"Occupy" turning to violence

[bara]

After watching the larger video there was no reason to flashbang those people. None at all. They were not after the cops, they were after the injured man.

As far as Im concerned that goes from 'crowd pacification' straight to assault with a deadly weapon.

[Hyena Dandy]

Yes, I could be mistaken there. But Greenday's view entire thread has been generalized so far.

I was just calling him out on that specific declaration.

The thing is, if you can't generalize, you can't talk about a group like this. I don't mind generalizing the protests because they have to be generalized. They haven't put forward a cohesive 'what we're for' only a 'what we're against'.

We can only generalize about what they're for.

[Panacea]

Good! That's what you get for attacking cops. Riot police better be out tonight waiting for these morons.

You know, you're just a little too gleeful about this; as if you're glad the cops are kicking ass. That is . . . disturbing.

Apparently, some paint and other objects were thrown at officers . . . who were wearing riot gear. Fair enough; the cops have the right to arrest those persons or disperse that group.

They don't have the right to fire flash grenades into peaceful protesters who did not move towards police and were only attempting to aid a downed man.

One man went to the hospital with a skull fracture after being hit in the head with some sort of police projectile. That's pretty serious; he could die from that.

This is nothing to be gleeful over.

[Andara Bledin]

The injured man is a marine and Iraqi War veteran.

Article at The Guardian (why is it that a UK newspaper has better details than local?)
Article at Business Insider

It's interesting to note that despite video evidence of both use of Specialty Impact Less-Lethal Munitions (SIM) and injuries sustained during the attempt by the police to incite a riot from the protesters, the Oakland PD has denied both of these basic facts. Apparently, the police violated the majority of their own regulations regarding the use of such weaponry and the Guardian article states that the actions of last night are under review despite no official complaints having yet been filed.

^-.-^

[Gravekeeper]

We can only generalize about what they're for.

Yes and no. The general cause is nebulous, yes. But you can't generalize, or perhaps more specifically, marginalize them all into a single viewpoint as Greenday is doing.

Apparently, the police violated the majority of their own regulations regarding the use of such weaponry and the Guardian article states that the actions of last night are under review despite no official complaints having yet been filed.

Ugh, even better. I really don't like this weird trend of "We didn't do anything unless you've got it on tape" with the police down there lately.

That piece of justification to come down on the protestors for example was rather questionable and basically amounted too "We had a report of a dude with a gun, but we can't confirm it nor have any information or evidence whatsoever of it". Talk about a 180 from the Tea Party protests.

[Hyena Dandy]

Yes and no. The general cause is nebulous, yes. But you can't generalize, or perhaps more specifically, marginalize them all into a single viewpoint as Greenday is doing.

I think that's what we're all doing, though, if we say "What they really want is X".

We can see GD thinks what they want is to institute a truly communist society, which I honestly don't think is what they want, because they haven't SAID what they want. We can only speculate on what they REALLY want, and there certainly ARE people there who want a truly communist society. I know, I've got a friend who's there who's a communist. He's evidently found enough people there that agree with him that you can say its not just one guy.

But I agree, we shouldn't say "This is what they want". But saying ONE thing is all they want is pretty much the same as saying the other things are all they want (with the exception of something that they're protesting against - in other words, they clearly DON'T want less regulation on banks.)

[Gravekeeper]

I think that's what we're all doing, though, if we say "What they really want is X".

No one really said that except Greenday though? But again, this isn't some great mystery either.

In fact I'll explain the whole thing right now: The US media doesn't know what to do with this story because the issue is too complicated for the usual format of digestable sound bytes. So they're marginalizing based on whatever fits their narrative as they can just head out and find footage of a few protestors that supports whatever opinion the news institute wants to put forward.

But what you're actually seeing is something that has gone very wrong, and that wrong has affected many, many people from many, many walks of life. They don't all know what to do about it or how to fix it. Some of them have ideas, some of them don't. Some of those ideas are right, some are wrong.

But they all agree that something is clearly fucked up right now. Thats why the news down there can't get their heads around this. Its a complex issue with no easy explaination and they're trying to explain away the symptoms without talking about the disease. Because the disease is too complicated and the symptoms are too varied.

They can't figure out the protestors message, because the message is basically "Something is fucked up and we all know it.". But the media wants something nice, simple and Tweetable. They can't explain the message without explaining the "Something" and the "Something" won't fit in a Tweet. ;p

[Hyena Dandy]

Greenday isn't the only one who has claimed they know what they want. Panacea has also layed out what they want. I would say neither of them is completely right.

They all agree that something is wrong, but don't agree on how to fix it. That said, the Tea Party has ALSO said something is wrong, and yet this group is quite clearly NOT the Tea Party.

They're going to decide they want SOMETHING, eventually. If they can't decide, I really have to question their METHOD of protesting. A sit-in, or occupation, or hunger strike, or anything like this needs to have an end goal. "We aren't going away until X."

So far, they haven't decided what that is yet, but they need to decide something. Otherwise the protests will never end, because they don't know what it is that it'll take to satisfy them.

[KabeRinnaul]

I think a major aspect of what they're protesting is corporatism, rather than capitalism. Not the most even-handed link, but Stumble found it recently and I like that term.

[Gravekeeper]

They're going to decide they want SOMETHING, eventually. If they can't decide, I really have to question their METHOD of protesting. A sit-in, or occupation, or hunger strike, or anything like this needs to have an end goal. "We aren't going away until X."

So far, they haven't decided what that is yet, but they need to decide something. Otherwise the protests will never end, because they don't know what it is that it'll take to satisfy them.

Its not that the don't want something, its that there are many things to want which are all results of the same problem. You can look at them and go "Well what is that they want? Jobs? Welfare? Student loan reduction? Prosecution against those who fucked it all up to begin with?". But its effectively all those things, and all of those things are the result of the same core problem: A fundemental imbalance in the rules of the economy and the political power said rules are bestowing on a select few upper class over the majority beneath them.

I actually find it rather interesting that this movement is being portrayed as directionless with no real message or goal, when frankly the Tea Party was not really any more coherent in a singular message than Occupy is. But the Tea Party was somehow heralded as this grass roots movement of like minded individuals that care about America or some such. Meanwhile, Occupy has gone for 5 weeks and spread to 82 other countries. Fucking 82. Yet most corporate media is still scratching its ass going "Well sheesh! We just can't understand what all this peasant rabble wants!"


I mean really, lets review here.

Occupy is protesting:

1) Social and ecomic inequality
2) Corporate greed
3) Corporate influence over government


Tea Party was protesting:

1) Government spending
2) Taxation
3) The national debt and Federal deficient
4) A percieved drifting away from the originalist interpretation of the Constitution.


Yet somehow, the Tea Party was an all American grass roots organization that spontaneously popped up from like minded Americans that were fed up. Yet Occupy is supposedly a disorganized bunch of rabble with no clear message?

The difference of course is that the Tea Party was astroturfed and fit one side's political narrative. Occupy was not and does not. Hell, Occupy is Canada's fault. So its damn foreigners on top of everything else. -.-

I think a major aspect of what they're protesting is corporatism, rather than capitalism. Not the most even-handed link, but Stumble found it recently and I like that term.

Thank you. Corporatism is the word I've been hunting for in my head this whole time try and describe this.

[Rapscallion]

(why is it that a UK newspaper has better details than local?)

We've been doing it longer. Also, warm beer. it's fuelled our journos for decades.

Rapscallion

[Gravekeeper]

We've been doing it longer. Also, warm beer. it's fuelled our journos for decades.

Rapscallion

I think its more that the UK still has actual news on. As does Canada, because we learned from the UK to begin with. -.-

[Rapscallion]

Most of the time we do. Apparently part of last night's radio headlines told of how a group on a talent show were changing their name as it was the same name as a charity for the physically or mentally disadvantaged. Details are lacking as I was wondering how slow the news was.

Rapscallion

[Nyoibo]

(why is it that a UK newspaper has better details than local?)

Because there is less or no incentive for them to have to hold to a specific bias.

This was a good read I though, it touches on why not having a list of demands or suggestions or being a specifically focused group is maybe a good idea.

[Panacea]

So far, they haven't decided what that is yet, but they need to decide something. Otherwise the protests will never end, because they don't know what it is that it'll take to satisfy them.

The Occupy movement differs from the Tea Party in that, they were not co opted by corporate America. It is and has been a movement of people with widely differing complaints, political perspectives, and agendas and they "organizers" (to put it loosely) have deliberately kept it that way. I think they want to avoid another co opt. The Democrats and unions have been trying to co-opt the Occupy message, but unsuccessfully. That's good.

Ultimately, what will satisfy the Occupy movement is government that works and is responsive to its people. We don't have that right now. The US government is NOT responsive to the publics needs, but cater to deeply entrenched special interests on the left and the right. The recent news about the "super committee" is telling on that one; the members were picked specifically so the committee could fail.

When you have a government that is hell bent on sabotaging itself is it any wonder that the general population is furious and upset?

What the majority of Americans want (including myself) is government that works. Our government shut down a year ago after the 2010 elections. I remember local conservatives crowing how they were going to "take their country back." I warned them then that what they actually were going to get was gridlock; that neither side would be able to accomplish anything at all. And that's pretty much what happened.

It's going to be a long year.

I think a major aspect of what they're protesting is corporatism, rather than capitalism.[/URL] Not the most even-handed link, but Stumble found it recently and I like that term.

I love this term. It says the problem exactly.