Occupying Wall Street is another phrase for it or if you like, "huffing and puffing protesters". There's always a time and a place for critically engaging with the vomit inducing caricatures of these protesters by more "well respected" commentators the world over, but for now actually doing something constructive is the aim here.
In keeping with this, here's a few thoughts or at least as they would pertain to Canada (but why not the world?):
- One of the more common criticisms / things to sneer at when it comes to this whole occupy movement is it's perceived lack of... well demands. Neverminding the fact that we are demanding an end to the gross income inequality between robbers and robbed, as well as all the shifty things between the wealthy and government that this has entailed (which may in fact mean demanding the end of global capitalism itself, but hang on I'll get to that), here's something more specific: forgive ALL student loans.
Yes, that's right. ALL of them, from PhD students to recent University grads, Community College, WHATEVER. Forgive it all and take the millstone from around our necks already. You want young people to buy houses, cars, clothes, electronics, vacations, groceries, so we're generally talking CONSUME here, which of course will lead to DEMAND for things, which in turn allows a market economy to function... Ah ha. Overly simplistic? Hardly, a short sighted uber-rich elite class that is so caught up in expanding and preserving it's own wealth and power even if it means the destruction of the system itself sounds rather simplistic and yet, here we are.
So forgive the student debt already, education and opportunity is a right every person has, as opposed to being fettered to financial debt and an ideology of diminishing returns and little optimism when it comes to life itself.
- Tax the rich more. Aside from the fact that it is pure unsexy logic to tax someone more who earns more, especially astronomically more then everyone else, some level of equality between every human being is something all human societies should be aspiring to. The evidence is quite literally in many cases burning away right in front of our eyes everyday: a hierarchical socio-economic system that permits such gaps to dramatically emerge between rich and poor can't endure for long before it inevitably destroys itself. To use another cliche: it is truly unsustainable in every sense.
So tax them more, they don't deserve it and even if they did you have to ask yourself something: do you want to continue living in a socio-economic system that rewards these sorts of attitudes, that you're poor and a loser within this system because you want to be? This superficial Dr. Philesque ideological superstructure needs to hustle it's ass to the ashcan of history already. More tax for the rich, more equality between Canadians.
- It comes up vaguely every now and again, but it does seem like people are just afraid to have a serious discussion about it (aside from Marxists), that is: the continued legitimacy of capitalism. Or in other words: we need a new socio-economic system and we need to start discussing this issue seriously as it naturally effects ALL policies ranging from education, environmental, defence and healthcare reform. How could it not; our society is predicated on the (un)logic of a free market and the unfettered acquisition of material wealth.
Thinkers ranging from David Harvey to Sir Ken Robinson have been challenging these notion, so I'm not about to rehash all this. Nevertheless, challenging the logic of this system does not entail a return to dreary soldier goose stepping through the streets under a red flag past endless bread lines, read NOT a return to some sort of Orwellian 1984 Stalinist state. Over, done, put the McCarthyesque fear mongering aside and acknowledge that since at least 2008 it has been readily apparent that this system does not function anymore. Ideally this sort of serious discussion would open the door to all sorts of other discussions that should be taking place about the environmental impact of the oil sands in Alberta, our continued presence in Afghanistan, a return to Cold War strategic thinking in regards to China, how our welfare system will survive the onslaught of aging Baby Boomers, etc.
Dispute remains about what sort of system this should be, but this movement needs to make it clear that people no longer believe in the continued legitimacy of free market capitalism.
- Don't allow this movement to get hijacked or subverted by other interests be that Twitter, Tax Reform, Apple, Facebook, Concerned Citizens for the Reduction of Bureaucracy, WHATEVER. We can already begin to see this happening and in lieu of clearly articulated interests that need not be overly specific but CLEAR, this will happen and the "movement" in every sense of the term will stall when subverted and encompassed by some more recognizable and legitimate interest. Keep it in the streets and in people's eyes about some sort of power begins to sneer less and speak more seriously.
There's always more, but that's just some general thoughts for the moment which is badly needed before the moment passes us all by.
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