Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Elizabeth Arce

Fight Back Bank of America, March 15, 2012
Photo: Stacy Lanyon

What drew me to Occupy Wall Street was seeing people get together to create and share ideas. That's a really beautiful concept to me. Also, I feel like we’ve created an environment where people can feel comfortable to be who they are. People feel comfortable being and creating and sharing ideas, and I think that’s something that doesn't exist enough in this world, so that’s really nice to see.

I think it’s so important because we are sharing and creating ideas, and people are questioning their reality and looking at their life and realizing that this is the way things were before we were even born, and we’ve accepted this, and we don’t have to accept this. We can question it. We can think about it, and we can hopefully work to change it. Much of this was decided before we were born, so why do we have to live by it? I think people are questioning that a lot more than they used to.

I hope it will bring a world where people can make their own decisions about their own lives, so people can feel like they don’t have to struggle to exist. That’s what I want, and that’s a very vague thing, and I mean it to be vague because every single person wants a different thing in this life, and we can work together to find common ground. I’m hoping that people can build something where they can feel free to exist. A lot of people accept conventional views and think, “Alright, I have to get a job, and I have to make money, and I have to pay the rent, and I have to get married, and I have to have kids, and I have to go to college somewhere in there too." It doesn’t have to be that way. I hope people can feel empowered to bring about their own worlds. I hope we can create a world together of what we all really want. 

 You can view Elizabeth's livestream at http://www.ustream.tv/occupymusician. 
Interview by Stacy Lanyon
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