Occupy Wall Street never had a chance of creating change.  The concept sprung from the mind of Kalle Lasn, publisher of overpriced Adbusters Magazine from Vancouver, British Columbia.  Many Canadians know Lasn as the anti-American Pied Piper of unemployed and collegiate whiners.  His 20+ years of publishing Adbusters has created not one social or political change in Canada.  Lasn’s whole attitude is “if you aren’t with ME you are part of the problem” and people see right through that.  It’s his attitude that makes 99% or more of Canadians ignore his constant anti-corporate and anti-American message, even though he’s right about some of what he says.  But with his bent to alienate those he disagrees with, it’s no wonder that his Occupy brainchild would fail.

From the very beginning, OWS made a choice of not having leadership or goals, which made the “movement” nebulous and ill-conceived.  Their plan seemed to be to annoy people in as many areas as they could convince rabble to annoy, and somehow this annoying behavior would “raise awareness” of problems that everyone already knew existed.  Somehow, they figured, if they produced enough passive resistance pockets, banks and governments would change their rules – even though OWS wouldn’t state exactly what rules or behaviors they wanted changed.

The lack of stated goals kept OWS, well…, off-goal.   They had a gripe du jour, starting with bankers and Wall Street brokers, then the income disparity that the so-called 1% created by manipulating markets.  Then it was a war against fascist storm-trooper police in various cities.  They struggled to prove their right to trespass on public property or public spaces, erect tents, take up residence and bang drums mercilessly for hours on end. More recently they rallied against big box stores by trying to disrupt the holiday shopping of just plain folks.

In fact, the only consistent message that OWS gave was, “We don’t care how much we inconvenience people, because we represent the 99% whether they want us to or not. We’re patriots akin to the Boston Tea Party participants or the 60′s civil rights movers and shakers” But the more they pushed their message of annoyance, the more it became clear that very few people were actually represented by OWS.  How can a movement represent people whose interests they are harming?  And just because someone claims to represent me, does that mean they do?  I found that the NYPD represented my thoughts and feelings better than OWS.

What will most people remember about OWS?  Snarled traffic, trespassing, vandalism, drug use, public sex, filthy conditions in public parks and violence against police.  These were the Occupy Wall Street tactics of change.  Not trying to get state legislatures to change or create laws, not getting people out to vote, not encouraging the unemployed to get an education or increase their job skills – all activities that would provide real solutions. Instead they banged drums, blocked streets and bridges, and drove people away from local businesses, costing hundreds of regular folks their jobs.  They trespassed on and defaced private property, creating hostility and filth, thinking this somehow was going to get people to listen to their “message”.

Of course, not having goals means they can say they haven’t really failed.  They “raised public awareness” which, of course, is a non-goal. The public knew banks were evil and Wall Street screwed everyone and got away with it.  The public already knew there were hugely wealthy individuals who lived in ivory towers.  OWS tried to blame those wealthy individuals for the problems that OWS protesters themselves were experiencing in life. And if you had the ability to go live in a public park for two months and beg for food, you clearly had problems in your life.  People see through that kind of thing.

Now the public is catching on that OWS harms only the 99% while leaving the 1% unscathed.  They created a great deal of overtime pay for cops, but cost businesses and cities millions of dollars.  They kept people from getting to their jobs with their meaningless marches. They turned into a mindless rabble when their “Day of Action” turned into a day of violence against cops.  Because of all this, only the most extreme left-wing politicians will be associated with them publicly.  They have lost any meaningful mainstream support they managed to muster.

They have done nothing to effect change.  They have worn out their welcome.  People are just tired of hearing about them, and by New Year’s OWS will be a clip on “Remembering 2011″ newsreels. By summer they will be as forgotten, not having helped one person, not having made one change, not having influenced one governmental or corporate decision. Remember SARS?  Remember Swine Flu?   Remember OWS?  All three were supposed to make major impacts.  None have.

I really wish I was wrong about this, because I hate what banks and corporations have done to our economy.  But I always knew that taking up residence in a public park, banging pots together and begging passers-by to buy pizza for me, was not going to solve the problem.  Maybe there needs to be a movement, but it must have clear leadership and thoughtful, well-planned goals.  It can’t be some amoebic group of ne’er-do-wells protesting something they don’t really understand.

This is all just my opinion – I could be wrong.  Click here to leave a reply if you want to set me straight.

Thanks for reading,

Dave

Copyright ©2011 David Scott Lynch.  All Rights Reserved.