Is Occupy Oakland as Bad as They Say?
SEGREGATION
But not all is rosy in this new society. Some of the very worst customs already banned from our existing society have re-emerged at Occupy Oakland. One of the ugliest of these is segregation.
The encampment has already fractured into a series of micro-neighborhoods, just like a real city. But at Occupy Oakland, where you are permitted to live is determined by your gender and/or racial or sexual identity. Here, for example, is a roped-off “gated community” reserved exclusively for female, gay and transgender residents.
Elsewhere are tents with a “minorities only” rule.
And lest you might be so naive to think that these rules would only ever apply to the Occupy camp, and not to the city at large should the Occupiers ever take over, be aware that one of the Occupation’s many demands is to “Stop White Gentrification in Oakland” — which would mean the establishment of new laws preventing white people from moving into certain neighborhoods.
Yes, my friends, the Occupy movement has made segregation trendy again!
They aleady have this in Middle Eastern society; it’s called a harem.
Didn’t mean to get so heavy. Let’s look at the lighter side of Occupy Oakland.
Slurp up the banality of existence with a krazy-straw of resistenc.
Finally, an idea I think everybody can agree on: Occupy Solyndra!
I’m Satanic — and I’ll take bowing down to a spiritual tyrant over an Economic one any day!
To show how egalitarian and open-minded the whole Occupy Oakland movement is, they have workshops both in Marxism 101 and in anarchism. Being mutually exclusive philosophies doesn’t matter — as long as they’re both devoted to destroying capitalism, we can work out the details later in a brutal post-revolution civil war. Sound familiar?
The main problem when communists and anarchists get together in the same revolution is that the communists are by nature so much more organized. As a result, they’re usually more visible, and the reporters (at least the ones not trying to paper over the whole thing) assume that the communists are dominant. The same is true at Occupy Oakland — the signage was about 50% communist/socialist, 25% anarchist/anti-authoritarian, and 25% incoherent/confused/personal. A casual observer would conclude that the protest was predominantly communist. But I suspect the anarchists and the crazies outnumber the actual communists, but they’re just not as good at advertising themselves.
This sign gets it right — socialism is basically one big across-the-board bailout of everything and everyone. Remember: If it doesn’t work on a small scale, try it on a massive scale! What could go wrong?
“Possible” is a long, long way from “desirable.”
Just as in a real city, the wooden “streets” among the tents were given names: the main drag was called “Free Health Care Blvd.” (though somebody knocked the sign down).
One street had the interesting moniker “End Ism Rd.”
The Revolutionary Communist Party even got into the act, naming the area near their tent “Red Square.”
And also just as in a real city, graffiti artists had already taken to “tagging” the public streets; one funny cartoon on Free Health Care Blvd. mocked “Occuposers” who go home to Mommy and Daddy every night.
Any method for decreasing the amount of shit around here is OK with me.
A man, a tarp, a kitten, a dog, some stuff. Yes, it can be this simple. Society has been reinvented!
In a hilarious vignette that illustrates in miniature the absurd unfeasibility of the whole “green energy” scam, the Occupiers had set up a bicycle connected to a dynamo so that the computer in the media center would be powered by renewable and sustainable energy! Yeah!
Except…well, it’s really really hard to pedal day and night to keep the computer running, so the media center is in reality powered by an extension cord connected to the evil carbon-belching power grid. Note the feeble and ineffectual greenish wire running from the dynamo to the computers. Oh the shame!
Multiply this problem by a billion and you have modern civilization.
And what are they producing on that not-quite-people-powered computer? Well, amongst the plethora of literature handed to me by various protesters was this orange flyer issued by the Occupy Oakland movement itself. For those who still harbor fantasies that the Occupiers really are mainstream, no really, they’re just being misrepresented, the manifesto removes any remaining doubts about their revolutionary bona fides. The full text was posted on this site among others where you can read it in full. Here are a few excepts:
Dear Oakland
Occupation is nothing new. The land we stand on is already occupied territory. The United States was founded upon the extermination or indigenous peoples and the colonization of their land, not to mention centuries of slavery and exploitation.
…
The idea of redistributing wealth must not only be directed towards the “1%” but to all of us as well.
The problem isn’t just a few “bad apples.” The crisis is not the result of the selfishness of a few investment bankers; it is the inevitable consequence of an economic system that rewards cutthroat competition at every level of society. Capitalism is not a static way of life but a dynamic process that consumes everything, transforming the living, breathing world into objects and profit. Now that the economy has consumed every aspect of life, the system is collapsing, leaving even some of its former beneficiaries out in the cold. The answer is not to revert to some earlier stage of capitalism, such as the economic boom of the post-war years; not only is that impossible, those earlier stages didn’t benefit the “99%” either. To get out of this mess, we’ll have to rediscover other ways of relating to each other and the world around us.
Police can’t be trusted. They may be “workers,” but their job is to protect the interests if the ruling class.As long as they remain employed as police, we can’t count on them, however friendly they might act.
…Don’t assume those who break the law or confront the police are “outside agitators.” A lot of people have good reason to be angry. Not everyone is resigned to legalistic pacifism; for some people self-defense is a necessary part of their everyday life. Police violence isn’t just meant to provoke us, it’s meant to hurt and scare us into inaction. In this context, resistance is crucial.
Assuming that those at the front of clashes with the authorities are somehow trying to instigate a violent situation is not only illogical – it delegitimizes the spirit it takes to challenge the status quo, and dismisses the courage of those who are prepared to do so. We all experience the effects of power differently under capitalism, and the ways in which we struggle against it will reflect that. The goal should not be to compel everyone to adopt one set of tactics, but to discover how different approaches can be mutually beneficial.
…
The occupations will thrive on the actions we take. We’re not just here to “speak truth to power” – when we only speak, the powerful turn a deaf ear to us. Let’s make space for autonomous initiatives and organize direct action that confronts the source of social inequalities and injustices. An occupation of public space is not an effective political act in and of itself, it must move beyond this to become a staging grounds for actions that disrupt business as usual, and it’s up to all of us to take the initiative to see this through.
Occupy. Block. Strike. Take Over.
See you on the streets!
-The Oakland Commune
Finally, the speeches were over and people started assembling for the march. Anarchists grabbed their black flags and started tweeting on their corporate iPhones: the time has arrived!
The anarchists all took their places at the front of the march, each holding an oversize cover of a book that was either banned at some point, or is popular with anarchists, or both.
And off we went on a little spin around Lake Merritt. All told, I estimate that there were about 500 of us.
Are the Wobblies coming back? Maybe there’ll be some extra traffic at my farm site (http://wobbly.com). I should put a link to Zombie so they can find what they are looking for.
If they had a “Not a toilet” sign on their minds, maybe they wouldn’t need one on their tents.
It’s all about every nefarious lefty/crackpot organization you can imagine, recruiting every type of lowlife you can imagine to repeat their slogans. They go there and continue being lowlifes 24×7.
Does the #Occupy Movement Speak for You?
Oops…link didn’t work…
Does The #Occupy Movement Speak For You?
You can’t make this stuff up. They self-satirize. Great work Zombie!
Nothing clarifies like photographic evidence. Once again, thank you Zombie! Stay safe!
I case you are curious about the lad in a red t-shirt with Lenin on it, the t-shirt inscription says “the party”.
She is right! My well-being is linked to hers! I felt very annoyed when I noticed she did not even know how to spell “being”…
I wonder if they can move to South America and set up a permanent commune? Perhaps in one of the Guyanas? They just need a strong, spiritual, Marxist leader to pull it off.
Maybe with an IOC (imam of color), to be really PC. We wouldn’t want a white Christian charismatic leader telling POCs (especially QPOCs) what to do, would we?
(bubbagyro, that comment was TOO good!!!!! You made my day!)
Jim Jones wasn’t a Christian, especially by the time they’d gone to Guyana. He’d publicly rejected the Bible, thowing it across the santuary in mid-sermon. His beliefs would have been very welcome at OWS, the liberal mainline and emergent churches, and the WCC/NCC.
Jones was a life-long Communist who hid his politics (poorly) behind a pseudo-Christian veneer. He was a huge hit with the Democrats, who only began to speak of him as a religious fanatic *AFTER* he committed mass-murder.
AND Jim Jones was a close supporter and associate of one Harvey Milk. Yes THAT Milk. See how it all ties in together?
TEA.
I hear it’s lovely in southwest Bolivia; there’s this beautiful dormant volcano named Uturuncu…
Great comment!
Hey Zombie. I had the same idea as you did about downtown Oakland on Saturday. I wanted to see what had happened at the OO since the first day. Oakland is my hometown and current city of residence. I was there at the same time as you with my ‘little’ video camera in hand. I was traveling light because I didn’t know what to expect from the “security force” at the compound – I mean “commune” and I had heard on the news that they were confiscating unauthorized cameras.
I didn’t realize there was a scheduled march Saturday, but that was a bonus opportunity for footage. The commune, and even the march itself didn’t smell very nice. Lack of showers and deodorant will do that.
You nailed it in your photo essay above. This is no longer about Wall Street, if it ever was that is. It’s about any and everything these people had a gripe about. Interesting how well rehearsed the marchers were. Probably because most of them have done this so many times before in the Bay Area. I believe the “Brass Liberation Orchestra” was at the Obama visit to SF in October 2009 (video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6H795fMkmqw).
I asked the cop who was clearing the street for the marchers in his patro car “why didn’t you enforce the evacuation order last night?” No answer. But I’m sure he was under liberal Mayor Jean Quan’s orders not to talk …
The leader caught on to me about a mile into the march and sent security over to “talk” to me. It was a tall cigarette smoking Hispanic guy dressed in red (gang type), who I easily avoided.
I left the march at the Kaiser Center and headed back to the compound to finish shooting. Hopefully I’ll have time this week to post the video.
Great job as usual and keep it up!
Most definitely post a link to your video in the comments section here when you’re done! I can add it to the essay, perhaps, if it’s on YouTube.
I myself was a little too nervous to take video in the encampment, and the few videos I took of the march were pretty unremarkable — the usual chants. Then my camera battery ran out of juice so I couldn’t record the final “action” in the Chase Bank on Lakeshore, but luckily the OOers posted their own video which I just updated the essay with.
As for the enforcer dudes, I wouldn’t be surprised if many of them have gang affiliations. They certainly look the part. The older ones all had Black Panther berets and buttons too. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
The one video/photo I regret not getting was of something called “the supply tent,” which is where are the valuable stuff is stored, I guess. There were three scary enforcer dudes “guarding” it, by which I mean sitting inside and toking joints and crack pipes. They probably would have killed me if I had stepped in to snap a picture.
I wonder how long it will be until somebody rips this place off – or somebody gets killed during an attempt?
There have been thefts at the OWS event. Nothing new about that.
1389 good to see you here tovarich – fighting the good fight as you do so well.
I want to gather up these inbred morons and deadbeats and get them on the train to the homeland that my grandparents knew – let them all wallow in the gloris of Stalin’s and Marx’s legacy.
And let them see how long the police tolerate their hypocritical bullshit and allow them to interfere with businesses and pedestrians.
I give you hint: about one hour before the prison trucks roll. THAT is what they want, that is the government they worship>? let them have it.
Nice essay but with a very naive conclusion….they would not replace the society they are rebelling against but rather would recreate a feudal system where might is right (correct) and the king makes ALL the decisions, including who lives and who dies…come to think of it, OWS Oaktown would become a Stalinist paradise.
I was at Woodstock. Spent 7 days there, watching the whole thing play out. There were almost exactly 1000 times more participants at Woodstock, searching for the same Utopia. I remember sitting with my friend on a hill overlooking the crowd, and saying “this will never really work, you know”. My friend just nodded. Another friend I found drinking muddy water out of a puddle. I said, “you can’t drink that, you will get Typhoid or something”. He looked up from his mud wallow and said, “I took the blue acid. They announced that the blue acid was poison. So what difference does it make if I drink the mud?” He died of AIDS from drug use years later. Lots of memories. I became an accomplished scientist and businessman starting soon after this Yasgur’s farm awakening. I guess that was when I started growing up. One thing: Watch out for the internal police at these events. No one was killed at Woodstock. At Altamount, in California, one or two were killed by the internal police. Unbridled power is a dangerous thing. Good thing the real police have rules. More than just Mick Jagger yelling out “Pee-pooh! Pee-pooh! Behave!”
What came after Woodstock is the part that most have forgotten. Since Woodstock had little crime and wasn’t a “complete disaster”, other events like it were planned around the country. However what made Woodstock work was gone the minute Woodstock ended.
All the following events were huge disasters, with riots, murder and mayhem. Its one of the reasons why Woodstock is so warmly remembered by the left. Because it came and went.
Altamont…Isn’t that what happens when you sub out security to the Hell’s Angels?
Thanks for these reports.. informative and amusing.
Don’t blame the weed.
Can I blame the folks smoking it?
It just confuses the heck out of me how people who will all but leap upon a smoker and tear the cigarette from his lips will say “right on!” or something equally idiotic to someone who lights up a joint. Never mind that a person nearby has to grab her inhaler because of the pot! No one ever asks, in these environments, if it’s all right to light up a joint, and it makes me shake my head.
Someone asked me at a bus stop in Seattle if I minded them smoking pot…so, it does happen. I guess maybe it only happens where it’s legal to smoke in public.
Cannabis, as well as other bronciodialtors, can aid in asthmatic conditions.
Yet another excellent photo essay, Zombie. Thanks for keeping us in the loop. Seems like these people just want an excuse to hang out, smoke pot, and have lazy tent sex.
Steve Kemp – I look forward to your video, please post it here.
I don’t think “counterproductive” is a strong enough term for this. There is a legitimate beef that they have: corporatism. http://bit.ly/sT5BOT That issue is hard to sift out from the mish mash of complaints in NY.
But, as this montage shows, in Oakland, it’s completely obscured by the insanity there. No one with a job can take these people seriously.
What ever happened to “FREE LOVE AND NICKEL BEER?”
It became women of the night and coke.
“What ever happened to “FREE LOVE AND NICKEL BEER?”
People grew up.
Free love and Nickel beer, eh? Well, I suppose we could agree SOME communist-anarchist-death-to-capitalism traditions are good.
Well, it seems one reason that some of them don’t have jobs is that they can’t spell.
BTW Zombie – I didn’t see antisemitic signs; you don’t mention it, but did you run into any antisemitic stuff in Oakland?
Only a few anti-Israel signs — nothing noteworthy. The Oakland scene is much more focused on black/white racial conflict and not so much on anything related to Jews or Jewishness. There’s a completely different political vibe here compared to cities like LA and NY.
Thanks.
From what little I saw in the beginning on the news, and what I can gather from their websites. They ‘seem’ to be a tad cleaner here in Houston, Tx. I haven’t heard of the insane stupid crap like came out of oakland. Might still be happening, I just haven’t heard it. Hell I thought most of the Texas ones were probably about the same til I heard the story out of DFW about the possible ‘repeated’ statutory rape of a 14yr old. Some say she passed herself off as older, some suggest she had come with a group, ‘pimps’ if you will. be really interesting to see how THAT one plays out. Matter of fact I think I saw it posted here in the PJ Tattler yesterday as well.
Playing ‘shanty town’ is fun as long as you don’t actually have to stay. Put them in one of Rio de Janeiro’s favelas and I think they would do a 180 on hating success and loving failure. In a real shanty town, it’s not pretend failure and pretend success these morons are slumming at but life and death and sadness.
Now that would be a “scared straight” program worth instituting.
Send them all there with just the filthy rags that are on their backs, no money, no return tickets, and no passports. Let them live (or preferably die) by their wits (if any). They hate normal Americans, so send them where they will never see any of us again.
Now can we start discussing some test one must pass, in order to vote? How can we leave life and death matters to such idiots? I’m open to suggestions. It’s not that they’re just ignorant of politics: they don’t really have any understanding at all of how anything actually works. Not a clue!
John – it’s an easy test – you must pay taxes. There is even precedent – Per constitution, voting req’s were “Free, White, Male, 25, landowner”
Gender, age, race req’s have been dropped (or lowered) for proper reasons, but ‘landowner’ is not a bad one. make it ‘taxpayer’ to ensure that all voters ‘have skin in the game’ and it would be a good start.
Back in the beginning you had to be a land owner to vote. Nowadays, not so much. How about if you paid income tax you get to vote? You want to vote you pay some tax. Seems fair to me. Taxpayers have a far higher stake in the game than these freeloading idiots.
Aside: Where do they think all their tents, phones, shirts, pants, paints, brushes, drug pipes, backpacks etc. all come from. No one made those and passed them to everyone free of charge. No one even invented the stuff without expecting to earn something from it. Capitalism is about EARNING your goodies. These idiots are about destroying because they don’t want to earn anything by actually working for it. That would be capitalism. Can’t have that.
“Might is right”.
OWS supporters = Obama, Hugo Chavez, Ahmadinejad, the CPUSA, the American Nazi Party and David Duke (Charles Manson would probably be on board too, if asked). You really couldn’t make this stuff up.
Sometimes campaign adverts just make themselves.
I got a feeling that Obama’s comments in support of OWS will be neatly juxtaposed with some footage of feral behaviour (and it will erupt) and … voile!!! Instant Republican campaign …. just add water.
Anarchists, Socialists, Oh my
I’ll bet they don’t even know why
The terrible smell
makes it hard to tell
They made a terrible pig sty
This is actually a fascinating experiment in sociology. Anarchy is unstable; given a power vacuum such as these encampments started out with, people will self-organize. It would be interesting if we could simply leave them there (perhaps walled off in some way so that they could not escape into the public), withdraw all police presence, and let them ferment for a few years to see what happens. In particular, what happens when the women start having children. Most of the various aspects of society – especially the ones that they rail against – occur when women decide that they want a stable, predictable society in which to raise children.
Paul, what I’ve always wondered about anarchists is; how far are they willing to support a “no laws” scenario? If they are true anarchists, shouldn’t they be agreeable to the local police just gunning them down with no legal reason? I’m guessing they think anarchy is only cool if one side is practicing it.
Phil,
Anarchists children live in a fantasy world where they always see themselves doing the face stomping…they never see the other side of the coin, namely the self contradictory love of a system that would promote their own faces being arbitrarily stomped…
Kinda like the way they’re all for abortion…everything free and wild, as long as THEY arent the ones aborted…or stomped…or sent the bill for what they consume and/or destroy.
Ignorant stoners…
Please, for the love of god, bring on this “revolution” just as fast as you can, maggots…
Because I’m still young enough to be one MEAN old man!
To paraphrase an old saying “old age and experience will overcome youth and ignorance any day.” Not to mention that it’s hard to shoot straight when you are stoned out of your mind.
Robert Heinlein said it best, “Be wary of strong drink, it can make you shoot at tax collectors, and miss.”
Wasn’t the proverb “Age and treachery overcome youth and skill”?
Put the wall around Oakland itself, and let them work out that anti-gentrification angst without the hindrance of any imposed gov’t other than their own. Soon enough, their gov’t councils will resemble the scene in “Lawrence” as his “Arab Legion” attempts to run Damascus.
Isn’t the Allah girl also the communist/apple girl? I wonder if she means what she put on both signs?
Yep, the same person. I guess she must be a Fundamentalist Muslim communist anarchist, or something like that. Alternately, she may simply be just a few suras short of a Qu’ran.
Bwaahaahaa!
And domo arigato for doing the reporting the OTMSM (0bama-tromboning mainstream media) won’t do.
“Alternately, she may simply be just a few suras short of a Qu’ran.”
Wish I thunk of that! May I use it? I will change last to koran.
Use at will.
I have a really negative reaction to these people.
Nooooo kidding.
great link. …amazing how stupid these occupy people are
lol
Thanks for that very ‘interesting’ and informative photo journal- a picture IS worth a thousand words. The black/white racial issue is what fuels Oakland. Home of the Black Panther and an entitlement chip on every shoulder only to be outdone by the PC chip for everyone and thing. Clearly that sentiment is ripe and spilling over into vilifying the wealthy in favor of socialism. This is one screwed up city (since the 60′s). I say the police should leave, live and let live. Place a giant chain link fence around them and let them annihilate one another without any intervention. Isn’t that the liberal Alinsky playbook mantra: Rule #13: identify, isolate, freeze and escalate. Poof! they self destruct.
I really don’t care about the unrealistic demands of the POC/QPOC. They are massively outnumbered by my people: the AMCNMWC/AMCNMWSO, that is, the American Citizens of No Matter What Color/American Citizens of No Matter What Sexual Orientation. That is, ordinary people who are trying to get on with their lives, and would do a whole lot better for ourselves if we didn’t have a Chicago-68-wannabe for President, and a weak-bladdered Congress.
2012. Let the electoral bloodbath commence.
For forty years Jews have been accused of being ” occupiers “.
Who would have guessed we were just ahead of our time.
Whoops.
You are so right! Won’t the PA be pissed when they start whining and realize their “Occupation” meme has been co-opted. G-d works in mysterious ways!
#Occupy Gaza?
It’s like the TV show, “The Walking Dead,” only there aren’t any real people, only zombies. How pathetic. Go in with the water cannons and the tear gas and the rubber bullets and clear those bums out! It’s about time the Oakland police did something about it. Just like in New York City, I’m surprised they let it go on as long as it has.
I think that the situation here would require SOAP and water cannons, with disinfectant soap at that.
“This Is Not A Toilet” – I mean, really!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmEHcOc0Sys
The city councils that have allowed these encampments to be set up around the country are who I will hold responsible for the injuries and the violence that is bound to occur when these tent cities are finally cleared out. It’s the police I feel most sorry for. In Los Angeles the city council went so far as to pass a resolution in support of the “occupation”, essentially telling the police to ignore flagrant violations of the law. But a day will eventually come when the same city council (or the mayor) will order the police to evict the squatter camp, the camp they themselves allowed in the first place. And when it turns violent, as it most certainly will, it’s the police who will unfairly bear the brunt of the criticism.
This is the antithesis to the American Psychiatric Association Annual Meeting.
And they’re inventing new and exciting psychoses to enter into the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.
The U.S. is still number one in some areas.
Are we a great confused nation, or what? And we have the perfect leadership to pull it all off. (Sorry for the sexual innuendo).
Well, speaking of innuendo, when /neal Stephenson’s new novel “Reamde” (sic) came out, I was convinced it was a description of what the Chicago-Soros machine and their puppet have done to Uncle Sam.
I just read an article about OWS NYC and they were complaining about the cool weather. I couldn’t help but think, what a bunch of pikers! I’m old enough to remember the buddhist monks setting themselves on fire in Saigon. Now, there is a committed protester! I would donate the fuel for that sort of thing. But…then there is the carbon footprint…fossil fuels, all that. Then I remembered cooking bugs with a magnifying glass on a hot summer day. Maybe a big magnifying glass or an array of mirrors focusing a powerful beam of light! Yes, now, THAT is commitment! I’ll call it SolarCide! Just a few loose ends to tie up. I’ve got to call my lawyer, then the DOE! maybe I could get government guaranteed loans!
March for life happens every year in JANUARY. Not even close to warm then. We have over a hundred thousand. No one complains of the weather. Of course the media never mentions us either.
The “Eat the Rich” woman has eaten too much already, she should “Starve the Too Big to Fail Beast”.
The trouble with “Eat(ing) the Rich!” is that “You can’t be too rich, or too thin!”
There’s just not a lot of calories there.
Thanks for your work, Zombie.
Tea party groups groups fill out the proper paper work for their rallies, they stay at only for the number of hours they are legally allowed. Tea party groups state very clearly their grievances such: as the government’s spending is out of control and government needs to learn like the rest of us do in our daily lives to live within its means. Tea party groups proudly wave American flags, sing patriotic songs, say the entire pledge of allegiance, and say prayers for the country. Tea party groups keep their language clean, dress neat and presentable. Tea party events are safe environments for the whole family. Tea Party people at the end of the event leave the place in better condition than they found it. Tea party events are usually only a few hours long and on weekends because Tea party people are produces in society and have to go back to work on Monday. Yet it is the Tea Party that is scorned by the liberals and their allies in the liberal state controlled media as a bunch of: racist, hate filled violent hayseeds, terrorist, and want to lynch all black people these claims are made about the Tea Party people by liberals yet they never offer any evidence to support their claims. These occupiers on the other hand are nothing more than useless idiot slaves of the left. These clueless morons have no clue at all about the real world, they have no clue why they are occupying what they are occupying, they can not even tell the sympathetic liberal media what their grievances are, or what they are protesting. These occupiers do seem to hate capitalism and wish to destroy capitalism yet they seem to be more than willing to uses anything they can hands on that was only made possible due to capitalism (cell phones, computers, their tents, their pre printed down with capitalism signs and shirts and so on). These occupies are putting the worst of liberalism on display for all to see, they are throwing their trash anywhere, ramped drug use is on display for all to see, they are going to the bathroom like animals anywhere they please including on a police car, they are openly calling for a violent revolution and I believe most of them are looking for a excuse to turn the occupation in something violent, they are openly calling for executions of people who are the produces in this country. The scary thing is that these numb skull drugged out useless idiot occupiers are the ones the liberal left including the Nazi and communist parties, Obama, and the liberal state run media are praising and are saying we all need to listen to them, and it is the Tea Party that needs to go to hell and be silenced. 2012 well be here soon people and with it maybe our last chance to save this country, or I believe another civil war maybe at hand, between the producers and the takers in this country that war will not end in any truce one side will have to distroy the other there can not and will not be a middle ground.
Remember that the liberals who now run the media used to protest like the OWS in their own youth.
When these media liberals look at these far-left-wing protesters smoking pot, drumming, dressing sloppily and even slovenly, the liberals see themselves 20 years ago (the anti-globalization “Battle of Seattle”) or 30 years ago (the nuclear freeze movement) or 40 years ago (the antiwar protests against the Vietnam War). So of course they sympathize. That was their own way of protesting in their younger days. In New York, even Pete Seeger showed up. That’s even more nostalgic.
The Tea Party protesters tend to skew older. They don’t remind the liberal media of their own youth. They remind the liberals in the media of their parents and grandparents, whom they rebelled against when they were young.
I think that the straw spread all over as in a stable is appropriate.
You insult stables. The jackasses are offended!
Who the hell wants to occupy Oakland?
I’ve yet to see reports like this from Occupy Detroit or Occupy East St. Louis.
It seems redundant, does it not?
Smash the commie scum!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Resist Resist
Doesn’t look half as bad it could if those pics are any indication. I mean, compared to a normal protest, this is almost mature, and tame.
The SF camp is far, far worse.
The Oaklanders apparently got a big donation of new-ish pro-level all-weather tents, so there is a veneer of non-grodyness to the housing situation. But inside most of them it gets pretty grimy pretty quickly.
The SF encampment keeps changing location as the city boots them out from place to place. First they were outside 555 California St.; then onto Union Square, then in front of the Federal Reserve on Market St., now in the bocce ball courts at the Embarcadero. I covered them at each of the first three locations, but I can’t spend my life following these people around from squalid camp to squalid camp every day. I decided to check out Oakland simply because of the media coverage brouhaha.
Hahahaha! A bunch of dope addict thugs looking for more handouts. Not a man to be seen in the rabble, none but mere children
Therein lies the problem Tommie Troll.
These clowns claim to represent ‘the 99%’ but implicit in that concept is that 99.99% of the 99% are mindless wage-slaves, duped by the big corporates, too apathetic, too stupid, or all of the above to get involved.
This explains why there is only a relatively small number of 200-300 in each major city directly involved in the Occupation – they are the only ones with the depth of insight, you see.
This insight could be the result of superior intelligence, finely honed analytical skills, a well developed intuition into the human condition and a breadth of life experience ….. or, on the other hand, it could be a delusion borne of excessive drug use.
It’s ZOOOOOMMMMMBIIIIIIEEEE!
*worship*
Shoulda known you’d cover this!
What on earth ARE you chaps up to over there?
We baton-charged our ferals in Melbourne last Friday and moved them on.
Previously we had twelve years of two jelly-backed Police Commissioners (both of whom were ditched in disgrace) who basically allowed ferals to run riot.
Big sur-prise last Friday when they got the eviction notice followed up by 400 REAL coppers throwing them into the paddy-wagon.
In the past Commissioner Jelly-Back used to send half-a-dozen pimply recruits straight from the academy and the more thuggish ferals would have their wicked way with them.
We have even had a Greens Politician demanding an enquiry into who authorised deploying 400 coppers (sub-text … only send enough so that we can have our street-theatre push-n-shove for the TV cameras and then run riot).
Get on with it you slackers and take out the trash!!
See, this is why I just LOVE Australians! I always believed that we had more in common with you than with most other countries. Too bad you guys are so far away.
Suddenly I am very, very ashamed.
Looking at the way Oakland PD de-loused the square it now makes Melbourne coppers look like a bunch of nancy boys on a Gay Mardi Gras float.
Why can’t we have flash bang canisters?
Was our tear gas past it’s use-by date?
Have our coppers even heard of bean-bag rounds?
Do we need to start a VicPol baseball team so they can learn to REALLY swing a stick?
Having read the report of the Oakland clean-up I feel cheated
@34.fester: oakland is no detroit..far from it. it’s mostly quite a lovely city (with just a few ‘bad hoods’) that has, lately become the arty and trendy place to be in the bay area. note all the white folks at marches such as this. five years ago, most of these immigrants from san fran, berkeley, alameda,etc. wouldn’t have thought to set foot in oakland but now they feel like they are on the cutting edge by living and playing in the city with the most interesting architecture in the bay area and the greatest weather in the world.
Having grown up in Berkeley, 50′s to the 70′s and lived 20+ years in Oakland after that, I can tell you that Oakland is STILL one of two armpits of the Bay Area, the other being the San Pablo/Richmond area. I certainly hope you are right about it becoming the next “desirable area” in the BA, because I still have a house there I would love to sell, and be completely shed of everything still connecting me financially to California.
That said, the Oakland Occupiers are the willing stooges for Oakland’s endemic looters, who are just waiting for the police action to start, so that in the confusion they can loot the downtown area again. One of the reasons the business district in Oakland is so anemic, is that every time some “cause” can be ginned up (Lovell Mixon, Oscar Grant, Raiders win, Raiders lose, you name it) the feral mob runs to downtown and Jack London Square and uses the uproar to steal whatever they can get away with. Just wait and see what happens when the police finally do decide to move (if they ever do.) The numbers will swell with all the folks from East Oakland and Jingletown showing up to do their pre-Christmas “shopping.”
Question about the video of the Chevy Chase bank occupation. Who are the organized dudes (and a few dudettes) with the covered faces and the shield-like signs? If you watch the crowd gathering and entering the bank, one guy in particular organizes this separate group who form some kind of wall around the event. They all carry heavy signs with arm-bands on the inside, like shields. They use the shields and their bodies to form a barrier. The organizer continues to move them around and place them, forming a right angle. Who are they? What is their purpose??
They are the anarchists. Their “shields” are oversized book covers (see photo from the beginning of the march). Of course, the “book covers” are a gimmick and just an excuse to have the equivalent of riot-squad shields, for group confrontations. If you paint Ferdinand the Bull on your military gear, then no one will recognize its purpose!
They’re pretty organized for anarchists. They may be the descendants of the Black Bloc, I’m not sure.
Zombie you are such a complete fuck tard it is unbelievable. “Der they may be descendents from blac bloc, der der”
Everyone hates you, die in your little smug puddle.
P.S. your blog is lame as all hell
Thanks for taking the time, and the chance, to take this pictures.
And I thought occupy cleveland and philly was bad.
Zombie –
Several of your captions provided some much-needed mirth. As always, I appreciate your incisive coverage of the Bay Area.
You. Totally. Rawk!
I’d say these morons should get a job, but who in their right mind would hire any of them. Scary thing is they walk among us, and they vote. Who will they blame when they’re the only ones left in Cali?
They wont get jobs or even look for them because the liberals have told these useless idiots slaves of theirs that they don’t have find a job, because they are vitims of a uncaring socity and they are owed what ever they demand.
Actually, most of them DON’T vote. I recognize many of them from Berkeley protests and I have spoken to many of them. TRUE fighters for justice down through the decades (King & Chavez, for example) would be sad and embarrassed.
Oscar Grant Plaza?!?! Please someone tell me the OWS folks picked the name and the city didn’t actually rename someplace after Oscar Grant.
Is it wrong for me to be really wanting these people to start a civil war? I just want so bad for them to start it just so they can be taught who really is on their side…
I pruned your comment to make it more printable. But please henceforth, tone it down a bit.
1932 Bonus March… ahhh… good times. There is a solution that can be learned from history. Probably applicable all over the country, not just in Oakland, or D.C. for that matter.
I use to live on 6th Street above Lake Merritt and I sure hate to see it look like that. It was a long timer ago, 1969/70 between tours in Vietnam. I loved Oakland then. It was a lot better city and the people were a lot different too. I even liked Berkeley, most of the people, even the protesters, were friendly even when I was in uniform. I had several discussions with them and they respected my willingness to listen to their thoughts and I was surprised that they listened to mine. I had respect for their courage and honor as they saw it.
Berkeley (and even Oakland) in the 60′s and early 70′s was still a good place to live. The faculty hadn’t all moved out to Orinda and Moraga yet, and there was diversity of opinion there. They even had a John Bircher on the Berkeley City Council. Then the students got to vote; the age was changed to 18 and residence for 6 weeks was sufficient. At that point the consequences of allowing starry-eyed, liberal-minded, wet-behind-the-ears adolescents to vote who didn’t have to pay the bills or live with the consequences of their actions started to manifest itself, and it has been a continuous downhill run since then. My husband was a police officer in Berkeley into the early 90′s and was essentially a victim of working for people who hated the very thought of him. But somebody had to stop their recycling from being stolen ….
I wonder if these people have the faintest idea of what they are fomenting.
There is a small contingency camped on our town plaza. I got an email today informing me that they would be in front on my shop with signs this week. Why? Who knows. I can’t even afford an employee any more.
“This is not a toilet” Huh, what are they talking about, it’s Oakland. The whole city is a toilet.
One usually only sees signs along the lines of “This Is Not a Toilet” in boarding kennels and pre-schools.
That mess is not going to end well.
I think some of the protestors don’t quite understand what the “Invisible Man” is about. And how it does not in any way relate to them or their cause.
A terrific book.
Most of the books were simply “banned” books — not necessarily books that they understand.
Actually, I wasted some time looking into several of the books, and in many cases the manner in which they were “banned” was very marginal. “Ferdinand the Bull,” for example was never banned in America, and Disney even made an animated version of it shortly after it came out. It’s just that the government of Spain (this being 1936) saw the book as a veiled political statement, and briefly banned it in Spain. Other books on the list were “banned” in the sense that some school district didn’t order any copies, or some such marginal victimification. And a few of the books didn’t seem to be banned at all, but are popular among young anarchists — like “The Hunger Game,” an anti-authoritarian young adult bestseller that was popular when these kids were tweeners (i.e. a couple years ago).
Note the update I just added to the end of the essay:
UPDATE:
Late in the day on Monday, October 24, the Occupiers sent out emergency press releases saying that they were tipped off that the police would follow through on their eviction orders in the upcoming hours:
I USED TO THINK THAT ABOUT 10% OF THE PEOPLE WERE NUTS….BUT IN RECENT TIMES , THAT ESTIMATE HAS DOUBLED , AND RISING SLOWLY BUT SURELY !!!
Where are all the cute chicks? Was this a mostly male event?
Maybe even hippie girls need hygeine nowadays …
D
My thought exactly! A drought of pretty young women – and I doubt that Zombie has a selection filter for her photos.
I’ve long noticed that one can predict the political/social fortunes of a group by looking at the womenfolk that group attracts and displays in public.
Women are smart that way – they innately understand winners and losers and aspire to be with the winning men.
When hippies were cool, back in ’66 and ’67, hippie chicks were HOT! I could sense the demise of the fad when the hippie chicks turned skank.
Nowadays, its those country girls that are so hot. Good news for America!
WOW you can sneak behind the kitchen right after they cooked and take pictures of the dirty dishes piled up, nice try. I also think you placed the things you supposedly found for pics for your stupid brainwashed blog/article garbage.
There ought to have been enough volunteers, immediately after lunch, or even during it, to have cleaned up.
Irresponsible and lazy is no way to run an encampment. It takes work to keep a camp site clean and vermin free. I see no sign of proper effort being made.
Fortunately, public health is good enough these days that the outbreaks of dysentery and similar illnesses are delayed. This is not, clearly, due to any effort of the part of those encamped.
Don’t seem to remember ever seeing that at a Tea Party. But nobody ever tried to pitch a tent and bang on drums until buttcrack-thirty at Tea Parties, either.
I thought cardboard-on-pallets was a nice way to make streets. I wonder how many of the occupiers realize that most shipping pallets are made from tropical hardwoods?
Looks like the Oakland Police moved in this morning and are clearing the camp right now.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/10/25/BAUB1LLTC9.DTL
Yep — looks like the rumors last night were true.
Next up: victimology! “Look at the mean cop enforcing the law! Bad cap — bad!”
#Occupy has conservatives on the run. This is evident by the massive shift in coverage and smear attempts by rightwing bloggers.
What OccupyOakland has done in the span of less than a month is set up I’m impressed by the efforts to set up a functioning
Here Zombie illustrates by photographs what he considers deficiencies in the OccupyOakland encampment. But, what this post shows is the lack of understanding of anthropology, history, engineering, government and the military by conservatives. Ignorance is a core plank of the conservative movement these days.
Conservatives, like Zombie, tend to be chicken hawks of late so of course they have no idea what happens when a large group of people move into an area and have to hammer out facilities. Besides defense, when one sets up a base camp, trash disposal and sanitation are key problems. This is also true with urban planning.
So it is especially striking most of the complaints Zombie postulates are issues which Government grapples with daily. Streets, sanitation, trash disposal, crime. So unwittingly Zombie is making a call for more government inside the OccupyOakland encampment.
This is in direct opposition to “stated” conservative beliefs, that they want less government interference. But, everyone knows Cosnervatives actually want more government interference in the lives of everyday Americans… as long as it is enforcing conservative social beliefs, oppressing those with dissenting views and murdering people in other lands. Conservatives love Big Government, they just hate when it helps people.
Of course, no conservative blog post would be complete without photographs of scary black people and muslims…
LMAO! Thanks for the satire! I cracked up at least six times reading that!
Yikes, and thanks for YOUR comment! I was about to respond seriously. (And here I am always begging people to please quit falling for LovelyEarth.)
…and you demonstrate incoherence – we needed that!
OWS….Or Operation Distract From Obama.
Thanks Zombie, you are doing the Lord’s work. You are THE reliable source for reporting on left-wing lunacy in the Bay area. I agree totally w/ another poster who lays the blame for any violence that may occur on the morally corrupt local pols, nearly all Dems, who have coddled these nuts nationwide and will have to send in the working and middle class cops to do the dirty work eventually.
First of all – Great work! Secondly, all I kept thinking was “dirty hippies”. Sad. So many leftists and liberals want to return to the glory days of the 60′s – looks like this group has succeeded. Their utopia is so far removed from reality that it’s laughable . . . and sad.
Well, Oakland has apparently started to begin to enforce the evictions. The rest will probably be taken care of similarly. Anyway, all this exercise in futility wrought is the American people getting some more of a glimpse of the true nature of this administration, political and otherwise: unAmerican. If the Obama administration had any foresight they wouldn’t have associated themselves with them. Most people will see these “occupiers” as part of the problem, or clueless. Obama didn’t have to cowtow to them – they’ll vote for him anyway, if they remember to vote. Perhaps, the ole doctrine of “not letting a crisis go to waste” was triggering their hopeful neurons?
Looking at these pictures, I think to myself, “Hippies, they are like bad pennies, they keep coming back!”
Since Occupy Wall Street wants to forgive all debts, (wiping out savings and checking accounts in banks), if it looks like they will win, I’m going to max out the credit card. On ammo. OWS is the failure of American Education made manifest. If all of OWS’s demands were met, 50% to 80% of the American population would die of hunger, exposure or violence in the next five years. Occupy rapes have already been reported, can murders be far behind? I think this is the start of the entitlement riots I’ve been predicting for some time, because government cannot possible redeem its trillions of dollars in pledges, as both parties bought votes for the past 30 years with borrowed money. I will link to this from my Old Jarhead blog.
Robert A. Hall
Author: The Coming Collapse of the American Republic
(All royalties go to a charity to help wounded veterans)
For a free PDF of my book, write tartanmarine(at)gmail.com
Does anyone want to point out to the OWS crowd that Robin Hood was stealing from the GOVERNMENT (prince/sheriff) to return wealth unjustly appropriated through EXCESSIVE TAXATION?
I don’t think Robin Hood would support Communism, Socialism or the DNC.
To make it even funnier, the reason for the excessive taxation was raising ransom, twice, for Richard I, “Lionheart”. You know, the good king who makes everything better when he gets home?
The irony!
I apologize, as I made a format error in my part. The second paragraph should read, “I am impressed with the Quasi-governmental structure OccupyOakland has adopted and implemented.” thank you.
Ahhh … thanks for that clarification.
It now makes heaps more sense than before.
(nahhhh …. not really …. it is still mindless dribble)
I think the real solution to this problem is a solution of Butyl Mercaptan and squirt guns. That would take care of the enforcers too. And be sure to spray the tents, their cloths and other personal effects.
I second the motion.
See the latest update at the end of the essay:
UPDATE:
The party is over:
Police clear Occupy Oakland camps, arrest dozens
Yes, that last: What could possibly go wrong?
If you’re old enough to remember the late hippie days and early 70′s, this whole frame of mind is very familiar. Portraying villains as heros, reinventing things needlessly, squalor and drugs, etc. In a couple years, half of these kids will be young businessmen. They will be angry because they wasted huge money on education, and they will listen to conservative radio in the mid-morning.
Keep the heat on them Zombie. If they control the narrative, they will control what Hiistory says about “The Occupants”.
Historians culd be going through your essays in 100 years.
Toilets are part of the social contract.
Lets see these same people protest under communism or socialism,. They would be shot in the park if there would be any parks left. Berkly is right up the freeway from Oakland where people live like this all the time protesting something.
Excellent coverage as always, Zombie!
These are the modern day Jacobins – and it’s interesting to see that at least one of the OWS organizers from NYC are active contributors to Jacobin Magazine…or that Elizabeth Warren, Democrat candidate for Senate in Massachusetts, considers herself as someone who “created much of the intellectual foundation for what they do”.
The protesters demand that their student loans be forgiven? I think they should demand refunds from the schools that neglected to teach them spelling.
One sign:
“Your well bieng is linked to mine.”
(Posterboard and felt markers apparently do not come with spell-check. Perhaps we need a federal regulation covering that.)
Thanks for the coverage. I am an Oakland homeowner/resident and I am always shocked by the racism and fracturing by who? Well the same people that say they want to bring everyone together and stop hatred!!!
I wish I would have known about the rally; I would have been out demonstrating for Capitalism!
Zombie, whoever you are… Don’t ever stop what you are doing. I’ve followed you for years .
Aw shucks!
I’m glad you found a home here, after poor treatment elsewhere.
Barack Obama Led #OccupyChicago – Circa 1988
by Joel B. Pollak
http://biggovernment.com/jpollak/2011/10/25/barack-obama-led-occupychicago-circa-1988/
It’s like they built a miniature Portland, Oregon in the middle of Oakland. Uncanny!
They came, they ‘occupied’, they stank to high heaven.
YUUUUUUUUUUCK.
Some great, Utopian ‘society’. These spoiled idiots couldn’t create a working toilet or a water well to save their collective arses.
I suppose they used their hands as “toilet paper” since “toilet paper” is surely evil and capitalist.
They used “The Chron”!
Strange how they want to create a new apartheid where white straight men are the 2nd-class citizens.
On a similar point to what you say, if they ruled the world, they would just cluelessly create (from the ground upwards) new forms of the old inequalities. But every generation brings along another army of naive kids who think the revolution will be different for them.
In 200 years historians might be debating whether everyone was complicit in this debacle, citing newspaper articles by straight white men apparently in agreement with it.
We know, however, that it is a mixture of blindness, misunderstanding, and a small group of neo-Marxists or probably just plain Marxists, who may will try and grab at any power they can get, which is why they are trying to foment anti-capitalist sentiment.
Love the local reporters chanting “peaceful” over and over again. First thing this morning (after the teargas and vandalism last night) was “peaceful”. One beautiful piece of footage last night of the “peaceful” march showed a couple of guys dealing drugs – the reporters completely oblivious.
And oblivious to the marchers overturning dumpsters, throwing paint, smashing car windows… Because they were doing it “peacefully”! What do you want? Nobody’s dead.
Great coverage Zombie – stay safe!
Why do I fear that eventually these people will have to be destroyed. The country is full of these people,(USA is the largest drug culture in the world and keeps drug trafficking profitable, eh?)and they won’t just disappear because this bunch of loons couldn’t get past square one with this silly collectivist camp out. They have the intelligentsia supporting their activities and one of the two major political parties is(for survival reasons) already on their side.
Thanks for another great photo essay, Zombie! As usual, you did a splendid job cutting to the chase…keep up the good work!
All that’s missing from all these gatherings is the tin foil hat construction booth, and a trailer mounted hamster wheel for them to generate their own electricity.
But, I can understand where this technology is totally beyond their comprehension.
They should let the police go home and bring in the local pest control technicians.
Amazing how people who have chosen to exercise their right to protest the loss of employment/economic stability (through no fault of their own) are considered to be outsiders & derelicts in their own country. Some of the protesters are unemployed AND college educated. Some are retirees. As for needing to be a tax payer to vote, how would citizens who are victims of the economy (i.e. unemployed/laid-off) be able to exercise their right to vote? Another example of how important it is to think before you speak, or type (in this case).
“College educated”? No, they are college certified; their degrees are in “fields” such as graphic design, communications, or Angry Studies. Note how many spelling and grammar errors there are in the signs that they proudly display; they have no education beyond that which the average ten-year-old could acquire.
I know I’m going to get killed over this but I just want to test my views on this. I personally support the occupy movement, I simply believe in what they complain about and if you want to see the consequences of bad management and short term vision in both politics and companies you don’t have to look far. I prefer a balanced view so of course there are many benefits also, still after the last decade it’s quite clear there is a deeper problem at play here.
Zombie is right, Lord of the flies came to mind and especially with movements like this sektarianism and fanatism will pop up right away.
I checked out their perspective and the funny thing is that they have exactly the same complaints as those commenting on this board. They paint a hilarious cartoon of the other side which they demonize at every expense, setting out on missions to find only what they need to feed the fear of the other. You see commies and they see fascists. Behind the ones occupying, are a lot of of the people who do work and do wash, do dress nicely and do pay taxes, they don’t know that much about the occupyers, they just feel ripped off. While people here claim Obama is in with them, they claim Obama is in with the 1 %. It’s like the both wings of the political spectrum are both locked into their own conspiracy theories drawing up cartoons of each other and hurling insults and cynical jokes at each other while at the end of it nothing gets done about the real problems of society which deteriorate even further. Both sides have a part of the truth but refuse desperately to listen to the other point of view immediately seeing Stalinistic Russia pop up at every hint of welfare or Nazi Germany pops up at every hint of law and order on the other side. I don’t mind people making a buck, but a reasonable chance should be given, the stats prove this is not the case in this recession. The problem you’re facing is that nowadays there is money in activism and a lot of money has actually been raised by the movement. There is room for dissent because of grave mismanagement in all higher regions of society. The last ten years have been fueling discontent. Everybody has an opinion about the situation but is at the throat of everyone with a principally different view.
I looked into what happened in Oakland and I agree that there’s definite signs that people came looking for a riot, still rubber bullets and tear gas use has been documented including a deliberate head shot, the OPD has a long history in police violence which is doucmented. The underlying cause is excessive poverty and fewer jobs around, which are statistically clear. Each side has its favorite problems but completely ignores or dismisses the other side’s problems. It’s quite hilarious really.
You can refuse to look beyond the pictures, but twenty million foreclosures will put those smelly poor underachieving hopeless radical elements at your doorstep. I don’t believe gunning them down and locking them up works, I believe the answer to be in the end of fear mongering and all sides uniting and working the country out of this mess,
A cynical zombie will tell me it’ll all end in a riot violence and death camps, but well I can’t help believe in sensible debate cooperation and the human mind which I believe to be good. But I know I won’t convince anyone here. So shoot. I apologise for the lengthy post.
“You see commies and they see fascists”
Except they ARE commies — just look at their signs. CPUSA is in full support of them, as is the American Nazi Party.
“While people here claim Obama is in with them, they claim Obama is in with the 1 %.”
They ALL voted for Obama. They are upset with him, not because he went too far, but because he didn’t go far enough.
“Both sides have a part of the truth but refuse desperately to listen to the other point of view immediately seeing Stalinistic Russia pop up at every hint of welfare or Nazi Germany pops up at every hint of law and order on the other side.”
Again, the Stalinist CPUSA and the American Nazi Party both endorse the Occupy movement. Regarding welfare, I don’t know ANY Republican that doesn’t believe in a social safety net that gets a worker back on his feet after a setback. But there’s a difference between a social safety net and paying people not to work, such as the move toward extending welfare benefits indefinitely. Such policy may buy votes for politicians, but it costs society in the long term, sapping motivation, skills, pride, and confidence from welfare recipients, and perpetuating the cycle of poverty.
“I looked into what happened in Oakland and I agree that there’s definite signs that people came looking for a riot, still rubber bullets and tear gas use has been documented including a deliberate head shot, the OPD has a long history in police violence which is doucmented.”
I visited their camp before they were evicted. By the way there were no rubber bullets, and tear gas is the preferred crowd control device for riots. I saw the video, the canister that hit Scott Olsen (founder of IHATETHEMARINECORPS.COM) was on an apparently random ballistic trajectory — he was in no more direct danger than members of the media covering the event.
If they’d been a band of typical homeless vagrants, would they have been allowed to camp out for even ONE night? Of course not, they’re squatters. The Oakland occupanistas wrapped themselves in a constitutional argument for free speech, even as they called for the overthrow of our constitutional system of government. There was such misguided sympathy for them, there were NO police in the days leading up to the eviction from Frank Ogawa Plaza. If anything, the stewards of our public spaces screwed up by NOT having a police presence, inviting an attitude of defiance and lawlessness. The whole situation is ultimately attributable to the ineffectual mayor, Jean Quan.
“I believe the answer to be in the end of fear mongering and all sides uniting and working the country out of this mess”
Right. As long as we give them everything they want (see their “second Bill of Rights”) then they won’t break into our homes, rape our wives and children, and take all our belongings.
Welcome to Zimbabwe.
ahhh …. I love the sound of batons on dreadlocks early in the morning
Obama’s Brown Shirts on the march. Oh, you said their shirts not brown just dirty. I figured since the last National Socialist group had brown shirts on their violent protesters well maybe you know. Of course those Brown Shirts back in the 30′s blamed everybody else too, capatilists, Jews, anyone with a job and money. Deja vu again.
They wear brown shirts to camouflage the poop they sleep in.
I’ve been watching the Hollywood lefties make appearances at and statements supporting the NYC OWS. How can people like Alec Baldwin, who makes money off the banks doing commercials for them, and who makes a lot more money in one year than I’ll probably see in my lifetime, then turn around and support people who are in fact protesting against the very way in which he makes his living? Does he not see the hypocrisy? Do these protesters not realize that most of these stars run BUSINESSES and invest in BUSINESSES with their money? Are the movie-making and television show productions not big BUSINESSES? And, while we’re at it, what makes Alec Baldwin more entitled to make that kind of money doing what he does than I am doing what I do for a living? What makes acting more important? The answer of course is, acting was his choice and he was able to make a go of it. I don’t begrudge him or any other highly-paid star for making what they do. It’s called the free market system. Anybody can try to be a successful movie star or to be successful at any other big money-making job. The ability to choose one’s profession and work hard to make it a success is a big reason why this country is so great. All I’m saying is that what makes them (meaning people like Alec Baldwin, Susan Sarandon, etc.) any different than the people they are supposedly protesting against?
You raise an interesting question. Why haven’t we seen Occupy Hollywood “A”list-ers and producers or Occupy the NBA. They make ridiculous amounts of money for doing very little. why is nobody camped outside there spralling mansions? Their 10,000 sq ft homes could give housing to 10 families of 4. Plus we could develop their acreages with small self-sustaining farms and seed saver gardens for families with 3 or more children.
entire post reads like you’re 14.
Occupy Wall Street, Self-Serving Anarchy
Anyone who has ever had burdensome college loans to pay off, anyone who has lost a decent job and can’t find another, anyone who ever bought a house he couldn’t afford, anyone who lost a bundle in stock market downturns while banks and auto companies received billions in bailouts must have felt at least a minimal degree of empathy for the Occupy Wall Street protestors.
Anyone who still believes they deserve empathy is a damned fool.
Whoever organized the initial disorganized demonstrations over a month ago may have had valid beefs with the establishment but the protests have long since been co-opted by the most radical elements within and from outside American society.
Communists, neo-Nazis, anti-Semites, skinheads, and anarchists representing extremist fringes now seem to comprise the bulk of the occupiers and are working to direct the rudderless group toward lawless chaos which promises to deliver to any sincere protestors a nation only anarchists would want.
As OWS-inspired demonstrations spread like pestilence throughout the country and the world, they grew increasingly violent and intractable after notable, wealthy liberals from President Obama and Vice President Biden on down to Michael Moore and Alec Baldwin gave them stamps of approval.
And, it’s getting worse:
. When representatives of nations such as China, Iran, and Russia where similar demonstrations would be met with repression, jail time, and worse, joined the chorus of OWS supporters, something is evidently, seriously wrong with Occupy Wall Street.
. When the disgraced and disbanded ACORN and billionaire capitalist/America-hater George Soros emerged . . .
(Read more at http://www.genelalor.com/blog1/?p=5818.)
“The party is over”??? Can’t wait for your update on the re-occupation!
Neither can I !
We’ll give it a couple weeks to ferment.
Occupy: The gift that just keeps giving.
You people need to quit all the boo hooing and man up and get a job and carry on with your life. If you dont like this country then get the hell out and go live in a country that is communist order so they can tell you what you can have and they can take anything that you think is yours but its not it belongs to the goverment. Live like that for a whale and tell me how you like that. I sure as hell dont want to live like that and Im not but you can in another country.
Why lookee here, got some updates just for you:
Murder at #OccupyOakland
Occupy Oakland murder victim was in fact an OWS protester and camper
Ooops, guess that didn’t go like you planned. Sorry about that.
This photo essay is VERY misleading and you know it. You simply take photos and write about what you want. What you don’t show is that your photos do not represent the majority of the camp. The Occupy movement will not be stopped. Americans are tired of economic inequality. Go lock yourself in your house because I have a feeling you are afraid of this social movement.
No, I’m afraid that this social movement will peter out before more Democrats jump on board and openly embrace it. The more media attention Occupy gets, and the more that liberals declare their support for it, the happier I am.
God forbid I take photos and write about what I want! Wouldn’t it be nice if I was prevented from doing that?
‘The Occupy Movement cannot be stopped’? Your whiny, inconsequential little movement will be stopped the moment the more radical elements among you convince themselves the revolution is at hand and start escalating confrontations with the police until more-or-less peaceful protesting–which most Americans support–transforms into full-scale rioting and looting akin to the London riots a few months ago.
The tragedy is some very young, very naive kids are going to get hurt before this is over. All they wanted was help paying off insurmountable student loans. They wanted people to listen, to pay attention. Young people do that. What’ll they’ll get is a lungful of tear gas and a police baton to the head.
Great journalism!
Mostly homeless, druggies and police haters or should I say any kind of authority haters. These idiots are a cancerous tumor that needs to be gotten rid of.
I’m proposing a “zombie action day” – a day on which everybody including the President will behave like a zombie at work, at home and outside, in support and solidarity with the occupy movement. We are all zombies now.
American corporations run by filthy white bas***** and half Jews are a cancerous tumor that needs to be gotten rid of. The world has been suffering from this cancer for a long time now. It’s about time the occupiers get rid of it!
Hrm, yase. The world will be a paradise if only we kill the honkies and Jews. What are you, the Timecube guy or something?