the Occupy Movement

In the spirit of educating myself I’m heading to the internet… and sharing my “research”.

 

what are they the 99% of!?

 

“Occupy Wall Street is a people-powered movement that began on September 17, 2011 in Liberty Square in Manhattan’s Financial District….

…#ows is fighting back against the corrosive power of major banks and multinational corporations over the democratic process, and the role of Wall Street in creating an economic collapse that has caused the greatest recession in generations.”(1)

 

The Occupy Movement was inspired by popular uprisings in Egypt & Tunisia  (called “Arab Spring”), and the Spanish Indignants (2). Click here to read the Wikipedia article on the Arab Spring, and here on the Spanish Indignants.

 

Although there are no clear leaders,  according to the Wikipedia article on the Occupy Movement there are 2 affiliated groups(2) :

• Adbusters Media Foundation- ”We are a global network of culture jammers and creatives working to change the way information flows, the way corporations wield power, and the way meaning is produced in our society.”(3) Click here to learn more. They also make a “logo free” shoe.
• Anonymous Hackers. An internet based, loosely associated group that encourages active social disobedience, internet activism, and vigilantism). click here for the Wikipedia Article. Generally affiliated with liberal causes. Click here for an article on their 5 biggest hacks. I’m not very good with technology but I think they commonly use Distributed Denial of Services attacks…
• Is there Union involvement?

 It seems to me that the Occupy Movement has NO CLEAR GOALS or DEMANDS! The people within the movement take pride in thier lack of demands. However The Demands Working Group ( from the Wall Street protesters) published “The 99% Declaration”, which calls for public works programs, tax hikes on the wealthiest, debt forgiveness, ways to remove the money of corporations and special interests from politics, and amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Read it here. This document was not agreed on with-in the New York City General Assembly (4). The NYCGA is  ” composed of dozens of groups working together to organize and set the vision for the #occupywallstreet movement.” See their webpage here.

 

 (I started this blog on Oct 4, when the movement was really gaining steam. When I started trying to finish it, I found myself just getting irritated. So, this will be all for now.)

 

Unfortunately, this was all I could find using “non-biased” sites.

(1)http://www.occupywallst.org/about/

(2)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%22Occupy%22_protests#cite_note-Fleming-11

(3)http://www.adbusters.org/campaigns

(4)http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/99_Percent_Declaration