I’ve given up hoping that OO will ever understand that its inability and/or unwillingness to condemn violence undermines the movement, so it’s time for me to ask: has non-violence been as contentious an issue at other Occupys, or is this strictly an Oakland issue? If someone could point me towards information regarding how other Occupys have addressed the issues of violence and non-violence, I’d appreciate it. Perhaps other towns have been able to negotiate these shoals more effectively than we have.
In light of the incredible fortitude displayed by UC Davis students in the face of horrendous provocation and the gauntlet of silence Katehi was forced to walk through, it becomes clearer still that non-violence will win the movement many more allies than OO’s endless ideological navel-gazing. OO is devouring itself with GA’s filled with bitterness, anger and infighting. We are defeating ourselves and guaranteeing our own irrelevancy.
It seems it’s only such a huge contentious issue at Occupy Oakland. Even during the destruction of OWS, about 100 people chained themselves to posts etc. and got arrested, but there were zero instances of destruction or violence. Even during and after the outrageously sadistic pepper spraying at UC Davis, students stayed nonviolent. From reports I read, the only signs of destruction or violence were in NYC on N17, with a handful (if that) of instances of a liquid substance thrown in cops’ faces, people in Liberty Square/Zuccoti Park breaking down the detested barricades, and a lone protester either flicking a cops’ hat off his head or taking his hat, for which he was hit over the head with a baton (the photo of the guy with the bloodied head). I don’t think I’ve ever read a statement from any other Occupy that comes close to endorsing the so-called diversity of tactics approved by OO’s GA, and that’s unfortunate. To the contrary, whenever the movement is described in terms of non/violence or militancy, the description is emphatically endorsing nonviolence. Only in OO is this even an issue.
OK, I do agree with a lot of what you’re saying, but the only reason I voted for the resolution tonight was because I knew it wouldn’t pass but I was hoping to get a chance to do some amendments on it so that it could pass. One guy said that he was tired of hearing this resolution again and again, but I actually thought we were getting closer to consensus until I heard all the Cons and heard the vote. I still respect everybody who voted against it because there were a lot of problems with it as stated, and I never would have voted for it if my own “temperature check” didn’t tell me it would be well below 90% as written. I don’t like the idea that the GA has to approve any legal action for detained members. I think that if you take an action or are accused of taking some action and you are arrested, we should be providing legal aid right away just on the principle of “innocent until proven guilty”, and a GA decision would only be required if everybody deemed the action so outrageous that we did not wish to associate with it. We can’t pass every small decision like that through the GA if it is time sensitive.
In the larger sense of things, I just urge you to have a broad perspective, I know it’s hard sometimes and so I’m giving the same advice to myself. There are a lot of Occupy movements, and most of them have taken stances against violence as far as I can gather. A lot of cities have been damaged by the oligarchy and the police state and the drug war — Oakland has not just been damaged, it has been traumatized. It has been scarred. But this city is not defeated, and we are strong together. And this movement, Occupy or whatever you want to call it, is too big to be taken down even by whatever some might find problematic about Occupy Oakland. It’s not all about Oakland, it’s about America.