St Paul's camp and anti-capitalism

[silverfox]

Help.

What is this trying to achieve?

Don't these people have jobs to go to? Or has capitalism liberated them from the need to go to work?

One of the reasons China, India, Brazil etc are powering ahead is they don't pay people to do nothing - if you don't work you don't eat.

I vounteer to go to St Paul's tomorrow with my clipboard and anyone there is obviously not looking for work - or daddy and mummy have so much money they are allowed to play (anti-capitalist) politics until the trust funds click in.

I've no objection to the right to protest. Futile protests, paid for by the very system you object to, appear to be biting the hand that feeds you.

[????]

I know he's a bit of a Bete Noire in these here parts but this made me chuckle...

...Rod Liddle's visit to the protests

[reggie]

Silverfox, go down there with your clipboard and get some information to share with us.

Also how we can tell whether a protest is futile or not?

[Loz]

reggie Wrote:

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> Also how we can tell whether a protest is futile or not?

Well, a good question is, has it achieved it's aims and objectives? In the case of OccupyLSX, well it doesn't seem to have any aims and objectives. Except, of course, it's name "OccupyLSX" and in that it has singularly failed.

[reggie]

Loz, is there any way of finding out that their aims and objectives?

And if a protest has not yet achieved its aims does that make it futile?

[Huguenot]

I guess that the easiest way of finding their aims and objectives is to ask them - and they don't seem to have an answer according to any journo (left or right) who has asked them.

That makes your second question a wee bit redundant - it doesn't have to be futile if it doesn't achieve its aims (it's a journey after all), but if it doesn't have an aim then it cannot even partially achieve it.

[reggie]

When I visited the camp the other day they had a list of aims, about 12, written on a big bit of cardboard outside their media tent.

Their website Occupylsx.org has no list of stated aims but does say this on their press page:

"Occupy London ? part of the global movement for real democracy aiming to challenge social and economic injustice in the UK and beyond"

Im not sure what 'real democracy' means but challenging social and economic injustice is a concept that many can understand.

[nashoi]

Really Reggie? On page one of the inequality thread ???? asks what is actually meant by equality, 34 pages and over 1000 posts later I'm not sure any clear answer has emerged.

[Jeremy]

The demonstration is being seriously undermined by the lack of a coherent aim or message. The statement on their website is so broad and vague, ranging from industry regulation through to global oppression.

I wouldn't call the demonstration futile, as people have a good reason to be angry... if their primary objective is to communicate their anger to the government and the greater public, then so be it. But it is a shame that they are not being a bit more constructive.

[Marmora Man]

It's also so bloody unsightly. I find myself in agreement with the view that everyone has an absolute right to protest but that the protest should be conducted standing up and not involve camping out.

The message, whatever it is, is not reinforced by establishing a tent city in prime London sites. I include the apparently permanent Westminster camp in this - despoiling what should be a public space for all to enjoy, but where the green square has to be fenced off to prevent further squatting protesters.

[LadyDeliah]

Here is their news paper, the Occupied Times.

That might give you an idea of what it's all about if you can't make it down there to ask.

They also have live feeds of a lot of the political speakers and workshops etc.

[Undisputedtruth]

I'd like to see the journalists going into the banks and ask the staff how their organisations screwed our economy, added trillions to the national debt and bring misery to millions of people. I bet they wouldn't get a coherent answer.

[Huguenot]

That would be because their staff never set out to do that.

[spongebob]

Are these the same "Anti-Capitalists" that are in Starbucks morning, noon and night??

Wndowlicking twats!

[reggie]

I looked up Starbucks history and found it started in Seattle which had become "home to a thriving countercultural coffeehouse scene" in the early 80s.

Didnt take long for Starbucks to be seen as a symbol of the exact opposite.

[Marmora Man]

Will be interesting to see what develops after 6.00pm tonight - the deadline given to the campers by which time they should have moved on. I hope they do move on, or get moved on.

[Huguenot]

Starbucks is a highly leveraged commodity business that operates under a feudal financial hierarchy.

Despite its liberal branding, it's probably one of the finest examples of 80s americanised corporate homogeny that ever existed.

[Loz]

Marmora Man Wrote:

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> Will be interesting to see what develops after 6.00pm tonight - the deadline given to the campers

> by which time they should have moved on. I hope they do move on, or get moved on.

The campers won't budge. The City of London will take it to court. Expect the whole matter to last weeks.

[StraferJack]

Laugh at them. Those fools camping out. Laugh at them. They aren't worth a damn thing

Right?

"When students cvrd their eyes with thr clothing, police forced open their mouths & pepper-sprayed down their throats" http://t.co/UMV0vQrH

And when the met come for the london versions who is to say. But fuck it right? They are just

Middle class twats.

Nothing to worry about here.

[Loz]

StraferJack Wrote:

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> "When students cvrd their eyes with thr clothing, police forced open their mouths & pepper-sprayed

> down their throats" http://t.co/UMV0vQrH

There is videos of the incident all over the internet, so everyone can see what happened. Yes, the police dis pepper spray a bunch of peaceful protesters. That in itself is enough for outright public revulsion.

So why did this person outright lie and over-egg the incident? Correct me if I am wrong, but nowhere can I find footage of the police forcing "open their mouths & pepper-sprayed down their throats". And there were a lot of videos from the incident.

Someone on the Guardian site had a good word for this. They called it 'hyperbollocks". And it undermines the truth, which is bad enough. Why make something up?

[StraferJack]

I'm guessing that in the aftermath of being attacked or witnessing a shocking attack, people are more likely to be hyperbolic (he types, whilst sniggering at the phrase above)

As you say it's a shame if it undermines anything - but it's a bit of a side-issue ultimately

[Jeremy]

Pepper spray forced into their mouths? I don't swallow that(!)

But even if it is true... what does it possibly do to bolster the cause of the London protests?

[????]

The yanks have form on Students, Kent State etc. Infact the yanks have form on most anti-capitlism protest, so it's not a huge shock.

[StraferJack]

All true enough, but with action imminent in London it'[s worth bearing in mind

A lot of ???? posting activity on a Monday morning - can only mean one thing.. a long week ahead ;-)

[Earl Aelfheah]

Unregulated capitalism has seriously undermined global well being and democracy. The 'Occupy' movement is attempting to encourage a debate on how we organise our society and economy in light of the global economic crisis. This thread would suggest that they are going someway to achieving this aim. It is hardly fair to criticise them for not providing easy answers.

It's easy to label the movement 'anti-capitalist' and snigger at someone buying a coffee, but this seems pretty flippant to me. It is not anti-capitalist to suggest that internaional markets are often unbalanced, irrational and inefficient and that they often lead to undesirable outcomes. We have any opporutnity to reengineer / refine the way that capitalism is currently structured for the better.