Occupy Together

Truth and Consequences

/ JillArcangela / Leave a comment

I’m sure most of us have had that moment in which you said the thing that had to be said, rather than the thing that someone wanted to hear, and suffered for your honesty.  Perhaps it was a friend who really loved someone who was just all wrong, or a person you once recognized who was fading to drugs or alcohol, or maybe it was even someone who loved you that you loved, too – just not the same way.  At one time or another, we’ve all had to say something that was as difficult for us to vocalize as it was for someone else to hear.  Even if you can’t recall or somehow managed to dodge the bashed-for-caring bullet up until now, let me assure you: If you’re sitting in occupation (or promoting it from the outside), you’re officially hated.  Don’t despair, though.  It isn’t your fault.  This is not one of those times where things would be better left unsaid.

There are many, maybe millions, who feel that the Occupy movement is a waste, a joke, or some insane scheme at Socialism or worse.  Being vocal about the movement, I am often headed off by feisty young Republicans, grumpy old men, or the flatly uninformed with all kinds of reasons why Occupy is the ugliest concoction of the most un-American things they can conjure.  My rebuttal is typically kicked off with a hardy and involuntary laugh, the kind that could send coffee out your nose if you were mid-swallow.  It isn’t funny, I know, but there is a level of humor in it for me that I can’t explain.  Perhaps it’s the “laugh or you’ll cry” mentality.  In my conversations on the matter, I’ve been told everything from Occupy being a movement to make the US, Canada, and Mexico one country to how the marchers only want their student loans forgiven because they are too lazy to work and apply their degrees.  I’ve been told Occupy should be shut down because we are wasting the precious resources of cities too broke to handle all the arrests (as though not arresting occupants is a situational alternative too mind-boggling to consider), but at no point does anyone ask themselves why our cities are all verging on bankruptcy.  These are just to name a few punch lines in the cascade of ridiculousness that falls from the mouths of those who are among the 99% but are so far incapable of getting behind the movement even though it is clearly behooves them, personally and nationally.

Understanding why these citizens would cling to foolish and shortsighted explanations, spouting them out in instant frustration then ramming their heads safely into the sand, rather than calmly addressing the problems of society may be critical to the movement consoling and recruiting those who tremble in the face of social change.  In my search for insight into this bizarre and counterproductive behavior, I read an amazing article written by Jim Sleeper, a political science lecturer from Yale University.  The article talks about the irony of those who discredit a movement poised to improve their lives and why he believes they do it.  His eloquence is masterful, and his vocabulary will make you smarter even though you’ll feel dumb while you’re forging through it.  I strongly recommend reading it as my discussion of it is no substitute for this primary source (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jim-sleeper/behind-the-snarking-about_b_1065830.html?ref=politics&ir=Politics).   Reading it, however, is not a prerequisite to understanding my related message.

Sleeper sees the response as being related to “a public psychopathology” referred to with the French term Ressentiment, which is essentially when those too fearful to face the real offenders and oppressors seek smaller targets (typically those courageous enough to take on those same enemies) on which to focus their anxiety and insecurity resulting in misplaced anger and hostile disagreement.  The resentment grows as private trash-talk by like-minded cowards becomes increasingly public, fueled by the attacks of those who propagate the fear and lies inherent to the condition itself for the purposes of agenda progress and propped up by the false security of an invented reality, one in which the problem is not the inflictors of oppressive societal conditions but instead the courageous individuals who stand defiantly before these powerful forces and point out problems the cowards are too intimidated by to address.  Basically, they don’t like you because you won’t allow them to live blindly.

By standing up for what is right, by shouting truths counter to the popular belief, and by fighting so vehemently against forces that govern the lives of Americans, you are proclaiming that something is wrong – seriously wrong.  Believing you, hearing you, and opening their eyes to see what you see is falling down the rabbit hole.  It means they have to accept that things are have gone astray and, worse yet, to discover the truth behind the lies that painted their existence.  As when Dorothy drew back the curtain or as in the case of any child who ever yanked off a holiday beard, the truth can be heartbreaking.  What would they have, what hope, what aspirations, what new responsibilities if they come to face the fact that their American dream has been just that – a dream?

Bringing the masses into the fold requires us, the revolutionists, to offer more than just political rebuttals for their misguided resentment.  (Granted, not laughing in their faces would probably also help, and I promise to try.)  We must remember that those who take to the frontlines in any battle are those who are cut out for fighting, which is something most people are not.  Those who quiver in the back or who plant their feet firmly in resistance to truth are still valuable members of our society and our movement, and we must do whatever we can to help them adjust to world the way it is if there is going to be any hope for achieving the world the way it should be.  We need to be able to give them something more than a laundry list of grievances and a heap of facts proving how far we, as a nation, have fallen from grace.  We need to meet them with hope and with wisdom; and while answers might be on short supply just yet, though I have considerable faith in those behind this movement, we can share with them our vision and our ideas.

In the weeks to come, I’m going to write to you about the Civil War and a story my father told me about the Battle of Antietam.  The relevance of this story will cue us for a honing of our movement that is both natural and essential.  In the meantime, we must find ways to stir the pot, but not in the bubbling, boiling, swishing fashion of the raucous revolutions of old.  We need to smooth and cox and simmer as we would a delicate pudding, patiently awaiting the melding and rendering required of all great visions.  We must take the time to listen and find the fear behind their words, to reason with those who seem unreasonable, to answer with possibility instead of counterpoint, and to find the common ground.  And if that moment comes when you realize you are out of time, out of patience, and out of answers, you can always do what I did after being trapped in a flea market stale with a raging Republican (a man peddling discount toys on a picnic table for a living – a man clearly of the 99%) and a toddler in full meltdown.  When he asked forcibly and with great vocal snicker, “then who do you vote for?”

I shrugged and smiled sweetly with a batting of the eyes, and yelled “OCCUPY!”

Then I grabbed my kid and ran.

Hey, you can’t win them all.

Chain of Fools

/ JillArcangela / Leave a comment

Last week, I wrote about the violence that overtook the city of Oakland, violence that left a two-tour Iraq War Veteran with a brain injury and so far unable to speak.  A couple days ago, I wrote about the shining example set by the Albany Police Department that refused to evict the occupants camped in Albany, an action which forced the city to communicate with the occupants and has begun to build a working agreement between the Occupy Albany group and the city officials.  Then, late last night, I tuned into the appropriate media channels, none of which are on the television – by the way, to check up on the Occupy camps around the world.  What I found was yet another attack being carried out against the Occupy Oakland group, which had organized a general strike that shut down the Port of Oakland for several hours.  Before this night of violence ended, a civilian was killed.  Even after all this, I woke up this morning to an article in the New York Post about the way in which businesses around Zuccotti Park are suffering as a result of the Occupy Wall Street movement’s encampment there (foot traffic supporting these businesses was made impossible because of recently removed police barricades around the area).  The article discussed the continued pressure from those seated snuggly in their political offices demanding actions be taken to clear out the Occupy Wall Street movement.  What kind of “action” do they have in mind, exactly?

There are, after all, only two real options in the situation.  Thus far, with the exception of Albany (whose hand was forced by the wisdom of Police Chief Steve Korkoff and his support staff) and Philadelphia (whose days of peace are numbered as a construction deadline for the plaza they occupy is quickly approaching), few if any cities have made the correct choice so far.  With so many examples of what-not-to-do in a one-of-two selection set, it seems – I’m sorry to say – plainly moronic that the great city of New York is still debating and not already underway in their course of just and cooperative action.  Personally, I’m marveling at the apparent ineptitude of the political officials presiding over lower Manhattan and their complete inability to understand the situation.  If this chain of command cannot understand what the one and only appropriate course of action in this situation is then they are, in fact, a chain of fools.  But let’s play fair, put the kid gloves on, and walk them through their options, shall we?

Option One: Work with them.  I know many politicians both local and more removed from the situation do not want to exercise this option because the movement has called them out on the corruption that has put and kept these people in office.  It has also voiced focused scorn toward the corporations whom these politicians are now indebted to for their professional successes and thus essentially sworn to serve.  However, considering the alternative (see Option Two) and the perhaps realized but not yet accepted fact that these groups and this movement aren’t going away, one would think that the city officials would chose to employ this option.  Meet with them.  Ask them to develop a working group to communicate and cooperate with the city in securing the space and items required to exist without filth, violence, and disruption to local businesses and residents.  What’s more is that if the city took measures to protect these camps, helping them manage the threats of outside criminals, and stopped the nightly evictions and attacks, people would feel safer approaching these areas and patronizing the areas businesses despite the tents in the park across the street.  Clearly, however, the city, state, and eerily silent federal governments have chosen not to follow the course of peace, liberty, and sanity.  So let’s see what’s behind door number two.

Option Two: Fight them.  So far, the use of aggressive policing, harsh enforcement of city ordinances, manipulation of local and state laws, application on non-lethal weapons, agitation of the camps, mass arrests, attempts to blind the public by manipulating media outlets, and bullying have been the mode of operandi for city officials.  This has left many police and “protesters” (I despise the word) injured, rendered a veteran literally speechless, indirectly caused the death of one citizen, cost what is now probably totaling in the millions of dollars collectively, and violated the constitutional rights of thousands upon thousands of American citizens.  Still, despite all of the blood, sweat, tears, and money thrown down on both sides of the line, this option has left us, as a nation, no closer to solutions for the problems the Occupy movement stands against and no closer to a conclusion of the events themselves.  Instead, the occupancies grow larger and more organized, the message of the attacks spurs outsiders to extend greater support, the perpetrators of the actions find themselves the victims of technological counterattacks, and the feeling of necessity to complete their mission becomes stronger inside the movement as the corrupt and their ringers out themselves with their increased volume and harder lines against it.

Even after such a short period of time, fewer than three months since the first tent was erected, it would seem that our government, both local by their actions and larger by their failure to defend the people, has taken the same stance on our grievances and assemblies as the governments in Libya and Egypt did not so long ago.  Our government has failed to heed its own words, to follow its own advice, and to protect the constitutional liberties entitled to us from birth.  This will force us onto a long and difficult path.  However harsh this course may be, however, we must understand that in their actions, thus far, the government has established its loyalty to a system without justice, without ethic, without respect for the people to whom this nation truly belongs, and hence without peace.  Their failure to cooperate and communicate with us, to hear our grievances, to aid us in our aim to mend our Republic and eliminate political corruption and corporate maleficence, and to protect us from the brutality that has been carried out against our camps, is their signature of approval on an agenda for continued abuse of our nation, our freedoms, our economy, our planet, and our people.  If our politicians will not hear us now that we are living and screaming in their streets, now that we are calling for reform, now that we are tolerating and reconvening after nightly physical assaults, now that we are expressing keen awareness of the political and societal atrocities being committed by corporate bedmates, now the American citizens have been injured and killed in this fight for freedom, when will they hear us?  Perhaps it is time to take their orders to disperse us, and the deafening silence of those in our nation’s capital who could defend us, as all the proof we need to know – truly know – that our government has nothing of the democracy from which it was birthed nor the republican practices for which it was groomed left in it.  With every moment of silence on the hill, with every tear gas canister fired, and with every night of violence carried out against people attempting to exercise their first and most basic human and American rights, they sound their call to war.

I believe, with every piece of my being, that our ability to stay peaceful – even when staring into the drooling jowls of the dogs of war – will be the key to our success.  For every occupant struggling to maintain his composure in the face of unadulterated violence, there are countless others on the outside watching.  As long as we remain peaceful, we can continue to prove to the growing audience that we are not the animals that politicians and their media paint us to be, and that we are not here to destroy the nation as they say we are.  We are here to restore democracy.  We are here to save our nation and our planet.  We are here to be the peace and justice we want to see in the world.  We must be committed to this path of peace if we are to succeed in our mission.  Let the chain of fools run themselves into the ground, burning up their resources and exhausting their men.  With poise and patience, we will out wait them and out will them.  And when the tear gas clears, when they have nothing left with which to try to tear us down, we will still be there – ready to do what we came to do.

“Do your worst,” Churchill said, “and we will do our best.”

Where The Good Cops Are

/ JillArcangela / 3 Comments

When I started researching this letter, I intended to title it as my father suggested: A Tale of Two Cities. Unfortunately, the occurrences of police brutality have persisted far beyond the suggested “one of two” cities in the title. In recent days, it seems brutality is becoming the common response to occupancies in cities all over the world. Even within days of the tragic injury of an Iraq War Veteran in Oakland (CA), occupancies in cities including Denver, Austin, and Richmond were met with similar tactics of tear gas, rubber bullets, pepperballs, and the old fashioned baton beating. It would seem these local officials and police administrators were determined to barge into these occupancies in search of their very own martyrs for the movement. But this is only one side of the story. What of the other city in the famous title?

Perhaps the one police department not getting enough attention these days is the small and courageous force of Albany, New York. Contrasting the courage being asked of officers who must set aside whatever personal feelings they have about the Occupy movement’s objectives and swallow their fears of exercising brute force against unarmed civilians, the officers of Albany and their superiors did something far more difficult. They stood up to the powers that be and said, “No.”

Yes. That’s right. They said, “No.” Allow me to explain.

When New York Governor Andrew Cuomo and Albany Mayor Gerald Jennings called for Occupy Albany to be cleared by Albany’s finest, Police Chief Steve Korkoff wisely evaluated the situation and then refused to uphold his orders. His justification for this was that the group was peaceful; he feared disturbing the peace would result in violence; and he believed that mounting an offense against the occupancy would upset a positive relationship between the citizens of Albany and its police force. Moreover, action against the movement seemed irresponsible when weighing the logistics of the situation (violence, manpower, cost to the city, etc.) and the charges against the group (misdemeanor trespassing). What’s more is that the city police department’s refusal to comply with the orders given by the governor and mayor were supported by the state police force. A representative of the New York State Police even commented to the Albany Times Union newspaper that “police know policing, not the governor and not the mayor.”

The refusal to carry out orders for clearing the occupancy is, of course, unprecedented. I, for one, feel that Chief Korkoff should be commended for his ability to stand up for what he believed was both right and beneficial to his city. His valor not only protected the occupants and their rights, the citizens of Albany, and his officers, but it also had several other beneficial upshots. The first is that, since it was clear the city had no recourse otherwise, a meeting with the occupants was held to iron out agreements regarding their stay. This, in turn, opened the lines of peaceful and respectful communication between the two groups, fostering positive feelings on both sides. Additionally, it functions as an example for police forces and local governments in other cities as a possible course of action in dealing with the Occupy camps in their areas. Though many police forces are taking their lessons from the pages of the now infamous Oakland Police Department, they should be taking them from the quiet capital of Albany. Police have all too often been the mechanism of violence when they should in fact be the last defense against it. Above all of this, however, what I like best is the subtle reminder that the constitutional right of the people to assemble cannot and should not be trumped by state or local restrictions on the use of public space. Now, here’s an idea we can build upon.

A lawyer interviewed recently by Keith Olbermann pointed out that restrictions on the use of public spaces create a unique problem when discussing our right to peaceable assembly. These restrictions are not technically law as they are not passed by legislative branches of government, but rather written and enforced by executive rule. They are ordinances, and though you can be arrested for violating them, the arrests are essentially optional – something we know to be true because of the selective enforcement we have seen over the last several years. That aside, if the local law intends to uphold these ordinances, the question next becomes, “If not here then where?”

I’m certain that when our founding fathers (it freaks me out, by the way, when they are referred to as The Architects; that’s way too Orwell/Huxley for me) wrote our right to peaceable assembly into blessed existence there was plenty of open space and even a fervor about the very idea that created tolerance to things like trampled bushes (my apologies to the Rose Kennedy Conservancy). Today, however, our culture and population have created a very different landscape for political assembly, literally. Every tiny space is ruled over by some group, public or private. Our cities have become hulking establishments of metal and concrete with narrow streets and narrower sidewalks. Our city parks and plazas are home to the homeless and lunch break vacation spots to the metropolitans. Places once sacred because of the great liberties conceived and signed there are now merely temporary parking for coffee sucking suits and photo-ops for passing tourist groups, people living out some momentary appreciation for freedoms they don’t work to maintain or see vanishing from their lives.

At some point, cities need to be reminded that their municipal ordinances do not trump your constitutional rights. And at many points, we all need to be reminded what these spaces – in each city selected for profundity of location and visibility to the offices on high – were really intended for. They were given to us for this very purpose: for us to come together and enjoy our American freedoms.

In Nashville, recent developments have the state and local officials on the ropes as Occupy Nashville was awarded a restraining order against Tennessee Governor Bill Haslam and other city officials, and a lawsuit is being assembled regarding the attempted infringement on the occupants’ first amendment rights. The case will be huge for the visibility and morale of the movement, but even Nashville’s progress came at the barrel of gun – or, in this case, the butt of a nightstick.

If only the story of Albany was as loud in the ears and as clear in the eyes of Americans as the nightly reports of mayhem and brutality. If only an honorable police chief making comments from a press conference was as visually stimulating (and hence newsworthy by our media standards) as grey clouds of chemical weapons being dispersed on scattering civilians wearing bandanas over their faces. If only military contractors pushed valor and humility as hard as they pushed nonlethal weapons when gearing up our nation’s police forces.

Though the reality for most occupancies is less than what it should be, and what we know now it could be, it only makes the movements commitment to remain peaceful even more important, especially when under attack. This is one final and beautiful lesson we learn from Albany. In peace, more things are possible. Stay peaceful, campers… And thank you, Albany.

Oakland Raiders

/ JillArcangela / Leave a comment

As I am writing this, I am listening to a live stream of the police raid of Occupy Oakland’s camp.  This raid is now in its 14th hour.  My stomach is turning.  I can taste adrenaline in my mouth, and I am just outside of Philadelphia, more than 2,800 miles away.  Police are now making a notification of pending arrests; choppers are overhead and a sonic cannon is being set-up.

When I woke up this morning, I heard about the raid and contacted Mayor Jean Quan’s office to plead she call it off.  Apparently, my plea and those of countless others, I’m sure, fell on deaf ears.  Whatever Mayor Quan’s career aspirations are, they clearly do not require winning over the people of Oakland.

The fight is intensifying with every moment that I write.  The knot in my stomach grows tighter and more acidic.

I am not sure why a city as close to economic disaster as Oakland is would use its resources and spend its money to break up a peaceful assembly.  I am even more perplexed by the thinking of the Mayor and her administrators in regards to addressing said assembly.  The brutality of this eviction, the lack of communication with Occupy members, and the blatant disrespect for the constitutional rights of all American citizens is only the surface of the poor judgment that lies at the heart of this attack.  The deeper failing lies in the very idea that this single attack, a vile waste of dwindling resources in the collapsing city of Oakland, will put an end to a local branch of a movement that has reached all six inhabited continents and that gains power and visibility every day.  The decision to mount this attack against a peaceful, constitutional assembly which is ultimately backed by millions of people worldwide is short-sighted and plainly moronic.  It is cutting a head off of Hydra.

By now, the park has been gassed and cleared in Oakland, but where did they go?  They went into the streets, and they did so in greater number.  Tomorrow, the camp will be back, the march will be bigger, and the message will be louder.  This movement isn’t going away, and attacking it will only make is stronger.  Arrestees become heroes.  Cuff marks become war wounds.  Tear gas becomes the wind of change.

My writing has been repeatedly interrupted by visual checks on the streaming video and surfing to find new feeds.  I am updating Twitter every few minutes.  The news grows more and more shocking.  An aerial feed of Oakland’s remaining occupants who took to the streets and reassembled at another location was cut off moments before police launched pepperballs at that crowd.  In a desperate search to find more information, I refresh my Twitter again to learn that two more cities have come under attack.  I am sick.

With no more video to follow, I turn to the television.  Unable to get localized coverage of the events, which undoubtedly will be only momentary snips of video and unassertive comments on the attacks, I find nothing; and I mean nothing.  The national news coverage struggles to find things to cover in their attempts to ignore the growing Occupy movement: a series of political candidates shaking hands with the people they will knife in the back the moment they are in office; the exhausted, tabloid-esque coverage of Michael Jackson’s doctor who – SURPRISE! – was really just a pharmaceutical drug dealer; the financial double-talk of an investing advisor masking the truth of our economic ruin with literal bells and whistles.  Not a peep about the brutal attacks taking place on an increasing number of cities.

As the feed dies, my ability to watch comes to a close, but it doesn’t matter.  I know how this night ends.  Some are arrested, some are treated for wounds, and some seek shelter.  All reassemble.  It won’t be long – a day at most – before the tents are up, the people are back, and the marching begins again.  Even as I write this, I hear a voice breaks through.  Clicking over to my internet browser, I discover a feed that had been cut off streaming again.  The pixelated image reveals a line of officers with riot shields and a line of “movers” (I refuse to call them “protesters” – see Protest Is For Pansies) standing before them, still fighting in what is now hour 17.  Believe me when I say this, Mayor Quan – and all those who attempt to crush this movement under the boots of oppression, they will still be there tomorrow and the day after and the day after that and all the days it takes to make this right.

 

Note: While all this was transpiring, my father – a brilliant man who is both sympathetic to the movement and a retiree of the NYPD – sent me an article about the Albany Police Department in upstate New York.  The officers of the department refused to follow the commands of local officials to evict the Occupy campers in their city.  I have not read the article yet, but will and promise to write about it soon.  This is notable, commendable, and wise.  During the Nuremburg Trails, obeying orders was not a reasonable excuse for carrying out acts against citizens that were morally divergent or even questionable… something the officers of forces around the globe might want to keep in mind.

Victory and Challenge

/ JillArcangela / 2 Comments

Students of history know that every war is comprised of battles.  Some you win, and some you lose.  Ultimately, the side that wins the most battles, the biggest battles, the most important battles, is the side that wins the war.  We will keep returning to history as a learning tool throughout my posts, as there is no better teacher.  For now, and in good form, we’ll start with the most basic of lessons: Winning battles wins wars.

 

The movement reveled this week in a handful of early victories that are both compelling and critical.  While the media is attempting to ignore us, except for the occasional local news fluff and the oral diarrhea that has come to characterize the dramatic Right, we continue to make our presence heard and attract the eyes of the world.  I suppose you could say that this fact is a glimmer of a pending victory over a reluctant corporate media, but we cannot rely on these networks nor deem it necessary to win that battle.  The battles we can and should win are those that bring closer the collective human conscious, the non-televised reality of the occupancies, and the people outside of them.  Victoriously, these are the battles already being won.

This week a 92-year-old Pete Seeger marched and sang with Occupy Wall Street.  Goldman Sachs pulled both its donation and its presence from a fundraiser for a local credit union in Manhattan when it was announced that OWS was being honored at the function.  Eric Cantor cancelled an appearance scheduled at the prestigious Wharton School of Business, a college of the University of Pennsylvania, because the public audience threatened to consist of Occupy Philly’s successful student walk-out which showed up at Wharton’s front door.  Occupy Houston managed to reroute a march after police tried to lead them down a desolate side street, forcing police to cooperate with them and bringing their march into more visible areas without anyone getting arrested (or run over).  All of these notable events come in addition to the nightly victories won over police and local governments that repeatedly attempt to evict you from your camps.

These things, no matter how small the media blips, are victories for our movement.  While large victories make headway for our cause, small victories are the ones we build upon.  They keep you in the news, even if only for a moment, reminding people outside of your physical sightlines that you are there, day after day, night after night.  Most importantly, these victories are the basis for morale that inspires you into your next action and keeps you warm in a cold base camp.  Every inch you gain, every new vote of support, every night the camps survive, and every time the elitists snub the movement, you win.

With each win, you return to your humble and beautiful collection of tents and allies with even more hope and determination.  Warmed and fueled by the light of your own fire, you stand ready for the nightly eviction notice and the dawn of tomorrow, which you will surely live to see.  The daily victories may be small, but they are battles won on the path to true and complete triumph.

The future of this movement is still uncertain.  There are many challenges that lie ahead.  There is a future that cannot be predicted.  There are problems we have not yet imagined.  There is the undeniable reality that as we progress, winning battles and overcoming obstacles, the counterattacks will be planned in matched intensity.  The further we march across their field, the more vicious their mechanisms will become and the more brutal our fight for success.  The meanest faces of resistance to our revolution have yet to be seen.  The most difficult days lay ahead, and they are not just comprised of nightstick engagements and wafting clouds of chili powder.  They are environmental as well as political.

The winter is coming to many of these occupied cities.  The cold will be long, and the snow will seem relentless.  As the fights heat up, the camps will plunge into frigidity, bringing you to the true test of your dedication.  As you huddle in, you will come to face a thing within you that will become the greatest battle of your occupancy and probably your life.  You will come to the real fight – the one with yourself.  The winter will seem an allegory for the battle both within and without, but survive it and the history you will write will be someone else’s learning tool.  As is true for the many victories you revel in at this moment, those ahead will reward you with a supreme strength in character and, hence, confidence.  In the meantime, however, arm yourself.

The enlivening glow that will keep you warm in those toughest times is ample at your fingertips today.  Bottle this sensation.  Gaze upward and take it all in.  Remember each moment of revelry and awe and love for your movement as a series of sensations.  Capture the details of these inspired times, without failing to notice the true beauty of your strength and unity, and store them in your heart and mind.  These victories, these moments will keep you warm – burning, in fact, and ready for what comes.

As you climb closer to your goal, the challenges will get harder and more frequent – making your celebrations shorter lived and longer between.  You will not get too many moments like these, in which to revel in small victories for long periods.  However, as the path becomes harder and the fights more vicious, you will know that your goal is that much closer… And just imagine what that victory is going to feel like.

Who Are “We?”

/ JillArcangela / 2 Comments

The Declaration of Independence starts with it.  It is chanted in the street.  It is called out repeatedly in the general assemblies.  It is the position from which millions speak these days.  It is “we.”  Our uses of the word “we” give us a sense of solidarity, and they enable us to pull people into the streets for a march, into the camps for a peek, and into the GAs for an education.  However, with camp life centered on its own occupants and activities, with supporters from outside the occupancies seeing mostly tweets and posts, and with the talking heads of the Right criticizing the human fabric of this movement while the Left remains largely silent, the question can be raised, “Who are ‘we’ exactly?”

“We, the people…” is a title bestowed upon us with great honor by the first among us to rise against powers that attempted to exploit our labor and natural resources, tax the working class without remuneration, and endow the wealthy and connected, all while ignoring the needs of the people.  More than two centuries later, we find ourselves in colonial shoes, and the reference to our declaration doctrine is empowering on the lips and to the ears.  It reminds us that we were here before, and it rallies us to rise and defeat those tyrannical and oppressive forces again.  It gives “we” – the plural pronoun that names us – a singular designation: the people.  It is an identity based in unity, all of us together as one.

We are the 99%.  Even though it is more symbolic than statistical (especially when you consider the upper-middle class who foolishly and arrogantly align themselves with the Billionaire Boys Club to which they will never truly belong – but that’s another post), the statement is meaningful and powerful.  Most importantly, it is accurate in distinguishing the opposing 1%, the real target of our frustration – regardless of what Fox News tells the nervous and miseducated upper-middle who are installing security cameras at their McMansions and crouching protectively over their Beamers.

March chants like “we won’t take it anymore” and the use of the word “we” in addressing the group during GAs give us a sense of union, reminding us constantly that this isn’t the time or place for the I-statements we were encouraged to use as children struggling to vocalize our emotions.  Ironically, for all that we were taught, it is not “I” that helps us confront our fears and express our preferences anymore.  Our frustrations are universal, and our emotions are shared by millions.  Speaking in the first person suddenly seems limited and short-sighted.  Turning on the television to survey the opposition reinforces the antiquity and self-centered sound of “I” in the context of our current human and environmental climate.  We cringe as they bang their fists on the desktops, regurgitating the proclamations of egotism and entitlement: I worked for what I have.  I pay enough taxes.  I shouldn’t have to pay the bills of the lazy and the inept.

Barked between their corporative and megalomaniacal talking points are blips of what they think of us, who they think “we” are.  According to them, we are Socialists.  We are unemployed because we are lazy or because we didn’t work as hard as they did.  We are inconsequential, confused and moronic, disorganized and doomed, a passing trend of protest from a spoiled and savage group of hippie youth who are looking for the next handout.  We know that we are none of these things, but still the question pleads an answer.  Who are “we”?

We are artists, teachers, writers, strategists, analyzers, techies, farmers, foodies, medics, organizers, philosophers, intellectuals, laborers, spiritualists, scientists, and legalists.  We are mothers, fathers, sisters, brother, husbands, wives, and children.  We are those seeking platforms and those seeking enlightenment.  We are those who wish to speak and those who wish to listen.  We are the young, the old, and the in between.  We are the thinkers, dreamers, and doers.  We are a representative sample of the entire human population.  We are everything we need to be to change the world.  We are hope.  We are vengeance.  We are calm, quiet justice – inevitable and liberating.  We are individuals banned together by common plight and common goals.  We are crowds of thousands occupying an ever-growing number of cities worldwide.  We are mankind, standing together until the last glass castle falls.  We are the people of the world… And we are mad as hell.

*If you would like a visual perspective of how big this movement really is, please see this collection of photos as posted by The Atlantic.  It’s truly awe-inspiring how massive we are, and hence, how powerful.  (http://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2011/10/occupy-wall-street-spreads-worldwide/100171/)

Protest Is For Pansies

/ JillArcangela / 2 Comments

There is a lot of talk, conjecture – really, about what is happening on the streets of cities all over the world.  The critics, mostly those who stand to lose and their media marionettes, spout a lot of misinformation, half-truths, and whole lies in an effort to discredit you, your intelligence, your efforts, and your mission.  We know that this is simply weak propaganda.  It is an attempt to convince those who do not understand what is happening that nothing is happening.  It aims to sway those who may be on the fence about where they stand or what they believe in their favor, to affirm for them that there is no future other than the one that they have written.  They say a lot of insulting and inflammatory things in their insolent postulations, but none are as insulting as their repeated use of the “protest.”

This is not a “protest.”  Allow me to explain.

By definition, a protest is “an expression or declaration of objection, disapproval, or dissent, often in opposition to something a person is powerless to prevent or avoid.”  We are not engaging in a “protest” because this is not simply an expression of our disapproval; nor are we “powerless to prevent or avoid” the fate that would be ours if we were merely protesting.

We are, by definition, a “movement.”  We are “a group of people working together to achieve a political goal.”  For us, however, the definition of our movement is even deeper than this.  This is not just about achieving a political goal.  This is about survival, reform, and dare I say, revolution.

Our United States government has been hijacked by a corruptive, corrosive force that aims to use financial means to enslave the population.  The advance is fierce, and what’s more, it is blatant.  The corporate agenda for political manipulation and societal control has been underway for more than a century.  Before Carter lectured us on materialistic values; before Eisenhower warned us about the Military Industrial Complex; before Teddy Roosevelt busted the trusts; Abraham Lincoln warned us about corporations having been “enthroned and an era of corruption in high places” to follow.  He told us “the money power of the country would endeavor to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”

While we may not have heeded the warnings of countless individuals over the course of our history, we see now that we have reached the tipping point.  We have come to a time when these corporations are so brazen, their future so secure, they do little to even veil their unscrupulous manipulations of politicians and citizens alike.  Big business lobbies for legal change, spending billions of dollars to fund bills that will change the construct of our political, legal, and economic systems to favor their business interests.  They use campaign contributions, which without term limits translates to purchasing long-term positions in Congress, to support candidates that will best serve their corporate agenda through regulation, deregulation, voting for or against bills, and the awarding of contracts.  They forge conglomerates, taking over media networks, to create a means of societal control, feeding the public everything from tainted information about political, environmental, and financial conditions to hyping the latest craze for the purpose of increasing their revenue and distracting us with material needs and celebrity drama.

If we do not succeed in our mission to awaken the world to the injustices committed against humanity by these zombie-like, non-human entities and to stop them in their relentless pursuit of consumption, we will all be crushed under their impending system of control.

We cannot and will not allow our lives to be determined by the fluctuations of numbers scrolling across a ticker board.  We will not permit a handful of insatiable parasites to feed on the blood, sweat, and tears of those forced by economic and political manipulations into any version of indentured servitude.  We will not tolerate any practice by business or government that attempts to promote a neo-feudalistic society in which a person’s future is determined at birth by his lineage or economic status.  We will not forsake the liberties, freedoms, and rights bequeathed to us by our forefathers in contracts written in earnest and paid for with the blood of generations of Americans soldiers.  We will not turn a blind eye to the decimation of basic human rights or the exploitation of the human will to work for survival.  We will not set aside our hopes and dreams to work for the fortunes of others.  We will not forgo our needs so that others can live out their every whim.  And, for the love of mankind and all that is good in the world, WE WILL NOT PROTEST.

We are more than protesters.  We are revolutionaries.  We are the future of this nation, the future of the world.  And if we think we are going to have any future other than to buzz around in circles, worker bees taking only their allotted share and functioning under the stern law of the few who rule, we must be ready to rise against any and all challenges.  We must do more than protest.  We must push, advance, agitate, march, propel, shift, shove, and force.

We are a movement… a group of people working together to change the world, to bring the power back to the people, to shape a future in which we can be truly free.  We are not protesting.  We are moving.

The Ants Go Marching

/ JillArcangela / Leave a comment

“Mic check!”

“MIC CHECK!”

“Mic check!”

“MIC CHECK!”

And just like that, my heart is pounding.  A cold gust of wind whips the excitement around the crowd and registers more like electricity on my skin than it does the chilly foreshadowing of a coming winter.  The crowd closes in a little as a reverse echo, quiet than loud, reminds us of the things we know and informs us of the changes.  Then, the closing remarks, each phrase repeated by the shouting crowd, “We will be peaceful… …and non-violent…  …We will respect… …all property… …both public and private…  …And above all,…”

As I shout these words, I reflect on the statements I have made.  I think about how they are so important to the health, safety, and success of this movement.  I think about the acts of vandalism and public indecency, even defecation, which are being played up by those who attempt to discredit this movement and should never have happened.  A mix of hope and sadness color a whirlwind of thoughts, so many in a split second, and then a cheer rises from the crowd – a hooting, hollering response to the final words in our pledge, “WE WILL BE LOUD!”

I am pulled back from the momentary mental flood – the head plague of all writers – into this moment, this place, these people, this march.  Another cold wind forces its way through the crowd, supercharging the surface of my skin.  The beat of a single drum begins somewhere near what is about to be the front, and the movement moves.

It is hard for me to believe that this is the first time I’ve ever done this.  I feel nervous, almost self-conscious, and the sound of my own voice yelling is strange and uncomfortable, but I press on.  As the group moves further from the starting point, I have the feeling of being in a parade, something I have done.  I notice the people on the sidewalks looking at us, some smiling, some cheering, others scowling, and many taking pictures.  I resist the temptation to smile and wave like a half-witted beauty queen atop a moving pink-and-white iced wooden cupcake.  I refocus on the people ahead of me, and I continue to yell even though I feel a bit silly.  I know that what I’m doing matters, that it has to be done, and if I am unwilling to do it than I do not deserve to benefit from its efforts.  I think about how many people know they will feel as I do at this moment, and I wonder how many of them aren’t here for that reason.  I credit myself for stepping beyond my shallow suburban comfort zone, and by the time the group turns the first corner, so do I.

The group is yelling things like “Banks got bailed out, we got sold out” and “no representation without taxation.”  I believe what I am saying.  I’m settling in.  I notice that the crowd is swelling, putting my middle position much further from the front and back than I was when we started only a few short blocks ago.  Another high-voltage breeze pushes through the crowd.  Signs held high wiggle as their bearers struggle to control them.  The wind sweeps upward, carrying our voices high along the shiny walls that narrow the sky above us.  I follow our voices with my eyes, realizing that the places to which our cries sore are the parapets of the glass castles in which our tyrannical adversaries hide, enthroning themselves with political manipulations and drenching themselves in the thick rewards of their loathsome, unscrupulous behaviors.  I yell louder.

I find myself gaining momentum as the march presses on.  The crowd in yelling, “We are the 99%.”  An echo within the group is bouncing back, “and so are YOU!”  The ones in the secondary call are making eye contact and pointing directly at specific people who watch from the sidewalk.  “Spectators” pops into my mind.  I remember being told once that life is not a spectator sport.  This, I realize, is why I am here.  It is also why, against my husband’s wishes, I have my two-year-old on my back.*  I want him to learn participation the same way he learned speaking and eating, by just doing it all his life.  I suddenly feel a gratitude I’ve never felt before, gratitude for the very thing that got me in most of the trouble I’d been in during my life thus far: the wing-walker gene.  It is the little thing in my brain that makes me able to take chances without fear; a sensible nervousness and a bit of looking before leaping, sure – but not fear, never fear.

In my moment of appreciation, I have again turned my face skyward, and this time I notice people in the windows.  Some, in the lower levels, are pumping their fists in the air.  In the higher windows, they are tight-lipped with folded arms, expressionless except from a furrowed brow.  There they are.  They are just men, I hear myself thinking above my now throat-straining shouts, men with jobs that pay for the food on their table… and the Land Rover, but ok – there’s no crime in owning an expensive car or even an expensive yacht, for that matter.  It is the job at which they work that bothers me, as their life’s work has become the business of taking the food off my table and a future of opportunity from the 30 pound promise on my back.  What will his world be like if I don’t march?  And yell?  And throw my fist in the air?

The group stops here, and a girl with a bullhorn spouts off disgraceful facts about the companies housed in these lofty offices.  I repeat her calls with a sense of disgust growing in my stomach.  I watch the windows as I yell.  They are looking back from high above the city streets, from behind their glass ramparts, scowling faces and silken ties.  To them, we look now the same way they always see us, small and insignificant, like ants scouting for and surviving on their crumbs.  They have that part right, at least.  We are, indeed, like ants.

Ants, an army of individuals who alone seem quite puny, but I have never opened a cupboard door to find an army of ants devouring the sticky dripping of my honey pot without that distinct “oh, shit” moment.  The thing about ants, you see, is that they don’t have to be big because they come by the thousands.  They are capable of moving things hundreds of times larger than the body mass of their entire colony, the human equivalent of moving mountains.  They are resilient and relentless, focused and cooperative.  They work together to pick apart things that they never dream of approaching alone, and with time and patience there is nothing they cannot tear down.  When ants are marching, it is for the purpose of their survival.  They head for the target, without breaking their line, without faltering at all, and they attack their mission with tireless dedication until the work is done.  They are, for all intents and purposes, unstoppable; and though they seem small from above, they are, in the grander scheme of things, a force to be reckoned with

Again, I come back to where I am.  Feet planted firmly on the ground, son on my back, fist in the air, hearing myself chanting in unison with the people who also had the courage to be in this place in history.  “…AND WE WON’T TAKE IT ANYMORE!”  A huge cheer erupts from the now enormous crowd.  Again, the beat of a drum, and we continue of our path.  The ants are marching.

* A note of thanks to Occupy Philly, the Philadelphia Police Department, and the Office of Mayor Michael Nutter for making our city’s occupation safe, so that I could experience this day and share it with my son.