The Occupy Wall Street kids are not alright
GOODY TWO SHOES: A house divided against itself cannot stand, Abraham Lincoln warned in 1858. Lincoln was speaking of the existential threat to the Union of half the states promoting slavery and half the states trying to abolish it, but were he alive today he might be making a similar observation about the Occupy Wall Street movement.
The Occupiers are protesting the unfairness and immorality (if not criminality) inherent in the vast inequality of income between the 99% of workaday Americans who do not earn the eye-popping compensation of the 1% of those who work as investment bankers or corporate CEOs – and the outsized influence their wealth has on the political process. Fair enough. But in the nearly three months since the movement launched and spread to cities from coast to coast, the 99% has further splintered into those who work hard at protesting the 1% – gathering donations of money, food and clothing; cooking and serving meals; and banging on drums – and those who are living symbiotically off of them.
Completely oblivious to the irony, the Occupiers – whose standard of living is much higher than the street people who used to sleep in the parks that the protesters are now occupying – resent sharing the resources they worked hard to amass with vagrants and con men who feel entitled to the fruits of their labor.
The freak snowstorm this week-end caught the East Coast by surprise, but middle class Occupiers in Boston anticipated having to deal with wind chill factors and had asked homeless people to school them in street smarts. Kristopher Eric Martin, who works in Occupy Boston’s logistics and supplies tent told The Boston Herald that “These guys are experts at staying warm and staying dry [and] are used to living on the streets and sleeping with one eye open.”
The Occupiers – who are not so down and out that they can’t go to the ski department of the nearest REI and pick up a pair of silk long johns – learned the hobo trick of stuffing their clothes with hay and straw for extra warmth. But when the homeless wanted something in return for their expertise – like a hot meal, since they typically work for food – the Occupiers suddenly decided that they were freeloaders: “They come in here and they’re looking at it as a way of getting a free meal and a place to crash, which is totally fine, but they don’t bring anything to the table at all.”
It was pretty much the same story at other urban parks that had been taken over by the Occupiers, The Associated Press reports:
[P]rotesters from Portland to Los Angeles to Atlanta are trying to distinguish between homeless people who are joining their movement and those who are there for the amenities. When night falls in Portland, for instance, protesters have been dealing with fights, drunken arguments and the display of the occasional knife.
In NY’s Zuccotti Park, where the homeless poured out of shelters to partake of the gourmet grub dished up by professional chefs, the Occupy Wall Street volunteer kitchen staff got ticked off “about working 18-hour days to provide food for “professional homeless” people and ex-cons masquerading as protesters,” New York Post reports: “We need to limit the amount of food we’re putting out” to curb the influx of derelicts, said Rafael Moreno, a kitchen volunteer. … Many of those being fed “are professional homeless people. They know what they’re doing,” said the guard at the food-storage area. [During a three-day strike by the cooks] a limited menu of sandwiches, chips and some hot food will be doled out -- so legitimate protesters will have a day to make arrangements for more upscale weekend meals [emphasis, The Stiletto.] Even more galling, the bottom 1% of the 99% (that is, the freeloaders) have also taken to “liberating” money and goods from the Occupiers, NY Post reports: Crafty cat burglars sneaked into the makeshift kitchen at Zuccotti Park overnight and swiped as much as $2,500 in donated greenbacks from right under the noses of volunteers who’d fallen asleep after a long day whipping up meals for the hundreds of hungry protesters, the volunteers said. “The worst thing is there’s people sleeping in the kitchen when they come, and they don’t even know about it! There are some really smart and sneaky thieves here,” Terrie said. Predictably, “the skein of civility has been frequently shattered as bullies, the mentally ill, drunks, thugs and anarchists have threatened the safety and well-being of the camp's more peaceful residents,” as the Oakland Tribune put it. Most encampments handled violent crime, like sexual assault, internally. Occupiers in NY and Baltimore, for instance, decided against reporting the crimes to the police and instructed victims to report incidents to the Security Committee “which will investigate and "supply the abuser with counseling resources.” But in Oakland, the Security Committee “counseled” a man who was threatening a woman by smacking him upside the head with a chunk of wood, prompting one police officer to liken the incident to a scene from “Lord of the Flies.” Though the Occupiers at Zuccotti Park continue to shun the police when it comes to personal safety, after the theft of the kitchen money organizers decided to protect the $500,000 in donations that has been amassed by keeping it in the bank, where it is being used to fuel the engine of capitalism. However, the Occupiers are committed statists; all the money raised by everybody goes to the Finance Committee. Bryan Smith, a member of the Comfort Working Group, which “is charged with finding out what basic necessities campers need, like thermal underwear, and then raising money by soliciting donations on the street” tells the New York Post that the central planners on the Finance Committee gives his group only $150 a day, as compared to the Kitchen group, which gets more than 10 times that amount: “What can I do with $150?” said Smith. “We have three tons of wet laundry here from the rainstorm – how do I get that done? We need winter gear, shoes, socks. I could spend $10,000 alone for backpacks people need. We raise all this money. Where is it?” So Smith is rebelling in the only way that people who resent the government taking too much of their earnings can – he hides some of the money he makes from the Finance Group: “The other day, I took in $2,000. I kept $650 for my group, and gave the rest to Finance.” While discussing how the events at Zuccotti Park and elsewhere have unfolded, The Stiletto’s friend Pam, reminded her of this old joke: A Communist explained communism to a peasant by telling him: “If you have no land, and someone else has two acres, each of you gets one acre.” The peasant liked this idea. The Communist continued: “And if you have no sheep and someone else has two, each of you gets one sheep.” The peasant liked this idea even more. The Communist continued: “And if you have no coat and someone has two, each of you gets one coat.” The peasant was appalled: “That’s awful! I want no part of this!” Dumbfounded, the Communist asked, “Why not?” The peasant answered, “I have two coats.”
The Occupy movement is as much a social experiment as a socioeconomic protest. A police supervisor in Oakland observed, the Occupiers have created “a far more oppressive society than our own.” Many Occupiers will eventually go home having learned nothing. Others – particularly those who have been mugged by reality – will understand why allowing any government to redistribute earnings from successful, hard-working members of society to those who are nonproductive or irresponsible goes against human nature – and is, therefore, intrinsically unsustainable.
It may be too much to hope that the Occupy movement will unintentionally spawn neo-cons, but some participants will gain a greater understanding of and appreciation for capitalism – as well as a new-found respect for the rule of law and those who defend it.
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