[Mars]

Stuff is gonna get worse before anyone feels the need to do about it. Right now it's not worth risking one's life for, for the vast majority of people.

[Sololop]

Theres an "Occupy Nova Scotia" protest going on now... we'll see how it goes.

[MP-Ryan]

Theres an "Occupy Nova Scotia" protest going on now... we'll see how it goes.

A few sprung up around the country this weekend; Toronto, Vancouver, and Edmonton all have them (despite the fact that Toronto is the only one of the three with actual banking executives).

[Unknown Target]

I visited the one here in Rochester, talked to a few people. I'm hoping to make it to the general assembly tomorrow. I'm pushing for the movement to become more locally focused and politically active, instead of just protesting in the streets.

[Unicorn20]

As the finer souls of this forum have already elucidated income inequality seems to be a major driver of recessions and thus seems a rationally sensible target for protest

I nearly shat my paints in the penis size thread, if that's what you're talking about, old Batoots. If you read the case studies in the IMF paper it looks like they referred mainly to extremely poor countries that were brought down by either social unrest, or unsustainable debts resulting from income redistribution policies, and conclusions drawn are not necessarily generalizable to industrialized countries or the Republican agenda. Then again, I need to shut up now, lest I contradict any of the bold statements I have made in a previous account-life.

The penis stronger than the sword.

Perhaps, but the thread topic has been discussed to death on fourchan. Suffice it to say that there are not enough liberal arts majors in the country to turn OWS into a viable movement. The protest still hasn't topped the teabagger gatherings in attendance and attention. I don't think anything will come of it. What's more concerning, for me at least, is the effect of endocrine disruptors and environmental estrogen on American penis size, testicular volume and sperm count what will happen when New Yorkers trying to commute to work in downtown Manhattan finally snap.

[Klaustrophobia]

it might not match tea party in attendance, but they've already got FAR more attention.  I only ever saw a very few stories or headlines about the tea party.  one of them was when they were crying 'racist' at that one guy.  all of them were during election time.  ever since this occupy thing started, it's been the first story on my homepage almost every day.  it's in the scrolling headlines of every news site every day. 

[Unicorn20]

it might not match tea party in attendance, but they've already got FAR more attention.

You're right, I think. They do have a decent amount of recognition now. In fact their initial spike in popularity was much more rapid than that of the teabaggers, we'll see if it can be maintained.

****posters please queue behind the yellow line, the rest of you give me your thoughts: will we have a Tea Party counterweight come election season or is this an unsustainable outburst without any coherent agenda or ideology?

Sort of. This is not an unplanned outburst. /b/ oldfags have been behind it all along and they're not just going to give up once people get bored of protesting in New York. Something resembling OWS will remain in the news for the next few years, but I don't think it will be a real counterweight to the tea party simply because Obama is the incumbent. If the economy sucks, he gets blamed, if it suddenly makes a rapid recovery then capitalism will not look so bad anymore. Lose-lose for the neckbeards.

[G0atmaster]

Could someone link to some general info about this movement, what its objectives are, what they're doing, etc.?

[General Battuta]

Could someone link to some general info about this movement, what its objectives are, what they're doing, etc.?

It's supposed to be a fairly apolitical mass protest of income inequality -- the fact that an increasingly tiny portion of the country controls an increasingly huge share (90%+) of the wealth, mostly through byzantine legal and commercial tactics rather than hard work. This is nearly incontrovertibly A Bad Thing, as centralization of wealth stratifies the nation, kills the mass public's ability to participate in democracy, and leads to greater economic instability.

In practice, of course, its rhetoric and aims will inevitably be polarized and pushed towards one end (the left end) of the partisan spectrum.

[Klaustrophobia]

what they're doing is camping out in parks and on the streets.  what their objectives are, your guess is as good as theirs.  but here's one idiot's ideas that caught on with the less intelligent of the crowds, and had to be quickly disowned by the "collective."  note the opportunity taken to blame fox news.

http://occupywallst.org/forum/proposed-list-of-demands-for-occupy-wall-st-moveme/

let me edit this so I come off as less of a troll.  batt's post above is a nicely worded description of what the protest ideally represents.  my remarks are about what it really seems to boil down to, in my opinion based off of what I have read/seen of the protests. 

[StarSlayer]

I'd prefer resurrecting the monumental bad ass that was Teddy Roosevelt and letting him loose on the country.

[jr2]

I'd prefer resurrecting the monumental bad ass that was Teddy Roosevelt and letting him loose on the country.

+1; good plan

EDIT:  And who is the pinko commie that came up with

http://occupywallst.org/forum/proposed-list-of-demands-for-occupy-wall-st-moveme/

THAT???

United Socialist States of America, anyone??

[bigchunk1]

I went multiple times to the Chicago branch of this protest near the Chicago board of trade. Many people were holding signs addressing various issues.
Tax the rich, no more bailouts for millionaires, we are the 99%, live simply so that others may simply live, just to name a few.

One guy held up a sign with a picture of the monopoly guy on it gritting his teeth. The sign read: This is not a game! Go directly to jail! I regret not filming that one.

To say the protest is not organized would be missing a lot. There were unions, groups of local college students handing out water drawing signs handing out flyers etc., and a group of people with foreclosed homes who called themselves 'Action Now'. The overall message may be somewhat decentralized, but there is a lot of political clout behind it.

I took a small video of the protest, but I'm no videographer, actually I don't think the video is much of anything special, but at least it will give you a sense of what's going on in Chicago. It's from last Monday. The protest goes around the corner to the right into the front entrance of the Chicago board of trade. The protest has grown in number since. The night after this video was filmed, I heard on the news that the protest spilled into the street and closed it down.

One thing I would like to see come out of this movement is some serious campaign finance reform in the form of regulations on corporate lobbying of elected officials. It would be hard to push any policy of economic fairness otherwise. It's too early to be able to predict exactly what may come out of the OWS, but I hope it will at least be a goal.

[Aardwolf]

Now that they've avoided being pigeon-holed as some Neo-Marxist whackos, time for the Neo-Marxists to step up to the plate

[deathfun]

Funny thing not too long ago
Someone interviewed the organizer for the Vancouver Occupation. What did he say?
"Once we get every together, we'll figure out what we're protesting"

I mean, really? REALLY?

On a similar note, I don't see these 'occupations' doing much of anything other than being a waste of time

[Klaustrophobia]

the ones smart enough to actually have a purpose also realize that standing on a corner and shouting isn't likely to help. 

[JCDNWarrior]

What I've noticed so far is that most people seem informed and really want a stop to 'crony capitalism' and corporatism. Some groups are socialists, marxists, even anarchists, but most seem to be above average intelligent and decently aware of what the real problems are. The movement spread all across the world, since it seems decentralized there's no way to call the entire movement under one name. Seems it's turning out better than I thought so far. In the end, we'll see what happens, but I would very much enjoy to see all these people gather around the 12 Federal Reserve banks in the USA, preferably with the proverbial torches and pitchforks, as they're at the center of the bailouts and monetary and financial problems.

One purpose that the whole Occupy shows is that there are many many people very discontent and unhappy with what's been going on. Not everyone may know what -exactly- is wrong but that's why people need to be educated by those that do know more on the issues.

[perihelion]

When they produce some candidates I can actually vote for, let me know.  Until then, I can't see how this actually accomplishes anything, however much I may agree with the sentiments being expressed.

[deathfun]

One purpose that the whole Occupy shows is that there are many many people very discontent and unhappy with what's been going on

People are always unhappy and discontent with what's been going on. Even more so when someone else says they're unhappy with what's been going on, rallies some people up, and waits for group mentality to set in

[General Battuta]

One purpose that the whole Occupy shows is that there are many many people very discontent and unhappy with what's been going on

People are always unhappy and discontent with what's been going on. Even more so when someone else says they're unhappy with what's been going on, rallies some people up, and waits for group mentality to set in

Yeah but in this case there's actually a quantifiable problem. I'm a big advocate of the idea that our current social and economic systems work very well and will continue to work well and improve themselves, but I think that movements like Occupy Wall Street are an important corrective force and a crucial part of that self-improvement.