“Kill the police”. “F**k the police.” - Peaceful Occupy Oakland protester Jan. 28, 2012

But, no, these Occupy protests don’t attract violence against middle class, blue collar, Americans. - MASSIVE (many would say phony) rationalization by Occupy supporters.

Yes, yes.  We get it.  Tea people bad.  Occupy people good.  Tea grievances bad.  Occupy grieves good.  Tea protests bad.  Occupy protests good.  No violence is bad.  Some violence (if we are doing it for the right causes) is good.

This is the unremarkable belief in the fight against good and evil.  All designed in the minds of a minority as a massive rationalizations on how Occupy, as leaderless and undefined as it is, is a ‘cause’ in which extraordinary measures can and should be taken for the good of everyone.  Blocking doors to ordinary working people, shutting down intersections to thousands, occupying public and private spaces, forcibly breaking and entering private property, purposefully shutting down commerce and jobs, purposefully confronting police, fire and church community services can and must be considered acceptable for the furtherance of the cause.  It’s for the good of the people.

-

Tea Party groups are comprised of humans of lessor intellect, low moral standards and generally intend harm to others.  Either this is true or, someone needs a brief reminder of acceptable social behavior.

Definition of STEREOTYPE
transitive verb
1 : to make a stereotype from
2 a : to repeat without variation : make hackneyed b : to develop a mental stereotype about

Examples of STEREOTYPE

  “It’s not fair to stereotype a whole group of people based on a few you don’t like or agree with.”

-

One other thing.  Shenon claims not to support the destruction or occupation of private property yet, simultaneously, she steadfastly supports several groups regularly associated with these very actions - re-read the S.F. Occupy letter and the associated Web site.  Breaking into and entering private property, in this case it seems, is not only warranted and acceptable, it’s a cause for celebration.

thanks for the correction Sher and I apologize for not reading more carefully.

I think you failed to read my post carefully heterochromatic.  Try
reading again as I’ve actually said what you are saying I should.

She—carrying guns is an indication of their rather strong attachment to their
interpretation of Second Am rights, and not acts of violence.

Try showing that the guns were fired at folks if you want to prove anything ...or
even that the guns were used to intimidate,

and stop trying to declare that Occupiers are exercising their right to assemble
when they occupy other people’s property.

if you actually read the Constitution, you’ll find that there is no right to assemble,
except a qualified one….

Searching for other data, one intriguing website I’ve run across is
History Commons http://www.historycommons.org/aboutsite.jsp
that is an open-content investigative internet space that gives
opportunity to report on about crimes against the people.  The kinds
of information being made available is described at the website link. 
Given our present “discussion,” the event that caught my attention is
the April 16, 2011 California Tea Party Rally Co-Organized by White
Supremicist Political Organization. http://tinyurl.com/7uac4hs gives
a list of Anti-Defamation League ADL articles that highlight specific
events giving public exposition of extremist and hate groups partic-
ularly against the Jewish people but against all others to whom bigotry
is perpetrated as well.  I am suspecting Imax is a disguised shill for
extremists assigned to set up artificial arguments against organiza-
tions such as the Occupy Movement who are challenging the financial
industrial complex and those who give OWS support.  The link
http://www.adl.org/learn/default.htm is a site for the ADL that is
a guide for and reports actual law enforcement actions against hate-
motivated extremist groups suspected of threatening criminal activity
in the United States.  What is most interesting is how these fanatical
clusters link up with Tea Party groups.

Media Matters http://mediamatters.org/blog/201108030016 also
reports on the “Fertile Ground”: White Nationalists Organize Within
Tea Party” rally held in April 2011 at San Juan Capistrano. 

http://tinyurl.com/74j3gj8  is a link to the Southern Poverty Law
Center, a nonprofit civil rights organization dedicated to fighting hate
and bigotry, and to seeking justice for the most vulnerable members
of society, that reports on groups such as The American Third Position,
that exists to represent the political interests of White Americans. The
Intelligence Report magazine’s current issue discusses right-wing
rhetoric that encourages armed action.  I am reminded of the carriers
of arms to Tea Party meetings.

Occupiers are just ordinary people.  Within any public group there exists
a criminal element.  There is no manifestoed doctrinaire intention by the
Movement to exercise violence but exactly just the opposite, peaceful
protest.  The fact that some violence happens, no deaths caused by an
Occupier by the way, is random and incidental.

With all of the Occupy incidents of criminal mischief, actual or alleged,
if a comparison is in order, it is valid to note that Tea Party meetings
are different in intention and do not involve the general public.  They
are an assembly of conservative minded who also have gripes but are
anti-government in intervention, whereas the Occupiers want more
government involvement, particularly to function as protector of the
people.  But many of Tea Partiers carry guns to the meetings with no
apparent reason except they are exercising their right to bear arms. 
What legitimate reason could there be other than a love of guns and
guns can do?  They are meant to kill.  Occupiers are exercising their
right to assemble, also a Constitutional right, in order to voice their
protest at a perceived, legitimately perceived, national economy that
evolved decades ago to advantage the wealthy and have exploited
those who are not in that bracket.

Imax’s arguments are blunderous misunderstandings, but nevertheless
calculated to fester the dialogue, which in fact is merely dogged without
rational basis.  And you are right, heterochromatic, not worth much
further response.  This will be my last.  Sometimes people go around
howling just because that is all they can do.  Imax’s tactic of “calling
people out” is chronic on TD and her way of attempting to engage
others.  It is her MO.  It is one thing to challenge people’s beliefs which
I find a virtue if there is a point to it.  But once the point is made it is
superfluous to continue to beat a dead horse to death unless one wants
to puff up their own ego. 

Any acts of violence at any Occupy event are the actions of individuals
not the express intention of the Movment.  If Imax wants to show the
crime and violence of any Occupy gathering, she is required to show the
intent of each crime and act of violence.  Other than that, and she knows
very well, her arguments are hollow. 

Trying to sort out what actually is going on, it is plain to see that
the Occupiers are a group of angry people who are outraged they
are interfered with by law enforcement as they exercise their right
to assemble.  In retrospect, they have been extraordinarily restrained
given the level of their anger and frustration.  Granted the protestors
do not have a right to take over private property, and I personally do
not pardon such action, but they are reacting in the only way they know
to reciprocate for the lack of atonement by and prosecution of financiers
who long have been responsible for criminal action against the people of
the United States.  Obama is just now getting started through the Justice
Dept. to investigate.  It is realized how extremely complex to conduct
such investigations for accountability is but more noise about it should
have come sooner from the White House.  At least it is underway which
would be nonexistent under a Republican White House.  In any case, it is
expected some convictions will result from thorough inquiries.  Even
more equitable would be if the convicted were made to make restitution
to those taken advantage of regardless of how extensive.

hetro, - “show me the stuff about how widespread the—-“Throw urine, bricks, glass, or rocks at ANYONE and you’re likely to get your ass kicked - lawfully or otherwise. ”

-

Come now.  I’ll not allow you to get away with this tack any longer.  This feigned ignorance.  I’m calling you out.

You’ve seen it for months.  You chose the city and I clearly showed you two incidents of violence directly related to the occupation of Wall St.  It’s simply not honest for anyone to argue that all peripheral or “carnival attendees” attracted by events must be excused from accountability.  That, hetero, is dishonest to the extreme and you well know it.

Pick another large gathering and I’ll show you the violence that grew from it.  This same crime and violence was never associated with much larger anti-war crowds or the Tea movement.

Imax, don’t confuse myself or even She with the person who wrote that letter.

That was .....Beth…..and I’ve got a picture of her

  http://www.statefansnation.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/Sgt1.jpg

The letter Shenon puts on display:

Occupy S.F. had an “amazing day”.  They successfully broke into and entered a large hotel complex.  They know nothing of the bibles and bricks hurled at law enforcement and witnessed by dozens of reporters. 

What an amazing day for the homeless, for police and fire services, local residents and the organizers of the day’s events.  Photo’s of the party are on display at Occupywallstwest.

-

Give me your best guess:  Who will shenon call after her neighbor across the hall breaks into her home while arguing it’s necessary so to shelter the homeless?  Will she cry fowl after law enforcement are forced to react?

IMax———show me the stuff about how widespread the—-“Throw urine,
bricks, glass, or rocks at ANYONE and you’re likely to get your ass kicked -
lawfully or otherwise. ” ___

is and we’re gonna get to agreement.

‘

jnust help us all out and omit the shit that’s the result of the circus atmosphere
and the result of of living under high-stress conditions in the already stressful
city….. the three really stoned teenagers in a tent and what happened in the
middle of that night I’d like to setthat stuff to the side until after the we sort
the 23 year old asshole would-be anarchists who are there to break a bank
window and throw a rock at a cop’s head.

you show me a bunch of that at OWS in NYC over the course of two months, I’ll
say you’ve carried the point.

hetero,

My argument has remained consistant.  Not only throughout this thread but over the course of the past three months.  Occupy demonstrations, including OWS, have attract violence and confrontation with working-class, blue-collar, every day Americans.  It is literally impossible not to see it.  There is only agreeing with these tactics or not.

Block a door and the police will come.  Block an intersection and the three of us (we) will see the same confrontational outcome.  Set up residence in public spaces, refuse to move and allow the free movements of others, and you can count on an aggressive (violent) reaction. 

It matters none what any group or individual’s issues are.  Throw urine, bricks, glass, or rocks at ANYONE and you’re likely to get your ass kicked - lawfully or otherwise. 

All of the above can be counted on 100%.  Let’s not feign complete ignorance to how this works.

IMax——“You’re arguing that OWS demonstrations are
not attracting violence, confrontation, a heightened
atmosphere of criminality. “

don’t bullshit a bullshitter. that’s not what I’m
arguing and it sure as shit ain’t what we’ve been
discussing.

We’ve been discussing violence from Occupy
demonstrators as part of the demonstrations….. not
what kinda shit is going on out the edges.

long time back, I went upstate to some big deal music
concert. three days of whatever…..VERY big old
crowd very peaceful, and two or three people died
while attending the thing…....

did this Woodstock whatever attract a heightened
atmosphere of death?

—-

now cut the cheese, IMax.

two months of the one and only original Occupy Wall
Street here in NYC…....

where’s the violence inherent in the (non) system?

don’t give me garbage about the guys that NYPD drove
down from Riker’s and don’t tell me about the street
thugs who came for the circus and hung around for the
free food and drugs and to prey on the soft kids.

gonna some truth.

She—- the Tea Party events have oft been planned as
simultaneous demos in various locations around the
country….That’s my interpretation of the intent from
IMax and it’s not worth our time to parse it too
tightly.

ask him what he meant and have done with it.

hetero,

You’re arguing that OWS demonstrations are not attracting violence, confrontation, a heightened atmosphere of criminality.  Those are not the facts. 

The above cannot be said for Tea demonstrations two years ago or anti-war protests ten years ago. Looking away from this is not an argument.  Nor is arguing that any injuries you happen to be aware of, in your accounting, are serious enough to concern ourselves with.  Violence is violence.  And, in this case, the violence can be seen amongst every large gathering of Occupy demonstrators.  It is inarguable.

I asked if you could share with me two items like the two I offered.  Am I wrong in pointing out that if you are unable to locate and share even two of the same, well, clearly you’re not looking in that direction.

Really, heterochromatic?  Then the statement by Imax, “According to
those same news organizations the largest Tea protest attracted
upwards of 500,000. “ was a confusion?  The use of the definite article
“the” means a specific protest event.  If it was a collection of events
rolled up into one, it should have been said. 

Imax, you are such a bore.  You are now speaking as a schizoid “we!” 
Your feeble attempt to portray me as impassioned about Occupiers’
confrontation with the police shows your delusional acrimony.  Try
to compose yourself.  That is the only way you will be able to present
a rational comment. 

I just received a response to my email sent the other day to the
OccupySanFrancisco.  It is copied here:

From: “OccupySF Communications” .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Date:  Thu, 28 Jan 2012 7:40 PM (5 minutes ago)

Thanks for your support of the Occupy movement!

OccupySF is a peaceful movement.  Last Friday we had an amazing day of
action through our Occupy Wall Street West campaign where we shut
down various banks in the financial district, had rallies at the courthouse,
City Hall, the ICE office, etc.  After the march at the end of the day, we
marched to occupy an empty hotel, Cathedral Hill hotel, to highlight the
fact that there are thousands of homeless people alongside empty
buildings that could house them.

I know of no incidents of bricks being thrown and I was there until ten
pm.  The police did pepper spray some ten to twelve people, including
an 18 year old woman, in front of the barricades of the hotel. If there
was such an incident with bricks, it was not with OccupySF consent.  We
specifically passed a statement at the General Assembly against the use
of property destruction and certainly not to harm anyone.  If I find any
more information about this alleged brick incident, I will let you know.

Thank you again for your support of the Occupy movement.  We are at a
pivotal time in history:  an economic; political; and environmental
emergency that will affect the lives of future generations if we don’t
make changes now.  We need as many people involved as possible to
grow this movement and achieve the change that is necessary.

Thanks,
Beth
Communications - OSF

IMax——a discussion about violence isn’t what I had
in mind… I was looking for facts and stats.

As far as I can tell, no protester in NYC ever was
injured sufficiently during any demonstration to
require a day in the hospital and none of the cops
was injured more seriously than the one who needed
suturing for a hand laceration caused by glass.

and you’re going to have to explain to me why the
sexual predation upon protesters is really protester
violence and not something only peripherally related.

Please show me all the violence from OWS right here
in my home town…..

Sept 17- Nov 17 gives you two months

Hetero,

How many do you need?  Do you have two more of the same you can show me?

Occupy Wall Street: Adam Gabbatt on Zuccotti Park violence during Day of Action
November 17, 2011

Sexual Violence at Zuccotti Park and Blaming the Victim
Eve Ensler, Huffington Post, 11/8/11
Author of ‘I Am An Emotional Creature” and “The Vagina Monologues,” Founder of V-Day

-

Shenon,

So far you have been unable to comprehend the topic at hand.  Nothing in this discussion warrants our individual opinions on the particular grievances of ‘Tea’ vs ‘Occupy’.  We understand you have your personal preferences.  Your emotional responses to opposition is well noted. 

Occupy demonstrations attract violence and confrontation with working-class, blue-collar, every day Americans.  The fact is, you love it.  These confrontations bring your issues and grievances to the fore.  You want more!  Regardless of the apparent dangers to others.

Block a door and the police will come.  Block an intersection and the same will happen.  Set up residence in public spaces, refuse to move and allow the free movements of others, and you can count on an aggressive (violent) reaction.  Throw urine, bricks, glass, or rocks at ANYONE and you’re likely to get your ass kicked - lawfully or otherwise.  All of the above can be counted on, 100%.  Let’s not feign complete ignorance to how this works.  That’s for petulant children and people who know no better.

You can lay down your constant suggestion that I am the one with no grip on the situation.

She——the 500,000 was not offered as pertaining to a
single location, just as IM’s 17,000 figure for Occupy
was offered as a national total.

less heat, more light.

Imax, there is a difference between town meetings of the Tea
Partiers and the Occupy Movement to occupy public and some
private spaces in protest of the financial industry’s raping of t
he American citizens for over three decades with the legislative
assistance of the Republican Partiers. The largest meeting the
Tea Baggers had was in Washington, D.C. with Glenn Beck heading
the entertainment, was attended by 100,000 to interrupt Martin
Luther King, Jr. Day commemorations and rail against the
government, specifically the black President Obama since the
Supreme Court and Congress.  The irony was the government Tea
Partiers protested was the one dominated by Republicans with their
House majority and the Senate 47 Republicans and one Independent,
Joe Lieberman voting with the Republicans most of the time, leaving
the Democrats with 51 and Bernie Sanders an Independent who voted
with Democrats most of the time.  But for important legislation a 2/3
majority (66) was needed thus allowing the Republicans to block passing
crucial bills. 

You really ought to quit while you still have some semblance of
dignity, since what you are saying is nonsensical garbage. For instance,
which news organization did you get your figure of 500,000 attended
Tea Party rally since the largest one yielded by a search gives the
Washington, D.C. rally of 100,000?  Your exaggerations are laughable. 
There is no comparison between Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street
movements except they are both populist movements.  US News article
at http://tinyurl.com/7rugn5w/

NYC

hetero,

Say what you will. In this case, on this subject, the facts are not on your side.  Occupy gatherings attract violence. A lot of violence. In fact, by its very design, it’s been encouraged - regardless of wordy protestations otherwise.

There is protesting and there is confrontation.

Designing and coordinating a clutch of people for the express purpose of continual and sustained confrontation with law enforcement, along with everyday people going about their jobs, (middle class Americans, all of them) causes what?  Confrontation with a constant risk of injury and violence.  So it has been.

Now choose a city (any city) where there’s been large gatherings of “Occupy’ protesters and I’ll show you the accompanying violence.

-

Look for yourself at the latest example in occuywallstwest. As an organization it encouraged the breaking and entering of an entire hotel complex.  That action, in and of itself, provoked and received a violent response.  I response which shenon attempts to rationalize as unjust.

One last thing.  According to news accounts the largest Occupy protest to date attracted 17,000 people all across the country.  According to those same news organizations the largest Tea protest attracted upwards of 500,000.  In the case of the latter not once was there a need for riot gear and pepper spray. Yes, that’s saying something.

Maybe because you were a profiler is why you often sound imperious
and autocratic, Imax?  In profiling, esoteric ways are sometimes used
to find dead giveaways about something or other that has presented
a mystery.  So-called profilers have to have extra-large egos to think
they can interpret clues to human behavior.  Not so sure profilers are
all that authentic though.  At least not in the way television programs
glamorously portray them in criminal investigation.  It is mainly the
practice of heuristics, you know, commonsense thinking.  Personality
profiling, usually based on a Jungian rational and irrational preference
scale is gathered from a respondent questionnaire that does not
require the services of a hired profiler, there is a scoring process
with an accompanying guide that suggests interpretations of answered
questinnaires.  One can even take an online version (1.2 million people
have completed the 10-question test).

While the TV shows are highly entertaining, a research study at the
University of Minnesota contradicts claimed validity of profiling, at
least in solving criminal cases.  In some instances, profilers certainly
produce more accurate information than those who are not trained to
predict suspects of a crime.  But in studying other cases, it was found
that profilers have little to no legitimacy.  The study illustrated that
chemistry majors predicted more precise profiles than the actual
trained profilers.

Involved in teaching critical thinking at the university level for 20 years,
I can spot faulty unsupported opinions in a short minute.

IMax, there’s widespread and there’s widespread…..

as well, there’s violence and there’s violence.

the bulk of the arrests in San Fran were for
obstructing exits.

why don’t you amuse yourself by going through the the
history and looking for serious violence (rather than
assholes breaking windows or taunting cops) and try
to peg out an estimate of how violent the demos
really are how representative of the whole that
violence really is.

I don’t find myself in denial about it, and I am open
to hearing you present a sober analysis.

less heat, but all the cold hard light

hetero,

I never supported the Tea Movement’s basic issues.  I did support their right to protest.  I still support the fact that not one incident occurred that required riot gear and pepper spray.  Not one time all over the nation.  Now that’s saying something.

I supported Occupy when it began.  I supported Occupy’s core issues.  That ended when the violence began.  If both you and Shenon are not seeing this wide-spread violence, for whatever reasons, you’re looking away.

Choose a city (any city) where there’s been large gatherings of “Occupy’ protesters and I’ll show you the accompanying violence at and around each of those events.  That too is saying something.

Say what you will. In this case, on this subject, the facts are not on your side.

I got the idea that IMax is driven to exaggerating
the extent of the Occupy violence cause he’s nursing
a grievance and it’s not difficult to understand that
grievance if you’re going to attempt portray these
people as being ” a creation” “controlled” and
“crafted by right-wing
bankrollers”

it’s that level of shitheaded rhetoric and
contemptuous condescension that makes the attempt
about as worthwhile as something puked out by Glenn
Beck or Louis Farrakhan.

Much of what the Tea Party espouses is utter nonsense
and ignorant and sometimes indeed quite ugly….much
in the same way that so much of what gets espoused by
the far-left (and some of the people on this blog) is
worthless nonsense based on ignorance.

try according that group of Tea Party idiots the same
basic human respect that you lend to the fucking
idiots who think that they’ve a right and a duty to
jump into some old hotel and throw things at cops
because THEY are all brilliant original thinkers who
all know the TRUTH and all are bathed in the pure
light of RIGHTEOUSNESS and are not at all influenced
by other people who have miseducated them and
manipulated them.

——

maybe then, IMax might stop trying to waste time and
space pretending that half a hundred assholes in
Oakland represent everyone in OWS.

Shenon,

After twenty-five years as a profiler I understand all too well the implications in your description of others as ‘sinful’ when not seeing the world as you do.

I’m sorry for you.

I don’t mind repeating myself heterochromatic but just who makes
up the Tea Party was covered in my post earlier today at 8:50 am.

“The Tea Party, actually a creation of predominantly white, right-wing
elites, where, according to The Atlantic report, Apr. 2010, 50% has an
annual income over $50,000, but 47% pay no federal income tax, and
20% an income over $100,000, is a baggy but complicated web of
chapters, front groups, action committees, and so forth, backed and
for the most part controlled by think tanks, non-profits, Political Action
Committees (PACs) and other organizations crafted by right-wing
bankrollers.  Vicious racist animosities, most loudly incited through
racist demagogy against Blacks and Latino immigrant deeply permeates
the Tea Party movement and is their sixth sin.

...Slate reported also in Apr. 2010, members of the Tea Party are from
traditional middle-class families who had a certain expectation of
upward progress. But over the last ten years, they got stuck and
therefore angry. Before the recession, the 2000s showed the first
economic recovery post World War II during which average family
income was lower at the end of the decade than it had been before
the era’s economic peak in 2000. That’s a sobering lack of gains for
the typical American family, giving rise to much economic anxiety. 
They too had the American Dream, but sharply felt unlikely to have one.”

Imax and I are having more of a difference of opinion about the nature of
the Occupiers not the Tea Party so much, except Imax erroneously
accusing me of something (unclear and unreferenced specifically) about
how she perceives what I’ve said about the Tea Party.  And so it keeps
going…tra la.

if you guys want to keep going round on violence in
the Tea Party, maybe it would be helpful to define
just who is in the thing.

Most folks would define that group as consisting
mostly

white conservative middle-aged middle-income college-
educated Christian leaning toward the Republican
party….and overwhelmingly physically non-violent.

the people at Occupy events are mostly non-violent
but attached to them are clumps of younger, rowdier
and confrontational folks who have a taste for the
old non-ultra violence and who think that provoking
the authorities is good theater and that every
innocent person who gets bloodied on the scrum is
helping to bring the “revolution” closer.

the bulk of the Occupy folks are not in agreement but
they’re awfully reticent to condemn the rowdies.

if you guys want to keep going round on violence in
the Tea Party, maybe it would be helpful to define
just who is in the thing.

Most folks would define that group as consisting
mostly

white conservative middle-aged middle-income college-
educated Christian leaning toward the Republican
party….and overwhelmingly physically non-violent.

the people at Occupy events are mostly non-violent
but attached to them are clumps of younger, rowdier
and confrontational who have a taste for the old non-
ultra violence and who think that provoking the
authorities is good theater and that every innocent
person who gets bloodied on the scrum is helping to
bring the “revolution” closer.

the bulk of the Occupy folks are not in agreement but
they’re awfully reticent to condemn the rowdies.

There is not one shred of hate in my entire body…or mind.  Sorry
Imax you are only trying to paint yourself as a poor little innocent.
Ego ego ego….try some self-reflection.  It does wonders for the
soul and soulless.

Shenon,

WOW!  You truly, deeply, hate people who look unlike yourself.  And I’m not referring to the Tea movement.

Good luck with that.

If you can write for 10 minutes, Imax, and you have demonstrated
you indeed are able, there is no one stopping you.  Your accusations
are absurd and your plea to be trusted is ridiculous.  Whining is most
unbecoming to you Imax.  If you think you have a point, you ought to
just make it.  Stop chasing your own tail.

You may have visited the Occupy sites but it is conspicuous you do not
comprehend what they are about. I am assuming nothing.  It isn’t that I
think you are ignorant because we disagree, you show you are ignorant
by your comments. I’ve been a vocal and printed supporter of the Occupy
Movement since the first day their existence came to my notice.

You have not provided one specific reference to show what I’ve said
about the Tea Party other than your puffed up skewed opinion.  But
I welcome the opportunity to again give my portrait of the Tea Party’s
racist and reactionary overemotionalism against a half-black president
intent to push liberal ideals in support of Middle America, that has Tea
Party leaders livid and overworking on an anti-working class agenda
which is their first sin; the Tea Party howling blitzkrieg against the
government general public protective programs of Social Security and
Medicare is their second sin; their vile scheme to disentitle voting rights,
which is seeing an intensification in the past few months is their third
sin; religious intolerance is their fourth sin; the attempt by the Tea Party
founder who instructed Tea Partiers to blame the attempted murder of
Gabby Giffords on Democratic liberals instead of on the deranged
solitary conspiracist Loughner whose fanatical beliefs about a
government whose president is Democratic but the Congress and
Supreme Court are decidedly conservative and anti-progressive, is
their fifth sin.  The Tea Party, actually a creation of predominantly
white, right-wing elites, where, according to The Atlantic report,
Apr. 2010, 50% has an annual income over $50,000, but 47% pay no
federal income tax, and 20% an income over $100,000, is a baggy but
complicated web of chapters, front groups, action committees, and so
forth, backed and for the most part controlled by think tanks, non-
profits, Political Action Committees (PACs) and other organizations
crafted by right-wing bankrollers.  Vicious racist animosities, most
loudly incited through racist demagogy against Blacks and Latino
immigrant deeply permeates the Tea Party movement and is their
sixth sin. 

All this aside, Slate reported also in Apr. 2010, members of the Tea
Party are from traditional middle-class families who had a certain
expectation of upward progress. But over the last ten years, they got
stuck and therefore angry. Before the recession, the 2000s showed the
first economic recovery post World War II during which average family
income was lower at the end of the decade than it had been before the
era’s economic peak in 2000. That’s a sobering lack of gains for the
typical American family, giving rise to much economic anxiety.  They
too had the American Dream, but sharply felt unlikely to have one.

There is no argument that OccupyWallStreetWest expected a
confrontation with law enforcement.  The Occupiers have had to
“confront” law enforcement at every event and since September 2011
when the Movement started in Zuccotti Park, New York across from the
financial district.  You simply quibble over what is plainly obvious. 
Overall the Movement has been peaceful.  Else hundreds of thousands
would have been carrying firearms and other weapons… and using them.

Shenon,

Back in Sept/Oct I looked up several of your comments on the Tea Movement.  One thing you made clear.  The words and sentiments of the few represented the whole.  You’re actively arguing the opposite regarding Occupy.

I never agreed with Tea Party issues.  At the same time I can say I saw not one bit of violence from participants and never once any need for riot gear and pepper spray.  Four years later the movement is affecting legislation in both Houses of congress and will effect the coming presidential election - nonviolently.

Shenon,

Thank you for the links. I have studied those sites extensively over the past few months.  You should trust me on this. I visit each regularly. Paying particular attention to Occupywallst.org.  It’s a mistake to assume me ignorant simply because we see things differently - that’s too easy and, frankly, beneath you. 

Once again, if we study the real-time postings we see that occupywallstwest pleaded with followers to turnout and support the break-in of this large hotel complex. Occupywallstwest went a step further by pleading people “come prepared” (prepared for ‘occupation’ and an obvious confrontation with law enforcement). 

Are you willing to argue that occupywallstwest did not expect a violent confrontation with law enforcement after they themselves incited people to enter and occupy this huge complex?  This, you believe, is the nonviolent confrontation you support?

I am so hoping for a couple of brief and succinct answers.  I’m not asking about the conditions or causes for protest.  I’m trying to make a point, if you’ll be patient and allow it. 

-

You’ve never once extended me the courtesy of the equivalence of 10 minutes of hearing me on any subject. From your first post directed my way, without fail, you have found every way conceivable to tell me how ignorant I am in not agreeing with you.  Do you realize your demeaning arrogance?  I get the sense you are unaware. Nonetheless…

Any way, you can’t expect me to treat you respectfully or kindly today.

Imax you can speak directly to me instead of “about” me.
You show a certain slinkiness in speaking of me in the third
person. It is without a doubt Occupiers assemble to confront
authority.  Perhaps you should visit Occupy Wall Street website
and their sibling Occupies in the country and read what they are
about.  For you speak melodramatically as if you are ignorant of
their motivations and ongoing actions.  Your last comment is petty
and without substance.

No one is advocating violence of any kind, that criticism of yours is
also empty.  If you indeed researched the past you can cite where I
said anything about the Tea Party.  My sentiments about the Tea Party
is documented but it is not as you report.

http://occupywallst.org/about/
http://www.adbusters.org/campaigns/occupywallstreet
http://www.usdayofrage.org/
http://www.nycga.net/about/
http://occupysf.org/about/

Related links
http://takethesquare.net/

“There will always be some degenerates who will resort to sordid behaviors and some police who will inflict harm on peaceful protestors.”
-

The problem with leaning on this rationalization to excuse violence is two-fold.  First:  This type of violence is taking place at nearly every large ‘Occupy’ event.  Second:  I researched past comments.  The same argument didn’t float with Shenon when the discussion involved the Tea Movement.

Occupywallstwest encouraged people to turnout in support of the hotel break-in and encouraged supporters to “Come Prepared”.  In fact Shenon would be hard-pressed to point out one Occupy protest event that was not designed to confront authorities, force their hand to react, only to decry the use of force on ether side.

She—- cool. post it if you get any more info, but it looks like the physical stuff
from the protestors and the physical stuff from the cops was very limited and
involved a couple of dozens out of the thousands.

Thank you heterochromatic for the three links.  I visited all of them
and integrated them with the ones I found.  I think the situation has
been reported very clearly.  The Occupy Wall Street West denounced
whatever violence was levied at the police and reminded protestors
of the general agreement to keep the protests peaceful.  Seems to me
the incident was taken care of by arrests of four people and the OWSW
internally.  Pepper spraying and baton beating of the protestors were
reported in several newspapers.  So while of course I do not have first-
hand knowledge, which would be rather difficult since I am on the
opposite side of the country! the newspaper accounts are credible. 
I’ve also written to the Occupy San Francisco and Occupy Wall Street
West for any information they can provide about the brick throwing.
I don’t condone violence of any kind and was attracted to the Occupy
Movement cause because it was peaceful yet was delivering a powerful
message.

There will always be some degenerates who will resort to sordid
behaviors and some police who will inflict harm on peaceful protestors. 
Why this happens has been the material for several dissertations on
human behavior.

@ Shenonymous~~~~~ here’s an eyewitness account of things that suggests
that violence is not central to most folks on any side :

http://open.salon.com/blog/yserba/2012/01/22/occupy_sf_turns_the_city_int
o_a_theme_park_of_protest

as does this report

http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_19790364?source=rss

and as does this report which reads as if those folks getting physical were the
ones that got sprayed…..

http://progressive.org/occupy_wall_street_west.html

~~~~” Overall, there was little confrontation with the police, especially
compared to the ongoing Occupy-police skirmishes across the bay in Oakland.
Throughout the day there were 20 arrests, most of which took place at Wells
Fargo. At 5:00 p.m. all the small groups converged for a final march down
Market Street, with new people just getting off work to swell the ranks. During
the final march, a few small confrontations did erupt, with police pepper-
spraying ten people at one point. Later, a group of activists briefly occupied the
vacant Cathedral Hill Hotel, but the police forced them out within a few hours.”
~~~

Shenon,

Remember:  You have no knowledge of protesters being pepper-sprayed for simply protesting.

Remember:  Occupywallstwest posted news of the break-in at the Cathedral Hill Hotel as it happened.  Occupywallstwest then pleaded with people to rush to the scene and support the break-in.  Occupywallstwest pleaded with supporters to “come prepared!”

Remember: At the end of the day Occupywallstwest posted photographs of the ‘party atmosphere’ and declared the day a success.

This is not the way to effect lasting change.

Good morning.  It won’t be god that forbids it.  It would be me who
does that!  I will check out the story for both sides later as I have to
go to work in a non-violent frame of mind.  I would hope that youhoo
two too do the same and report back as well.  Have a good day.

Shenon,

Remember.  You have no knowledge of protesters being pepper-sprayed for simply protesting.  Yet you base your entire premise on this. 

Can you try again to explain your rationalization using what dozens of journalists on the scene have reported (I assume you were not there)?  ‘Occupy’ seized an entire building complex and threw potentially deadly projectiles at law enforcement from its high roof.  Your complaint is the use of non-lethal pepper spray in this situation.

Let us, at the very least, discuss this situation in it’s FULL context.  You appear to condone and applaud violence when it pushes your agenda. But, God forbid, violence is applied against you.

~~~~ Occupiers have a valid complaint of brutality, pepper spray is searing, it
burns the skin (how would you like to be pepper sprayed just for exercising
your rights? In the eyes?  Why don’t you go and have a dose? And baton
beatings are not the most enjoyable, nor the proper human way to be treated
for protesting also according to our Constitutional right. Go try out for a baton
beating as well!).~~~~

no, they don’t have a valid complaint if they first assaulted the police….and
assaulting the cops is not a valid protest tactic and quite NOT in accord with
our constitution.

are you REALLY going to go on with the assertion that protests and protesters
aren’t subject to same laws and regulations that we usually live by?

do you need to re-read the First Amendment or am I silly in thinking that the
word “peaceably” is still in there?

Good god how can you be so crass?  Occupiers have a valid complaint of brutality, pepper spray is searing, it burns the skin (how would you like to be pepper sprayed just for exercising your rights? In the eyes?  Why don’t you go and have a dose? And baton beatings are not the most enjoyable, nor the proper human way to be treated for protesting also according to our Constitutional right. Go try out for a baton beating as well!).

Good god is right!  Rights are being stepped on as an alarming practice these days.  We don’t really know how injured the policemen were since you provided no link you only give your hearsay report.  I whole heardedly support the effort of the Occupiers to publicly express complaint of the despicable treatment the corporatocrats have inflicted for nearly half a century.  The contemptible usury by those with the power of money and the ever widening of the gap between the moneyed privileged and almost titled class and what was once middle America that is fast disappearing is completely a nightmare.  The Occupy Movement is phenomenal with nothing like it since the Civil Rights Movement. The people have a right to protest and they have legitimate reason. 

I really only gave a condensed history about the Civil Rights Movement as an example of the last time, also 50 years ago, when hordes of American people came together
to wake up the government.  It does not hurt, but rather helps I think to be reminded of what the Civil Rights did for this country’s morality and its minorities. Good god, it is you who needs to be revived from political somnambulance! 

While I believe in fiscal consciousness of government spending, I am not libertarian in the least, there is conclusively usefulness for government, but it must be a government that is responsive and responsible to the people.  Government exists solely and for the express purpose of protection and benefit of the people.  And definitely not for the welfare of the corporate world, or exploitive individuals.  Conservative elements in governments everywhere are denigrative of the Movement while most of the Liberals are supportive.  That is because conservative elites are not too keen on democracy or egalitarian rule by the people.  Such is the nature of the human condition at the present time. But times they are a changin as one famous person put it.

“Protestors Occupy Cathedral Hill Hotel at Franklin and Geary” - http://www.occupywallstwest.org

Let me get this straight.  People off the street break and enter private property, ‘Occupy’ that entire complex, throw potentially deadly objects off the buidling’s high roof and there are people complaining about pepper spray and aggressive law enforcement in this situation?

WHAT THE ____ IS WRONG WITH YOU, Shenon?  How can you possibly be taken-in by such a massive rationalization?  This is somehow the fault of law enforcement?  Good God, girl.  Do you have no centering judgement?

If the goal is meaningful and lasting change this is not the way.

I didn’t mean to be, Sher, I thought I was understating things here.

If you feel I insulted you, I readily offer my apologies.  I usually value and enjoy
your comments and this one was a rare clunker and doesn’t mean that I don’t
accept to again enjoy and appreciate what you bring to the party.

You needn’t be insulting.

bluntly, no one forced the marchers to attack the police and there were no
circumstances that necessitated it.
as well, disrupting banks doesn’t compare to fighting government-mandated
segregation, there is no 1st Amendment right to disrupt banks or attack cops,
violence is not part of sanctioned protest and is not encouraged by the
Constitution or the Civil Rights Act.

your thinking is fuzzy here.

Gee hetero - you might say better what you mean.  Those
are Occupy sites, and seems to come directly from the horses mouths. 

DoDa poleese have a website to discuss their problems
with the Occupiers?

Sher~~~ sorry to say it, but that link and much of the rest of the comment was
pretty much a pile of crap.

SF is off the topic of London, but from
http://occupyca.wordpress.com/ If some
protesters flung objects at the police
it was by reason of reciprocity of
treatment.

”Despite inclement weather and brutal
police, demonstrators blocked traffic to
a number of bank branches and a handful of
other corporations, including Bechtel.” ...
“Around 5pm, they gathered at Bradley Manning
Plaza and began a march that traveled to a Bank
of America branch where demonstrators had locked
arms using pipes and performing a sit-in at the
entrance of the branch. Around 7pm, riot police
intervened the march and attacked demonstrators
using batons and pepper spray. Shortly afterwards,
a luxury car dealership’s windows were smashed.”

Some subgroups of Occupy West (California)
vandalized some businesses, and in a more
or less hourly e-journal is reported in detail
of that January 20 protest effort at
http://www.occupywallstwest.org/wordpress/?p=1034 

It is more to be ashamed of our free and
democratic country when citizens must resort
to such protests, which can erupt in to violence
on both sides between protestors and municipal
authorities because of widespread injustices
done first to the people. The anger and resentment
is not slight.  The right of the people to protest
and challenge the government that is oppressive or
unjust is a guaranteed Constitutional right in the
First Amendment and the Civil Rights Act of 1964
encouraged. Moreover, it is encouraged by our
governing document.  Bricks and Bibles as projec-
tiles against a police who wear armor and body
shields who resort to inhuman treatment of the
protestors. 

Besides challenging segregation in the courts,
African Americans came to rely more and more on
direct action to publicize their struggle for equality
staging peaceful sit-ins and boycotts.

One of the most dramatic of the early protests
was Martin Luther King, Jr.‘s 1955 demonstration
in Montgomery, Alabama.  Protesting rules that
required them to sit in the backs of buses, African
Americans refused to use public transportation and
picketed against the regulations.  The protest soon
spread as African Americans boycotted white
Montgomery businesses in an effort to slow down
business and to force businessmen to support
African American demands. After months of
confrontation and not without violence, the
city agreed to end seating requirements on buses,
signaling a symbolic victory for civil rights
workers in the South.

IM—-I like to know that I’m reading from the same thing that you’re quoting, if
you don’t mind.

different reproductions from the same original may or may not include the entirety
of the original.

if it’s a problem for you, forgive the request.

Hetero,

Seriously?  It’s difficult for you to search “Protesters Throw Bricks and Bibles” within your favorite news site?  My 3 second search of Google News located 388 related articles.

I’ll not always post links.  Typically I post links as a courtesy, for those hard to locate items.

IMax—I know that trying to post links in this site is difficult but I would
appreciate it if you would try to provide them when you’re quoting from a source.

Violence, violence, and more violence. 

Protesters Throw Bricks and Bibles at Police in San Francisco

Occupy San Francisco’s “Day of Action” turned violent Friday night when protesters occupied an abandoned hotel and began throwing objects at police officers from the roof, police said.

“Once they gained access [to the hotel], some of them made it to the top of the roof and they then began to throw bibles down at the officers,” San Francisco Police Department spokesman Carlos Manfredi said.

“One of officers was struck with a brick to the chest and one of our lieutenants was struck in the hand with an object and may have damaged or even broken his hand,” he said.

This is appalling and embarrassing.

worse than boring! Owen and his buddies bought the land for New Lanark instead
of simply occupying it. they were like part of the 1%.....not cool.

“What ideas individuals may attach to the term “Millennium” I know not; but I know that society may be formed so as to exist without crime, without poverty, with health greatly improved, with little, if any misery, and with intelligence and happiness increased a hundredfold; and no obstacle whatsoever intervenes at this moment except ignorance to prevent such a state of society from becoming universal.” Extract from Robert Owen’s “Address to the Inhabitants of New Lanark” New Year’s Day, 1816

“Is it not the interest of the human race, that every one should be so taught and placed, that he would find his highest enjoyment to arise from the continued practice of doing all in his power to promote the well-being, and happiness, of every man, woman, and child, without regard to their class, sect, party, country or colour” [From a Paper Dedicated to the Governments of Great Britain, Austria, Russia, France, Prussia and the United States of America, published by Robert Owen, 1841.

-

Boring?

gerard,

Your questions here are often interesting.  But I do I wish, just once, you could offer something of real substance.  Your esoteric what-ifs take you and others about 1/10 of the way toward aiding men AND woman around the world (I am a woman too).

You’ll find that your grand experiments have been attempted numerous times and, without exception, have all failed.  Why do these social systems you dream of always fail?  Simply put; base human nature has not changed in thousands of years.  You’ll not change that by simply dreaming it into existence.

You can “dream” yourself into your very own ‘University Park’, gerard.  For a simple start you’ll find that nearly everything you espouse here on these pages in the American histories of hundreds of communities across history. You’ll also better understand why I asked the few questions I posed here if you study, for example, George Rapp, Robert Owen, and William Maclure.  Do this and, perhaps, we can have a real discussion about real potential solutions.

-

P.S. Because you have been snide and abrasive with me from your fist post directed my way I have responded in like fashion.  You talk of peace but, and you should hear this well, gerard, you fail to practice even a modicum of the sciences in making peace with others.  Change your nature. - I know, in the beginning, you’ll have no idea why I say; learn to stop thinking and begin listening.

These inane controversies between IMax and Gerard are very pointless and boring. The last bromide to engage our attention was:  “Gerard dreams of changing man’s nature without employing suppressive coercion.”
  1. Gerard is not alone in her “dreaming.”
  2. Through many centuries man’s (and women’s) “nature” (whatever that uncertain term means) has been changed, mostly without “employing suppressive coercion.” “Human nature” has been changed by the gradual development of deeper, more convincing awareness of the necessity for change. Coercion of various types has pushed for these changes, but “suppression” has not been predominant; rather, the freeing of creative possibilities has enabled change.  Suppression,  on the other hand, has been a strong retardant to change of all kinds because it is the kiss of death for creating alternatives and confidence in their possibilities.
  As to “dreaming,”  somebody went pretty far forward in recent times by believing and acting on four powerful words:  “I have a dream ....” so don’t knock it!
  My hope for people like my challenger here is that he find his way to the “mountaintop” and that he can see even a small corner of “the Promised Land” which is nothing less that a fair, well-educated and peaceful “land of the free and home of the brave.”
Sad to say, that the vision is, at the moment, almost lost.

Mankind can do better, yes. 

Apparently gerard has never taken the time to think through the various ideas she advocates on these pages.  Nor has she spent more than a few minutes assessing the long history with the many attempts at what she advocates.

There is another possibility.  It’s possible gerard truly has no idea what she continues to advocate.  It’s possible she simply mimics sound-bites, without fully realizing exactly what she says and writes.

-

Study Robert Owen’s New Harmony project.

What an absolutely fascinating idea, this:
  “Question: How does one assure that all men will not educate or motivate themselves past the abilities of their neighbor?  How does one convince a parent that their children should not excel beyond themselves?”
  Possible responses: 
  1. Who the hell would want to do either?
  2. Have you ever known anybody who even so much as thought that would be a good idea?
  3. How do you dream this stuff up, anyway?
  4. I would suggest that the human race has a
ways to go yet before we start putting on the brakes.
  5. Shall we start a “No Child Left in Front” movement?
  6. And yoo-hoo!  Hello! What about us women? Shall we unmotivate ourselves and stop trying to get an education, to fight for equal rights, to vote etc.? 
  Postscript:  Have you ever considered how “unmotivating” it would be to be poor but willing to work yet there are no jobs? Sick, but there’s no money for a doctor? Absolutely alone in the world at age five and nobody cares? Wake up and smell the millions of roses—probably more like billions.
  Don’t kid yourself, IMax.  We can do better, and there will still be some food, clothing and shelter left over.  The problem has already been solved. All we have to do is to convince the guys in suits and uniforms to go along with the idea and get ‘er done!

we all have to squeeze out our contribution to global warming and I’m right there
in the trenches

A “bit more regularity just might be good for the planet’s health.”

-

I heartily agree.

awww Imax, gerard is merely stating that if all men were educated well, they
might heed the better angels of their nature and act with more wisdom and make
the world a better, more decent place.

decency and wisdom are not alien to human nature, IMax, and exercising them
with bit more regularity just might be good for the planet’s health.

Gerard dreams of changing man’s nature without employing suppressive coercion.

If men were angels then the economy might succeed without selfish incentives, but if men were angels it would not matter whether the economy succeeded since they would have no material needs.

When gerard devises a non-coercive way to make man in no way responsible for his own character she will instantly become the world’s most revered hero.

-

Question: How does one assure that all men will not educate or motivate themselves past the abilities of their neighbor?  How does one convince a parent that their children should not excel beyond themselves?

And of course dreaming another world awake is a very bad idea because this world is plenty good enough with all its lying, stealing, war, exploitation and repression.  Worse yet, young people are actually getting together to cook up this crazy idea of better possibilities where every child has enough food to eat and a house to live in and every parent has a job sufficient to provide for family needs with maybe a little left over for Christmas.  Where everybody gets an education good enough to help him or her participate in self-government.  Damn!  We can’t have that!  Where all the world’s resources don’t float magically to the top and land in the pockets of 1% of those men in suits who wall themselves off from the rest of us and pretend they deserve it!  What are you, a communist or something?
Drop dead!

Occupy re-education camps sound delightful.

One of the more apparently unusual lecturers was Jerome Lewis, a social anthropologist at UCL, whose expertise is pygmy hunter-gatherers.

According to Lewis, the [Occupy] connection, is that these societies are perhaps the most egalitarian on Earth, with no gender or age hierarchies and a central tenet called “demand sharing” in which it is assumed people will not keep resources for themselves, something mirrored at the camp.

“They’ve developed their own version of demand sharing, in effect,” he said. “If you want to take it to a more mystical, spiritual level they’re dreaming another world awake. That’s the way some of them see it.”

Before this site goes down, we need to know that Occupy London, in addition to its tent city, has developed two sites called Tent City University, open to anyone anytime.

“Giving a lecture at the Tent City University was an eye-opener for Richard Werner, who has a day job at Southampton University.

The professor of international banking said: ‘It’s different in the sense that the questions were much more informed than those I get from my students. That was a bit of a surprise. Clearly, these are people who have read into things and already have some recognition of some of the problems, and they have thought about potential solutions. So there were much more details questions, more engaged questions.’”

Sadly, the future of these learning centers has been made uncertainby evictions, along with the camp itself.

yes, that was what I was referencing.

and it contained not only the guarantee that the

“——That election of members of Parliament ought to be free;

——-That the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament
ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of
Parliament;

——-And that for redress of all grievances, and for the amending,
strengthening and preserving of the laws, Parliaments ought to be held
frequently.”

which signified that Coke’s fight had been won,

but also

——-    “That it is the right of the subjects to petition the king, and all
commitments and prosecutions for such petitioning are illegal;”——-

which pretty much, along with other provisions in the document, signified that
free speech was won, leaving but the borders as to libelous speech, treasonous
speech etc to be secured.

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/17th_century/england.asp

thank you much for the fleshing out of my bare and meager bone, Sher.

Since we are really talking about rights and freedoms it might be
useful to give a short (really truncated) history of British laws and
because it is claimed, rightfully, that early America took as a hint
mostly from Mill, on how to shape their own laws.  I think it is
important that this kind of discussion take place in public forums
like TD.  Of course no one is breaking any arms, even e-arms.

First part.  There is no argument that in England, human rights started
with the 13th century Magna Carter in England, heterochromatic, but
none of its sixty-three clauses made reference to the right to free
expression, but by limiting royal powers and strengthening individual
protection, they attempted in other ways to apply liberties to the
‘freeman of England.’  The history of free speech in Britain was not as
smooth as you might think.  As brief as I can make it, we can see why
when a couple of years later in spite of an amendment to the MC called
the Charter of the Forest tried to fill in a couple of gaps that had to do
with unfair taxing the commoners, this did not guarantee freedoms of
speech, expression, press was not simply granted.  Nevertheless, most
of the clauses in the Magna Carta were repealed by the 19th century.  (It
did however, provide an inspiration for the American colonies in drafting
their Declaration of Independence 500 years later.)  Then in the early
14th century, another statue regarding the treason of planning the
death of the king no longer a death sentence.  But, any speech could
still be judged as dissident speech, particularly those considered hostile
to the government on important political issues, and the person making
the speech could still be prosecuted.  After the Peasants’ Revolt of the
late 14th c., the rural population recognized the symbolic power of
controlling public space in order to articulate their demands for greater
land rights and freedom of speech was gaining a foothold in human
rights. 

Somewhat later, the 17th c.Levellers,  a rights activist group (that
would be considered leftist progressives today) fought to restore any
rights that were usurped by the monarch or Parliament and established
new ones such as all freeborn men (not slaves) the right to vote, freedom
of worship, freedom from conscription (the military draft), indemnity
from prosecution, equality before the law and a commitment that the
content of the law itself must be fair.  These Levellers were also talented
with printing and so political printed propaganda was borne, and
freedom of the press became an issue.  Then when Charles tried to
restore some of the Royalists laws for his own benefit (gee, doesn’t
that sound like what we have here today???? Yeowie Kazowie!), Charles
was called on it and a copy of King John’s charter was read (could be
called read a riot act!).  Freedom of religion was also a major right during
this period where egalitarianism was used as the basis for creating all
people as equal regardless of religious belief.

The road to the freedom of speech in Britain was not without many
potholes and rocks in the way thrown there by the Royalist/Parliamentary
government, and in a 1606 judgment of seditious libel was considered
incitement to revolution and encouragement of acts of violence against
the authorities.  A politician was imprisoned for simply associating with
the Levellers.  However not too much later Charles lost his head.  William
and Mary’s monarchy saw the 1689 Bill of Rights which I think is to what
you are referring.  But, the right of free speech was complicated and the
issue of libel gained in legality.

Second part - Freedom of speech, assembly, etc.
Much later, about 75 years later, around 1763, 18th c., Blackstone
wrote “one should not expect absolute freedom to publish whatever
one wanted.”  Then in mid-19th c. some public spaces were provided
where speeches could be made but it was not the same in all locations
throughout Britain and some were considered “scaffold” politics.  But,
the unstoppable train towards freedom of speech was on its way. 
Democratic rights became a huge public issue in the late 19th c.
stemming from the late 18th c. Thomas Paine (1791) pamphlet Rights
of Man, but Paine was convicted in absentia of high treason!  The Libel
Act of 1792 was passed which took the power away from judges to
decide the legality of criminal libels and gave the privilege to the juries. 
So things were happening, but it was not without further bumps when
the Treasonable Practices and Seditious Meetings Acts became law. 
Caps of liberty worn by some citizens at public meetings signaled an
embryonic revolution was taking place.  More fomenting of discontent
resulted in Habeas Corpus, then the Bill of Rights and something called
the Act of Settlement.  A violent event left people killed and many more
injured and was forever called the Peterloo Massacre.  Later that same
year 1819 the Six Acts was enacted that constrained a complex set of
free speech preventions.  These curtailed training of persons to use
arms, the authorization of Justices of the Peace, legally seizing arms, 
speed up misdemeanor adjudication, prevention of seditious meetings
and assemblies (effectively revoked freedom of assembly), increased
punishment for blasphemy and seditious libels, and to subject taxing
stamps on newspapers.  This lasted until the People’s Charter around
the middle of 19th c. that effectively repealed most of these and
reated the condition for public free speech once again. 

Enters John Stuart Mill, and his treatise On Liberty who advocated respect
for diversity and society should recognize the rights of all to engage in
public debate, regardless of what was being argued.  Much more history
of tenuous legality of speech, assembly, and free press took place until
the 20th century when by about the 1960 when censorship law as being
challenged over such novels as Lady Chatterly and Wizard of Oz were
won by the court of public opinion and the legal courts lost. 

Nonetheless, quoting from law professor, Ronald J. Krotoszynski, Jr.’s
The First Amendment in Cross-cultural Perspective,, “while many
modern constitutions predate or reflect those principles, freedom of
expression was only given legal guarantee by the British government in
1998 through the Human Rights Acts (HRA) which codified provisions of
the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms
into British law. Of particular relevance is Article 10 of the Convention,
which states:

  “Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right
      shall include     freedom to hold opinions and to receive and
      impart information and ideas without interference by public
      authority and regardless of frontiers.”

The fact that Britain only codified freedom of expression in 1998
demonstrates that, in one important respect at least, “British domestic
law prior to the HRA substantially restricted the ability of the British
judiciary to consider free speech on the merits. In the vast majority of
cases arising before the HRA, any claim that an act of Parliament unduly
infringed legitimate speech rights was heard (if at all) by the European
Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France.”

Sher—- freedom of speech came to us from England and was firmly established
with the overthrow of the Stuarts a hundred years before our Bill of Rights

as well,  absolutist monarchy was more a Continental practice than an English
one.

A little truth goes a ;ong way and raises the hair on the back of the necks of ideologues in no time.

With Great Britain’s multimillennial absolutist monarchic tradition,
freedom of speech is relatively a new concept in the popular culture
where respect for it has not emerged fully formed yet from its
primeval egg unlike the freedom of speech that is almost genetically
a sacred right for Americans, which is as old as the 1st Amendment
to the US Constitution.  We assume it, where others yet do not.

The Occupy Movement, wherever it shows up in the world, gives a
coat of legitimacy to the characteristically peaceful protests because
of its affiliation with the antecedent organization in New York over
and above the usual spontaneous anarchic eruptions that typically
lead to violent acts provoking ire in the general public.  People
disaffected with their government or dire elements in their society
need to be inspired and encouraged to give support to the Occupy
type protest.

The current apparent “loss of favor,” is only a common but temporary
emotional reaction that happens naturally with new behaviors and
interactions due to habituation but the originating causes of the
Movement has not evaporated and will be revived with much renewed
energy.  It is beginning to be seen, only with experience it has learned
valuable sustaining lessons.  The people of the world are precocious and
quickly have found their footpath to democracy, direct or otherwise.

The fact is these demonstrations are losing favor everywhere.  Donations to ‘Occupy’ has all but dried up, the media is turning its collective attention toward the U.S. Presidential election and the American and British people are disgusted with the petulant violence and vandalism so clearly associated with these protests. - Children on every corner of the planet are rightfully excoriated for these behaviors.

People are a great deal smarter than some here believe.  99% see how only the most ardent Occupy advocates and supporters are angling for a “Revolution” nearly no one is seeking.

Fold up your tent.  Go home and take a bath.  Educate yourselves on what you can do for and within your communities.  Then get off your insufferable, petulant, and whining asses and vote like an adult.

Occupy everything from your local school board to the U.S. Congress.

If the occupiers met in public spaces in the daytime and left at night it would make it a lot harder for the powers that be to justify pushing them around and kicking them out.

gerard, having all those nukes puts the US i position to do a hell of a lot of
threatening….. I see no benefit at all to the world in adding Iran to the list and
greater prefer that the theocratic ghouls of Iran not linger long in power but get
sent back into their houses of worship to resume their clerical functions
unhindered by the need to execute Iranians for failing to heed their
pronouncements.

P.S. Just like the symbolism of Iran having nukes is threatening whereas the U.S. having thousands of them is not a threat but brings “security” to the entire world.  NOT!

For those who believe the symbolism, a feather tickling the end of one’s nose justifies calling out the Marines.

gerard——- you assume too much and possibly know a bit too little about
toleration for dissent in both London and NYC.

http://members.fortunecity.com/speakerscorner1/

Not to put too fine a point on it, I doubt that the main objection of the elites in government and business are as concerned about having spaces taken up as they are by the “getting together” that occupies spaces, plus, of course, the “unorothodox” nature of the crowd that does the getting together—particularly since the “occupiers” lack money for renting toilets and paying rent for the “space” to the city or the church.
  But if, on the other hand, the “occupiers” offered the city or the churches a huge sum of money in exchange for their occupancy, that would make everything hunky-dory, and portable toilets and showers would appear quickly and mysteriously, out of nowhere. No library books would be trashed and nobody would have to pedal a bicycle to keep the lights on. The police would be showing up regularly for snacks. Its the symbolism of the thing that is so annoying—even threatening, don’t cha see?

gerard—- you don’t “form a space” by taking someone
else’s if you have democratic designs.

“A space to speak. A space to be heard.” Wail Qasim, an 18-year-old politics student, agrees: “You can go to the ballot box every five years, but politicians don’t actually represent your view. So the importance of this kind of space is in the way it brings together people to open up a dialogue about building an alternative.” Blogger Steve Maclean, 31, is slightly more pragmatic: “We’re forming a space where people can come together and crystallise all of what we think. Out of this more concrete ideas can be formed.”(from a London Guardian report on Occupy London)
  You can judge how threatening the “power elites” find such “getting together” by how eager they are to dismiss the “getters together” and how quick they are to demean not only protesters, but the content of their protest. Naturally, the elites don’t like to have the State’s dirty underwear washed in public.

they were allowed their day in court and they lost. what will they do?

( and ARK: a nicely gratuitous attempt at linkage in the opening )

The time it took to bring about this “eviction” indicates a couple things:  1. London elites are at least still going through the motion of seeming to care about democratic procedures. And 2. St. Paul’s has been somewhat more understanding than Trinity in New York, though both showed a decent respect for the validity of the need to protest current economic injustices. 
  If only governments and churches would really come together and throw their weight into stopping the widespread pain and filling the most urgent needs of the 99%, there would be some hope of revitalizing real democracy. But continuing exploitation, support of war and incitement of fear and dread only increase distrust.

The petty scrutiny of anyone doing good is getting worn out. Where is this scrutiny when it comes to the tens/hundreds of thousands of people who die because of pollution, war, poverty…