Forum Post: A simple demand
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 29, 2011, 8:46 p.m. EST by enickma
(2)
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
It seems one of the more common "criticisms" I hear about this movement is presented as a question. "What do they want?" The insinuation is that if there's no distilled demand or message, there's no credibility. Of course we know that's not true, but nevertheless, I submit that there is indeed a single demand that would strike at the core of the real problem.
We, as a nation, should insist on a separation of market and state... just like we have a separation of church and state, and for the same reasons. Business can have no more common effect on the people's legislature than to pervert it for it's own ends, and even those who count themselves conservatives or libertarians can respect that the state should not be involved in business, except where regulation is necessary to ensure honest practices.
I see this as one of our founding fathers greatest failures, that a "wall of separation" was not erected between our government and our markets. This has proven to be the source of a great many problems, and it's time we fix it. That means campaign finance reform, federal reserve/banking reform, an end to lobbying, and transparent accountability from our elected public officials. It means many things that can be decided by smarter people than me, but I believe the basic "demand" these protests should make is a simple SEPARATION OF MARKET AND STATE.
-Nick
Demands recognize a controlling authority. Recognizing a corrupt authority legitimizes tyranny.
OWS is the evolving model of a new social order. The old order are zombies, walking dead that feed on the flesh of the living.
Bump! :-)
My understanding is that part of the strength of the Occupy Wall Street protests is its lack of demands. They want to be non-exclusionary so that they may gather as many people as they can who recognize the same problems. All of them may then promote their solutions, just like you are doing.
It's definitely an interesting idea. What responsibilities does it leave to government? How would businesses be regulated, if at all? How do we enforce the separation?
All valid questions. I think we've grappled with those same questions when it comes to the separation of church and state as well. I don't think simple, common sense rules and separation are mutally exclusive. In the same way that freely practicing religions cannot break the laws of our society, so should freely practicing businesses not break our laws. I think there's some value in keeping those laws as simple and fair as possible, but that's a different topic. In my opinion, the most important part of the idea is that business gets it's hands out of our government. It no longer represents us, and most of the grievances I've heard people cite all boil down to the fact that corporate America and the banks have taken over our policy making. The only way to fix it is to insist on a complete separation for the sake of maintaining a democracy that represents it's citizens.