Occupy Wall Street

Green Left Weekly’s Sue Bolton has been part of the Occupy Melbourne protest since it began on October 15, 2011. Below she recounts the past week of the occupation in Melbourne’s City Square, which was broken up by a violent police assault on October 21. However, protesters have vowed to re-establish the occupation once more. For more updates on Occupy Melbourne, regularly check GLW's live blog at http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/49153.

For more activist reports on the Occupy movement, click HERE.

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Day 5, October 19, 2011: Still going strong

We are still going strong with about 45 to 50 tents in City Square. I estimate there are about 100 people camping each night with many others staying until late in the night.

The occupation has been set up as a well-established occupation with a 24-hour roster for the info desk and the kitchen. The kitchen is feeding homeless people who also use the square.

The tide of rebellion and revolution now sweeping Latin America is posing a serious challenge to imperialism’s brutal global rule. For anyone who wants an end to war, exploitation and oppression, Latin America’s struggles to create alternatives are crucially important.

Australia's leading socialist newspaper Green Left Weekly is strongly committed to supporting the growing “people’s power” movement in Latin America. Through our weekly articles on developments in the region, GLW strives to counter the corporate media’s many lies about Latin America’s revolutions, and to give a voice in English to the people’s movements for change.

The continent-wide rebellion is weakening imperialism’s power. As a result, it is taking increasingly threatening steps to push back the power of the people. Our solidarity, to help the people of Latin America defend and extend their tremendous achievements, is vital.

Photos by Don Fitz and Barbara Chicherio

October 17, 2011 -- Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal -- It ain’t easy organising anti-Monsanto pickets in St. Louis, where it seems that every other person has a relative, neighbour or friend who works for the corporate demon and is worried about its retaliation. Nevertheless, the Gateway Green Alliance and Safe Food Action St. Louis planned a demonstration as part of the October 16, 2011, World Food Day and Millions Against Monsanto nationwide events put together by the Organic Consumers Association.

 Several dozen activists fighting the company’s efforts to force GMOs (genetically modified organisms) on everyone who eats food, as well as its attempt to destroy small farmers in the US and across the globe, met at the Monsanto's world headquarters on the afternoon of October 16. Soon we were joined by a couple of carloads from Occupy St. Louis and had a lively group of 50.

A big problem with picketing Monsanto’s headquarters is that Olive Boulavard traffic whizzes by at 40–50 miles per hour, meaning that drivers can’t read a sign with small or thin letters. But several of us remembered the old Burma Shave signs on two-lane highways.These are photos of the picket.

October 16 , 2011 -- Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal -- According to http://15october.net, protests and actions -- inspired by the Occupy Wall Street mass movement across the United States -- were to take place in more than 950 cities in more than 80 countries on October 15. Actions had already begun in some parts of the world before that.

Below are a number of statements issued by left organisations in the United States.

For more on Occupy Wall Street, click HERE.

It is five minutes to dawn and the wind smells like freedom

By Mike Ely, Kasama Project

October 14, 2011 -- Click here for PDF version of this statement -- It is no longer five minutes to midnight. After Arab Spring leaps to Spain, and Greece, and on to New York’s Wall Street, it suddenly feels like five minutes to dawn.

We no longer need assume that there is no time to stop the world going to shit. There is an opening and we are flooding into it.

We are suddenly in a moment that is not marked by exhausted routine protests that speak for no one and speak to no one.

[For more on the BDS campaign click HERE. For more on Occupy Wall Street, click HERE.]

 If a people one day wills to live                     fate must answer its call
And the night must fade                               and the chain must break

– Abou-Al-kacem El-Chebbi (Tunisia)

We are part of the world’s 99% yearning for freedom, justice and equal rights!

Statement by Socialist Alliance (Australia)

Download a PDF version of this statement to print and distribute

October 14, 2011 -- Socialist Alliance -- The Occupy Wall Street protest started small. But it has now become a global movement, with occupy events planned in about 1500 cities worldwide.

It’s born out of the recognition that, in country after country, ordinary people are being made to pay for an economic crisis caused by the super-rich. The 99% are being told they must surrender their livelihoods, their future, their security and their dignity to keep a broken system afloat.

In contrast, the 1% are having a wonderful crisis. The world’s biggest corporations have emerged stronger, more profitable and more powerful than ever before.

To add insult to injury, the 1% want to convince us that we, the 99%, are to blame for the crisis. They say our wages are too high and that we don’t work hard enough. They say our social security systems are not affordable and that our rights at work are should be done away with. They say our public education and health systems are not efficient and that our public services must be privatised.

Photo from Solidarity.

[For more on Occupy Wall Street, click HERE.]

October 8, 2011 -- Occupy Wall Street Media -- Occupy Wall Street (#OccupyWallStreet) is the beginning of a whole new kind of democracy: a bottom-up people's democracy led by the 99%. It is a bold vision for the future that is beginning to inspire the nation. However, to pull it off, we're going to need a robust people's media unbeholden to corporate money. If we want people's democracy then we've got to build a people's media -- the two are inseparable.

Occupy Wall Street. Photo from Solidarity.

This article first appeared at the Kasama Project website under the title, "Occupy critiques: How did I get here? By know-it-all subtraction?". It is a response to sections of the US left on the Occupy Wall Street movement that has sprung up across the United States, and is inspiring similar initiatives in other parts of the world. It is posted at Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with Mike Ely's permission in the interests of discussion. Comments are welcome.

[For more on Occupy Wall Street, click HERE.]

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By Mike Ely

And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack
And you may find yourself in another part of the world
And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile
And you may find yourself in a beautiful house,
with a beautiful wife
And you may ask yourself,
Well…How did I get here?!