Forum Post: Good luck and God speed

I hope this message finds you all well.

In the past month I have attempted to fully understand the movement that has become known as OWS. I have read articles, posted on the forums, and viewed the live feed. It wasn’t until I went to the protests, an action spurred by the recent news of Scott Olsen, that the message became abundantly clear.

One of the greatest symbols of this nation makes a promise to the people of every nation:

                    "Give me your tired, your poor, 
                    Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, 
                    The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. 
                    Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, 
                    I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

A promise to all who were willing to come, they could live the “American Dream.” This is a promise which we can no longer keep, not even for our own citizens. The Occupy movement has given a voice, a body, and new life to our burgeoning class of tired and poor who simply yearn to be free. It accomplishes this, not by aligning itself to a political party or some list of specified demands, but simply through existence.

Amidst the crowd, I struggled to find the hippies, the “generation of entitlement”, the angry mobs of anti-Semitic anarchists I had read about on many posts and articles. I only found disenfranchised Americans of every walk of life. I then asked myself, how do they plan on affecting any change within the Government without becoming politically charged or listing official demands? The answer was simple, and was surrounding me the entire time; they were there to change people, not industry, not government, but people by challenging the economic and social ideologies of both Liberals and Conservatives alike.

“Whatever it meant. There was madness in any direction, at any hour. You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning. And that, I think, was the handle - that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting - on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave.” -HST

Since its infancy, the movement has maintained its original form and function, of peaceful protests aimed at the inequalities endured by the many for the benefit of the few. There have been scuffles, but as the movement has grown, so too has its opposition so this is unfortunately expected. May this wave not crest before its time.

As Always,

Good luck and God speed.