2011 has been a tough year. Times are bad and may be looking worse in the year ahead. The in-thing is to blame the filthy rich bankers and industrialists who have been profiting from innocent workers, won a taxpayers' bailout and not sharing their ill-gotten wealth. While Australia is not shielded from the negative effects reeling from the global financial crisis, the economy has slowed down and jobs are becoming scarcer. Will OCCUPY get us far? Only if rich capitalists are moved to create more jobs instead of splurging on affluence and luxuries for themselves.
In early September, members of the media were barely paying attention to the vague, lefty Hooverville-campout thingy called Occupy Wall Street.
By early October, its protesters had coalesced around a theme: "We Are the 99%" (who disapprove of greed, corruption and the disproportional power held by the richest 1%).
And the movement spread from Manhattan: seemingly overnight, there were Occupy Boston, Occupy Los Angeles and Occupy Chicago. And then Occupy London and Occupy Hong Kong.
People were even "occupying" Antarctica, and late-night talk-show hosts cashed in on occupy jokes. ("Earlier this week, a protester at Occupy Wall Street proposed to his girlfriend," Conan O'Brien said. "His exact words were, 'Will you occupy my parents' basement with me until I get a job?' ")
That sort of nationally broadcast mockery was a sign of just how big the movement had gotten. In 2011, occupy became this generation's sit-in, a word connoting peaceful but uncompromising objections to the status quo.
http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2101344_2100571_2100572,00.html #ixzz1h7QX2l00
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