Continued Message Woes for Wall Street Occupiers
As the protest at Wall Street enters day nine, working groups and task forces are still working on crafting the message intended for the media and the world.
One working group titled The Call to Action Working Group, made up of about 20 protestors, met on Monday evening where what appered to be a stalemate was reached. For almost ten minutes of discussion, there was a disagreement on the definition of the message “We are the 99%.” One person demanded the addition of an international perspective to the message, referring to the level of global poverty compared to the level of U.S. poverty.
One woman from the media committee removed herself from the process altogether, saying, “I’m sick of [it]. This group is too big.” She suggested the committee disband and form two-to-three person groups.
The discord continued today when a group of protesters gathered to draft a proposal on how to democratically craft the Occupation’s demands.
The consensus among the group was that the demands should be a “living document,” where as time goes on, demands can be added and removed from the document. One suggested method of achieving this was putting up posters where anyone can write demands. Another person suggested that everyone should break up into small groups and then send a representative to a larger group to present proposed demands.
Another member raised concerns about selling their working idea to the General Assembly: ”[We can't] hash this out in the whole giant group– because I’m not confident [...] talking in a group of 300 people. It’s not working for me, and I’ve been hearing it’s not working for a lot of people. We need to talk about what we need, within smaller groups, with a set time limit.”
In the end, a member of the facilitation committee, a group which seems to mediate between the other groups, broke in to say, “I’ve been involved in this process for three months. This idea of demands is making me sick.” he continued, “I’ll make one observation– I’ve worked in a group of fifteen. People are insane. Giving a process that’s clear with direction doesn’t work. You saw this on [the statement] Principles of Solidarity. It doesn’t work. This process sounds beautiful, but I guarantee you, it is not workable. I’m not making decisions on the group. What I suggest is this: the people that have made proposals, go on the side, you’re on the agenda [for the General Assembly]. I think you have great ideas, go talk about them.”
One member of the group estimated that the demands could feasibly be written by Friday.
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Why don’t they just use a wiki?