Ian Bunn | Political & Popular Culture Arts

Anger at corporate greed was a unifying call (April 15th 2012)

Sweta Vohra the US producer of FaultLines at Al-Jazeera English from Washington DC has published an article with Jordan Flaherty on the history of an occupation, referencing how the OWS movement went from a small group of NYC protestors to a broader people’s movement. The article states, ”When people gathered in Zuccotti Park on September 17, the anger at corporate greed was a unifying call. This was a protest that in large part was about shifting power from the wealthy to the many. It was a mostly white crowd, but it sought to incorporate a wide range of voices. The economic crisis in the US had made the white middle class question their future. Soaring unemployment rates, suffocating student loan debt, and thousands of foreclosures began to close in. This reality propelled the Occupy movement forward. And many feel that the presence of so many relatively privileged white people brought increased media attention and public sympathy. Organisers told us they immediately saw the next step as needing to raise awareness among the many young people new to activism that came flocking to occupations.”

Inspired by Aljazeera http://ow.ly/a82q5 image source twitter http://ow.ly/a82Ep

Greedy narcissists and possibly sociopaths (December 29th)

Barbara Ehrenreich the 70 year old US political activist referred to as a ‘myth buster’, along with her husband John Ehrenreich a psychology professor have released an article on Aljazeera discussing the rise of the OWS Movement. “…those in the top 1 per cent of the wealth distribution – the bankers, hedge-fund managers and CEOs … have been around for a long time in one form or another, but they only began to emerge as a distinct and visible group, informally called the “super-rich”  … Extravagant levels of consumption helped draw attention to them … but as long as the middle class could still muster the credit for college tuition and occasional home improvements, it seemed churlish to complain. Then came the financial crash of 2007-2008, followed by the Great Recession, and the 1 per cent to whom we had entrusted our pensions, our economy, and our political system stood revealed as a band of feckless, greedy narcissists and possibly sociopaths.

Inspired by Barbara & John Ehrenreich http://ow.ly/89X6l image source David Shankbone http://ow.ly/89X95

One of the most powerful things of all is aesthetics (December 15th)

Kalle Lasn the 69 year old Estonian Canadian author, activist and co-founder of the anti-consumerist Adbusters magazine has been credited with “branding” the OWS Movement by William Yardley in a New York Times article, “…as uprisings shook the Middle East and much of the world economy struggled, Mr. Lasn … felt the moment was ripe to tap simmering frustration on the American political left. On July 13, he and his colleagues created a new hash tag on Twitter: #OCCUPYWALLSTREET. They made a poster showing a ballerina dancing on the back of the muscular sculptured bull near Wall Street in Manhattan … For Mr. Lasn, they were tools to begin remodeling the “mental environment,” to create a new “meme,” the term coined by the evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins for a kind of transcendent cultural message. “There’s a number of ways to wage a meme war … I believe that one of the most powerful things of all is aesthetics.”

Inspired by William Yardley http://ow.ly/7VnB5 image source freerepublic http://ow.ly/7VogT

OWS created a space where people could gather (December 13th)

Mark LeVine a US history professor in an article published by Aljazeera, laments the loss of the OWS Movement’s ‘People’s Library’ at Zuccotti Park NYC during a recent police raid on the encampment. LeVine recounts a discussion with his old friend Alan Minsky the producer of the ‘Axis of Justice’ radio show. “By permanently occupying Zuccottii and other parks, the OWS movement created a space where people could gather, create libraries, share books and ideas, and even meals. Where they could plan for another world, that isn’t merely possible anymore, but the only hope for the survival of humanity as a civilization … The library … reflected the uniqueness and power of the still young 99 per cent movement. From the very beginning, the OWS encampments were not just gestures of protest … but were efforts to build community where people were knowledgeable and participated in informed dialogue.”

Inspired by Mark LeVine http://ow.ly/7Vn39 image source meaning.org http://ow.ly/7Vnh6