At your local Occupation, you’ll find strange bedfellows indeed. Some are vegan but most are not. You’ll meet those passionately committed to non-violence and others just as fervent about militant direct action.
Every Occupation contains anarchists, socialists, communists, etc. but perhaps the largest contingent is made up of folks who have never contemplated such a label and for now, seek reforms in the current capitalist system (again: for now).
Under an umbrella as big as the 99% concept, all these groups intertwine and peacefully co-exist where you’d least expect it. This is why OWS continues to grow and why it needs all of us to bring our voices and our open minds into the mix.
"It needs all of us “striking at the root.”
more > More than one way to Occupy: #KeepYerToolboxFull | Project Censored
recent #occupy news - Davos | Oakland
#occupied | The Occupied Wall Street Journal
This week in Occupy, Mitt Romney got mic-checked, Davos was #occupied, the President co-opted Occupy language in his #SOTU address and Occupy Oakland’s attempt to transform an abandoned building into a community center ended with 400 arrests and sparked coast-to-coast solidarity marches.
#The World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, was #occupied beginning on January 25 by activists and their igloos and yurts. They were aided by the mayor of Davos, Hans Peter Michel, who has been more welcoming toward protesters than his predecessors. Michel reportedly “cleared the parking lot, offered the protesters the use of a portable cabin and helped them build igloos.”
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Three Ukrainian women went topless, braving the cold to draw attention to their message, which equated bankers with gangsters. Bloomberg News, of all outlets, covered the forum with the headline “Mega-Rich Occupy Davos as 0.01% Decry Income Gap,” noting that the word “inequality” appeared only once in the event’s 130-page program – in the title of a panel about art – despite the fact that the forum’s Global Risks 2012 report describes “severe income disparity” as the world’s top risk over the next 10 years.
#On Saturday, January 28, Occupy Oakland commenced with “Move-In Day,” an attempt to establish a more permanent collective by converting the long-abandoned Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center into a social and political gathering place. The occupation began with a march, and as it reached the convention center it was met by a phalanx of police, preventing anyone from entering. Accounts on the ground and videos capturing the action show police blockading and kettling protesters until night fell, some of whom beg through tears “I just wanna go home! Please let us go home!” 400 were arrested, including journalists, such as Susie Cagle from AlterNet and Gavin Aronsen from Mother Jones, who delivered a detailed account.
Oakland PD traps demonstrators outside a YMCA. Photo: Guerrilla News
#As usual, AlterNet reports, the corporate media relied on police accounts, which painted protesters run amok, while more accurate reporting came from the livestreamers embedded in the action. Filmmaker Brandon Jourdan captured the Battle of Oak Street, where police fired tear gas, rubber bullets, bean bag rounds and concussion grenades at demonstrators. In a press conference, Mayor Jean Quan blamed the violence on the demonstrators and suggested that those who’ve been arrested multiple times over the course of the Occupy movement be barred from the city of Oakland. She also reportedly doesn’t bother to notify arrested protesters that charges have been filed against them. How did a liberal mayor who once marched with protesters in defiance of police fall so far?
more > #occupied | The Occupied Wall Street Journal
Flash-grenades & tear-gas: 400 arrested at Occupy Oakland
Members of the Oakland Police Department shrouded in a cloud of tear gas put on gas masks during a confrontation with Occupy Oakland demonstrators near Oakland Museum of California in Oakland, California January 28, 2012 (Reuters / Stephen Lam), video uploaded on YouTube by brettnchls on 28 Jan 2012
Police in Oakland, California, have used tear-gas and flash-grenades as a 2,000-strong Occupy Oakland march turned violent, with some protesters claiming that rubber bullets were also fired into the crowd. At least 400 people were arrested.
Initially, authorities had said 200-300 people were detained. But later the figure was revised to over 400 arrests, reports Reuters citing the Oakland emergency operations center.
The demonstrators had attempted to take over vacant buildings to use as their headquarters, they also broke into City Hall and tried to occupy a YMCA. Police spokesman Jeff Thomason told media most of the arrests came around 8 pm local time. Police took many protesters into custody as they marched through the city's downtown area, with some entering a YMCA building.
Flash-grenades & tear-gas: 400 arrested at Occupy Oakland (PHOTOS, VIDEO) — RT
Occupy Oakland Responds to Oakland Police Repression, Demands Accounting of Brutal Tactics, and End to Disinformation
Occupy Oakland's building occupation, an act of civil disobedience, was disrupted by a brutal police response yesterday. Protesters were met with baton strikes, shot with rubber bullets, and exposed to tear gas along the route. Police immediately issued denials that tear gas was used; however, as many victims can attest, it was used freely and without regard to safety of the diverse crowd, which included families and children.
Later, in a subsequent attempt to Occupy an abandoned building in downtown Oakland, Oakland police arrested hundreds of demonstrators. Many were reported injured as police used batons to herd protesters into a kettle in front of the YMCA.
The OPD and City have issued several false claims that need to be rebutted. OPD claim that there was no tear gas used, a fabrication easily refuted by video shot by protesters. Police also claim that several officers were injured by protesters—again, there is absolutely no evidence of this claim, which is made at every demonstration and subsequently proven to be baseless. Protesters kettled in front of the YMCA, fled into the building, aided, at first by employees there. They did so to escape police, herding protesters against the walls of the building with baton-strikes. As always, police justify their actions by claiming that protesters attacked them or are a danger to others. But there are no reported injuries to police from protesters; a wedding party felt so unthreatened by Occupy Oakland, that it continued to have a reception in an art gallery in the plaza throughout the night.
City Administrator Deanna Santana and Police Chief Howard Jordan have made their intentions clear in the press statement released on Friday night. They intend to manipulate the law to intimidate protesters, implying that acts of civil disobedience and freedom of assembly are criminal, and targeting assumed leaders regularly with unannounced warrants for invented charges.
These actions from the OPD come at a time when the city of Oakland is laying off hundreds of workers, and following millions of wasted dollars in similar brutal police actions.
Residents of Oakland will not continue to stand for this behavior and Occupy Oakland is undeterred by such repression.
Occupy Oakland Responds to Oakland Police Repression, Demands Accounting of Brutal Tactics, and End to Disinformation
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