Brent Nyitray
Fairlington Blade
Let the mutherfuker burn!
jnc4p
Kevin S. Willis
Michigoose
lmsinca
markinaustin
Memetrics
novahockey
quarterback
ScottC
yellojkt
I was in DC today doing tourist-in-your-town stuff and had some time to kill before my dinner reservation, so I wandered over to McPherson Square to see for myself the scope and magnitude of the Occupy DC protests.
I arrived at dusk but it was clear that the entire park had been taken over by the protesters with tents randomly placed everywhere except for one big wedge of green space on the southwest section of the park. When I arrived there was music playing with some people dancing on the grass. Later there had been some sort of evening meeting and people were dispersing with cooking equipment while others lingered to talk and kids played.
The center of the park has a statue of James B. McPherson, a Civil War general who had been killed in the Battle of Atlanta.
Ringing the statue were a wide variety of signs espousing various ODC positions in a range of detail from simple slogans to long treatises.
Beyond the vast number of tents, there were all the trappings of a semi-permanent encampment. There was a headquarters tent with a daily schedule as well as a medical tent.
Additionally, there was a large area set aside to boxes filled with clothes. I couldn’t quite figure out if it was a donation collection point or a distribution center or both. There was also an organized recycling center.
Around the encampment there were a variety of semi-official activities going on. Under one tent, after a human megaphone announcement, there was a lightly attended class at the ODC ‘university’ while on the other side of the park were the archetypal drummers.
But for the most part, people were just milling around enjoying the pleasant evening. Some people seemed to be reluctant to have their picture taken while others just took it in stride. And I was not the only person using the spectacle as a photo-op.
I really hadn’t know what to expect. There was far more infrastructure than I had imagined despite the tent city being a rather disheveled mish-mash of camping gear and tarps and canopies. What impressed me most was the casual sense of community. People were there with purpose. And they didn’t look like they were leaving anytime soon. You can see higher resolution versions of these photos as well as others in my Flickr set.
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All Things in Moderation 
Very cool, yellojkt, thanks for the pics. I drove past the SLC site relatively early this morning and saw lots of tents despite the newspaper headline I saw yesterday about the City/police shutting them down due to a body found there Friday morning. As I've said a couple times in the past, I've been impressed by the lack of SLCPD prescence before this, so I'll have to see how much that's changed.
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Ummmm. . . "presence"
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Thanks for this, yjkt!
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yellojkt:Thanks for the report. The Occupy Tampa guys are much less organized — but there were only about 40 of them when I saw them a couple of weeks ago.
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Since I can't say something nice, I won't say anything at all. Right now. ; )
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I don't have anything to say right now, but great reportage. Thanks, yellojkt! Yeomans work with the photos.
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yello:People were there with purpose.What is that purpose?
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Occupy Wall Street doing it's level best to increase unemployment.
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Scott, do you have anything else to back up your statement (or implication) that OWS is the cause of small businesses suffering? Or how widespread? Did two businesses complain in Oakland, or maybe 20? I just don't see that this link provides anything other than anecdote.
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okie:Scott, do you have anything else to back up your statement (or implication) that OWS is the cause of small businesses suffering?You mean apart from things like this?“If this doesn’t stop soon I will be out of business,” said Marc Epstein, 53, president of Milk Street Cafe on Wall Street, less than a block from the New York Stock Exchange.Sales have dropped about 20 percent since the protests began last month and the 103 jobs created by the cafe’s opening in June are now at risk, said Epstein, who is not alone. Caroline Anderson, general manager of Boutique Tourbillon, a Wall Street jewelry store, said customer traffic is down about 20 percent, and Vincent Alessi, a managing partner at Bobby Van’s Steakhouse on Broad Street, said his lunch business has been cut in half.Or things like this?As Occupy Toronto protesters begin their third week of camping in a downtown park, the head of a neighbourhood business association said the gathering is starting to affect local merchants.Or things like this?Area businesses nearest to New York's Zuccotti Park, the protest's unofficial campgrounds, say the rally is hurting business."People used to come down for their lunch, now the people aren't coming down," says Zhi Wang, a smoothie cart owner stationed at the edge of the park. He pointed at the surrounding skyscrapers, which house some of the world's largest financial institutions and the Nasdaq Stock Market's headquarters.Nearby vendor Abdel Hafeez says his sales of breakfast items like muffins and coffee have fallen by half since the protest began Sept. 17. "Instead of coming through [the park] to get to their buildings, all of my customers go around," says Hafeez. "I wish this is done soon. … Business is very bad.”Or apart from this?In an irony that eclipses most, the Occupy L.A. protestors have successfully stymied a weekly farmers market that is held on City Hall grounds and has been for years. Vendors truck in fresh produce and sell to passers-by sometimes making $200 for the day, but usually plenty less.But this last Thursday, the rag-tag farmers found their space literally occupied by Occupy L.A. supporters who refused to give ground. According to a report in the Los Angeles Times, Occupy L.A. activist Martine Fennelly flatly stated that the protestors are staying put because “an occupation means an occupation, not a three-week camp-out.”This controversy is pitting the farmers group, which found its space on the south lawn of City Hall in 2007 through the help of District 9 Councilwoman Jan Perry. In addition to produce, the market growers also sell flowers, honey, shrimp tacos, ceviche and other goods.But when the Occupy members refused to take down their tents and move for the day, City Hall officials scrambled to find a new location for the market. Their abrupt move was to a less convenient site with little traffic, resulting in income dropping and leaving many vendors giving up until the protest ends.So, apart from all of the actual news reports about small businesses suffering in various locations because of these silly people, no, I don't have anything to back it up.
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Thanks, Scott. I read each of the links and they really did not add anything more of value and they do not give any idea whatsoever of the magnitude of the issue. In fact, at least two of them discuss that some local businesses have actually seen increased business due they attribute to OWS.Thanks though. Good night.
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Generally, protests aren't good for business. Often, when a certain percentage of protestors are anti-capitalism, they end up yelling at the barista at the closest Star Bucks instead of billion dollar bankers.But the right of association, and protest, and petition for a redress of grievances (even ambiguous grievances) is right there in the constitution, silly old thing! The approach may be, um, not particularly efficacious, however.
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What is that purpose?"Exactly the words I was going to post before I decided to demur.I've almost concluded that views of OWS are so diametrically opposed and alien to each other that it is impossible to discuss. I find the who project so misguided, misinformed, self-indulgent, destructive, stupid, vain, etc. that have almost no desire even to hear more explanations or justifications of it.The people who protested in my city were a motley collection of malcontents and apparent drifters. Some of them stood on a high fountain overlooking the rest holding American, defaced American, and anarchist flags beside each other. They wanted free this and free that. They complained about everything in the liberal complaint encyclopedia. It was thick with conspiracy mongers and nutcases. But it was the whole flag display and desecration/faux patriot stuff that really angered me. I was surprised at my reaction. I wanted to do something about it.
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Forgot to address that to Scott. My posting is so sloppy.
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Scott: "What is that purpose?"In my experience (I have not walked amongst the OWSers), the purpose of such folks is to effective positive change, and congratulate themselves for their good intentions in coalescing in a non-specific effort to do so. And also to meet chicks. I can't prove it, but if "feeling like you're part of something important, maybe even historic" could be measured on a breathalyzer, I bet most of those folks are bombed out of their minds by their own sense of participating in a significant and moral movement towards equality, and against inequity. and so on. I imagine there is a huge gap between what they feel like they are accomplishing, and what they actually are accomplishing. There usually is.
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those who protestsheesh
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qb: I find the who project so misguided, misinformed, self-indulgent, destructive, stupid, vain, etc. that have almost no desire even to hear more explanations or justifications of itI think you are unfairly tarring the 10% based on the behavior of the 90%. Having recently seen a few videos of OWSers being human microphones and responding to things with their jazz hands, and having just recently been to a Baptist megachurch, I see a lot of notable similarities. OWS is a left-wing Big Tent religious revival. Praise egalitarianism!
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I probably phrased that to harshly (ya think?). Probably should have said the protests. Still misguided, etc.
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kw,I read that Occupy Denver elected a dog leader, too. Perhaps that is apocryphal, but I hope not. It makes total sense.I don't see much discussion of the major public health risk they are becoming, or the rampant crime.
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Kevin:In my experience (I have not walked amongst the OWSers), the purpose of such folks is to effective positive change…Sure, but what does that actually mean? Purge the American League of the designated hitter? Get the NFL to eliminate the tuck rule? Invent a cure for Alzheimer's?Who in the world doesn't want to effect "positive change"?I don't know what their real agenda is, if they actually have one, and I doubt anyone else here does. Which is one reason why I am puzzled by the support that some people here seem to have for this "movement". It seems to me closer to Abbie Hoffman's notion of "revolution for the hell of it" than any coherent purpose.I also wonder how much support people here would have for these people if they were camped out on their lawn or on their street or in front of their place of business.
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Scott: "Sure, but what does that actually mean?"It's too amorphous. There are so many of them, and they're all being civilly disobedient, and the media is paying attention to them–they must be doing something. "I also wonder how much support people here would have for these people if they were camped out on their lawn or on their street or in front of their place of business."I'm not going to speak for anybody here, but generally I think there is a tendency to remain sympathetic, while saying: "Come on guys, can you move it somewhere else? I've known people all my life who just think it's good that people–especially the young people–rebel now and again, and hopefully against unfairness and inequality and discrimination and not so much against high taxes or government regulation. I'm not unsympathetic with that, but I think a movement with specificity and an interest in accomplishing more than just assigning blame would probably be more productive. Folks who can afford $5000 laptops can become shareholders, individually or collectively, of these companies, and attend shareholder meetings. There was a lot of characterization of the Tea Party having a certain philosophical incoherence (ie: keep your damned government out of my Medicare), but I, personally, think OWS has the TPers beat by a country mile when it comes to incoherence.
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Obviously there are repercussions when people gather to express their displeasure with what they perceive as an entity that crashed the economy and their future. As long as they have the legal right to assemble and do so peacefully, I doubt the negative impact will be as large as the negative impact the bursting of the bubble and a depressed economy has had on millions of Americans. They'd have to be on every street, in every park, and in front of every one of the big banks to have a comparable effect. It's unfortunate a few local businesses suffer from the gatherings but there is a larger percentage of Americans who has suffered even more in the past decade or even longer.This seems like a rather inconsequential and minor argument to me in the grand scheme of 9% unemployment and millions of homes lost to me.
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lms:This seems like a rather inconsequential and minor argument to me in the grand scheme of 9% unemployment and millions of homes lost to me.I imagine it would seem a whole lot less inconsequential to you if it was your business being effected by it. It is hard to understand how ruining the neighborhood around Zucotti Park and making it essentially unuseable for its stated purpose ("…the use and enjoyment of the general public for passive recreation") can be seen as a defensible response to being pissed off (for vague and unknown reasons) at banks.It is also not at all clear to me that the legal right to assembly translates into the legal right to set up encampments in a privately owned park.
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lmsinca: I doubt the negative impact will be as large as the negative impact the bursting of the bubble and a depressed economy has had on millions of AmericansVery true. This seems like a rather inconsequential and minor argument to me in the grand scheme of 9% unemployment and millions of homes lost to me.Well, sure, when you put it that way.
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I don't know scott, we've lost about 20% of our business income in the last few years because of the inconvenience of 9% unemployment and upwards of 20% underemployed or those giving up seeking employment for now. Which is worse? For us and the small businesses we deal with, it's the lousy economy and lack of purpose in dealing with it. Competing interests I guess.We live on a corner and the street that runs perpendicular to the side of our property has some very nasty protest signs in almost all the front yards because of a group home for the mentally challenged. This has been going on for about 8 years now and it's really depressed the home values on that street. Is it the group home or the signs that have depressed the values? I guess it depends which side of the fence you're on.
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lms:Which is worse?The question is whether you personally would view the deleterious effects of the OWS crowd on local business as "inconsequential" if it was your business that was being effected, not if you can imagine or are even experiencing "worse" deleterious effects for other reasons.Is it the group home or the signs that have depressed the values?I have no idea. But are the depressed valued "inconsequential" to you?
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scottIt doesn't matter if it's consequential or inconsequential to me personally. I've learned to deal with the adverse effects of either or. I'm sure there were plenty of parents of school age children that went to segregated schools that were not happy about how the schools were integrated. Sometimes there is a larger purpose to political movements. I don't know if the OWS movement will have any lasting effect on the future or not, but I believe they're entitled to try as long as they stay within the realm of their legal rights. It's not up to me to say whether the rights of one are more important than the other. Change is messy and there are always unintended consequences.
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lms:It doesn't matter if it's consequential or inconsequential to me personally.I wouldn't have asked if it didn't matter to me.Sometimes there is a larger purpose to political movements…Change is messy and there are always unintended consequences. I've never had much of a taste for Lenin's omelettes.
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lol scott. I'm sure a bunch of kids, homeless, and malcontents are really emulating Lenin with such an unclear message.I can't help it if things that are consequential to you are less consequential to me. The most consequential thing for me both personally and professionally is the future of our national economic well being. They have a message that's different from the "shared sacrifice", austerity one we've been hearing for the last couple of years, so I don't see any reason not to at least listen. If it shifts the debate slightly I'm all for it.
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lms:I'm sure a bunch of kids, homeless, and malcontents are really emulating Lenin…It wasn't their cavalier attitude that I was referring to.They have a message that's different from the "shared sacrifice", austerity one…What is their message?In any event, call me crazy but I am not all that inclined to think that "a bunch of kids, homeless, and malcontents" have much in the way of solutions to our current economic woes to offer.
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ScottI didn't say they had solutions, I think they're just highlighting their discontent, which is not that much different than the discontent many of us feel. Obviously, solutions are much more difficult.
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Scott: It is also not at all clear to me that the legal right to assembly translates into the legal right to set up encampments in a privately owned park.Protestors practicing eminent domain!
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lmsinca: I didn't say they had solutions, I think they're just highlighting their discontent, which is not that much different than the discontent many of us feel. Obviously, solutions are much more difficult.There is some truth to that. While they aren't going to solve anything by squatting in private parks and closing down port traffic in Oakland, they're a natural outgrowth of the current conditions, high unemployment, a general sense that banks socialized their risk and privatized their profit, etc. Perhaps it would be impossible to prevent the kind of crash we had, but in any case, OWS are like barnacles on a boat. If you don't want the barnacles, don't put your boat in the water. 😉
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