Photo: Stacy Lanyon
I, actually, had prayed for Occupy. Earlier that year, I had
just finished working for the women's peace organization CODEPINK. I had
been working for them about seven years. I didn’t really know how I wanted to
direct my activist energy after that because it had been my passion—doing peace
organizing—but it had also been my job, so it was everything. I was figuring out what else I wanted to do in the world. In the anti-war movement, we had talked about the different pillars
of war and militarism and money being one of them. I remember having this
really clear thought as I was walking down to the street here in
Manhattan. I really wanted to get at the heart of capitalism, of this
culture of capitalism. Because I had distanced myself somewhat from CODEPINK, I didn’t
really have an activist organizing community at that moment. I was looking for
something new. I remember just in that way praying for Occupy.
In the summer of 2010, a friend of mine who's an astrologer had said, “I’m really telling you this because you’re an activist, and you’ll get it. At the end of next summer, it’s going to be really radical, as in upheaval of capitalism radical." So I had all of these things in my mind. I was slightly repelled at first because we had just been down organizing on Wall Street for the bailout for the past year. I had myself been down on Wall Street for weeks at a time. I was wearing some crazy wolf mask that was supposed to be a fox. We had mass marches around the bailout, and it didn’t seem to do anything. Then, someone from a CODEPINK meeting was all, “Oh yeah, here’s this thing from Adbusters. They’re calling for people to go down to Wall Street." I was like, “On a Saturday? That’s so dumb.” Then, I ended up being out of town for the beginning, and by the time I got back, my parents were coming into town, so the first several weeks of Occupy, I would just hear about it.
I went down at the beginning of October, and I was like, “Okay, now what can I do?” My first impression was that it looked like fun. It looked like work. It was this whole cluster of people sitting over their laptops and typing in the center and other people just walking around talking. There were a lot of people I knew and definitely people I didn’t know. It was funny trying to figure it out as someone who had some experience organizing. I had been doing communications work for many years. I'd talk to folks and ask people how I could help, and everyone was like, “Just come and be in the park.” I guess for me at that point, being such a doer, I was like, “Okay, I can be at the park, but I also have skills. I can do things. I can help.” I started to ask if there was a communications team or a PR team because I knew that those were really solid skills that I had, and I had lots of contact in New York. It took a while to figure out where those people were because no one wanted to tell me. They wanted me to be at the park first to get a feel of it.
I eventually found out where folks were meeting, and I showed up at a PR meeting. That’s where I went most days. They were meeting three times a day, every day. I don’t know if I went to all three meeting every day, but I went to at least one meeting a day for months and months. We were always so busy in the PR group. We did a lot of different things. When I started, we were a pretty robust group of about thirty. We interfaced with the media. There was an email inbox. There were several phones, and then we turned it all into a Google phone because we were trying to make the access as easy as possible, as opposed to it being how it had been where there were a handful of gatekeepers. And of course there was the press table that someone was stationed at every day when the park was still occupied. They were there to just interface with the press, answer questions and make sure they were talking to organizers or activist. Our job was not to be a mouthpiece for Occupy or the movement, but it was to make sure that inquiring reporters, of which there were many dozens and dozens of requests every day, talked to a variety of people who were involved in the movement.
As a communications person, what happens a lot of times in some activist organizing protests is that the members of the media will come out, and they will look for the craziest looking person, and they’ll go up and talk to that person, and that will frame their entire story, and eventually thousands upon thousands of people’s understanding of what was going on. This isn’t to belittle any particular person. It was just that our job was to make sure the media was getting the real gist of why we were there. If they wanted to talk in particular to a mother or someone from New Jersey who had been laid off, our job was to get a sense of who was available, who could talk to the press, who had great stories. Some people had great stories and had never talked to press, so we helped them get a little more media savvy, so that they felt comfortable telling their stories. We created databases of people who were willing to speak to the press, so we would be sending out calls all day long.
At one point, we were answering the general Occupy phone as well. I can’t even tell you how many times I had walked someone through how to use the interwebs. It was really wild. We had folks who went to other groups to ask what they were working on and if they wanted media training or action planning. The action planning for the smaller groups came a little later. We would do our best to try and provide skills training and shares and just to be a reference point. It was a huge amount of work to just find a contact person for each group, to even know which working groups there were, and to make sure that the interviews coming through weren’t going through just to the same five people. That’s probably ten percent of what we did. We wrote a lot of press releases and advisories, notes and friendly memos to members of the press before, during and after any action, so they’d get the talking points or the gist of why we were doing the action. Then, we provided support for other groups around the country who were doing Occupy related actions.
In the summer of 2010, a friend of mine who's an astrologer had said, “I’m really telling you this because you’re an activist, and you’ll get it. At the end of next summer, it’s going to be really radical, as in upheaval of capitalism radical." So I had all of these things in my mind. I was slightly repelled at first because we had just been down organizing on Wall Street for the bailout for the past year. I had myself been down on Wall Street for weeks at a time. I was wearing some crazy wolf mask that was supposed to be a fox. We had mass marches around the bailout, and it didn’t seem to do anything. Then, someone from a CODEPINK meeting was all, “Oh yeah, here’s this thing from Adbusters. They’re calling for people to go down to Wall Street." I was like, “On a Saturday? That’s so dumb.” Then, I ended up being out of town for the beginning, and by the time I got back, my parents were coming into town, so the first several weeks of Occupy, I would just hear about it.
I went down at the beginning of October, and I was like, “Okay, now what can I do?” My first impression was that it looked like fun. It looked like work. It was this whole cluster of people sitting over their laptops and typing in the center and other people just walking around talking. There were a lot of people I knew and definitely people I didn’t know. It was funny trying to figure it out as someone who had some experience organizing. I had been doing communications work for many years. I'd talk to folks and ask people how I could help, and everyone was like, “Just come and be in the park.” I guess for me at that point, being such a doer, I was like, “Okay, I can be at the park, but I also have skills. I can do things. I can help.” I started to ask if there was a communications team or a PR team because I knew that those were really solid skills that I had, and I had lots of contact in New York. It took a while to figure out where those people were because no one wanted to tell me. They wanted me to be at the park first to get a feel of it.
I eventually found out where folks were meeting, and I showed up at a PR meeting. That’s where I went most days. They were meeting three times a day, every day. I don’t know if I went to all three meeting every day, but I went to at least one meeting a day for months and months. We were always so busy in the PR group. We did a lot of different things. When I started, we were a pretty robust group of about thirty. We interfaced with the media. There was an email inbox. There were several phones, and then we turned it all into a Google phone because we were trying to make the access as easy as possible, as opposed to it being how it had been where there were a handful of gatekeepers. And of course there was the press table that someone was stationed at every day when the park was still occupied. They were there to just interface with the press, answer questions and make sure they were talking to organizers or activist. Our job was not to be a mouthpiece for Occupy or the movement, but it was to make sure that inquiring reporters, of which there were many dozens and dozens of requests every day, talked to a variety of people who were involved in the movement.
As a communications person, what happens a lot of times in some activist organizing protests is that the members of the media will come out, and they will look for the craziest looking person, and they’ll go up and talk to that person, and that will frame their entire story, and eventually thousands upon thousands of people’s understanding of what was going on. This isn’t to belittle any particular person. It was just that our job was to make sure the media was getting the real gist of why we were there. If they wanted to talk in particular to a mother or someone from New Jersey who had been laid off, our job was to get a sense of who was available, who could talk to the press, who had great stories. Some people had great stories and had never talked to press, so we helped them get a little more media savvy, so that they felt comfortable telling their stories. We created databases of people who were willing to speak to the press, so we would be sending out calls all day long.
At one point, we were answering the general Occupy phone as well. I can’t even tell you how many times I had walked someone through how to use the interwebs. It was really wild. We had folks who went to other groups to ask what they were working on and if they wanted media training or action planning. The action planning for the smaller groups came a little later. We would do our best to try and provide skills training and shares and just to be a reference point. It was a huge amount of work to just find a contact person for each group, to even know which working groups there were, and to make sure that the interviews coming through weren’t going through just to the same five people. That’s probably ten percent of what we did. We wrote a lot of press releases and advisories, notes and friendly memos to members of the press before, during and after any action, so they’d get the talking points or the gist of why we were doing the action. Then, we provided support for other groups around the country who were doing Occupy related actions.
I never slept at the park. I had no interest. I hate being
cold, and I live only three subway stops away. There is something that felt really
familiar about it. We had a CODEPINK house in DC. That was
always full of just this constant flow of radical activist women from all over
the planet in a communal living situation, getting up and going to
congress every day. I was really used to that flow. Then, just seeing all of the
different folks all smushed together, different issues, different reasons. On Friday nights at 5PM we would so this storytelling hour facing the steps. People would just stand there and tell their story. We would go around in a circle. It was beautiful. I was somewhat used to watching middle-aged women come out
of their lives and say, “Wow, I’m really fuckin’ tired of what’s happening,”
but this was a different mix. It was beautiful to see how they inspired each
other and how we all inspired each other. I feel like I can hardly remember parts of the park. I can just remember
little clips. Normally, I was running around to other places.
I still answer press emails for Occupy. They still come
through, as well as emails. It’s all just been a consistent flow. It’s weird
because, all of the sudden, I have all of this time on my hands. I wonder, “Where did
this come from? Oh, it’s because I’ve been doing Occupy press and
communications stuff several hours a day for over a year." I’m like, “Wow, what
do I do with all of this time?” Strangely enough, right at the end of of 2011, I went to get my certification
as a life coach. That’s been my trajectory, and I work now with artists and
activists on an individual basis to really dig deep and see where they’re stuck.
I saw a lot of stuck people in Occupy, and what happens a lot of the time in movements
is that collective spaces turn into therapy when people are unhealthy. It’s
no judgment to people who have a lot of stuff to work through. We all do, and
there aren’t necessarily institutions or structures that support people and encourage people to live their lives in the most fulfilled and passionate ways. I’ve
worked with some folks that I’ve met through Occupy. I’m definitely interested
in how we can be better activists, how we can build a truly beloved
community.
When I’m faced with the question of why it’s so important, I think, “How can we not?” Even for people who don’t do anything about it, they know that something isn’t quite right. We all feel the culture of capitalism in different ways. If you’re a family in the Bronx, and your son or daughter is seventeen years old and being rabidly pursued by army recruiters. You’re torn because that is the only way your children will potentially have access to college. I remember a girl named Linda from the park who was a housewife in New Jersey, and her husband lost his job. I remember that she just had no idea what to do. There are students who have done all the "right" things—worked really hard, taken out a bunch of loans, gone to the right college, picked the right major, graduated from law school—and you go to look for work, and they have nothing for you. We all experience it in a million different ways.
Something isn’t right with the way society is functioning right now, and culture tries to make up for it sometimes. For me, there’s no choice. There’s no option to not do what we do as activists, to not try and shine a light on injustice and then with the other hand try and create a new relationship. I remember when I was with CODEPINK, and I see clearly why it was so important to do what we did? They thought that we were just a bunch of crazy "shrill" bitches, and now look, the majority of the population agrees that the war was a big tragic mistake. No one listened to us in the beginning. It takes a while for culture to shift and public perception to shift. You have to keep hammering at it. I feel like that’s part of what we did as Occupy.
It was just the right moment. Occupy shot out just like a bolt of lightning and startled people. I don’t think that there are ways to manufacture it, but we have to keep trying, to be creative and innovative. Even in the times that we can’t be creative and innovative, we have to build strong foundations for how we want to be together, how we want to see that we belong to each other. That’s why I feel like this is important work. That’s why I’m attracted to Occupy. People wanted to be around each other. They wanted to experience something and shape something collectively. They didn’t want to have something pre-ordained. In the PR group, we could have been the worst about that. We could have been the pre-ordainers of the message, but that’s not how we were. It was collective to a fault sometimes. We were creating something new. We were telling people that it wasn’t about having a checklist of demands. That was my favorite part about Occupy. That’s my favorite part about the work I do now. I don’t have a pre-ordained list of what people should be or how they should be changemakers. I’m there as a guide.
When I’m faced with the question of why it’s so important, I think, “How can we not?” Even for people who don’t do anything about it, they know that something isn’t quite right. We all feel the culture of capitalism in different ways. If you’re a family in the Bronx, and your son or daughter is seventeen years old and being rabidly pursued by army recruiters. You’re torn because that is the only way your children will potentially have access to college. I remember a girl named Linda from the park who was a housewife in New Jersey, and her husband lost his job. I remember that she just had no idea what to do. There are students who have done all the "right" things—worked really hard, taken out a bunch of loans, gone to the right college, picked the right major, graduated from law school—and you go to look for work, and they have nothing for you. We all experience it in a million different ways.
Something isn’t right with the way society is functioning right now, and culture tries to make up for it sometimes. For me, there’s no choice. There’s no option to not do what we do as activists, to not try and shine a light on injustice and then with the other hand try and create a new relationship. I remember when I was with CODEPINK, and I see clearly why it was so important to do what we did? They thought that we were just a bunch of crazy "shrill" bitches, and now look, the majority of the population agrees that the war was a big tragic mistake. No one listened to us in the beginning. It takes a while for culture to shift and public perception to shift. You have to keep hammering at it. I feel like that’s part of what we did as Occupy.
It was just the right moment. Occupy shot out just like a bolt of lightning and startled people. I don’t think that there are ways to manufacture it, but we have to keep trying, to be creative and innovative. Even in the times that we can’t be creative and innovative, we have to build strong foundations for how we want to be together, how we want to see that we belong to each other. That’s why I feel like this is important work. That’s why I’m attracted to Occupy. People wanted to be around each other. They wanted to experience something and shape something collectively. They didn’t want to have something pre-ordained. In the PR group, we could have been the worst about that. We could have been the pre-ordainers of the message, but that’s not how we were. It was collective to a fault sometimes. We were creating something new. We were telling people that it wasn’t about having a checklist of demands. That was my favorite part about Occupy. That’s my favorite part about the work I do now. I don’t have a pre-ordained list of what people should be or how they should be changemakers. I’m there as a guide.
Stuckness is everywhere. People don’t even know how to
relate to their own emotions. Most of us don’t. We're stuck in terms of how to be in
genuine or authentic relationships with each other. If you don’t know how to do
it with yourself, you’re not going to know how to do it with someone else. What
I’ve experienced time and again in activist circles is a total inability to
nurture and take care of the body. People were not eating and not sleeping. I
understand that the park was the park, but there was a lot of time after the park
when people were recovering from park time and still not taking
very good care of themselves. Burnout is a very real thing, and I would get
really frustrated when people would talk about being burnt out just because I
was starting to be healed from my own burnout. In being stuck in a much bigger picture, there’s so much
emphasis on the doing, but not the being. How are we going
to be here? How are we going to be with ourselves? How are we going to be in right relation to each other? There isn’t a culture of stillness and deep reflection
in our broader society. If being successful means crossing all of your items
off of a to do list at the end of the day, then we’ve got a really, really
broken idea of success, and that keeps us in the same place.
At risk of sounding naïve, I would like to see a transcendent
world, one where we all get to live out magnificent futures. There’s so much
possibility, and I understand that there are institutions that limit a lot, but
I know with every fiber of my being that there are just as many if not more
beliefs that we hold that limit us from doing what we’re here to do, and keep us thinking inside someone else’s box, even when we think we are thinking outside
of it. With my own work, I ask, “How do I apply the work that I do on
an individual, deep down emotional level?” “How do I bring this work more effectively
to bigger groups and even activist circles?” Even that, it’s like yeah that’s
all interesting, but I have to continue to ask myself if this is really what I’m
here to do, and I don’t think that we all get a chance to or even know how to
ask ourselves that question. The kind of world I want to see is where people
don’t just ask themselves that, but there’s actually really
visible, vibrant, supportive communities to help you move through those
questions and figure out what you want to do, how you want to do it, how you
want to be, how you want to be in the world, what principles you want to live
by.
I want justice. We deserve it. We deserve to come out on the other side not broken and burnt out and holding up justice for other people and not for ourselves, not being able to deserve our own happiness and health. In that world, why would we ever makes things that would then destroy people or destroy the planet or destroy communities? We wouldn’t built weapons of destruction. We wouldn’t use chemicals that poison the ground so that in twenty years we can’t grow anything. That’s where we would be because we would see that we belong to each other. We belong to the planet. That spirit moves through each of us, and it connects us. We would have the kind of love that we have for our mother, our kid, for everyone and everything. That would be always present. I don’t know what kind of amazing things would happen from there. That’s the magic.
Interview by Stacy Lanyon
http://buildingcompassionthroughaction.blogspot.com/
https://www.facebook.com/stacylanyon
https://instagram.com/stacylanyon/
https://twitter.com/StacyLanyon
http://stacylanyon.com/
I want justice. We deserve it. We deserve to come out on the other side not broken and burnt out and holding up justice for other people and not for ourselves, not being able to deserve our own happiness and health. In that world, why would we ever makes things that would then destroy people or destroy the planet or destroy communities? We wouldn’t built weapons of destruction. We wouldn’t use chemicals that poison the ground so that in twenty years we can’t grow anything. That’s where we would be because we would see that we belong to each other. We belong to the planet. That spirit moves through each of us, and it connects us. We would have the kind of love that we have for our mother, our kid, for everyone and everything. That would be always present. I don’t know what kind of amazing things would happen from there. That’s the magic.
Interview by Stacy Lanyon
http://buildingcompassionthroughaction.blogspot.com/
https://www.facebook.com/stacylanyon
https://instagram.com/stacylanyon/
https://twitter.com/StacyLanyon
http://stacylanyon.com/