Photo: Stacy Lanyon
I’ve been a protester since the 70’s. After 2008 with the election
and the rise of the Tea Party, I was really looking for something, and then
Occupy came along. I’d been to Liberty a couple times before October 1st,
but it really was the Brooklyn Bridge arrests that made me feel like these were
my people. Ever since October 1st, I’ve been as dedicated as I could
be.
One of the first things I did when I joined Occupy was go to
a huge tea party convention on Staten Island that Newt Gingrich was speaking
at, and I mic checked him myself with 700 supporters screaming at
the top of their lungs at me. Several people followed me out and literally
threatened to beat me up for interrupting Gingrich. The reason I did it was
because this was at the point when Gingrich was saying that 9 year old kids in
poor schools should be cleaning toilets, and that really, really made me angry
as someone who grew up poor in New York City.
I Occupy for myself. I’m very selfish about wanting to express the ideas that are in my head. I created my “Angry Pacifist” sign back in Zuccotti when I was doodling with a bunch of kids. There was a crayon section, and I was just playing and having fun and thought, “Well, I might as well try and get my world view on a piece of cardboard.” I wanted to offer not just to outsiders but to occupiers themselves the idea that we are a non-violent movement and that we should stay non-violent. It gets harder and harder to do that, but pacifism is one of the wonders of the world. Demonstrating non-violence in the face of state violence shows that difference. The public understands who the victim is in that equation. When we are violent and they are violent, it almost seems like their force is justified to deal with our force. I call myself an aspirational anarchist. I love the idea that we can move to a system that is more equal, but I’m also 50, so my mind is very reformist now. I really think this is the time to make a move politically.
I Occupy for myself. I’m very selfish about wanting to express the ideas that are in my head. I created my “Angry Pacifist” sign back in Zuccotti when I was doodling with a bunch of kids. There was a crayon section, and I was just playing and having fun and thought, “Well, I might as well try and get my world view on a piece of cardboard.” I wanted to offer not just to outsiders but to occupiers themselves the idea that we are a non-violent movement and that we should stay non-violent. It gets harder and harder to do that, but pacifism is one of the wonders of the world. Demonstrating non-violence in the face of state violence shows that difference. The public understands who the victim is in that equation. When we are violent and they are violent, it almost seems like their force is justified to deal with our force. I call myself an aspirational anarchist. I love the idea that we can move to a system that is more equal, but I’m also 50, so my mind is very reformist now. I really think this is the time to make a move politically.
A part of Occupy that I love so much is that there
are these concrete things that people are doing -- Occupy the banks, Occupy
student debt. They are doing these very specific task driven things, which is awesome. Also, there’s this
broad cultural statement that Occupy is trying to make. Just like people lived
the fifties under Mccarthysm and all this repression, the the sixties was born
form that oppression. I think those eight years of George Bush were very
repressive and kind of scary. We were constantly being threatened that if we
didn’t go to war, nuclear arms would be unleashed against us. I think it was a
scarier time. It certainly was a more a repressive time after 9/11 to be
a protester here. I think that now we are offering this cultural alternative. That’s a beautiful thing that’s happening, just
this cultural shift from repressive to more open, and who knows where it will
end up.
Interview by Stacy Lanyon
http://buildingcompassionthroughaction.blogspot.com/
https://www.facebook.com/stacylanyon
https://instagram.com/stacylanyon/
https://twitter.com/StacyLanyon
http://stacylanyon.com/
Interview by Stacy Lanyon
http://buildingcompassionthroughaction.blogspot.com/
https://www.facebook.com/stacylanyon
https://instagram.com/stacylanyon/
https://twitter.com/StacyLanyon
http://stacylanyon.com/