked from "Wall Street protests enter 11th day" might actually be coverage of the affair. No, it's not the lead story - sadly, that's the trial of Michael Jackson's doctor. Whether it's the pepper spraying (which did seem completely unwarranted based on the videos I saw) or just that it's hit 11 days now, it does appear that at least SOME MSM is covering the story (okay - the main news network in the country). The issue they face is one of communicating their goals. I think they need to get organized and actually have something cogent to communicate to reporters. If the protesters can get *that* sorted out, they may actually get some real discussion on the issue. But expecting *action* is completely different - kinda like hoping unicorns will come deliver chocolate rainbows to your house.
White shirts are officers (lieutenant and higher), blue shorts are rank and file.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Police_Department#Ranks_of_the_NYPD
Specifically, the guy who pepper sprayed the crowd is deputy inspector.
lord gets 33% of produce from fields. church gets 33% of produce from fields. serfs get 33% of produce from fields.
So ... back then the top 5% took only 66% instead of 72%? That doesn't really support your argument.
I'll take my current position over that of a medieval serf, thank you.
Tin soldiers and Bloomberg coming, Four dead in the SOHO...
Never answer an anonymous letter. - Yogi Berra
The pure stupidity and greed makes me wonder each time a US resident steps up to voice some thoughts. I had no idea there is a protest, I still don't have anything than a vague idea what they want, but why in somebody's name would you need to starve in order to protest against something? What does age have to do with the whole thing? Just because bored older farts like you are burried in loans and are so s*tless afraid of their pension plan they would not risk anything even if it takes the life of a relative should dismiss a younger population till they get old enough to be themselves burried in loans?
"I don't even really know what it's about. I heard "protesting corporate greed in America", but I mean that's a tough thing to protest.. you're basically protesting capitalism.."
Um... no.
I don't know who started this BS, but there is nothing about capitalism that requires corporate greed of exploitation of others. On the contrary: the very basis of capitalism is the idea that two people will naturally trade in ways that are mutually beneficial. If they aren't, then it isn't capitalism.
Blaming distortions of capitalism by corporations and government on capitalism itself, is like living in the boondocks where you only get distorted cell phone and television reception, and blaming it all on the whole concept of radio.
do you have a problem with numbers.
Read radical news here
you're basically protesting capitalism.
You are? Since when was it capitalism that when an investor (or many) made failed investments, the government would jump in and cover their losses? The banks did badly. The "Capitalist" reaction to that, from the government should have been "OK. So what? Good luck". Instead the government took tax-payer money and started shoring up those failed investments. If it hadn't been for this government stupidity, which is 100% the opposite of capitalism, the crisis of 2008 would have been significantly worse, but essentially over before Christmas. In 2008. Due to government intervention funded by tax-payers, we'll pay for this for decades to come.
Shoring up the banks was socialism. Isn't that what the Wall Street protesters are protesting?
I didn't read TFA, but this sentence seems to be implying (or at least I am inferring) that arresting == aggression. I presume they are separate issues.
There's "OVER 9000" cops downtown, and it makes getting around quite annoying since I have to navigate police barriers (not a big deal, but just annoying). There's definitely more cops than protesters at any given area. At the beginning of protest, they had a 2-cop shoulder-to-shoulder line blocking Wall St. The only protesters were 6 people dressed in white robes (could pass for either Star Wars freaks or priests), cops were quite bored.
Ok, stop.
If you can't recognize the fact that the police deployed a disproportionate force in FAVOR of the police, you obviously can't trusted to deliver a credible objective point of view. If the police outnumber peaceful/non-violent protestors that doesn't speak highly of police leadership. ("OH SHIT, THE UNWASHED MASSES ARE THREATENING OUR CORPORATE MASTERS! DEPLOY EVERYONE!")
In depth, and by the Pacifica Radio Network.
http://rt.com/usa/news/occupy-wall-street-spreads-505/
http://www.pacifica.org/
http://www.kpfa.org/
And also I found, http://www.facebook.com/pages/Project-Censored/151690209993
I really don't see that this is any real revelation, It's NOT a free country (unless you're very, very rich) and it's NOT "By the people for the people", it's by the money for the money!
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
It's probably like everywhere else where the worst of the police get trolled into action by the worst of the protesters. Which then makes one side believe police are all pigs and evil and love bashing skulls, and the other believe protesters are all instigators who love nothing more than riling up anarchy. Then reasonable people like me get called out by both sides for being "anti-" just for trying to explain both sides to each other.
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
that was supposed to be "anti-[their-side]"
your thin skin doesn't make me a troll
Moreover, there's very little a blue-shirt (low-ranking) officer could realistically do to resist or stop the actions of their superior officers (white shirts).
Yep. Case in point, the blue shirts reacting to Anthony Bologna (the pepper-spraying white shirt who got doxed)... one of them yelled "Thanks for the warning" after receiving some spray in his eyes himself, another looked down at the women screaming in pain and said "I can't believe he just fuckin' maced her". Still couldn't do anything other than hold the orange net with shocked expressions on their faces.
Grammar nazis are to this community what excrements are to gold.
just like yelling bomb on a plane or fire in a movie theater is just free speech and not inciting correct?
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
No, not at all. People on a plane or in a theater are not supposedly trained professionals doing a job.
I'm so sick of hearing about this all the time! Non-stop coverage everywhere I look, and now slashdot as well? Can't we just pretend that nothing happened and let the bankers do what they do best, make the world safer for the children?
All glory to the Hypnotoad!
I was going to ask at which the 10 people realized that there were 11 of them. But fair enough. Your point about the extended prisoner's dilemma doesn't apply. It's just simply factually not true that attempting to make things more equal benefits everyone. It lowers the standards for the poor (who obviously suffer from it the most) and doesn't allow civilization to further advance. So it's a row deal for everyone. The fact that it may seem like a good idea is precisely the fault of the evolutionary biology. When we were finding things which we used to sustain life, the so-called pie was fixed in size. But now that we are building such things, the pie keeps growing. So hindering advancement of civilization is actually hindering the growth of the pie. As for the regulations, if they were simply employing less people they would not be attempting to regulate in such minute details. The only reason that top industry experts have to be hired by such agencies is that agencies try to regulate minutia instead of just providing top-level guidelines. It's a vicious circle in which power attracts expertise which is used to generate more power. The easiest way to stop is to reduce the power. But there are more subtle ways than just slashing agency employment (for example, instead of regulating everything only concentrate on identifying the most dangerous scenarios that may come out of business practices and regulate those).
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Not true. We have better access to healthcare, housing, clothing, communications, forms of entertainment and have a higher variety and amount of food available to us than people did 30 years ago. We have lower savings rate and work longer hours (so we have less leisure time). Money isn't wealth. Money is a token used to enumerate how the wealth is divided. If we have access to more of that which enables and improves life, then we are wealthier. And we are.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
*) There is serious "victim mentality" among protesters - such as "media is suppressing coverage" (no, its just not important enough - the protest is much smaller than an average union rally).
The assaults on peaceful protesters surely are important. When you are pepper-sprayed for no reason or have your head slammed into a car for no reason, you don't need a "victim mentality". You are a victim.
And yet if I yelled "Stop!" while a Doctor was trying to stop bleeding, and in response another Doctor pepper sprayed me, said Doctor would be in jail.
There is no excuse for any of this behavior, or for any of the arrests that happened. The vast majority of the people arrested seemed to be guilty only of carrying cameras.
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them
Whoever modded you "informative" may agree with your version of events, but your whole post reeks of a giant strawman liberal-hippie getting the stuffing beat out of it. I am reluctant to accept such a pristine evaluation of cop behavior and an utter dismissal of the other side's grievances without harder evidence.
Leah McGrath Goodman describes this event in her book about Nymex (the USA petrolleum futures exchange)
those pits are almost entirely gone today, replaced by electronic trading. the pit traders were a rare breed - excessively physically aggressive, and during the greenpeace protest, they almost killed some people. in her book, alot of them could not deal with 'screen trading' and wound up driving cabs.
There is nobody in charge, so there is nobody to suffer from a cia assisted suicide.
Dungeon Tactics : Free Open Source SRPG
I also live a block from Wall Street & agree with the above - mostly. The fact is there never were "thousands" flooding the street - at most a few hundred and that only at the height. However, there IS a legitimate critique of US "capitalism" that can make you appreciative of productive companies like Apple while strongly opposing the predatory financialization of the world economy. Read Keen, Hudson and Graeber for thoughtful analysis on this. "Wall Street" is the name of that predatory economy that needs to be shut down, even if one is appreciative of markets and productive corporations, and understands the use of real banks and capital in creating a better life. however, I don't think the protestors are all that bright or have a clear critique and a vision of an alternative system. The fact that when I visited Liberty Park and heard and saw either Ron Paul libertarians or new agee types was enough for me to see just how sad and pathetic these protestors are. It also annoys me that when some white middle class girl gets pepper sprayed it's all OMG and everybody & the media gets their panties in a twist, while ignoring the day to day brutality poor people have to put up with. And if the cops, instead of eating donuts and being fat pigs, stayed in shape, they could subdue protestors without having to use pepper spray. Seeing the NYPD occupying my neighborhood, does not instill much confidence in our "finest."
Very little mention was made in the media of the pilot protests on Wall Street today, despite significant organization, and a coherent message.
A Video of such, you can skip the first minute.
IMHO, traditional media outlets do tend to ignore marches and protests, unless something violent occurs. To wit, how many of you reading this were even aware of pilots picketing Wall Street today, with 5x the numbers of the other Wall Street protestors? Because we were organized, polite and non-violent, we didn't garner much media attention. Because the other protestors were scruffy, angrier, and less compliant, they were 'noticed'.
On the other hand, the NYPD was extremely helpful with the mechanics of the protest. It helps to be well behaved in some ways.
Perhaps you should watch some of the other videos.
The cops are also blocking the street, traffic isn't going anywhere (especially since there is no driver in the parked cars)
Other videos show what they people are doing, they are staying on the sidewalk behind the "police line" until one is pulled across the line, for as far as I can tell (from four different cameras) for talking, and two others are peppered sprayed. ALL three of the victims were on the sidewalk behind the "police line."
Apparently if you are a cop, legally charged with making people move (although you've done NOTHING to make the people move) you apparently, A) pepper spray them, and B) yank them over the barrier and into the middle of the street,
A civic body implement public safety constraints, barriers or distance to allow patients to enter an abortion clinic or church funeral. But they cant be as severe to drown out the protest completely. Its a fine line. The Supreme Court overturned the lawsuit judgment against Reverend Phelpd who protested military funerals, even though all nine were personally disqusted with the guy.
The white verse blue shirt is also related to the terms white collar and blue collar. Though currently not nearly as rigid of a class distinction as it was in the past. Basically, you "high" status of doing desk work was publicly shown by wearing white clothing that you could not keep unstained if you were to preform manual labor. Blue coveralls are often issued those engaged dirty work. Such as an auto mechanic. Google searching "mechanic coveralls." The top link: http://www.automotiveworkwear.com/Merchant2/coveralls.html Out of 12 garments shown, 9 are variations of blue and 3 are variations of Khaki.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-collar_worker
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue-collar_worker
Is there any pathetic analogy you wont try to use to defend the indefensilble. Congratulaions, you are part of US facism, despite your feeble attempt to deny.
You haven't been to China yet.
New Economic Perspectives
"Don't have enough votes? Then you change your fellow voter's mind."
And how do you do that without getting a billion dollar advertising fund?
Street protests, marches and other methods of raising awareness.
After viewing the videos and accounts, I was wondering what the orders were? What was the purpose of the cops? Was it to make sure a riot doesn't start by dispersing the crowd by penning them up in little groups? Was it to stop the advance of the group? What was it?
If anyone knows I am interested because I don't see what's the point of all the dragging, spraying, and camera stealing if it's not contributing to any safety upgrades so to speak.
I have been part of the Occupy Wall Street protest. Tonight there was a public assembly where Cornel West spoke followed by a citizens' soapbox. The movement is organizing and trying to define itself. There are currently a couple hundred people in the park, and there are police everywhere. The atmosphere is incredibly upbeat and friendly--there are young people, there are lawyers, there are doctors, there are concerned citizens of all races, ethnicities, and sexual preferences out supporting this movement. We are not going away. This is the start of a movement. If you are in New York please come out and join us.
The movement is not perfect, but it is something. People = power. Now is a time for action. It is time for us to take our country back!
You might want to read on Gandhi.
He didn't have a billion dollar advertising fund but he accomplished quite a bit.
Be very, very careful what you put into that head, because you will never, ever get it out. - Cardinal Wolsey
We posted before, WE R MYDAILYCOMPLAINT , not a coward. Love the call out. Great site. thank u
Just to clarify, I I only wrote down things that I personally observed - that's the "eyewitness evidence" that was requested. If you notice, other /. posters who live/work in the area have generally agreed with me.
From the publicly available videos of pepper-spray use during Union Sq protest, it is very clear that a cop used excessive force against a protester - which is unprofessional at best and assault at worst. Cops aren't perfect - but neither are protesters.
I completely agree that number of cops initially deployed was unreasonable compared to number of protesters. However, cops had to work with 20-50k estimate that was provided by organizers - in which case, number of cops would have been right.
Police presence was reduced the next day, but it is still, in my opinion, excessive - there is no need to have a cop every 20 feet, however, it was reduced from 'ridiculous' to 'excessive'. I'll grant the NYPD the benefit of the doubt - the only harm from having too many cops is paying for their overtime.
Great points, except for the disingenuous ones.
Nor anywhere close? JP Morgan Securities is right on Wall Street. Goldman Sachs has two offices within blocks of Wall Street. Ditto for CitiGroup and Bank of America.
So other than the largest banks and investment firms, yeah, Wall Street would be a ghost town.
A goal, not a claim, as others have already pointed out to you.
That's usually the case these days. Like when Toronto deployed 20,000 cops for a few hundred G20 protesters. And yet they weren't able to do anything about a squad car that was set on fire by said protesters. After being parked unmanned for hours, far away from any police presence. Almost like they were hoping that it would be vandalized, so they could justify it and future massive police presences. Huh, interesting.
Other than the cops pepper spraying peaceful protesters, of course. And remember that many of those unruly protesters may actually be undercover cops or informants egging the the real protesters on so they can be arrested and hit with terrorism charges.
Word salad. Define "well meaning but clueless". Did they all want unicorns who's shit turns purple and smells like rainbow sherbert? Or do they want the banks broken up and corrupt bankers prosecuted, like those crazy liberals Ronald Reagan and H.W. Bush did in the 80's with the S&L crisis?
What did Apple do to crash the economy? How many billions did Apple take in government bailouts? How many homes has Apple illegally foreclosed on? What is Apple doing to worsen the unemployment rate, slow the economic recovery, or worsen the already high level of income inequality in the U.S.?
Non sequitur.
Yes, the same media eager to cover 200 teabaggers congregating with lawn chairs and "keep your government hands of my Medicare" signs.
So, any more right wing tripe masquerading as dispassionate analysis, or are we done here?
That's quite an extensive report there. What about your story about the woman who was "maced"? You say she was deaf but her narrative in the Boston Review suggests she heard everything that went on. Why are you floating this story that she was deaf, doing damage control for the boys in blue?
What's excellent about this report? He just makes a bunch of claims that aren't clearly supported by the evidence he lays out. How can we know that the only reason the man with the camera was attacked was that he was carrying a camera? Even if someone was there and knows that was actually the cause, there's no way to tell this from the video. Yet this guy is saying "Look, the only reason he's being attacked is because of his camera. Look, see?" See what? The video doesn't support that claim at all.
Please understand that I'm a liberal and I'll be the first to believe that law enforcement officers sometimes get off on using excessive force. But reporters also get off on attention and ratings. This guy seems to belong to that group.
You lost all credibility when you compared Wall Street to Apple.
And since when does someone have to be starving to protest against Wall Street?
Officers dressed in white shirts are usually of higher rank. White gets dirty easily, and wearing it shows they don't actually do much of the work in the trenches. They come out to play and act tough during big events. They're also usually politically connected to some degree, far above what a patrol cop could expect.
The rest are in actual work uniforms, because they actually work.
"When someone agrees with me it means their report was excellent!"
Lesse; CBS Corporation, ABC owned by Disney, NBC owned by Comcast/GE, Fox owned by Newscorp (Murdoch)... hmm. Nope, no idea why we're not hearing about anti-corporate protests.
, loyal worker bee.
People's happiness is based on relative wealth, not absolute wealth. That may have evolutionary causes, but it's still true and should be acknowledged by policy.
Again see the article I linked to in my other reply to you - less leisure time and more wealth (but relatively less so) is likely to decrease overall happiness, not increase it.
I'd like to point out the following:
1) iPhones are avaliable for almost nothing down (with contract) and an iPod touch can be ordered new for 200$
2) DLSR's are even cheaper with no need to have a contract
3) bitcoin is bullshit.
You're not old until regret takes the place of your dreams.
In ten years most of these protestors will be married, have children, and be working for the very same Eeeeevil corporations they are protesting now and talking about the good 'ol days when they got maced by the NYPD.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
I live and work in the Financial District, NYC so I can give first hand information on what I've seen. So far the protests have been minor and largely ignored by the population down here. The largest march had maybe 200 people. I've seen another with about 50 - 100. So it's small scale events. The protesters are camped out in a common area with tents, sleeping bags & such. All participants seem to be basically peaceful young hippie types, many students, etc. About as non-threatening as one could imagine. The police have erected barricades everywhere to impede pedestrian traffic. That makes it a hassle to get around both for protesters and residents. Lots more cops than usual are in the area (and this place is normally manned like a fortress). Mostly the cops are just standing around looking bored. That being said I wouldn't be surprised if they are reacting strongly to the protesters. All the NYPD has focused on in the last 10 years is anti-terrorist training. The result is a force ill-equipped to handle peaceful, non-violent protests. So the overreaction to the crowds (such as pepper-spraying women) is not a surprise to me.
to be fair, im not defending the cops here, im simply defending the argument that it is interfering in one way or another. however the response was not justified (from what we can see anyway)
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
I see, so because I'm not starving to death I don't have any right to protest corporatism, corruption, and greed in the government. Because I own any sort of electronic device, I must implicitly support evil corporations. Because I own a small piece of something that will appreciate in value, I'm lumped in with evil bankers, who engage in all manner of illegal activity in order to make money they don't need. Because I protest as an individual instead of as a collective, my petitions are meaningless. And on and on...
It doesn't really matter what your perception is of the individuals making up a group of protesters. With the possible exception of some of the church-organized abortion protests I've seen before, I've almost never witnessed a protest that didn't have quite a few participants in attendance who had the physical appearance of young, dirty n00bs who just wanted to be part of a scene.
The important part is the message being sent! It doesn't make a difference if the protesters themselves fall into tax brackets too low to find themselves personally affected by having to pay tax money that was used for banker/investor bailouts. It *DOES* matter, in a huge way, because those decisions wind up further polarizing American society into a relatively small group of "haves" and a large group of "have nots".
If this protesting has been going on for two weeks straight and is causing conflicts with the area police, it's *newsworthy*, plain and simple! If I turn on my local nightly TV news channel and I see them spending half the broadcast running down the crime reports of every 7-11 holdup or car theft, I fail to see how THOSE incidents are so worthy (despite them not affecting almost any of the viewers directly), yet a protest involving hundreds on Wall Street about serious economic issues doesn't deserve even a 5 second mention that it's still continuing?
Clearly, our news is being selected for us.
Some of your points are valid, IMO, but on others, I think you're way off-base.
For starters, in today's busy society, taking out the time to protest is a real challenge for most working folks. If you've got a full-time job and a family, making time to protest an issue like this in a rally that drags on for weeks means you're going to wind up on the unemployment line yourself! Who has more time than money AND has the energy to keep up a protest? Yep, usually those "young, foolish (but well-meaning)" college age kids, or those "crazy idealists" who already are largely "off the grid" and living non-traditional lifestyles. If things reach a point where a true cross-section of middle-income America is out in force, protesting our economy in some fashion, we're probably already at the point of no return -- because that would indicate massive unemployment and despair, the likes of which mean a violent revolution and government overthrow is imminent.
Also, while I'm not vouching for the level of knowledge of the individuals you spoke with personally? I don't necessarily see ANY conflict of interest when it comes to using, say, Apple products like the iPhone and attending a protest like this. It's not really a protest about Capitalism! Apple Computer isn't part of the economic problem. If anything, they're one of the last remaining vestiges of the SOLUTION. The protest SHOULD be about government manipulation of Capitalism and the corruption that permeates the whole thing. It's FAR from a free marketplace when federal govt. and the Federal Reserve conspire to prop up institutions that were supposed to fail due to their own gross negligence and mismanagement!
It's worth noting that the video evidence indicates that at least some of the violence was initiated by certain police officers. When even other cops are taken aback ("I can't believe he just fucking maced her"), something's clearly not right.
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Part of the media gap may be because such an ill-informed, ill-aimed and intellectually diffuse protest is meaningless.
Precisely because it's so ill-informed, ill-aimed and intellectually diffuse, *and yet it's still persisting over a week later*, it is newsworthy.
The simple fact that people are dissatisfied enough with the status quo to put in this kind of time and energy, even without any clear ideological focus, is a clear signal that there is a lot of untapped motivation. Any aspiring politician with a hint of ambition would be quick to try to capitalize on this.
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
"*) There's a huge number of DSLRs at the protest - combined with iphone4, means nobody there is really starving."
By your logic there can be no legitimate complaint about poverty. If you can afford to complain you're not poor and have no right to complain. If you're poor but not complaining you're not really poor, or you'd be complaining.
I don't know how many, if any, of these protesters are claiming to be impoverished, but just because they found a way to acquire expensive cameras and phones (presumably with $50/mo plans) doesn't mean their points aren't valid.
Furthermore, from what I've read, it's not the depth of poverty of which they are complaining, but the disparity between the wealthiest and everyone else. Their own status is irrelevant. They may even be children of wealthy stock brokers for all we know. That wouldn't invalidate their message. What would invalidate their message would be if resources were in fact equitably distributed.
Sorry, but your logic is off a bit. By all accounts that I've seen and read, the main targets of Deputy Inspector Anthony Bologna's pepper spraying were sitting peacefully on the sidewalk after being corralled by other officers in blue. One of the men in blue can be heard in some of the videos saying, "I can't believe it, he just fucking maced us!" as he wipes his face, having apparently caught at least some of the fumes himself.
I hesitate to bring up your username out of a desire to avoid any ad hominem arguing, but sheepofblue is jarringly pertinent when your comment is apparently so much in favor of authoritarian behaviour. Did you intend such an association, or was that purely accidental?
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
"and heard and saw either Ron Paul libertarians
new agee types"...
If by new agee you mean a modern equivalent to SNCC, SDS, NLF, e.g. today's lefty terrorists:)
sharing the same space with goldman anarchists and goldwater libertarians then maybe they'll be a bridge to the new front on the people's war on "crony capitalism"
resist propaganda
anybody compelled enough to be drawn into this should be OK with it too. You're correct, it's hardly Chicago'68 (or more recent elsewhere).
The whole purpose of protesting is to get knocked around and arrested in the second place; first being to stop traffic.
Property destruction, while sometimes inevitable, sometimes warranted is usually only a last-ditch resort out of desperation.
Regardless, i'm starting to believe that if the mission is gridlock at a cost of bruises and bail money and trips to the courthouse; then why not just have flashmobs of people who rented a car, drove into town, park in the streets and walk away.
Call in and report the car missing even. Save everyone the hassle of confrontation and there aren't enough tows in the city to keep it from being an all-day affair. Then have a 2nd wave do it the next day, and the next after that.
Bet towing a car, finding lot space, etc... is more difficult than busting a person and processing them in court!
resist propaganda
Just because something feels good, doesn't mean it's correct. Income disparity in a primitive society is very small. But even it's wealthiest members enjoy a worse life style than the poorest members of our society. Your insistence of using "happiness" as a metric diabolic (in the literal pejorative sense). I said in my post that it may not be good for the egos of those who advance less. And, well, not pinching the egos, not stoking the flames of jealousy may make people happy. But it's taking happiness in the worst of human vices. It is destructive to the core through and through.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Income growth within a percentage of population, as subdivided by income class, is tautological. It attempts to prove that a certain income class doesn't see their lot in life improved. But it's not the case because the percentage of people who actually stay within that group is very small. There is great deal of mobility from income class to income class. Thomas Sowell did an actually study on this and showed it to be the case... not with rhetoric, but with actual data. And if the actual people see their incomes improve or diminish depending on how they do in life, then discussing how each quintile does is pointless (because MOST people don't remain within the same quintile). Besides, income INCREASE does not indicate (however small it is) an decrease in quality of life. Even if it's a relatively small increase, the fact that jealousy may make it seem unpleasant, doesn't remove the fact the actual life-enabling mechanisms available to those people have increased. We don't live in the world of man-v-man. We live in the world man's wits v nature. If we reduced the harshness to our lives that we all suffer from nature, than our lot still improved.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
supply-side church
When people try to turn logical argument into gotcha phrases and slurs, I always take as their admission of having lost the argument. Just letting you know. Take as you will.
Any guest worker system is indistinguishable from indentured servitude.
Here's a second video of that asshat with the pepper spray:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-eTi5-qNgA
On the bright side, the NYPD has finally said they're going to investigate the guy.
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them
I'm not advocating happiness as the sole metric for ordering society, but even on a practical level happier people are more productive, more healthy and less likely to engage in crime. And I think you're mistaking a cognitive bias with an active emotion.