#NerdsUnite: An Observation on #OccupyOakland

<editorsnote> For weeks now people have been posting on my wall, and tweeting to me that I should cover something on Occupy Wall Street. I, personally, will never ever ever ever evvveeerrrrrrrr talk about politics. It's not my passion, man - I'm an effin hippie! BUUUUTTT I'd adore it if someone DID come on board to cover it!! Insert Monica. I met her in San Fran on one of my many adventures, and Occupy Wall Street is her passion - so now she's here to talk about it! YAYYY FINALLY!!!  </editorsnote>

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @stinkerbell

I never went to the original location of the occupy encampment. The day I visited, a new camp was being erected at 18th and Linden Street. It was a grassy vacant lot. According to organizers, the property owner was in foreclosure so this location was perfect. Situated right at the corner, it was highly visible to cross traffic evident by the honking as cars drove by.  

I arrived in the early afternoon, just around lunchtime. The occupiers were moving in, getting settled, and a few news vans were already at the site. The only way into the property was through a hole cut into the side of the fence. As I climbed up to the grassy area, this looked nothing like what I had heard about on the news.

I interviewed one young guy who was there to protest the rising cost of his education and to stand up for the widening gap of financial status of most Americans. Another man showed up passing out flyers. He said that he was there to support all of the causes Occupy now seems to represent. According to him, it was okay that Occupy doesn’t have single, unified message. To him, the Occupy movement represents people standing up for what they believe in and to protest against the injustices that are taking place in America today.

As I stood on the periphery of a group meeting, I was happy to see that they were putting specific plans in place for the next phase of Occupy Oakland. They specifically said that this encampment was there to speak out about the amount of foreclosures that were currently taking place in the neighborhood. They were also very specific about making sure no drugs, alcohol, and trash were found at their site. They had no desire to upset the neighbors.  

After the meeting convened I looked around again. I saw a covered area with a cardboard sign that read “kitchen”. I overheard someone say that all of the food was donated by people in the neighborhood. At another glance there was a heap of donated clothing sitting in a pile. Also donated to the group. Another huddle of people were talking about what message they were going to paint on the blank canvas that lay on the ground.

People smiled as they walked past me. Still, something felt strange to me. It seemed like half of the group were just like “regular” people. Then there were others that were young. The kind of kids you see hanging out on the Haight in San Francisco, playing guitars, smoking cigarettes, a little on the scruffy side and smelling of b.o. and patchouli. I had to wonder, how many of these people here were actually homeless? I was too afraid to ask.

Of the small group of people that were there, quite a few declined to be interviewed. At one point during the day they refused access to the news reporters and their cameramen. Why? To me it seemed strange that they wouldn’t leap at the opportunity to get their message broadcast on the evening news. Although the chances of their actual message being edited were quite high, it still didn’t make sense why they wouldn’t communicate.

From my interviews, I have a better understanding of what it means to be a citizen. One aspect of citizenry is to stand up for what you believe in. Another aspect is to fight for social injustices against the Government. Being a citizen means being a participant. Although most Americans have been passive for many years, to be a citizen of today is no longer a passive act.

Where does it go from here? I think this is a question many are asking.  From my perspective this is I what I see: without the Occupy movement having a single, unified message it becomes impossible to hear what it is everyone is shouting about. How can I, as a citizen of my community, participate when I’m fighting a cause that closely resembles a hydra? Michael Moore and the New York OWS recently came up with a vision statement. Moore goes a step further and proposes a specific list of goals and demands. I think to keep the momentum moving in a positive direction, Occupy needs some sort of structure.

My next stop is San Francisco. I’m curious to see what the city by the Bay has in store for me. Stay tuned.

#Occupied,
Monica

To see images from my visit there, please go here.

#occupynerdsunite

click here to follow Monica on the twitter

#NerdsUnite: Suzie Signmaker & #OWS

<editorsnote> So, now apparently we have opened the door wide with the Occupy movement. See! I told ya'll that I personally wouldn't talk about it, but apparently a WHOOLLLLEEE lot of you have a lot to say about it - like my GirlsIRL partner Jenn Hoffman. Here's her take. HIT IT JENN!  </editorsnote>

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's @JennHoffman

“Get a job, you hippie.”

If this is your reaction to Occupy Wall Street, you aren’t thinking critically.

I have a lot to say about OWS, but first let’s address this ridiculous “sign” made by a typical Suzie Signmaker (pictured above).

Simply put, this girl is an idiot. She’s an idiot because she assumes the people at OWS are all jobless. She’s an idiot because she assumes all the OWS supporters come from one mindset or one particular point of view. She’s an idiot because she assumes all the protesters majored in “Bitter Women’s Studies” rather than “Biology”, when statistically students who major in the “ologies” are unemployed, underemployed  or in as much student debt as those who majored in a specifically directed liberal arts areas such as gender studies. She’s an idiot because she thinks that if you care about the socio-economic advancement of Americans you must be a lazy communist left-wing wacko. She’s also an idiot because her mother was probably also a useless idiot who taught her that women should not have careers, or they will become hateful dykes who major in things like “bitter women’s studies.”

But mostly, she is an idiot because she doesn’t understand that her parents raised her in a time when the average family COULD afford to have her mother leave work to “raise her properly.”

This time no longer exists.

This time no longer exists because the middle class she so was so lucky to be part of in the 80s or 90s is slowly being eradicated by the gaping hole in between the have’s and have-not’s. People like the hard working father she describes would have to SURVIVE rather than THRIVE in America today. Suzie is blinded by her own blissful experience, so Suzie can’t see that.

The men and women of Occupy Wall Street are protesting because good, decent, hard working people can’t even afford the modest lifestyle she was so fortunate to have. She doesn’t realize that engineers have been laid off at exponential rates since the 90s, so maybe her father was a hard worker – or maybe he was just lucky. She doesn’t realize that when she was growing up, greedy home lenders weren’t giving out dirty mortgage loans with balloon payments, leaving many people just like her parents unable to keep up with rising cost of even their “modest” homes. She doesn’t realize that if many of these people did get a job at McDonald’s they would still be unable to pay their basic bills, afford any form of Healthcare or make enough money to get out of the insurmountable amount of debt you  incur just to attend college, visit a hospital or put food on the table.

Funny enough, me and this girl Suzie are not very different:

MY dad was also successful computer engineer and MY mom quit her career to “raise” me right too. We also lived within our means and were not in any credit card debt or danger of losing our home when growing up. I majored in Communication and Sociology in college and I have an MBA (majors that are apparently acceptable to her) and I was employed straight out of college.

But unlike her:

I AM the 99% and I know it. She is part of the 99% too, but she is too simple to understand that the other 1% depends on her ignorance and complacency in order to keep her right where she is: Blind and going nowhere.

So Suzie, keep making your silly signs and sticking your empty head deeper and deeper into the sand. In the meantime the rest of us more evolved people will be busy trying to organize all the bitter women, hippies and communist whackos so you can afford to remain stupid, useless and dull.

#nerdsunite

click here to follow Jenn on twitter

www.jennhoffman.com