Summer Disobedience School, June, 2, 2012
Photo: Stacy Lanyon
Some friends brought me down to Zuccotti Park in October. I hadn’t really watched the news much, so I didn’t know what to expect. I was a little skeptical. I went to Washington Square Park first before I got to Zuccotti because there was a general assembly there. I didn’t know what a general assembly was. I just saw a thousand people doing the people’s mic, and I was like, “Wow, what is this?” Immediately, I was having conversations with people about the Federal Reserve and the private central banking system and the derivatives based financial system and all this"weird" stuff that I had talked to people about before this, and people had thought I was crazy. My first thought was, “Wow, there are crazy people just like me.” I immediately felt that this is where I wanted to be. I was instantly drawn to it, as soon as we got to Washington Square Park. Eventually, we marched to Zuccotti. As soon as we got there, I saw all of the people, signs and banners. It was before the tents. It was just tarps at the time. It was amazing. I’ve been involved with Occupy as much as I can ever since. It’s changed my life. It’s changed a lot of people’s lives. I think it’s an amazing thing.
Occupy Wall Street and the Occupy Movement is so important because, to me, I feel like there is a dog eat dog kind of mentality that Americans have in this country that is unsustainable to say the least. Blind consumerism and ever broadening corporate rule is out of control. Look, we’re in the middle of Manhattan. If you look around, you can see all this marketing, and you can see the banks. There are so many banks. Where I live, there are just banks, pawn shops and drugstores. Those are the major businesses that are opening on Long Island. It’s important that people come together and we start our own economy or our own culture to show that the true power is with us, the average American. The problem is that the majority of the "99%" don't know it or believe it yet. The "1%" will only have power if we continue to feed that power. I think that the more that we withdraw from that and help each other out, the more that we try to pursue a sustainable economy as far as keeping money and keeping resources within a community rather than within "the corporation," the more power we will have. I’m a big fan of a community based economy, maybe a bartering system or co-ops and stuff like that.
Occupy Wall Street is so important to me because I’ve never felt more a part of something. What’s great about Occupy Wall Street is that we cover a lot of issues. We have a diversity of tactics, and we’re a diverse bunch of people coming from all over. I was just in Chicago for the NATO protests, and I went to DC for Occupy Congress. If it wasn’t for Occupy I don’t think I’d be doing half of the stuff that I’ve been doing. It has fundamentally changed the way that I think.
What kind of world do I hope it will help bring about? “Another world is possible.” That’s what kind of world, another one. I’m not really sure. Anyone but this one because it’s just not working. It’s not working. I know many have tried before us. The movement is only 8 months old. On a really deep level, I’ve been changed a lot. I think if more people can experience that and put away their biases and prejudices towards Occupy Wall Street without actually coming and experiencing it, they would see a change in them as well. A lot of people support it, but not a lot of people participate.
My fantasy would be for the whole system to collapse and a Utopian society rise from the ashes like a phoenix. That’s some really far out stuff, I know, but that's my vision. I want a society that helps people rather than hinders them. That’s what I’d like to see because the way society is now, the way the economy is now, the way it’s geared, it’s always an uphill battle. I know a lot of people who are in a lot of trouble financially, most not through their own fault. Something has to change. Change will happen whether you are a part of it or not. I’d rather be a part of it. I want to be at the forefront of the change to build a new world.
Interview by Stacy Lanyon
http://buildingcompassionthroughaction.blogspot.com/
https://www.facebook.com/stacylanyon
https://instagram.com/stacylanyon/
https://twitter.com/StacyLanyon
http://stacylanyon.com/
Occupy Wall Street and the Occupy Movement is so important because, to me, I feel like there is a dog eat dog kind of mentality that Americans have in this country that is unsustainable to say the least. Blind consumerism and ever broadening corporate rule is out of control. Look, we’re in the middle of Manhattan. If you look around, you can see all this marketing, and you can see the banks. There are so many banks. Where I live, there are just banks, pawn shops and drugstores. Those are the major businesses that are opening on Long Island. It’s important that people come together and we start our own economy or our own culture to show that the true power is with us, the average American. The problem is that the majority of the "99%" don't know it or believe it yet. The "1%" will only have power if we continue to feed that power. I think that the more that we withdraw from that and help each other out, the more that we try to pursue a sustainable economy as far as keeping money and keeping resources within a community rather than within "the corporation," the more power we will have. I’m a big fan of a community based economy, maybe a bartering system or co-ops and stuff like that.
Occupy Wall Street is so important to me because I’ve never felt more a part of something. What’s great about Occupy Wall Street is that we cover a lot of issues. We have a diversity of tactics, and we’re a diverse bunch of people coming from all over. I was just in Chicago for the NATO protests, and I went to DC for Occupy Congress. If it wasn’t for Occupy I don’t think I’d be doing half of the stuff that I’ve been doing. It has fundamentally changed the way that I think.
What kind of world do I hope it will help bring about? “Another world is possible.” That’s what kind of world, another one. I’m not really sure. Anyone but this one because it’s just not working. It’s not working. I know many have tried before us. The movement is only 8 months old. On a really deep level, I’ve been changed a lot. I think if more people can experience that and put away their biases and prejudices towards Occupy Wall Street without actually coming and experiencing it, they would see a change in them as well. A lot of people support it, but not a lot of people participate.
My fantasy would be for the whole system to collapse and a Utopian society rise from the ashes like a phoenix. That’s some really far out stuff, I know, but that's my vision. I want a society that helps people rather than hinders them. That’s what I’d like to see because the way society is now, the way the economy is now, the way it’s geared, it’s always an uphill battle. I know a lot of people who are in a lot of trouble financially, most not through their own fault. Something has to change. Change will happen whether you are a part of it or not. I’d rather be a part of it. I want to be at the forefront of the change to build a new world.
Interview by Stacy Lanyon
http://buildingcompassionthroughaction.blogspot.com/
https://www.facebook.com/stacylanyon
https://instagram.com/stacylanyon/
https://twitter.com/StacyLanyon
http://stacylanyon.com/