Occupying Territory

[digitaldiscipline]

No, this has nothing to do with the Palestinian petition for UN membership (to which I say, "Good on ya," but am not conversant enough in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict to have developed a sufficiently nuanced take on things beyond "CAN YOU STOP BEING SUCH ASSHOLES TO EACH OTHER?!?")

No, this is about the complete media blackout on the Occupy Wall Street protests, which are, primarily, trying to call attention to the deep and abiding corporate influence on governmental policy in general, and economic policy in particular, especially as it pertains to coddling corporate interests at the expense of the rest of us. As a friend and cop who was on the scene summed up the protesters themselves, succinctly and eloquently:

"The goals of the Occupy Wall Street protest are righteous, but there are a whole lot of crusty trust fund baby professional agitators who are not winning hearts and minds."

Rude Pundit visited the demonstrations on Thursday and makes a good point about whether or not a larger demonstration will be taking place once people who, you know, have jobs and real shit to do, have a day off to join in the protest and ramp up the signal.

Not that the MSM, which is owned by and beholden to the big corporations that are the target of the protests, are going to say the first fucking thing about it. I kind of hope NPR gets their shit together, at least. Objective journalism should still have a fucking place at the table, especially when shit's this pervasive.

Comments

[i-renovated.livejournal.com]

See, I've been watching this and thinking the same thing. The media blackout--reaching even to NPR--disgusts me. Even Amy Goodman and DemocracyNow! (my reliable source for lefty-revolution reporting) pretty well ignored this whole thing. I'm all for conspiracy theories (because there is usually more truth toclandestine power than any of us want to admit), but I think what your friend mentioned above is probably a good part of the silence. At this point there is no sexy soundbite for any media to latch onto. No outrageous pictures. No videos of violence or police brutality or incited mob.

What is going on is a lot of talk, most of it by those crusty trusties who are too busy spouting consensus philosophy to deliver a concise, angry, unifying rally cry. They need a Lorax, but first they need a message the media can run with. They're so busy circle jerking consensus to realize that lack of leader and message is only exacerbating (rhymes with masturbating) the corporate media blackout. It pisses me off, because it is time to end Corporatocracy or suffer the consequence of centuries of slavery. These people equate leadership with the current power structure, forgetting their basic sociology 101 that told them the need for a change agent to overthrow the status quo. If I thought I could be coherent for more than five minutes at a time, I would totally grab a bullhorn and hop a flight.

Huh. Maybe instead of Man Friday, you should consider Revolution Man Friday. No shaving required. That crazy cabbie look sells when your barking orders to Crusty Trusties.

[y2kdragon.livejournal.com]

:(to which I say, "Good on ya," but am not conversant enough in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict to have developed a sufficiently nuanced take on things beyond "CAN YOU STOP BEING SUCH ASSHOLES TO EACH OTHER?!?"):

No, that about sums it up for me too.

[i-renovated.livejournal.com]

Okay, after watching the livestream of Occupy Wall Street for awhile, and putting together coverage earlier (especially that the first arrests were due to the rapid invocation of some obscureass 150 year old law prohibiting gathering in NYC with masks on)--I think I figured out the root organization of the hubbub. Anonymous, a splinter group of which was a bunch of cheesed off hactivists who got actively incensed about the whole WikiLeaks bruja-ha.

Check this for the quickest insight: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfduiP1Pckw&feature=player_embedded

But this is the one that has the status quo blacking out the media about the whole thing, I'm sure of it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gP9q61Fjlqo

I'm needing some time before I blog on this one...my mind is blown. Am I way behind shit that I didn't even see this before?!

[lizkayl.livejournal.com]

A- I just friended you.
B- I hadn't even heard of the protests except vague mentions yesterday. Craziness!

[etcet.livejournal.com]

I saw that notice, flipped through your journal to figure out who this was, and reciprocated. Huzzorch!