Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Mark Adams

Occupy Christmas, December 25, 2011, Liberty Square
Photo: Stacy Lanyon


I would say that I’ve always kinda known that something was wrong in the world, ever since I was a little child. I grew up in Dubai. I spent a number of years there, and I wasn’t a citizen of that nation, so I grew up under oppression from the state and also from the police. I always had a feeling that kind of repression was going on all around the world and that something needed to be done, but I never knew how to plug in, so my days at college I would try to join any sort of a rally or protest and try to change the system. After the Arab Spring had taken off, I was hoping that something would happen here, so when the Madison, Wisconsin thing came and went, I was like, "Wow, I wish I could have been there," but when Occupy Wall Street came and stayed, I knew it was time for me to plug in and just leave everything to be a part of the movement.

I think Occupy Wall Street is important because there needs to be change. Right now, the system we have is corporations make a lot of money off of wars, off of prisons, and they pretty much affect the policy of the government, and it’s not just here. It’s overseas as well.  You could call it Capitalism. You could call it whatever, but that’s just the way of the world, and I think that needs to change. That is why it’s so important because we are trying to change the entire system to the point where everybody is following a more democratic process, which is not the current system. 

I want a system where people aren't being oppressed by the state, where people make their own decisions and are not sending money to defense contractors for wars. Instead, that money is being used at home for free education, free college, free health care. There is no reason why countries like Sweden and Germany can have free colleges and free health care, and we can’t. I think that’s why that change needs to come, change as far as social services, change in attitudes, change in dialogue. I think there needs to be change all over.

I would like to see a form of direct democracy, consensus based decision making happening on the local level. I would not like to see a state or federal government making decisions. Rather, I would like to see small communities of maybe a couple hundred people using the form of general assembly, which is the consensus based horizontal movement process, to make decisions so that all voices are heard and nobody is left out. This would ensure that all marginalized voices and all minorities and all races and all colors are represented in the decision making. I don't see that happening in a big city of 8 million people. Ideally, I would like to see people move out of the cities, go out in the country, go onto land. This is a huge country. I've been all over this country, and there is so much open land. Small communities of people could use that process to make decisions.

I'd also like to see the elimination of currency. That way, it becomes about producing as a community. We are all brothers and sisters. We are all comrades, and we produce for a need, not for greed. When we need food, all of us get together, and we grow food, and we share that food with everyone else without the thought of profit. If we need clothes, we all get together and we make clothes. If we need medicine, we all get together and we make medicine. We make everything for everybody. That is what I would like to see come out of this movement and out of the world.

It can’t just be about America. It can’t just be about borders. It has to be about breaking down the borders in people’s minds that separate people based on race and religion. It also has to be about breaking down physical borders, so that as human beings, as animals in this world, we have the freedom to move about anywhere without somebody saying, “Oh this is your passport, so you can’t come into this country, or you’re a citizen of that country, so you can’t come into my border."  We go wherever we want. We go into these communities. We plug in. We become productive members of society, and all of the communities coordinate with each other, but there is no overlapping government. There is no authority over them. There is no police or military to oppress them. There is no punishment. Instead, there is a dialogue, so when somebody does something wrong, you try and get to the core of it because when somebody does something wrong, it is a mental problem, and you need to address that instead of exclude them. I believe in inclusion. I don’t believe in exclusion. 

I think that would be the perfect society in my mind where everybody has the right to health care, the right to shelter, the right to food and medicine, and there is no, "This is mine. This is yours." You look at something and you’re like, "This is ours," and we all share, and there is no concept of profit.

 Interview by Stacy Lanyon
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