Faces Of The Occupation - Chicago Edition

Oct 11th, 2011
If you want to support the movement, there are options HERE and HERE just for starters... or, you can get you asses into the streets. 

At first, I was admittedly confused at what Occupy was all about. Then, I became angered and concerned at the sight of my fellow Americans in jeopardy from authoritarian tactics and even police violence. The movement quickly went from being ignored to being ridiculed. Now, it is being viciously attacked by the right (examples HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE).

I finally had to put my weight behind it. There was no other choice, in my estimation.

Matt Stoller helped me explain this when he wrote brilliantly a little over a week ago:

"What these people are doing is building, for lack of a better word, a church of dissent. It’s not a march, though marches are spinning off of the campground. It’s not even a protest, really. It is a group of people, gathered together, to create a public space seeking meaning in their culture. They are asserting, together, to each other and to themselves, 'we matter'."

Today, I had the chance to see this first hand...

This is America.

People aren't waiting to talk... they are listening. There is a big difference.

A policeman and an occupier debate the movement.

Not a dope smoking, drum circling hippie.

A "Libertarian" and a "Socialist" discuss the difficulties that lie ahead in figuring out how to work together.

More polite debate. More Americans who might never have ever spoken to one another before addressing our problems and looking for solutions. Together.

If you don't think we are all in this mess together. We are. Here's more proof.

The crisis is "too big" for any smarming, establishment propagandists to stop the response.

Get out there.

Get involved.

Do something.