Forum Post: Why Does The Media Keep Asking "What Are You Demanding?"
Posted 13 years ago on Oct. 4, 2011, 5:09 a.m. EST by TheSheepLookUp
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The media and we ourselves are far to preoccupied with demands or grievances. The media wants to get a sound byte that they can spin and use for propoganda to serve thier own purpose. And some people want to base their support on a signal issue or set of issues. These people have not broken free of the electronic illusion of the mainstrean media or the left/right paradigm. It would be very premature at this point to make any collective demands. I believe that at some point we should have a revolutionary convention with delegates that represent general assemblies from all over the nation. It is in this matter that I believe we should decide on a set of grievances and demands. For now we do not have demands. We have purpose. Our purpose is to assert our first amendment rights and all our constitutional rights. Our purpose is to join together and demonstrate the solidarity of the people of the United States of America to the world. Our purpose is to show the world that a peacefull revolution committed to non-violence can change the world.
I would love to here any other suggestions for what our purpose should be. Please comment.
Love and peace. Occupy together.
This movement already has a name and a focus. Reading the demands list here: http://occupywallst.org/forum/proposed-list-of-demands-please-help-editadd-so-th/ inspires me by setting what seem like possible, if difficult goals that are hard to reject from a reasoned, informed, and ethical point of view. I think other have been motivated by the focus of this movement as well, as demands such as these help give focus.
These demands should help make people aware of some of the problems caused by the corrupting power that money currently has in our political system, and they seem like productive and obvious steps to take.
Great post, thanks. The difference between purpose and demands seem to get down to semantics. I think that some very basic demands need to address the fundamental thefts of democracy, namely: The "Personhood" of corporations should be recinded and not allowed to partake in democratic choices much like religion was excluded by our founders. Political lobbying would be limited to those INDIVIDUALS who vote for the politicians. Politicians must be held responsible for their votes and must be excluded from profiting through their public SERVICE.
I agree that it's important not to be pulled off-course by the demands of media to simplify this group or its members into a pre-constructed sound byte for everyone to argue about.
It does seem that one underlying motivation is to re-tilt the current imbalance back toward a country that is run by and for its individual citizens, not by and for its incorporated citizens and its wealthiest 1%.
Here's why it's important that we have demands. Without demands, there is no "we".
To restrict our purpose to just asserting our right to assembly is to undermine the movement from the start. People assemble every time they wait for the light to change. What makes this different is that we're assembling to accomplish something. What we seek to accomplish is our demands. To restrict our purpose to demonstrating our solidarity is not enough. George W. Bush is a person in the USA; I'm not in solidarity with him. The Tea Party is a group of people in the USA; I'm not in solidarity with them. Wall St. is made of people in the USA; I'm not in solidarity with them. The reason I don't stand in solidarity with them is because their demands are opposed to ours. If we are to grow as a movement, we must convince people to stand in solidarity with our demands. To restrict our purpose to peaceful revolution and changing the world is not enough. What are we revolting against? How would we like to change the world? This is determined by our list of demands. If we demanded more authoritarian rulers and more power for the police, our peaceful revolution would change the world, but for the worse. Our peaceful revolution will change the world for good only if it is in pursuit of just demands.
That is why we ought to determine our demands. This is not very difficult to do. I propose the following: HOLD WALL STREET ACCOUNTABLE. Tax the rich. Regulate markets. Prosecute white-collar crime.
These demands are worth assembling for, they're worth struggling for. They define a movement that many Americans can -- and all Americans ought to -- stand in solidarity with. Accomplishing these demands would change the world for the better.
Don't let the MSM say we don't have demands. Our demands are clear. The most dangerous thing the status quo can be confronted with is a movement of people who know what they want and who know how to get it. We are such a movement. And we are going to hold Wall Street accountable.
Corporate Free Speech There needs to be better corporate representation. Money is speech. Every individual, even individual stockholders, "ownership," has a right to free speech. Free speech means no one can force or prevent an individual's speech. Ownership has the right to direct the corporation's speech and political contributions. Majority control of contributions may violate an individual's free speech. Corporate management can speech for the corporation, but ownership needs to authorize that speech. No speech or money spent on political contributions may be made without ownership authorization and such contributions must be taken from the individual's dividends. No dividends means there is no allowance for contributions. Corporate management must poll the ownership to determine the amount and placement of all individual stockholder directed contributions. The assignment of all corporate contributions must be made public so that ownership can verify the correct placement of their contributions. Management can not make contributions on the behalf of nonresponsive ownership and thus can only make contributions for which they have been directly authorized.
Money is speech. Corporations are people, because people get the money. Free speech means people are not forced to pay for someone else's speech. Corporations may not force to pay or deny dividends, to a person who does not approve of money spent on speech. Corporations may only spend money on speech that is taken, by approval, from the people who get the money. Every person who gets money, from the corporation, must approve the money spent on speech, in order to protect the right to free speech. Since the money spent on speech is identifiable with a person then that money is subject to caps associated with that person and must be reported. Also, tax consequences flow, to each person, for tax exempt contributions. If the corporation feels that the cost of polling and reporting the money spent on speech is prohibitive, then the corporation is prohibited from spending on speech. Corporations spend money on product ads and any political placement in a product ad must have unanimous consent of ownership.
Keep asking yourselves/ourselves what we want..this is only the beginning..why let 'them' rush us into anything? We'll distill real answers to our own real questions. The mainstream media is a trap. We should keep thinking for ourselves and keep working on the demands and the declarations. The recent declaration was very clear and comprehensive. But it is an evolution. Be our own media.
I understand your sentiment. However, in this case the media is asking the same question most Americans are asking. Once we have a good answer to what is actually a fair question, we will see an exponential rise in support. Currently we're riding the wave created by the police tricking us into "taking" the Brooklyn bridge. I think we're feeling good and we're mistakenly thinking that this wave of support is due to the demandless, leaderless approach. I don't think the current wave of support and attention has anything to do with being demandless or leaderless. It has to do with us engaging in a tactic of active non-violent resistance / civil disobedience (albeit accidentally), a tactic that has been used successfully throughout recent history to bring attention to injustice.
In successful movements, the wave of support from these tactics rose exponentially because they were paired with not just statements about "what we don't like" but also statements about "what we're for"! In our case, we haven't done that. We've only given negative comments or none at all. So millions of people across the country who are inclined to join our cause aren't doing so. How many people in the country do you think will jump in a support a movement that they don't understand? Seriously folks. Let's ask ourselves that honest question and give it an honest answer. We have the world stage but we're not doing anything with it. We're squandering a huge opportunity to have our message carried far and wide.
Why are we doing this, remaining silent about what we're for? I and many others are genuinely perplexed. Maybe some of us have seen V for Vendetta one too many times and got the wrong message from it. Maybe we haven't studied the 50 or more successful overthrows of regimes since 1950 using non-violent active resistance combined with being FOR something and having a list of demands. Gandhi and his fellow Indians beat the British without any weapons and King and his supporters beat unbelievable resistance in America by making a long series of clear demands and then engaging in non-violent tactics when those demands weren't met. They also skillfully used the press to spread their positive message far and wide.
We can do this! We have a positive message. We just need to do the hard job of articulating it instead of claiming that not doing so is some kind of beneficial tactic. If we stay on the course of failing to articulate positive agenda, our support will soon dwindle as fast as it rose when we accidentally "took the bridge". Taking the bridge would have been a good thing to do if we'd done it intentionately and paired it with a positive statement about what we DO want. We need to tell the world what we DO want. Once we do, they'll join us.
Here's one list of demands we could rally around. http://occupywallst.org/forum/proposed-list-of-demands-please-help-editadd-so-th/
stop economic oppression/democratize economic policy/democracy and empire are incompatible
Lots of grievances, yes. But the real reason we are out here is because we don't have jobs and if we do then it doesn't pay enough to keep us afloat. Nobody had grievances 3 years ago. Jobs won't come by way of private hiring because nobody is buying anything. It is a visous cycle with a downward trend. We need to keep infusing government money. Government hiring. I know this sounds like more waist but we have no other choice. Yes the bills will get high but we need to stop the bleeding right now. Higher taxes on incomes over 250,000. That is the patriotic thing for wealthy Americans to do. Whenever our country goes to war young men and women lay their LIVES on the line- they are patriotic. Were just asking for a new type of patriot to step up to the plate.
If we want to change something in our world we have to go out of the statist idea that every problem must be resolved by politics or by demands to them... I thik the goal is to build a collective way of life and the conviction that everyone can help and work to make this world better...we, everyone, not leaders or political parties..
Building a collective way of life is a wonderful dream. I'm totally for it. But to reach that dream, we're going to have to do more than talk about it. We're going to have to set goals along the way, clear ones that potential supporters can understand. Then we'll need to use tactics to achieve those goals. Once we begin to articulate what we're for (other than "we're for the dream of being a collective") we'll get real traction.
This movement will stop the machine.....by unplugging it, not throwing itself on the gears.
That's a catchy statement, but what does it mean today, on the ground? People feel the angst and want to get involved and do something. The problem is we haven't been clear on what to do other than "join the meetings" or "form your own meetings in your town." OK..... We're at the meeting. We have committees. Now what are we going to DO? What are we FOR?
I see the Occupy Wall Street as a fight for dignity but everyone seems to have different agendas .The growing distaste towards the system is literally killing Americans .I have watched and heard people literally die and rot away due to selling there bodies ,using drugs and being neglected .Forced into a corner .Well I see that many people in New York and all over America feel that way .People are being pushed to limits that are destroying there sanity and the very person they are .
One thing we can not put our faith in no more is the constitution it can be amended legally and is withering away .