Thirteen Observations made by Lemony Snicket while watching Occupy Wall Street from a Discreet Distance
1. If you work hard, and become successful, it does not necessarily mean you are successful because you worked hard, just as if you are tall with long hair it doesn’t mean you would be a midget if you were bald.
5. There may not be a reason to share your cake. It is, after all, yours. You probably baked it yourself, in an oven of your own construction with ingredients you harvested yourself. It may be possible to keep your entire cake while explaining to any nearby hungry people just how reasonable you are.
6. Nobody wants to fall into a safety net, because it means the structure in which they’ve been living is in a state of collapse and they have no choice but to tumble downwards. However, it beats the alternative.
1. Complexity / chaos. Just like an iPad would seem like magic to a caveman, so OWS might seem all crazy-scary if you’re not down with consensus-based decisionmaking, or sleeping outside, or drum circles, or whatever. People wearing masks at a protest, yipes! Human microphones! Lengthy decisionmaking without coercion or anger! So it’s new, complex, unprocessed, a bit raw, nothing wrong with that, even if you don’t like it.
3. In a month, we’ve done a few things.
Like: seized, held, and shaped the national and international discourse. Held territory, and turned it into liveable space. Made the NYPD back down twice (and made ourselves stronger in the process). Made converts across the globe. Inspired hundreds of similar protests. Had a blast. Made music. Made love. Just made. Indeed, y’all trolls might be asking what our playbook is, and what you might learn from it.
Some great photos of participants, too. I saw a great sign elsewhere that read, “The beginning is near” — as in “the end is near,” but… yeah. I want to be making it along with them. Why am I not?
