[Public_Domain]

Oh hi there.

I wrote this on June 18th... It's a little long-winded and definitely not from a standpoint any of you will agree with, but I'm going to share it with you anyhow. It is about my experience with my local Occupy organization. It could have been longer, much longer, if I actually made any attempt to record my experience there, instead of madly typing this up on the night of June 17th for no reason at all. It's 4409 words long and very unprofessional. The title is meant to sound vaguely in defence of Occupy; the movement is peaceful, ie. "harmless"; and misunderstood, ie. "confused". Both are true, of course. But the title is directed at the movement itself; it is ineffective and delusional.

$1:

The Occupy Movement is Harmless and Confused
PUBLIC DOMAIN
An adventure into a mundane campaign for social justice in the Decadent West

From day one, I figured checking out the Occupy movement was better than not, when I already have attended less popular protests in the region. I e-mailed the local communists and asked if they would be in attendance, they gave back a "sure". Cool. They are the only other group I make my presence known with. They operate mainly under a different protest name but commonly hand out copies of People's Voice, the official Communist Party of Canada newspaper. I've been in the paper, but I've never gotten a copy. I may at some point, it's available online.

I decided that this movement was close enough to being radical for me to make a peaceful accepted presence at. Locally, and through much of Canada, there was a planned specific day for worldwide protests. October 15th, the day of Action or some shit. I had only been in the province for about two weeks when this rolled around, and was completely losing my mind over a just recently closed chapter in my life. Listening to all the excited national press I noticed several red flags and communists choosing to arrive. Radicals online talking and arguing about appearances and actions to take at the protests. People already were denouncing the thing as bourgeois liberal democratic hogwash. But no one knew how it would turn out. Various levels of support all over, regardless it was taken up by many radicals to be a platform for these ideas.

First day was in the first few weeks of autumn. Chilly air, the warmest day was obviously the first day. I had painted a large sign on the back of some wood panelling, nailed to a 1.5x1.5in chunk of wood. I had taped letters on and painted over them in black, before removing the tape to reveal a negative "Marx said there would be days like this" image. I painted all the words except 'Marx' in with white paint, adding to the contrast and making it look like I actually did something interesting. Heavy fucking sign, dug right into my shoulder.

The first day there was marred mostly by awkward silence. Several people showed up, well over 100. These masses filled the waterfront park. Cars honked like mad. Our event also coincided with the random Zombie Walk; several members of which carried signs or joined our event. The event was noticeably quiet, and Radio Free Canada's main orchestration of the event had made an audience out of the crowd, rather than a thriving mix of communication. The group had been in planning stages mainly over Facebook, of which I feigned a presence in from the beginning. Petty issues havoked the group on day one, after an elderly organizer disagreed with local metal and punk bands playing music during intermission at the event, claiming it was a loud and disruptive self-promotive performance that would scare off older attendees. Regardless it went ahead. She would later claim to have seen people leaving, but I didn't notice shit. Evidently she would continue causing issues, demanding her affinity group's name be represented and such.

The media showed up, and poured over people. They came to me, and after capturing an iconoclastic photo asked me a few questions for the local free newspaper, oddly named "Capital". Browsing online I found some discussion of the news on a conspiracy site, where someone suggested that I was a 'plant' (agent provocateur?) for Conrad Black's media machine. I was perplexed by the idea. Also there was the general "what a hippie yuts' nonsense. I didn't seek the media out, I just answered their clear questions with hopefully clear answers. I explained that I am an anti-capitalist and that "I'm against seeing brands and logos everywhere. I'm against private property in its entirety."

The (polite) media mongols came and left early in the day, perhaps an hour or so after it began. When it began may have been 9 AM or so, it's hard to recall almost 3 quarters from the start. The quiet day proceeded and a few democratic decisions were made. Namely, the plan for future meetings was chosen from a basic list of: Complete occupation, visit everyday, or visit every Saturday. Ultimately every Saturday won the vote, and that is what would continue to happen regularly.

The Communist Party did as they said and showed up, and handed out dozens of copies of their paper, including to me. I chatted with the former representative for the riding, who simply called himself a "militant communist". While I have made no effort to join their party and was terrible with communicating with them, they respected me completely for even talking with them as a local radical. The local active group are all 60's Vietnam hippies, aged communist representatives, decades-long members. I have my own issues with the group, mainly of the idea of being anti-hierarchy in a hierarchical organization, who maintains a national leader from the Soviet age. On basic ideological terms, while a revolutionary leftist, I am an anarcho-communist while this party and my comrades support Marxist-Leninism, though they really don't discuss material dialectics with me or ever argue with what I've had to say. They made no efforts to convert me, I suppose surprised that I'm revolutionary at all and not willing to rock the boat. Their respect of me has my respect of them, so I consider myself a fellow traveller. We discussed to each other briefly about animosity towards the optimistic vague social democratic theme of the whole event. There also seemed to be a concerted effort to "soften" our argument as not being "anti-capitalist" in some individuals' efforts to portray that as being "pro-democratic". I made an effort to make sure anti-capitalism remained a key point, and a few vocal members helped make sure that became a key detail of this local subdivision of this movement.

Surveying the crowd showed a total lack of a student presence, with about five or so people 20 years old and under there. I would later talk to a few there on later dates. The first day though was mostly just awkward silence. A lot of random folks took pictures of me and/or my sign. Whatever I guess. The more people who see the message, the better.

I left at about 6PM, when there was a consensus to end the event. It was getting cold and most people who arrived hadn't fully anticipated it. I had not eaten breakfast, so I was quite interested in returning home. They served food at the event, but I was quite hesitant on taking from the pooled resources. And so were other people apparently, likely causing some food to end up wasted. Apples were delicious, and so were the sandwiches, but I was interested in returning home anyhow. The day had been pleasant.

The next week about half of the group reconvened at the park as democratically decided on Saturday, October 22nd. Continued conversation on the local Occupy group page on Facebook led me into contact with a user who would confront me at the event on the 22nd. A quiet and peaceful intellectual social pariah, I immediately had respect for her. She told me she wanted to speak with me the first day, but had not. We ended up hanging out together the entire day, long after the event itself. We walked around, discussed similar interests, and found we were very compatible. Lots of similar knowledge. I would later find out about her pride in being in asexuality, as well as her passion for Doctor Who and Hetalia. It also turned out that she wished to be a he, and ever since finding that out I've refused to title him as a she other than when describing events before the point when I discovered his gender identity. He let me know about his fears to explain this to his family, who he has to act "girly" in front of. He denied political ideology specifically, but found a lot of ground with me, tending to spend the events with me as we discussed politics and the social reality of the Occupy movement.

We found, as weeks passed and numbers dwindled, the increased disillusioned nature of our local Occupy movement was difficult to support. I had chosen from the very beginning to let the events play out for themselves and never made a push to speak to the masses from the tent of Radio Free Canada with their microphone and megaphone. Either did the Communist Party, saying they're tired of trying to radicalize events like this, having done so since the 60's with little fanfare. The people showing up to this event were in denial about our kind of presence, we weren't what the audience had anticipated. All the more reason to make some noise, perhaps, but ultimately no revolutionary took the stage. I had scribbled mad notes for a few hours as people took the stage as I considered sending a message, but stayed back in the end. It was peppered with calls for class war and very Marxist terminology being prattled. I just couldn't bother telling these people to take down the bourgeoisie.

Regardless, I made it open to everyone there that I am a fucking radical and I'll be represented. This made me a lightning rod in a way. One of the admittedly few dissenters who came near us took particular issue with how I presented myself. On this day, sometime in later October or early November, I had chosen to wear a sort of camo appearance, my warmest clothes. I wore a pair of blue jeans under my broken large pair of came jeans for extra warmth. In addition I wore a camo spring jacket over a dark grass green sweater. For sheer appearances sake I wore a toque get-up with a red star, a very obvious stereotypical Soviet kind of image. I did it more out of the sheer controversy of it, giving me perhaps an avenue to discuss it, like a conversation starter. It was technically the warmest clothes I had, as well as the only thing I had to cover my ears, but I won't lie by saying I wore that hat without understanding the kind of appearance it gave. And start conversations it did, as a former citizen of the Soviet Union marched into the centre of our protest to call my an idiot and angrily denounce the movement itself for letting me attend, screaming at people who tried to get in between our conversation. He told me communism itself is a failed idea, while I explained that the treachery experienced in the USSR wasn't what I was calling for. He basically called bullshit and we simply continued our ideological discussion. I did my best to remain respectful, and tried to fairly represent my side of the argument. Ultimately he went away pissed, flipping me the finger and telling me to fuck off before storming away in disgust. You can't win them all. He was the sole main problematic dissenter of the entire several-month long event.

Anyone else I chatted with were completely calm and civil, including a gentlemen who was walking his kids that offered an angry back-handed comment to me and my sign, which I immediately countered for him. Politely he was compelled to talk with me and left on a very respectful note, attending to his wanting and pleading children who were clearly bored by the ineffective boring ramblings between a random street-ranting protester and their young working class father. We already had similar radical viewpoints, as I notice often in many people throughout the country, but as with most people it was an unrefined set of ideas.

During that event the first real division between myself and the local self-elected organizers showed up. As people tried to diffuse the situation between the Soviet citizen and I (the man was making a massive scene) a few organizers started to respond to his accusations. He mocked the Occupy movement for being anti-capitalist, to which the main Radio Free Canada representative said "We aren't calling for the destruction of capitalism!" to the man, to which I made sure to interject "Well, uh, I am." since I was quite willing to continue arguing from my stand point. The organizers left me to finish the argument with him, since their talking points mainly consisted of watering down their argument to sound more 'middle class' like, a liberal sort of platform basically suggesting that the bankers and "1%" were ruining their chance at a clean Keynesian chance to chase the American Dream. This contrasted with me, as I was calling for the end of currency, private property, and corporations all together. A revolutionary restructuring of society, more than just putting forth a new representative and encouraging people to vote for a watered-down revolution. Suddenly I had discovered that radicals were downplayed; the people who wanted to be considered the "people's message" at the event were very willing to use "communism" as a way of telling the media they weren't radical or out of line with popular liberal veins. It showed a sad affliction with the bourgeois democratic system, and any talk of that was fairly depressing to see. Populist pandering from the get-go, ultimately ignorant, ultimately playing into the hands of our enemies.

Near December there was a local council election. The organizers took advantage of this to make a scene. Many many people ran for the council, and several had convinced the Radio Free Canada orchestraters to let them use the Occupy movement as a platform for their push to be elected. "Vote For -----" buttons started appearing on chests everywhere, repetitively for many weeks on the few who showed. I was still popular among many of the regular attendees, who while perhaps disagreeing with me on many topics were nothing but friendly and tolerant that I showed up each week, even if I had ignored attending their out-of-event quasi-council meetings. The main Radio Free Canada supporter noticing and now commenting on my openly Marxist slogans, conversing with me every now and then on the corruption of capitalism. He enjoyed how 'well-spoken' I was and greeted me whenever I arrived each week. But past that, there was little argument or conversations between us. Just respect as protesters with ideas that they very likely feel are as ridiculous and hopelessly optimistic as I view theirs.

But in hushed tones, myself, comrades of the party, and my new asexual friend, found issues with the organisation and began dissent within. We contemplated whether the immediate coup in the hierarchy of the group to begin pandering towards working within the system was what was killing interest in the event. Was it apathy? Most at the event were simply frustrated with how things were, and seemed to be looking for alternatives. Many who showed up initially seemed, to me, to be very anti-capitalist. But more and more the laughably optimistic liberal revolution just became a boring platform to suggest that it wasn't the system that was wrong, just the people running it. My comrades from the party shockingly continued to show up, and I found myself mainly attending to hang out each Saturday with them and my new friend. We wanted to separate ourselves from the increasingly kooky kooks running the show. Talks of starting a capitalist effort to 'fight from within' again, random gibberish that was partially hijacked by the conspiracy-theorist clan of 'Free Men' and Alex Jones bullshit. Also much vocal time was given to the self-interested efforts of some of the organizers, prattling their own conspiracy theories in the regular messages to the crowd. Whether they were right or not wasn't the point I was interested in, I considered the event an opportunity to have better things to argue about than these rants about the Bilderberg Group and 'gatekeepers' and other such bullshit that serves only to divert attention from the systematic violence of the capitalist structure itself.

Worldwide, newscasts started to dwindle and noted the crackdowns that started to take place on the occupations. The events hadn't only lost social favour and interest locally, but worldwide. Almost nowhere did the groups that set up camp willingly leave when initially demanded, but soon one by one across Canada and the United States the encampments were 'swept clean' by kettling riot police. Images of violence and battle coming from the other events had been attempted to be used for moral support at our event. Our pathetic numbers made our stance very hard to make leverage with in the same way.

The local 'peace officers' showed up and marched right up to centre stage, asking to speak to the 'main guys'. That consisted of all the outspoken people, as well as the Radio Free Canada speakers. The first time the officers showed up they came to tell us to take down many of the tents. There were maybe about 6 or so, and the officers demanded we only have one, if any. There was an unwelcome scene immediately when they showed, with one officer snapping frantically as about 20-40 protesters encircled the 2-3 officers. No threats were made of course, and they maintained they only possessed flashlights. Their lack of guns noticeably relaxed the crowd, and we fell back for the most part as the officers suggested they agreed with us but "had to do their jobs." which entailed informing us that we were violating local bylaws with our occupation. Over all, throughout the event, we would regularly be visited by officers as we violated their provisions, sometimes in a cheeky manner. One day several native protesters suggested building a tepee, which was happily and quickly supported by virtually everyone in attendance. We all assisted in building the 10 foot tall structure, with an upside down provincial flag jutting out from the top. A single police car would circle us for hours, but did not make any sort of effort to shut the tepee down until well after I left at around 8pm, over 2 hours since the protest itself departed. They did, ultimately, succeed in ordering it down, with the event almost revealing an open struggle between a more radical spirit of the attendees versus the liberal 'peaceful protest' speakers that dissuaded open civil disobedience as a risk to the movement itself. "I don't want to spend the night in jail." pleaded the pacifists. None of us did, we were too small to strongly defy the police.

I would later hear that a long tense stand-off between the native tepee owners ended after a few hours of the pigs asking them to either take it down or watch it be taken down. The natives, well into the dark night, alone with only a few people still around, caved and took the large structure down, saddened and disgruntled, hoping the native plight would discourage the officers from shutting down the controversial message it represented.

It became more and more obvious as each week passed that the movement was dead and was not gathering any support. Weather was blamed, and a universal acknowledgement of the inconvenience of choosing to start in autumn was often frustratingly used as an excuse for the exponentially shrinking number of people showing up.

By late December, my comrades and I stopped attending, as many before us, and as far as we knew the protests stopped being regularly held before the end of the year. The official message touted on Facebook was that the group would reconvene with a vengeance in the warm and beautiful spring of 2012.

Before this new year 'resurgence', my comrade moved back with his family in another town, needed to work locally and make money if he wanted to live on his own again, depressingly having to suffer through the idiocy of home sweet home. A sad event entirely, as I'd now risk showing up to these events representing my ideals alone, as there was no way to know whether or not my party comrades would bother with the Occupy protests any longer having seen how simple and vague it already was for several months. But the day the local Occupy movement chose to restart their efforts helped increase my odds: May 1st, May Day. It wasn't just a local decision, it was the day many Occupy groups chose to start up again, as the movement as a whole retained it's vague working-class imagery while still touting middle-class politics.

I bought a briefcase from Value Village for $7 a week before the 1st, and in preparation wrote two messages for the sides of it. "Let's Eat the Rich" and "Destroy Capital". I came with paper and a hardcover copy of the Communist Manifesto, as well as a copy of "Work" by Crimethinc. Walking up to the park I noticed nothing. Not a soul. I wondered if I was early, despite being exactly on time (2PM). I kept searching and found the 10-20 or so people who showed up huddled near the road for the most possible visibility for their size. Instant disappointment as my comrades from the party weren't there. Awesome, I'm the fanatical radical fish out of water standing alone with my ideas among a bunch of liberal social democrats scared piss of being associated with what I've got to say. I stood around for a couple hours, occasionally bantering with a few people who showed up. I silently stood around as Radio Free Canada showed its final corrupted form of the underpopulated organisation that was our local fearsome occupation. They concentrated almost entirely on conspiracy theories and tangents that had little to do with socioeconomics but instead more about local politics and personal entrepreneurial efforts. It was little more than an attempt to be populist to little over a dozen people; making the painful plea that this represented the people couldn't look more weakened as an argument. It was sad. Convoluted, obnoxious, pathetic.

The event ended at 4. Which is when police officers arrived, oddly enough, as everyone was already leaving the area. I was preparing to leave when my comrades from the party showed up. We chatted about the betrayal of the movement and its silly vague wishful politics. Ultimately we both expressed our disgruntlement with the complete lack of effort made into explaining the deeper social struggle symbolized by the day they chose. If you're reading this and don't know, look it up. There are many sources on the internet that can better describe the Haymarket riot struggle and aftermath than I could ever hope to achieve. We also talked about the irritating nature of bourgeois democracy, discussing the futility he had in running for several years locally, despite gathering a few hundred votes in his last election run in 2008. Anyhow, I got my comrade to sign my copy of the Manifesto, kindly writing "From a Militant Communist", then scrawling his signature, using the red pen I handed him. That made my day for the most part. As always I was glad to see them. We parted ways at 6pm or so, since I only brought bus change and parted home to eat.

I left that day knowing that it was likely the end of Occupy in my town. I came away with an awareness of who regularly protests in town (the same people leading Anti-Harper and Pro-Marijuana protests) and having left a mark on them. They often expressed some sort of fascination in me, respecting my politics mainly for at least having an anti-apathy stature, considered shocking enough for my age. I don't return e-mails and ignore some of the crazier ones in public, but suppose they have my respect. It's a shame the events have disappointed me in the long run, despite giving me a lot of hope in the first few weeks. But really, what could I have been expecting? Of course it was going to be a bunch of spaced out nuts. A whole collection of them. And for arguments' sake, I was definitely one of them. I like to believe I had a more dedicated and strongly thought-out plan for the future structure of society for the resolution of the problems Occupy aimed to dissent. It was foolish perhaps not to stand up and share my message, but perhaps I wasn't interested in being an icon. I let the social perception of me as an idiot ignorant che-shirt college commie keep me from really loudly broadcasting my message to the group at any point, knowing that to many I seemed little more than a hipster. Anyone who talked with me personally got a different idea I suppose, but I still ultimately chose to let the movement decay on its own merits. And that it did. Its foolish call for a general strike without union support helped strongly reveal its ignorance and blindness to their own social reality.

Occupy was something I never experienced before, living far from the major city outlets for revolutionary gatherings like Toronto or Vancouver. I've never seen the black bloc, I've never been part of an event that needed riot police to quell. I've only experienced small town groupings, not considered serious at all and largely ignored. Ultimately, this local Occupy community showed themselves to be just a slightly larger and longer version of what I've already experienced: a quiet event that no one thinks about in a town that knows it can't make a difference. No national news for us, not even the elitist organizers of our event could hope to be recognized in the face of the movement as a whole. The voices and photos from Occupy worldwide would be from Chicago, New York, Toronto, Oakland, Montreal, and other large epicentres for this sort of thing. Cities long scarred by bitter struggles along class lines. It would be surreal to experience such a thing. But that it not what I saw. I won't say I regret attending this doomed spectacle, I just wish it was more radical. The media overall has apparently chosen that this news story is too old hat to cover now, and seems to be content to quietly encourage the movement to die. As seems to be the consensus of many people in these dying days. I haven't heard from the movement since May.

One day perhaps I'll be a part of a much larger event in a more serious community that will less likely become filled with bullshit local rife competing for their space on the soap box.

End.

[BartSimpson]

Horseshi+.

The Occupy movement has spawned an awful lot of crime. Starting with the riots and then moving on to illegal encampments, rapes, assaults, and now a total of almost 100 arrests nationwide in the USA for conspiracy, arson, robbery, and terrorism.

And you want them to be MORE radical?

[Public_Domain]

100 arrests? Woah.

Crack down on Occupy and the crime rate will... be the exact same.

Anyhow, 0 arrests here, and 0 fines. 0 injuries, etc.

I'd say the effect has only been positive, with several people getting to eat when they otherwise wouldn't have that day.

Other than that, tame as hell.

[Unsound]

Welcome back Mr. C. Missed ya.

[Xort]

Street protests are useless.

The time and effort would have been better spent coming up with a plan, and then spent getting everyone to agree it was a good plan.

Protests seem to be more about social activity of like minded people, than an effort to have something changed.

[Public_Domain]

Xort Xort:

Street protests are useless.

The time and effort would have been better spent coming up with a plan, and then spent getting everyone to agree it was a good plan.

Protests seem to be more about social activity of like minded people, than an effort to have something changed.

Ultimately, that was it's only benefit: meeting other radicals.

[Public_Domain]

Unsound Unsound:

Welcome back Mr. C. Missed ya.

Thanks dude, miss you guys too. I lurk now and then, honest I do

[Xort]

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

Ultimately, that was it's only benefit: meeting other radicals.

Not to be down on the fun, but isn't it easier to meet like minded people online, then meet up with people that are local?
Rather than standing around for days out in the cold?
~
A side question I think I missed the city you were in, or you didn't say.

[Gunnair]

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

Unsound Unsound:

Welcome back Mr. C. Missed ya.

Thanks dude, miss you guys too. I lurk now and then, honest I do

I miss your radical left to the extremist right these days!

[BartSimpson]

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

100 arrests? Woah.

That's just for the terrorism-class stuff. It's into the several thousands for plain old arrests and citiations.

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

Crack down on Occupy and the crime rate will... be the exact same.

Perhaps. But at least the parks will smell better and the jails will cut off all of the ugly dreadlocks.

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

Anyhow, 0 arrests here, and 0 fines. 0 injuries, etc.

Nope. You really ought to check Google on this kind of thing before you post it.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&site ... afe=strict

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

I'd say the effect has only been positive, with several people getting to eat when they otherwise wouldn't have that day.

I will concede that the homeless took advantage of the Occupy camps. That didn't hurt too much aside from it would've been nice if the Occupy bunch had rented portable toilets instead of polluting the parks with excrement.

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

Other than that, tame as hell.

If that's your idea of tame then I stand by my previous stance that you'd make a fine Marine.

[Public_Domain]

Xort Xort:

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

Ultimately, that was it's only benefit: meeting other radicals.

Not to be down on the fun, but isn't it easier to meet like minded people online, then meet up with people that are local?
Rather than standing around for days out in the cold?
~
A side question I think I missed the city you were in, or you didn't say.

It's true that it's far easier to meet people of my... persuasion online, and I'll honestly say if it wasn't for the help of the internet in general I'd probably have succumbed to apathy or common liberal politics by now. While it's relatively simple to meet radicals online, it is a far different experience to actually get to talk with someone like-minded and enjoy a tea or dinner or just a casual conversation. I may put more weight on it simply because of the absolute drought there is in finding someone with similar thoughts in just normal day-to-day life.

I deliberately didn't include my location, nor my name. But certain details I mentioned in this 'article' would point directly to both those details with almost no effort at all. As such, I'll say: My current location and the location of these events was Kelowna, British Columbia.

[Public_Domain]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

That's just for the terrorism-class stuff. It's into the several thousands for plain old arrests and citiations.

Nothing more unbiased than the ones in charge of deciding what is right and wrong pointing at the people they've labelled wrong as an example of some sort of right being done. Also since these events were over the course of more than half a year, across the entire continent... I'm not stunned to see some crime. I doubt the number of protesters and their actions differed greatly from any other random selection of people statistically.

Things like arson and broken windows, sure, probably a greater amount. Rape and drug death shouldn't be touted as some profound example of wrong-doing at Occupy when the rates there were probably far lower than average, given the circumstances. The world outside Occupy isn't squeaky clean either, imperfection isn't a convincing argument against Occupy for a case liek crime, to me at least.

Most of the stuff thrown against Occupy as far as crime goes is purely emotional nonsense. Any deeper analysis reveals that it's just petty nitpicking and ignorance to a greater social reality.

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

Perhaps. But at least the parks will smell better and the jails will cut off all of the ugly dreadlocks.

Hilarious.

$1:

Nope. You really ought to check Google on this kind of thing before you post it.

By "here", assclown, I wasn't referring nationally. I meant locally, like my entire article discussed.

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

I will concede that the homeless took advantage of the Occupy camps. That didn't hurt too much aside from it would've been nice if the Occupy bunch had rented portable toilets instead of polluting the parks with excrement.

Took advantage? We invited them.

Mr_Canada Mr_Canada:

If that's your idea of tame then I stand by my previous stance that you'd make a fine Marine.

You think Occupy was so traumatic that it would require some sort of militaristic mentality to make it through?

My last high school, over the course of 6 months, was far worse for the city and community in general, than most Occupy encampments were.

Occupy was... boring.