The Disconnect

There was something implied in the occupation of Zuccotti Park.  Picketing, protesting, marching - you do that until your demands are met.  I've been reading about consensus-building, and while it's fascinating and a promising model for organizing, I'm having a hard time getting on board.  If the process is the purpose, then I don't know if anyone will get more than participation ribbons within the next five years.  The most cynical thought I have had about consensus-building is that it's the terrifying result of Special Snowflake-ism.  Occupy is anti-hierarchical, which I'll admit is sort of hard for me to wrap my head around.  Anti-hierarchy seems in this instance to be anti-power, and therefore anti-empowerment.  I held out a little hope after reading this interview with Marina Sitrin on historical use of consensus-building, only to have it totally dashed by Ted Rall later on.

 

    There are precedents of consensus-building working out beautifully.  But I don't think that will happen at Zucotti Park.  It's the very last thing I want to say "I told you so" about.  I'd love to be proven wrong. I've spent hours this week trying to convince myself that I am.  

 

    OWS has indeed empowered people to make their pain known.  I'll say unequivocally that is an accomplishment.  If I may be flip, America has been in need of a pity party.  (Tongue in cheek!  You can have a pity party about an actual problem.)  But it doesn't appear that this is all OWS has set out to do; there are still people camping out on Wall Street.

 

    I read an article by Ted Rall today about how consensus-building is basically useless at making things happen, but super-fun and important anyway I guess.  I read this in the latest Boise Weekly, which is running a series on empowering people with intellectual and cognitive disabilities to vote.  Amusingly, Rall's article (wherein he made a snide remark about having to listen to the mentally-handicapped during the occupation) was on the opposite page of the first installment of the series.  

Comments

[Joe S]

If I had to define OWS and its significance, I would say its voice is more totemic or prophetic than an actual social movement (at the moment). Prophets don't necessarily effectuate change directly. They point out injustice infusing the society (or in the Bible, lack of fealty to God's moral order). It's up to others (especially leaders in society) to change their ways and change society. Indeed, one prophet, Jonah, was actually eventually rebuked when the people of Nineveh turned from wicked behavior. In this case, we're hopefully seeing organized labor resuscitated, working class people realigned with the culturally liberal and racial minorities over changing the system. Even if OWS are a bunch of hippies and anarchists, they're turning direction to something that's important (inequality, the submerged state,a system which funnels wealth and prosperity to a few). To me, that's the imporant aspect of the movement-- and just by being in public spaces and being annoying, they're doing that.

FYI, did anybody notice that Lisa Simeone (former Cogblog blogger) got fired from her NPR show for supporting OWS. Considering how many shills they have on Fox News, that really is galling from NPR.

[Sir Charles]

Sara,

Welcome back!

Like Joe I think that there are valuable elements to the OWS movement. I think that it could prove to be a very useful antitode to the reflexively pro-business attitude that has permeated our culture for much of the last thirty years. I also concur in its prophetic and tomtemic value -- both for its opportunity to let people express solidarity and its potential for shifting the Overton Window.

I share your skepticism about consensus drive movements -- it is not a new phenomenon. Much of this same sort of thing happened with SDS in the Sixties. The end result was that disciplined groups like the Progressive Labor Party (not benign like the name sounds) and the elements who went on to form the Weather Underground ultimately usurped power within the movement. You cannot have a movement without power and politics without power is a vanity exercise.

Joe,

NPR is so running scared these days -- it's pathetic. I heard their new president giving a very Broderesque interview the other day. So I am not surprised to see that Lisa ran afoul of them.

On the other hand, as I can attest, she wasn't always the soul of reasonableness.

Still I don't like to see this happen.

[low-tech cyclist]

Hi Sara, good to see you!

My basic take is that there really IS a national conversation of sorts in the media, and (aside from the ability of moneyed elites to get stuff through Congress without anybody really noticing) what's in that conversation determines the range of possibilities in terms of political action.

So moving the conversation is a necessary first step. No, it's not clear what happens next, but who thought they'd succeed with Step 1?

And even if this goes nowhere from here, at least they fucking tried. Yeah, they're amateurs, they didn't know what they were doing, they didn't have a focused agenda, yada yada yada. But they got out there and tried to move the ball forward a little bit. I'm not going to tell them they were wrong to do so.

[kathy a.]

ltc, i've also been thinking that this is one of the many ways we can have conversations about what's important. top-down campaigns and pundits aren't really open to all; ads are ads; but water-coolers, blogs, chat with the neighbors, and outpourings like these demonstrations are all closer to how people ideally and actually thrash ideas through, and how collective reasoning happens. it's messy. no immediate or direct results. but one of our problems just now is around income inequality, the increasingly small impact of the individual, the lack of jobs -- there is a lot of frustration that nothing much is moving on the political front to alleviate these concerns.

[Davis X. Machina]

The ghost of “Soyez réalistes, demandez l'impossible! stalks this enterprise. My fear is that is going to be a replay of May, 1968 -- Les Événements de Octobre. It will be remembered for generations by those who took part, it will produce great cinema, memorable literature, fine art -- and accomplish little durable. The post-1968 legacy of the European left is very equivocal.

[Joe S]

Davis, 1968 (and the time after) was not a time when the social democratic state was being established in Europe. And certainly, on civil rights, feminism, gay rights, and other areas of oppression, there have been great strides post 1968 in the U.S. and Europe. I think the upheavals in the U.S. and Europe changed society significantly for the better (although, admittedly, not into a socialist society).

[Sir Charles]

Joe,

Arguably the upheavals of 1968 in the United Sttes helped paved the way for an era of extreme economic reaction -- as a strange indirect outcome of the culture wars.

Individual liberties have improved nonetheless. But the eoonomic power of middle and working class Americans has markedly disminished.

[nancy]

Here's a more optimistic take on OWS and one I'm inclined with which to agree. From TNR. (It's a one-pager, so their new obnoxious ads plan shouldn't drive you too much to distraction.) I agree with Joe -- might be step 1, but it's getting lots of buy-in for a reason. When people in Spokane hit the streets (a rarity) and stay there, something is striking a chord. There's a small town 20 miles away, year-round population probably 8000, that has something planned -- Occupy Cheney!

[Paula B]

This may help spur some action:

Fifty percent of U.S. workers earned less than $26,364 last year, reflecting a growing income gap between the nation's rich and poor, the government reported Thursday.

There were fewer jobs, and overall pay was trending down — except for the nation's wealthiest.
http://bit.ly/n0HSOB

[Paula B]

And then, of course, there's this:
Senate blocks money for teachers, firefighters
http://wapo.st/pdMjsY

[Davis X. Machina]

How does this help? How is this different from May '68?

[big bad wolf]

DXM, uh oh, occupy museums seems risky. next there will be just folks singing opera to the masses.

the ad at the end of that post, on the other hand, is nicely done, i think.

[Paula B]

You talking to me, DXM? If so, I'm not sure what you're referring to but, in any case, two things come to mind: 1/there's no reason to assume history always repeats itself, and 2/most of the people involved in OWS were born after 1968, so your reference might not mean much to them. What really counts is what's happening today.

The numbers in the income story add fuel to the fire, and the fact that all Repubs and some Dems blocked funding for public service underscores the political disconnect prompting protests.

[Sara Anderson]

Now that I re-read this, I see my tone was more negative than necessary, but I'm having a bit of an emotional reaction to the people who insist you must be totally dumb (and corrupt) to think they're going to try and do anything that might fail. I am indeed very impressed by how they got people to take their own pain seriously. Everyone's just been trying to walk it off. Americans are resilient people, but we're not made of stone.

[janinsanfran]

Taking a look around my local Occupy, I was immediately reminded of Peoples Park (Berkeley 1969) and the early days of the AIDS vigil at the SF Federal Building in 1985. The process focus and consensus building remind me of anti-nuke mobilizations in the 1980s.

(BTW, somewhere there is an article by Barbara Deming about how consensus actually works pretty well in crisis -- the police are coming with nightsticks... -- but poorly when there is infinite time to talk. I learned something from that, not being much inclined to long talkathons.)

I think we are seeing the first truly new generation of protest no longer much influenced by the 60s come on the scene here. They are living the hell of having played by the rules, taken college loans, and gotten neither a broad education nor decent jobs. They've enjoyed the personal and identity victories of the 60s and know no history of those struggles. And they confront a different environment.

These folks have got the fact that 99 percent are being screwed into the public discourse and that's great. If they do no more concretely, that may be enough. More organized players who deal in creating people power rather than just diffusing unjust power will come along. Those of us who see that need to help, respectfully. Occupy has got us out of a deep hole.

[nancy]

Paula -- do check the end of the 'globalize this and open thread' for your daily dose of Eric. wouldn't want you to miss out. :)

[Paula B]

Nancy---Thanks for the link. My mind reels -- the man is shameless. Overdog, indeed. Feh!