As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I’ve been a community ally of Occupy Oakland since October 25th. I’ve attended events and marches, spoken in favour of OO at two City Council meetings, donated to OO and the Bail Fund, and–despite my displeasure regarding ‘Diversity of Tactics’–advocated for OO to anyone who’ll listen.
But I have never attended an Occupy Oakland GA in person (though I’ve watched a ton via Livestream). Here are ten reasons why, in no particular order.
1. I’ve never been a member of any political organisation. I’m deeply uncomfortable with the concept of joining anything, even when there are no membership applications or dues involved. During the Thatcher era I thought about joining the Labour Party long distance from Oakland, but considering how things developed with Tony Blair I’m extremely glad I didn’t. I just don’t join things–the risk of betrayal and/or disappointment is too high.
2. Whatever I do in life, I am generally all in or not in at all. When I commit to something, my commitment is serious. I am clinically obsessive-compulsive and find it hard to walk a middle path, but that’s what I’ve managed to do (so far) with OO. If I start going to GAs, I would feel the need to go to every GA and would feel horribly guilty every time I missed one.
3. I have a spouse who thinks I’m a bit of a loony for supporting OO. We’ve been married for 27 years and I’m not keen on getting a divorce.
4. I have a full-time job. Jobs take up a lot of time.
5. I have writing gigs and other outside commitments. These also take up a lot of time.
6. The hand signals creep me out. Especially the twinkles.
7. The human mic creeps me out. I don’t like mindless recitation of anything.
8. I am a white middle-aged male socialist. You don’t want/need any more of those at GA, do you?
9. I don’t want to get shouted at by anti-non-violence advocates and I don’t want to be tempted to shout at anyone, especially that guy who called Gandhi ‘a misogynist prick’.
10. I don’t like inhaling second hand smoke (of any variety).
11. BONUS REASON: I understand how things work in subcultures. If you weren’t there at the start, you weren’t there at all, and if you join now you’re a poseur. Contrary to Poly Styrene, I am not a poseur, I do care, and I don’t like to make people stare.
Are these legit reasons, poor excuses, or embarrassing cop-outs? You tell me!
(Cross-posted at Pickled Bologna)
John, I really like what you wrote. I identify with much of what you wrote. I can add that I’ve participated and read less and less of what’s on this site. I don’t feel part of what Occupy Oakland has become. I do support the original principles and rallying points of Occupy.
I’m just not an anarchist, RCP member, a militant leftist, or a rabid anti-capitalist. I don’t believe that “diversity of tactics” means anything but “we’re going to use violence to intimidate and provoke.” I don’t really believe that marching in Oakland “in Solidarity” with people half-way around the world whose struggles that I can’t possibly know intimately makes much of a difference to anyone but the self-satisfied marchers in Oakland.
I also don’t vibe with the whole “Decolonize” meme. I’m queer so I guess I’m part of an “oppressed minority.” However, apparently I’m not “a person of color” because my skin is too pale. Apparently “pale” is no color at all. And the color of my skin at Occupy Oakland seems to matter more than my ancestry or culture anyway. I happen to have Cherokee and Apache ancestors but since my skin is pale I’m labeled as a “person with no color.”
I don’t think that taking someone else’s property by force just because it lies vacant is the best use of resources.
I believe that communication with “the powers that be” is better than the “silent treatment” that Occupy Oakland seems to believe is effective with the City Council and the OPD. Also, I do believe that the system under which we all live is incredibly unjust and cruel. I believe that the 1% is actively working to take the rest that they haven’t hoarded already from us who are in the 99%. I believe they use any means necessary to do so.
Also, I believe that we in the 99% have become complacent and lazy. Also we have bought into the apathy that “voting doesn’t matter because the system is rigged” to our own demise. I believe we still have the trappings of a system that we the 99% could use to rise up and change the system that we currently have without violent revolution. There is no way that the 1% could get away with manipulating the system if everyone in the 99% were actually involved in our system of government 100%. I believe that we the 99% have abandoned our electoral process and are destroying ourselves in the process.
I believe that we don’t need to replace the system of government we have because we have never risen up to claim the power it already affords us. I believe that if we were to attempt to replace the system of government we have now through violent means without having reclaimed our government through all means already available, then we do so at our peril. We could end up with something much more oppressive and unjust.
I just can’t be involved with a group of people bent on “revolution” who can’t agree to be a positive force for change. And I don’t see Occupy Oakland as a positive force for change at this time for many of the reasons I’ve stated elsewhere and here.
So, I’ll remain on the side lines of this movement and stay away from GAs. I’ll continue to vote, work in campaigns, contact my representatives, and show up at protests that matter to me no matter under what banner we march.
I dunno, I mean people have to decide their own level of commitment. Some people who I saw earlier at the camp or at GAs, I never see anymore, even though they seemed to be among the most dedicated and hardest-working. I guess they burned out…. so we have to be as involved as we are comfortable being, and maintain our lives and livelihoods (assuming that we have either).
There’s a lot of danger to subscribing too much to any one particular aspect of this. I remember mentioning to a friend, that a lot of the people who stay at the plaza don’t bother with the GA. “So how are they part of Occupy Oakland, then?” she asks me. “Well,” I answer her, “they probably want to ask, ‘if you are not at the plaza, how are you part of Occupy Oakland?'”
There are many entrance ramps and exit points. Living in this fascist nation that seems to be swirling around the bottom of the toilet, we also need to recognize the need for eventual secret support. Not that you’re secret, after all your writings here and also to the EB Express, but I mean this as a general point. If every German/Austrian citizen of good conscience had come forward and denounced Hitler on day one, there wouldn’t have been anybody left to hide Anne Frank’s family, to run the underground railroads and safehouses necessary for liberation of the repressed peoples. It’s something to think about…. those with the least involvement and the most sympathy may one day be crucial. All of us who have participated in #OO openly and in public have made ourselves less useful to certain phases of the resistance.