Call to Sustain – Futurecasting the Occupy Movement

We have been doing a lot of live tweeting and a bit of streaming over the past few days. We were live at the Oakland occupation of 19th and Telegraph, and the raid of 101 market street in San Francisco. We went to UC Davis yesterday, and we were live at the 18th and Linden occupy Oakland camp last night.

In all of the flurry of spaces, places, faces and voices, I found myself more and more at peace with the growing limbs of the movement. I have witnessed the spread of strategies from site to site. We have established a network of solidarity that spans the globe From Wall Street, to Tahrir. I am convinced that despite presentations of mainstream media, the impact of the Occupy Movement, and our message will be heard. But, our success has a direct relationship with the duration of our tactical operations. Despite the variety of our tactics, they are united by one strategy, and that is placing our bodies in a space that draws attention to our plight.

If this strategy is to work, because of its lack of hierarchy, its decentered multiplicity, it will be through a relationship with the physicality, the visceral nature of occupation. As the weather grows colder, if the numbers sustain through the deathblow of winter, a new cycle-the spring of 2012-will cultivate the Occupy Movement like a virus in an incubator. Only if the strongest among us are able to sustain the icy chill, and continue to occupy the harshest that space has to offer, then the rest of us will come with the warm weather.

If we sustain and fortify, I am sure that by next summer Occupy camps around the country would become sites of mass visitation. Rather than giving their money to the travel industry, the 99% could pilgrimage to Occupied Wall Street. I am picturing a Summer of Occupy, vis-a-vis the 1967 Summer of Love.

Sustain Comrades, the world is watching.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>