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[Büge]

am i supposed to be constantine now too

i'm already like... five people

i'm exhausted

Norylertinedayxamuildtaibiegrel

[Thad]

OWS isn't really in a position to do it because it'd look way too self-serving, but I'd like to see a new movement with "police reform" at the top of the list.

Now see, I think police reform has rocketed to almost the top of the list of things OWS is fighting for.  And, indeed, it's helped increase both recognition of OWS and solidarit with it -- the rallies have only gotten bigger since the violence started.

[Mongrel]

am i supposed to be constantine now too

i'm already like... five people

i'm exhausted

Norylertinedayxamuildtaibiegrel

Norondor is the 99%.

All of it.

[yyler]

haha, because he's fat, right?

[Disposable Ninja]

He is Legion.

[Doom]

Welp, here's a cool account of how the LAPD really operates with protesters arrested at Occupy LA.

[Thad]

Ah -- so what the LAPD ACTUALLY learned from the Rodney King situation was to make sure there weren't any cameras on them before they started in with the abuse and neglect.

Welp, assuming his account's accurate then I guess I spoke too soon.  Hoping this gets more attention.  Lawsuits would be well-justified.

[Sharkey]

Meanwhile, it's super cool when you forcibly clear a bunch of people out of somewhere and then bitch about how they left all their stuff behind.

It makes me so mad I could pet a kitten.

[Büge]

Jesus Christ those comments. Is this a generational thing? Like when the Great Depression struck, did people in the old country go "suck it up, you kids! Look at Germany, they lost a war and they're not complaining!"

[Brentai]

20 tons of that shit is probably broken tents.

Of course if OWS was more clever they'd offer to all go back in and clean it up, and then make it very public when the city inevitably says "No".

EDIT: Weird trend I've noticed:

"It's a shame how I see all trash around here," onlooker Rami Delgado, 25, told the paper. "People don't understand that the freedom starts here in your mind. You know why this is filthy and not clean is there isn't leadership," he said.

But fellow visitor Normal Schwartz, 76, said the sad part about the scene is that it's now empty. "There was no longer this wonderful thing going on," he said. "It was just an empty, dirty park."

It might be journalism bias, but even following the commentary, it always seems to be the college and working aged citizens who are the biggest conservative pricks about this.  The much older people, who you'd expect to be the crotchety "get off my lawn" types, seem to be a lot more accepting and even supportive of the thing.  Probably a mixture of not being brought up with this whole Baby Boomer sickness and having been around to see from the outside what good the earlier protests were, and also what happens when a country gets a little too obsessed with economic recovery at the expense of other human concerns.

[Büge]

It might be journalism bias, but even following the commentary, it always seems to be the college and working aged citizens who are the biggest conservative pricks about this.  The much older people, who you'd expect to be the crotchety "get off my lawn" types, seem to be a lot more accepting and even supportive of the thing.  Probably a mixture of not being brought up with this whole Baby Boomer sickness and having been around to see from the outside what good the earlier protests were, and also what happens when a country gets a little too obsessed with economic recovery at the expense of other human concerns.

Could also be that the younger generation see OWS like "you're ruining it for the rest of us! Stop pointing out the inequities of society! I just want a nice car and $50,000 salary, not a revolution!"

[Mongrel]

Jesus Christ those comments. Is this a generational thing? Like when the Great Depression struck, did people in the old country go "suck it up, you kids! Look at Germany, they lost a war and they're not complaining!"

WWI was so devastating to the Western psyche and anyone who participated that I doubt one would get much besides 1000-year stares when you brought it up.

WWII always gets the play because it's the "heroic" war, with an almost storybook plotline. Whereas WWI is more like a gigantic crater on human history.

[Mongrel]

It might be journalism bias, but even following the commentary, it always seems to be the college and working aged citizens who are the biggest conservative pricks about this.  The much older people, who you'd expect to be the crotchety "get off my lawn" types, seem to be a lot more accepting and even supportive of the thing.  Probably a mixture of not being brought up with this whole Baby Boomer sickness and having been around to see from the outside what good the earlier protests were, and also what happens when a country gets a little too obsessed with economic recovery at the expense of other human concerns.

Could also be that the younger generation see OWS like "you're ruining it for the rest of us! Stop pointing out the inequities of society! I just want a nice car and $50,000 salary, not a revolution!"

Well, the cynical view is the one Brentai alludes to: That the youth of today are so hopelessly entitled and narcississtic that we are all but doomed.

[Brentai]

Kinda.  It's more like each generation was raised with its own horrific cultural disease that OWS is aggravating.

The Baby Boomers grew up with the idea that any sort of conflict involving the U.S. would inevitably end with the destruction of the entire world, and the only way to stop that from happening is to ensure nobody ever dares, ever, to try and attack the American institution.

Generation X grew up with the idea that all problems can only be solved with a massive application of money, and that any system that doesn't allow for huge collections of money in one place can never solve any social injustice, ever.

Generation Y grew up with the idea that it's okay to demand that things you don't like to hear be filtered out and silenced, that groups can only be formed and maintained through mutual agreement on topics, and that people who disagree with you are enemies to be defeated.


OWS is challenging the American institution, demanding that the massive hoarding of capital in one place stops, and doing so with a unified voice of dissent.  The three active generations of this country regard them successively as dangerous, stupid, and evil.  We've got a lot of work cut out for us.

[Mongrel]

So far my overwhelming impression of OWS is really just of a weak aimlessness.

I'm not saying things are just and fair, or that OWS should not exist, but I personally consider OWS a nearly complete failure so far. The worst kind of bubble-living university student claptrap.

As much as we hate the mainstream media, they still hold that title for now, and coverage seems to indicate that we never came even close to crossing the threshold where OWS would have a critical mass of useful support among the public. Not by a mile. Sure, you can say they were raising awareness, but then you could say the same thing about Fred Phelps.

It's like these polls you always see about people in the US saying they'd want a Nordic-style tax system. Yeah cute poll, but is that what people are actually voting for? Now you can go on about consipiracies, or The Man keeping people down, but at the end of the day they haven't gotten around to abolishing voting yet, so I'm going to remain a little skeptical.

[Friday]

So far my overwhelming impression of OWS is really just of a weak aimlessness.

OK uh you know that's the impression they want you to have, right? I mean, regardless of whether it's true or not, you are aware of how the mainstream media has been pushing this aspect really fucking hard, like, and when I say hard, I mean almost to the exclusion of all other aspects, right?

The worst kind of bubble-living university student claptrap.

OK uh you are sort of repeating Fox News Frank Miller word for word here.

As much as we hate the mainstream media, they still hold that title for now, and coverage seems to indicate that we never came even close to crossing the threshold where OWS would have a critical mass of useful support among the public.

So you think it's up to the media to tell us when OWS has a "critical mass of useful support among the public?"

[Disposable Ninja]

Yeah, I'm with Friday on this. Their message seems pretty clear, especially compared to the Tea Party when people first actually started noticing them.

Which, if you may have forgotten, was roughly three months after Obama took office, and they were all complaining about how he was already a terrible president. And the entire damn country has been listening to them non-stop ever since.

[Brentai]

You can make a critical evaluation that OWS has failed in its goals thus far even if you haven't consumed any flavored beverages, guys.  There's a reason I use "them" to refer to the OWS movement and "us" to refer to the greater demographic of people who want to change things.

Let's not ignore the military-industrial-media complex keeping the movement suppressed, but let's also not pretend that it excuses the protestors from not being able to deal with that effectively.  Now, in my opinion, they DID accomplish two things: getting the ball rolling (which was the primary goal) and demonstrating what tactics are NOT effective (popular appeal, attempts at free assembly, and economic pressure).  So I'd say Mission 70% Accomplished.  Of course the real devil's in that last 30%, which all deals with enacting real change.

[Friday]

See, critical evaluations aside, when I see a person calling OWS "The worst kind of bubble-living university student claptrap", it sort of triggers my oh no oh no oh no oh YEAH!!! reflex.

OWS may have failed in its goals, but it was/is certainly not made up of "homeless people, crack addicts, and spoiled university students," and anyone who says that is either:

1. drinking kool-aid

2. pushing kool-aid

[Royal☭]

So is Brentai saying they failed because they didn't overthrow the world order in 3 months time?