Just joined the list-serve; I like the statement as is
Jerry Kann
I
attended the GA on Wed. night (in the rain, as folks will recall) and heard the
"Don't co-opt us" statement read aloud to the GA. I have not read the
discussion on this list-serve yet, don't have time to now, but I would just
like to say I think the statement is just fine as is, in the version that I
heard read out the other night. I don't think it needs any more workshopping.
I heard the "concerns" voiced by some GA members and I don't think
any of them are very substantial or meaningful. For example, I don't see how it
could possibly be read as urging people not to vote. I also don't see how it
could alienate registered Democrats or hard-core Obama supporters, unless some
of those folks are determined to line up with the corporate state against
OWS--in which case, they're alienated from us already.
The statement is very eloquent and does what it's supposed to do--that is, get
the MoveOn crowd, and Democrats generally, to understand that they **can't**
co-opt this movement, no matter how much they may want to. In other words, it's
not an attack on the Democratic Party so much as a declaration that most people
in OWS (I hope) are just not dumb enough to be manipulated back into the
left-liberal section of the corporate state. It doesn't attack them--it just
lets them know that attempts to co-opt OWS or water it down or wreck will just
be a waste of their time.
I don't think you can make those "concerned" people happy. It sounds
like what they really want is, well, to be co-opted. So I think you might as
well just keep the statement worded as is. To mess around with it, I think,
would just ruin it.
Thanks,
Jerry
rob hollander
We put in a lot of work on it, so I appreciate your response.
As a declaration of OWS spirit, I like it, but I no longer see the concern about co-option. It helps, not hinders, us to have MoveOn and WFP and DFA and Democratic candidates trying to use OWS. And OWS can only be co-opted if OWS participants let themselves be co-opted.
If the Democratic party uses the OWS name, the anti-OWS public and media will criticise OWS for being mere left Dems. But they'll criticise us no matter what OWS does. Why should OWS address itself to them at all? OWS will never lose those people to the movement anyway: they already despise OWS.
So what is gained by protesting the Democratic allies at this moment? (Sounds like typical left in-fighiting, regardless whether OWS is left or not -- in fact, it's a symptom that OWS may really be left despite its protestations otherwise; the right stick together even when they disagree on principles.)
That's what many voices at the GA asked. And, now, I agree with them. I'd go further. We should draw those voters closer. Let the candidates come begging to us. Makes us more powerful. Don't have to give them anything. That makes us even more powerful.
I don't see how a group can be co-opted solely from outside, except in the eyes of its enemies.
I'd support a conditional statement like: "OWS will not support any candidates until corporate control is removed from government and from both political parties." That's not a rejection; it's a come-on. It'll bring Democratic candidates professing or promising independence from corporate control -- but which no one in OWS will believe anyway. And if Republicans don't respond, it shows them to be transparent corporate toadies, which will be an embarrassment to them.
Rob Hollander
Lower East Side Residents for Responsible Development
http://savethelowereastside.blogspot.com/
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