OWS Updates for the Week of April 11

Spring has awakened! Join us this Saturday at 1pm for the Occupy New York City People’s Assembly converging on Central Park to unite organizations, activists, and others to create a transformative, citywide, mass movement.

Occupy these Upcoming Events

Debt and Punishment
Wednesday, April 11th, 6pm-7pm
Union Square, Southside stairs
This talk examines how debt is a form of punishment designed to break up communities and create isolated individuals whose lives center around debt and its repayment. Opposition to debt is thus part of the refusal of the prison-industrial complex. Speaker: Nicholas Mirzoeff, NYU, Department of Media, Culture and Communication.
Learn more about the Student Debt Campaign, part of Education & Empowerment Working Group.

#A20 The Great Meeting 2.0 Community Development & Discussions
April 11th, 13th, 15th, 18th at 6pm
Union Square, Northend beyond the playground
With weather warming up, the Occupy community brings back one of its characteristic activities: the Outdoor Public Assembly. The Great Meeting 2.0 will be a day of mass public assembly on April 20th with live, real-time translation into Spanish & American Sign Language via projection, micro broad casted FM Radio and a People's Mic Team. The Great Meeting offers a non-decision-making discussion model for large groups. The Community Discussions will be topical based on an open stack but will offer breakout groups for those looking to volunteer and participate in the #A20 Great Meeting at the end of the discussions. We hope you’ll join us in developing this scaling of Consensus Based Direct Democracy.

NYC: The Second Precarious & Service Workers Assembly
Wednesday, April 11th, 7:30pm
360 Court Street, Brooklyn, NY
Tired of being treated like a servant by your customers? Tired of management demanding more and more for less and less? Feeling alone or frustrated? Come to the first Precarious and Service Worker Assembly to network with others who share your interests! Remember, they can’t run these places without us. Bosses thrive by pitting us against one another, but if not for us, Management wouldn’t make a dime. We’ll be discussing how we can make our collective situation much more interesting and how we can engage together in upcoming actions like the May Day General Strike.

Foreclosure Auction Blockade Training
Thursday, April 12, 630pm - 8:30pm
The CUNY Graduate Center, 365 Fifth Avenue Manhattan
Every week, foreclosed homes are sold at auctions throughout the five boroughs of New York City. Many of the families who live in these homes were victims of predatory loans and deceptive banking practices, but now face imminent evictions from some of the biggest culprits of financial fraud in the banking and mortgage industry. Others will have their house bought out by speculators, who are looking to flip properties, or gentrify new neighborhoods. Organizing for Occupation (O4O) and the Occupy Homes Working Group aim to protect the communities most affected by this kind of vulture profit-making. We are currently engaged in a campaign to bring a moratorium on all foreclosures in New York City through the power and beauty of communal song.

Join us for our week of action:

• April 16 - 2pm in the Bronx Supreme Court
• April 19 - 3pm in Brooklyn Supreme Court
• April 20 - 11am in Queens Supreme Court

Weekly Wall Street Marches: This week’s theme is Run on Bank of America!
Friday, April 13th, 2pm
Liberty Square
Every Friday at 2PM, Occupy Wall Street will converge in the streets once again and launch the first in a series of spring training marches from Liberty Square to Wall Street in preparation for May Day, a day of massive economic non-compliance and strike. For Friday the 13th, we are teaming up with the campaign to Break up Bank of America! Come out to the "Run on Bank of America" as we run, march, and call on everyone to move their money out of this monstrous bank.

Spring Awakening 2012: Occupy NYC People's Assembly
Saturday, April 14, 2012, 1pm
Central Park, southern end of the Park just west of Wollman Rink
Join Occupy Wall Street on #A14 to kick off exciting spring and summer events. On April 14th, New York City will converge on Central Park to unite with organizations and activists to create a transformative, citywide, mass movement. The day will give individuals an opportunity to connect with organizations and foster ongoing collaboration of groups working on common issues.
Join us at our Facebook event for updates!

Occupy Wall Street Poetry Anthology
Saturday, April 14, 2012, 2pm-5pm
Jefferson Market Library, 425 6th Avenue at 10th Street
For the month of April, the Jefferson Market Library is hosting an exhibition of poems from the Occupy Wall Street Poetry Anthology in the spiral staircase leading library goers from the ground floor to the main room. The event will kick off with a short "lecture" on the significance of May Day and the General Strike, which is currently a major focus of the Occupy Movement. The event will be held in a similar fashion to the Poetry Assemblies: readers will add their name to a "hat" and be called at random. Poets will get 3-5 minutes to read their work, depending on the size of the crowd.

IndigNación Launch Party
Saturday, April 14, 2012, 7pm-Midnight
The Commons, 388 Atlantic Avenue Brooklyn
OWS en Espanol invites you to join us as we celebrate the launch of Occupy Wall Street's new Spanish language publication with DJ Rock-L, Sonido-BigBoy http://bigboy.us/ and more! $10 suggested donation at the door gets you two beers and a raffle ticket, but any donation gets you through the door! We'll have cheap drinks, raffles, auctions, surprises and plenty of dancing and good times. If you think the fact that Latinos know how to party is some sort of racist stereotype, think again!
Check us out at www.indig-nacion.org

Studying May Day and the General Strike
Sunday, April 15th, 12pm-2pm
Union Square, South side of the Park
In response to the calls for a General Strike on May Day, this course will create a space to ask and discuss questions like:

• What is the significance of May Day?
• What does it mean to call for a general strike in the 21st century?
• What would a day without the 99% look like?
• What does it mean to be a worker these days?

This week: Stanley Aronowitz: “What Can We Learn from the History of May Day?”

Operation Book Bomb Tucson Book Drive
Monday, April 16th, 6pm-8pm
Trinity Church Parish House, 414 45th St bet 4th and 5th Ave, Sunset Park, Brooklyn
The Tucson Unified School District in Tucson, AZ recently eliminated the Mexican-American Studies Program and banned Latino history books from the curriculum. The People's Library at Occupy Wall St is sending them a book bomb! Please bring us any Spanish language books, books on Mexican History, or books on Latino Culture to donate to the Mexican-American community of Tucson, AZ. More details at http://www.peopleslibrary.wordpress.com

Foreclosure Auction Blockade Week of Action Begins!
Monday, April 16, 2pm
Bronx Supreme Court, Rm 600. 851 Grand Concourse, Bronx, NY
The Foreclosure Auction Blockades have been beautiful acts of resistance against the big banks and our corrupt and ineffective political and judicial systems. We have expanded and deepened our community through the non-violent and joyful act of singing in and over the auctions! We engage in the blockades because we know that housing is a human right and that we--who bailed out the banks--must now bailout the people. In order to achieve a moratorium on all foreclosures in New York State, we must show that we (as homeowners, tenants, and those that are homeless) are strong enough to shut down the auctions and keep our neighbors in their homes.
You can also join us on April 19 (3pm, Brooklyn Supreme Court) and April 20 (11am in Queens Supreme Court).

Is It Moral to Pay Back Student Loan Debt? with George Caffentzis
Tuesday, April 17th 6pm-7pm
Union Square, Southside stairs
One of the great powers of creditors have over student loan debtors is the moral blackmail they use to convince everyone that paying student loan debt is the right thing to do. In this Open Forum we will examine the claim that “It is moral to pay back student loan debt” and come up with surprising and liberatory conclusions. George Caffentzis is a philosopher of money and Professor at the University of Southern Maine.

Eviction Theatre
Every evening we are at Union Square Park, 1130pm - 1230am
Union Square
Join the NYC Community as they bear witness to a nightly mini-raid eviction that begins at the stroke of midnight. Witness comedic feats of strength as NYPD & The Occupy Movement say goodnight to one another in a theatrical setting. Different theme every night.

SAVE THE DATE

The 1T Day National Day of Action Against Student Debt
April 25, 2012, 4pm-6pm
Union Square
On April 25th the total amount of student loan debt in the U.S. is due to top 1 trillion dollars. This marks a momentous victory for Wall Street—much to the despair of student loan debtors across the country. On this date, the profiteers on Wall Street will be popping champagne bottles, eating caviar, and sneering at the debt-burdened students and graduates who lug around this 1 trillion dollar ball and chain. Occupy Student Debt Campaign is hosting a party of its own. We invite you to join Reverend Billy and the Stop Shopping Choir, who will preside over a debt jubilee - an emancipatory student loan debt write-off for all!

A Day Without the 99%: May Day 2012
The 1% needs us to continue reaping their profits, but WE DON'T NEED THE 1%.
This May Day, Occupy Wall Street, in coalition with numerous other organizations and occupations, calls for a Day Without The 99%: No Work, No School, No Shopping, No Housework, No Compliance. Let's take the streets, reclaim our communities, and support each other. NOT the 1%. On May 1st, let us stand together to reclaim our jobs, our communities, our lives. Withdraw your consent and strike!
If you’d like to be added to the announcement and/or discussion listserv or have any questions regarding meeting time, location, structure, please contact mayday@nycga.net or learn more at http://www.maydaynyc.org