Before this blog was assigned, I was
not well informed about the events that transpired in Oakland concerning the
occupy movement. After doing some
research, reading articles, watching videos taken by protestors, viewing news
reals, and seeing how the movement was about the inequities of the distribution
of wealth in America, I am better able to make an informed opinion. The premise for the movement was sound. I am in complete agreement as to why this
protest was set into movement. It is
unfair that the majority of Americans face such inequalities. The rich keep getting richer and the poor
keep getting poorer. Light needs to be
shed on the atrocities of our government’s action on the bank bailout. I am stunned by the fact that minimum
punishment was doled out on the individuals who were stealing thousands if not
millions of dollars. If one of the 99%
gets caught for stealing a loaf of bread to feed their family they are harshly
punished and now have a black stain upon their background. However, if those CEO’s/businessmen steal
thousands of dollars, their actions are not only ignored, they are given more
money by our own government and stockholders.
I feel the occupy Wall Street movement in New York City did a good job of
bringing attention to this situation in America.
While this occupy movement was
sending a good message, it was poorly orchestrated. There was no leadership, no counsel, and
really no direction. The protestors had
a message and wanted it heard. If they
had a structure their message would have been heard louder instead of being
heard as a cacophony of hypocrisy, violence, and unguided direction. This was not the same for the occupy Wall
Street protests. The Wall Street occupy
did a much better job than Oakland for getting the message across. In my opinion, the occupy Oakland movement
was a mess on all fronts. The protestors
did not adhere to the message. They called
the square they occupied after Oscar Grant.
This brought in a racial undertone.
Other groups joined the movement just to incite violence and looting. They had their own personal agenda apart from
Occupy. On the other hand Mayor Jean
Quan made this an even bigger mess with her indecisiveness and inability to
act. She started out with a clear and
strong message to stop the protests. She
cleared the square and put a halt to the protests, but later succumbed to political
pressure and changed her “hard lined” approach.
As a response they re-occupied the Ogawa Plaza which caused even more
problems. Even though the movement calls
for a recognition of the inequalities of salaries for the 99%, the movement shutdown
the Port of Oakland causing exactly those 99% they were fighting for to lose
out on more money because of missed pay due to the protests. Between the Mayor and the protestors, this was
the “perfect storm” of how not to try to get your message recognized.
This protest had a lot of unnecessary
violence. Was the violence
justified? To some degree I agree that
is was. There are countless videos on YouTube
showing the protestors literally throwing the first stone. The violence shown by the police force was
way too aggressive and should not have been taken to that degree. These protestors were civil, peaceful and
just wanted their voices to be heard. I
believe the Mayor over reacted and caused a lot of the problems associated with
the violence. It is unfortunate that
this got so out of control in Oakland. The
overall message for the occupy movement was positive, but the message seemed to
have become lost in Oakland.
