ughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

[Leftsolidarity]

So through my local Occupy's facebook page which I'm the main admin on, the group is trying to work with the Tea Party. WHAT THE FUCK??? They also keep going on and on about how "no, the police are on our side. the constitution says so" and blah blah blah blah blah. Just a bunch of fucking bullshit.

THEY REALLY WANT TO WORK WITH THE TEA PARTY!!!!!!!!

The one that has been following our occupation and all our actions and harrassing us and trying to get us arrested. WHAT THE FUCK PEOPLE?!?!?!?

ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH :cursing::cursing::cursing::cursing::cursing::curs ing::cursing::cursing::cursing::cursing::cursing:

[TheGodlessUtopian]

My occupy has mixed feelings about the Tea Party;apparently at its inception the original Tea Party in my state had socialists and Anarchist involved but as it grew more conservative the leftist elements left.This has left some of the occupiers having a "positive" view of the original Tea Party to the extent where a supposed "Anarchist" said,...yeah,and if they don't like it than we can just call up some of our Tea Party buddies and ask them to come down." This all while there is the same faction that openly dismisses them (the Tea Party).

I guess what I am trying to say is that political activism can take some fucked up routes that are a bit more convoluted than they appear on the surface.Why does your occupy want to work with the Tea Party? Is it a merger or just cooperation?

[Die Neue Zeit]

There are more correct approaches to non-United, non-Popular, populist front (and communitarian-populist front) work, and then there are ones bordering on lunacy. This is a clear example of the latter.

[Leftsolidarity]

Why does your occupy want to work with the Tea Party? Is it a merger or just cooperation?

CUZZ THEY ARE PART OF THE 99% TOOZZZZ!!!!!

:rolleyes:

Edit: Not exactly sure, I think it would be cooperation.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

CUZZ THEY ARE PART OF THE 99% TOOZZZZ!!!!!

:rolleyes:

Urgh...sounds like they lost their marbles than.

Yeah,that is really the worst kind of shit, reminds me of my occupies shit like,"the police are part of the 99% too so they should be with us!" (No,they won't be with us,you know why? Because they are fucking pigs who oppress people in exchange for blood money while working under the guise of freedom and rights and other bourgeois concepts!)

[Leftsolidarity]

Urgh...sounds like they lost their marbles than.

Yeah,that is really the worst kind of shit, reminds me of my occupies shit like,"the police are part of the 99% too so they should be with us!" (No,they won't be with us,you know why? Because they are fucking pigs who oppress people in exchange for blood money while working under the guise of freedom and rights and other bourgeois concepts!)


Yep, was just having that argument.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Yep, was just having that argument.

It gets old fast,doesn't it?

[Leftsolidarity]

It gets old fast,doesn't it?

Extremely fast. It was old when I first got involved.

We had this march on the openning of a federal building and me and our crew of 10+ communists/anarchists had done a fuck ton of work for it. We put our asses on the line a couple times, did a banner drop, and distracted the pigs. Then we get to the meeting and one of the openning lines is "WE AREN'T AGAINST CAPITALISM". I looked up and shouted, "FUCK THAT! I AM!!!". Ugh, people sometimes....they annoy me.

[NewLeft]

No one gives two shits about the tea party! Notice the push to recognize the tea party? It is driven by the media who can't stand the idea of the tea party becoming irrelevant!

Look at this wikipedia article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_action

Occupy Wall Street (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupy_Wall_Street) protests of September 2011, an example of nonviolent direct action. The Tea Party Movement (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_Party_Movement) has also used similar methods in recent years

This is the absurdity of the obsession with neutrality.. Every god damn FUCKING time there's a mention of OWS, the tea party is coupled in. Never the other way around though.. Since when have the tea party practiced direct action?? I thought they were the 'good' guys?

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Extremely fast. It was old when I first got involved.

I put up with it several times before I started to ignore it or only take it up during selective conversation.


We had this march on the openning of a federal building and me and our crew of 10+ communists/anarchists had done a fuck ton of work for it. We put our asses on the line a couple times, did a banner drop, and distracted the pigs. Then we get to the meeting and one of the openning lines is "WE AREN'T AGAINST CAPITALISM". I looked up and shouted, "FUCK THAT! I AM!!!". Ugh, people sometimes....they annoy me.

I hear ya,from day one whenever anyone would say something about how they weren't against capitalism or that we weren't socialist I would say,"...pfff...well I am!" I never let people assume I am a cappie;I couldn't stand being a fake.

(On a side note:I wish I had as many comrades as you have :( )

[Tablo]

No one gives two shits about the tea party! Notice the push to recognize the tea party? It is driven by the media who can't stand the idea of the tea party becoming irrelevant!

Look at this wikipedia article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_action

Occupy Wall Street (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupy_Wall_Street) protests of September 2011, an example of nonviolent direct action. The Tea Party Movement (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_Party_Movement) has also used similar methods in recent years

This is the absurdity of the obsession with neutrality.. Every god damn FUCKING time there's a mention of OWS, the tea party is coupled in. Never the other way around though.. Since when have the tea party practiced direct action?? I thought they were the 'good' guys?
Deleted the whole thing(picture and caption). Might get my IP banned, lol.

[Leftsolidarity]

(On a side note:I wish I had as many comrades as you have :( )

Not all of them are self-identified comrades. We just happen to be lucky to have a great commune with a great comrade who runs it who knows what he's doing. Add that with the fact that I am in one of the founding 3 bands of the new punk revival in the city and you got yourself some 100+ pissed off punk kids that respect you and will seriously listen to what you got to say.

[Leftsolidarity]

Deleted the whole thing(picture and caption). Might get my IP banned, lol.


:lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::laugh::laugh:: laugh::laugh::laugh:

I love you

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Not all of them are self-identified comrades. We just happen to be lucky to have a great commune with a great comrade who runs it who knows what he's doing. Add that with the fact that I am in one of the founding 3 bands of the new punk revival in the city and you got yourself some 100+ pissed off punk kids that respect you and will seriously listen to what you got to say.

Ah,sounds nice,like a semi-dream.On a related note: commune life is pretty great,huh? Living at occupy gives me a taste of it.

[Winkers Fons]

So has the experience of being the admin for an occupy page provided insight into the thought processes of Joseph Stalin? Some of this stuff could provoke even the most pacifistic of us to brutally purge the party apparatus. :lol:

In all seriousness though, I don't even involve myself in the local movement because it is about 50/50 uninformed hippie liberals and Ron Paul campaigners. The hippies blather on about unimportant pet issues and nonviolence while the Paulbots yell about restoring "true free markets".

[Leftsolidarity]

Ah,sounds nice,like a semi-dream.On a related note: commune life is pretty great,huh? Living at occupy gives me a taste of it.

Sure is. The local place is a punk house too so there are always shows going on. I spend most of my time out of school there and I'm finally moving in like 2 days after I graduate in June haha

When I sleep there for like a week at a time I always find myself thinking "why doesn't everyone do this, this works great" then I go home to an ultra-conservative rich house and I go "wow, fuck this shit. this shit would never happen there"

Idk maybe I'm just a silly little rebellious teenager haha

[Leftsolidarity]

So has the experience of being the admin for an occupy page provided insight into the thought processes of Joseph Stalin? Some of this stuff could provoke even the most pacifistic of us to brutally purge the party apparatus. :lol:


Haha not exactly, I actually stopped someone like that.

It's very hard to sit there and be an admin over stuff like this though. You just got to sit back and let it happen. I'm not going to be an asshole and try to overrun the movement with my personal beliefs.

I do get all Stalinisty on the Tea-baggers that sneak in though haha, it's so fun.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

So has the experience of being the admin for an occupy page provided insight into the thought processes of Joseph Stalin? Some of this stuff could provoke even the most pacifistic of us to brutally purge the party apparatus. :lol:

I too am an admin for my occupys site and yes....it does *malicious music*


In all seriousness though, I don't even involve myself in the local movement because it is about 50/50 uninformed hippie liberals and Ron Paul campaigners. The hippies blather on about unimportant pet issues and nonviolence while the Paulbots yell about restoring "true free markets".

Far too many for my liking.I wonder why they are even there since their lord and master has come out against the movement.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Sure is. The local place is a punk house too so there are always shows going on. I spend most of my time out of school there and I'm finally moving in like 2 days after I graduate in June haha

When I sleep there for like a week at a time I always find myself thinking "why doesn't everyone do this, this works great" then I go home to an ultra-conservative rich house and I go "wow, fuck this shit. this shit would never happen there"

Idk maybe I'm just a silly little rebellious teenager haha

Whenever I am not sick or have prior commitments I am at occupy 24/7....gotta say,life is awesome there even if it is filled with angry liberals and pseudo-leftists.Commune life is something I could get used to.

[Leftsolidarity]

Whenever I am not sick or have prior commitments I am at occupy 24/7....gotta say,life is awesome there even if it is filled with angry liberals and pseudo-leftists.Commune life is something I could get used to.

I wish I was able to spend more time at my Occupy sites. How many people are at your local?

[TheGodlessUtopian]

I wish I was able to spend more time at my Occupy sites. How many people are at your local?

It is difficult to tell since so many people come and go as their schedules change,but I would say on average there is always at least a dozen people on site 24/7 and up to three or four dozen during nights and on the weekends.

[Commissar Rykov]

I had the same argument with my local Occupy group last week. It is only about a dozen plus people but it has degenerated into lets be coopted by the Tea Party while the Liberals stand around with their dicks in their hands talking about not alienating hardline conservatives here. I finally said fuck it and left as the Liberals lacked the backbone to tell the Conservatives to fuck off to their faces and did it behind their backs instead while whining to me about it. So when I finally made a push after having enough all the Liberals just navel gazed and pretended they didn't understand my complaints so I figured I was done with it. If I wanted to hang around goddamn Fascists in suits I could find something better to do with my time than hang out with the Tea Party.

[Lobotomy]

I'm surprised Tea Partiers even want to be associated with Occupy.

[Commissar Rykov]

I'm surprised Tea Partiers even want to be associated with Occupy.
Most of them tend to be Paulistas with a hardon for conspiracy theories and borderline anti-Semitic rantings.

[A Revolutionary Tool]

In my city it seems like the only people interested enough to actually protest as part of the occupy movement are all libertarian Ron Paul fanatics. I caught wind of one starting so I looked it up on facebook and saw that every single person who joined the group was a Paul supporter and they all seemed to be friends. So I didn't bother to show up considering it seemed like it was going to be a few friends who were libertarian gathering at the park. No worries though, my city is basically irrelevant.

[Leftsolidarity]

I'm surprised Tea Partiers even want to be associated with Occupy.

I don't think they actually do. The ones in my city fucking hate us. That's one of the reasons I don't understand why the fuck they want to work with the Tea Party. THIS IS SO FUCKING STUPID!!!!!

[Die Neue Zeit]

In my city it seems like the only people interested enough to actually protest as part of the occupy movement are all libertarian Ron Paul fanatics. I caught wind of one starting so I looked it up on facebook and saw that every single person who joined the group was a Paul supporter and they all seemed to be friends. So I didn't bother to show up considering it seemed like it was going to be a few friends who were libertarian gathering at the park. No worries though, my city is basically irrelevant.

I worry only because, even then, the likes of these still tar the reputation of the Occupy movement.

[KurtFF8]

Well if proposals for endorsing the TP come up, get as many people as you can to block it.

[Leftsolidarity]

So now not only are some people talking about including the Tea Party but are talking about EXCLUDING communists and Disastr House people.

(Disastr House is the commune I was talking about. Ya know, they one that has been instrumental to the occupation here)


Fuckin tits man

[Commissar Rykov]

So now not only are some people talking about including the Tea Party but are talking about EXCLUDING communists and Disastr House people.

(Disastr House is the commune I was talking about. Ya know, they one that has been instrumental to the occupation here)


Fuckin tits man
Same happened to me but it was obviously more direct as I was the only communist in our small group. The Liberals only kept me around for the sake of "freedom" whereas the Paulistas needed me to leave so they could be more serious about being coopted by the local Tea Party even though they hate us to the point of absurdity as a group anyways. No matter how much I pointed that out though the Paulistas just keep ramming themselves forward while the Liberals let it happen while shrugging about it. This is why I just had to wash my hands of the whole affair you can't just allow yourself to be coopted like that but if no one else is willing to fight it isn't worth the effort.

[Leftsolidarity]

Same happened to me but it was obviously more direct as I was the only communist in our small group. The Liberals only kept me around for the sake of "freedom" whereas the Paulistas needed me to leave so they could be more serious about being coopted by the local Tea Party even though they hate us to the point of absurdity as a group anyways. No matter how much I pointed that out though the Paulistas just keep ramming themselves forward while the Liberals let it happen while shrugging about it. This is why I just had to wash my hands of the whole affair you can't just allow yourself to be coopted like that but if no one else is willing to fight it isn't worth the effort.

I'm in the same situation right now. Fuck this shit man, I'm not giving up on it but I'm sure getting tired of it.

[Commissar Rykov]

I'm in the same situation right now. Fuck this shit man, I'm not giving up on it but I'm sure getting tired of it.
I only gave up because the people who said they would support me stayed utterly silent while I was accused of causing divisions by being constantly against working with the Tea Party. I figured if I have no one watching my back I can't really be bothered to show up to every GA to make sure they don't pull their shit as I was obviously the only one willing to fight with them. So I just had to walk away as I can't afford to let my constant fighting with idiots over a group that can barely muster 6 people to a demo interfere with Finals coming up anyways.

[Ele'ill]

Maybe the tea party will militarize the OWS actions ...

[Commissar Rykov]

Maybe the tea party will militarize the OWS actions ...
Hopefully it will in certain areas I thought it would here especially after the really positive response we got from the Navajo and Hispanic communities demanding we run the Tea Party out of town. Obviously that didn't stick with anyone except me who took their responses as pretty damn serious. Then again I knew I was over my head when one of the first things I said was, "Fuck White Mormon Conservatives we need to be helping people who are oppressed in this community.":lol:

[wunderbar]

A couple people at my local occupy called for banning anarchists a while back, but it seems to have stopped recently. Which is both hilarious and frustrating, because A: Most of the anarchists who do show up are from out of town and Sacramento (really politically apathetic except for the local political ruling class and a handful of small lefty groups) has little to no anarchists and B: The most vocal anti-anarchist kept using Dept. of Homeland Security propaganda as his reasoning to ban them.

Our leadership here (unelected and unaccountable) is also really fucking spineless and contradictory. One of them attempted to distance our occupy from Occupy Oakland and Occupy SF, but at the same time nearly all our local resources were drained as carloads of people from here went off to Oakland and SF (and now Davis), making our occupy look even more pathetic.

[Leftsolidarity]

I might be getting a little to jaded and angery to admin the page nicely haha

I'm in a bad mood and completely just called someone out, called them an asshole, and unrelentlessly attacking their stupid fucking liberal ideals.


GOD FUCKING DAMN IT FUCK EVERYONE!!!!!!!!!

[Martin Blank]

I might be getting a little to jaded and angry to admin the page nicely, ha ha.

I'm in a bad mood and completely just called someone out, called them an asshole, and unrelentingly attacking their stupid fucking liberal ideals.

GOD FUCKING DAMN IT FUCK EVERYONE!!!!!!!!!

I hear ya. We had to go to war in our local #Occupy group tonight over liberalism.

[Welshy]

I hear ya. We had to go to war in our local #Occupy group tonight over liberalism.

What happened? I hope you all won.

[o well this is ok I guess]

I gotta give props to my local Occupy for letting the Red and Black fly for the entirety of its lifespan.

[Martin Blank]

What happened?

Back on November 8, our #Occupy group started discussing taking on a local area of work as a means to build the movement here. A couple days before, the local newspaper had reported that two downtown residential apartment buildings, the Bancroft and the Eddy Place, were going to evict all of their residents by Nov. 30, 2012, and the buildings were going to be sold to developers to create some kind of high-end lofts and apartments.

Both buildings are the largest apartment complexes open to Section 8 recipients (for those who don't know, Section 8 is a program that subsidizes rent and utilities for low-income, elderly and disabled people). The Bancroft has been the home to hundreds of poor and working people receiving Section 8 assistance since the 1930s, when it was initially converted from a hotel into a senior living center. There are so many seniors and disabled people living in the Bancroft that a local pharmacy actually closed down its stand-alone location and moved into the building. The Eddy Place apartments also have hundreds of residents, many of whom cannot find affordable housing anywhere else in the city (this in an area where a three-bedroom house rents on average for about $500 a month). In addition, a large portion of the residents in both buildings are African American.

The corporate media has cast both buildings as being the epicenter of crime in the downtown, and have been ratcheting up the attacks on these residents recently. What they don't say, however, is that the "crimes" committed around these two buildings are 90 percent prostitution and drug possession.

We originally raised the idea of organizing around these attacks and pending evictions at that Nov. 8 meeting. The initial response was curiosity and some apprehension, but any real discussion was pushed to the next meeting. At the next meeting, on Nov. 15, a core group within our local #Occupy (two members and a supporter of the Party, plus a longtime supporter of Workers World) raised the issue and made a number of strong arguments in favor of it. We took a vote at that meeting and the group reached consensus on doing the organizing work. Only one person objected at the time.

During the time between that meeting and the one on Nov. 22, though, that person (a Paulista) apparently found common cause with the small group of liberal grannies that run the local antiwar group. At the Nov. 22 meeting, he and these liberal grannies packed the meeting.

When we gave our Working Group report on the information-gathering and initial organizing we had done, these liberals and the Paulista (who was chairing the meeting that night) tried to get the group to overturn the decision made at the previous meeting to be involved in this work. Why? Because, according to the Paulista, these people were just "hookers and drug addicts" and "were responsible for a lot of crime" in the city. Moreover, having a demonstration downtown would not be "safe"! This Ron Paul scumbag used every racist code word, and the "liberal" granny peaceniks nodded approvingly. The topper was when this Paulista said, "Well, prostitutes and drug addicts don't pay taxes, so why should we care about them?"

That unleashed a torrent of arguing that pretty much absorbed the rest of the time of the meeting. It also provoked a "cold split" in the group (see my explanation of a "cold split" versus a "hot split" in the thread on RIU and Occupy), which was visually apparent, as people gravitated toward each other based on where they stood on the issue of doing this work. After the meeting was over, we all met up outside and made our first decision as a semi-separate body: We are going ahead with this work, with or without the rest of the #Occupy group (preferably without, in some cases).

That was last week, and it couldn't hold a candle to earlier tonight.

We had continued our information gathering over the previous week, including crashing an "informational meeting" of the local ruling classes on this issue (it was supposed to be an "invitation-only" event, but because the mayor and majority of the city council were there, it had to be an open meeting or else it would have been a violation of the Open Meetings Act -- this was our doing, too). We got a good look at the "plans" for the Bancroft and Eddy Place. To give you an idea of what the "plan" is, I'll write it out below:

1. Force out all residents from the Bancroft and Eddy Place by Nov. 30, 2012.
2. Put both buildings on the real estate market.
3. ???????
4. PROFIT!

Seriously, I'm not bullshitting. This is their "plan". They do not have a developer for the buildings, nor do they have any idea who might buy them. When one of our people in the meeting asked the facilitator what might happen if no one buys the buildings, she replied (and this is verbatim): "Failure is not an option."

That brings us to earlier tonight. In spite of the near blizzard we're getting here, the meeting was better attended than the previous week. The liberals spent the first hour going on about "good corporate citizens" and which businesses to target to be vocal supporters of #Occupy. As that mental masturbation session ended, we gave a report on our organizing work (more or less as a formality and courtesy). And, as was to be expected, the liberal grannies and the Paulista started up again.

The "crime" meme came up first ... until the Paulista was directly confronted about where his "evidence" was coming from (hint: it involves his anus). The the lead liberal granny said that holding a protest downtown was "not safe". Several of us asked her point-blank to explain what she meant by that comment. She tried to parry the question by smiling and batting her eyes. Didn't work. One of us asked her: "Are you saying it's 'not safe' because of all the Black people?" She sank into her seat, busted like a balloon, and didn't say a word for the rest of the night.

As the woman facilitating the meeting tried to talk about how we should all respect other people's views, I officially hit the end of my patience and tolerance. It was now my turn to speak (I'm reconstructing this from memory -- I spoke off-the-cuff):


We sit here and talk about how we are the 99 percent. Well, that may be true in a technical sense, but it seems like a lot of those in here are only concerned about the top third of that 99 percent -- the not-quite-as-wealthy, the "respectable" and the privileged. I am not here for them. I am here for the rest of the 99 percent.

I recently saw a survey that said one-third of the population of this country is poor or moderately poor. The people who live in the Bancroft and Eddy Place are a part of that one-third of the population. They are the most victimized, the most targeted and the most vulnerable. They are a part of that two-thirds of the 99 percent that we should be here for. They are part of the working-class majority -- the people who have only their ability to work as their means of survival. They are the true majority of the 99 percent.

If this movement really is about the 99 percent -- if this movement is about representing the voices and views of the 99 percent -- then these are the people who need to be here. These are the people we should be working and organizing with. These are the people on whose behalf we should be fighting. Otherwise, this is just a group of relatively privileged, mostly white people sitting around every week, pissing and moaning about how bad things are. And if that's all we are, then WHAT THE FUCK ARE WE DOING HERE?!

You could hear a pin drop after I finished. More to the point, the opposition seemed to completely evaporate. But the capper came right after I spoke, when another Party member stood up and talked about how it was necessary to integrate this group if it is going to survive, in terms of both class and race/nationality, and that it won't happen if the group spends all its time talking about which businesses to support and whether boycotting Wal-Mart should be an area of work for the group.

The group then voted again on three motions: 1) to reaffirm that the organizing around the Bancroft and Eddy Place is an area of work for the group, 2) to affirm that the core group (us and the WWP comrade) are leading it, and 3) that the group will not only organize a demonstration in front of the Bancroft and Eddy Place, but that we will also organize tenants' meetings in both buildings prior to any protest action, so that it will not be just a bunch of white people.

Did we win? Yeah. We did.

[Leftsolidarity]

Our occupation has offically been taken over by MoveOn. Fuck this.

[Commissar Rykov]

Our occupation has offically been taken over by MoveOn. Fuck this.

Sorry to hear that. It seems it is quite easy for the smaller Occupies to turn into local sideshows that mimic local politics more than they address real issues in the community.

[KurtFF8]

Our occupation has offically been taken over by MoveOn. Fuck this.

What do you mean by officially?

[Leftsolidarity]

What do you mean by officially?

You know what? I don't even know anymore. This shit sucks. Apparently Theres now been a split where the rest of the occupy people ditched to MoveOn people who became the unelected leadership. So now it looks as if no MoveOn people are allowed until they get re-established and going again. I don't this stuff is hard to follow when I'm just following through forums because I'm not actually in the city.

[TheGodlessUtopian]

My group only has half a dozen people camping now because of the injunction and lack of fire but while there was widespread people there everyone was determined no to let MoveOn co-opt us.My town was luck in this regard I suppose.

[KurtFF8]

You know what? I don't even know anymore. This shit sucks. Apparently Theres now been a split where the rest of the occupy people ditched to MoveOn people who became the unelected leadership. So now it looks as if no MoveOn people are allowed until they get re-established and going again. I don't this stuff is hard to follow when I'm just following through forums because I'm not actually in the city.

Well even if they have taken "the leadership," if you are not alone in being a Leftist there, that doesn't mean it's all over. You can block their bad proposals and still attempt to move it towards a class conscious direction (while pointing out the contradictions of the MoveOn style Democratic "activism")