How bad does it have to get in this country...

[Hotler]

before you are willing to get out from behind the comfort of your keyboard and into the streets to protest???? Nothing is going to start to change until tens of thousands of people take to the streets in every state. A few hundred at Occupy Wall St. will not cut it. Let's hear it, don't be shy.

[AJTheMan]

1. This isn't Europe

Here in America, the rich say, "We're gonna fuck you" and we, the public, say "where's the lube?"

[DontTreadOnMe]

2. Unemployment needs to reach 25%

then you will see people marching. In the meantime, 100 people can fight for each new job opening with the hope of joining back those with full-time jobs. Americans can be so easily distracted by bling, false hope and religion.

[Hotler]

3. So, I'll mark you down for...

25% unemplyment before you take to the streets. Thank you. next!

[Zalatix]

14. Been to the streets already. Last time was May 1.

[WriteWrong]

4. Never having heard of a succesful protest of that sort, I'm doing other things...

It will change when the people doing the work that makes it possible stop doing that work, and when people whose neighbors do the work that makes it possible no longer support or tolerate their neighbors' support of it.

If you're going to go and WORK for them eight hours a day, it's not going to matter what you protest in your spare time.

[AndyTiedye]

10. The People Doing the Work are in Asia or are Here on H1b and L1 Visas

H1b's can't go on strike, they'll be deported if they do.
I don't think they get to strike in China either.

[raouldukelives]

15. The problem is so vast and ingrained that may well be what it would take. nt

[cali]

5. sorry, I can't do it. I did it for years.

that will have to do, dear.

[femmocrat]

9. Passing the torch to the younger generation....

It is their turn now. I am proud of what our generation accomplished!

[Raine]

18. Yup me too, been there, done it and not going to do it

again. I'm just not up to it physically or emotionally.

[TomClash]

6. LOL

Because the 1% is really worried about protests . . . yeah, right.

[coalition_unwilling]

17. Judging from the massive police repression to Occupy protests, I would say

the ruling class is alarmed. Not sure about 'really worried'. They'll be really worried when the pigs turn their guns on the 1%.

In Los Angeles, for example, the pigs deployed 1300 to bust up a camp with fewer than 300 at the time of the final raid.

[Zalatix]

20. If the heat gets too high they'll simply start killing protesters.

We're under some delusion that a mass purge isn't possible in America.

[coalition_unwilling]

24. After watching the Democratic power structure in this state and city remain

ENTIRELY SILENT in the face of massive police repression against Occupy over and over again, I suffer no such illusions. I do not want to be a martyr (and my wife has let it be known that she does not want it either , but I have resigned myself to the very real possibility that a few martyrs are going to represent the next step in Occupy's maturation and the ruling class' repression of same. I really, really wish it did not have to be that way.

Watching the MSM breathlessly invoke the 'black bloc' to justify mass police violence against largely peaceful protesters, I have little doubt how the next installment will play itself out.

[Selatius]

22. All unaccountable oligarchs would likely use extreme force at the very beginning of the conflict.

This necessarily would mean you'd see cases of police brutality against unarmed, peaceful protesters regardless if Occupy could marshal a group of 1,000 protesters or 10,000,000 protesters.

One of the ways an oligarch can remain king is to destroy anything and everything that cannot be controlled within his realm of power. Leave no unknown variables in your equation if at all possible. Accepting no dissent or protest would necessarily mean using excessive force as a matter of policy.

Our allies in Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates generated good results by using extreme force against Shia protesters and blanket violations of their rights and drumming up charges against protesters in order to remove them off the streets and into jails and prisons and wherever else they can pen them up.

Our largest trading partner, China, is run by a military dictatorship that has remained in power precisely because it didn't tolerate protests in one city, much less several cities across China. By killing thousands at Tiananmen Square as the climax of a slow escalation between the state and the protesters, the Chinese Communist Party ensured that it would remain in power into the 21st century.

I'm not saying that the corporate oligarchs on Wall Street that buy our politicians are equivalent to our allies in places like Saudi Arabia or the UAE or our trading partners such as China, but if you can cut a big enough check to get people to work for you, you can also cut them checks to beat on people as well.

And before I end this post, I would say that there are very important degrees of repression that they would normally employ. Obviously, they're not resorting to mass executions, torture, and disappearing protest leaders at the very beginning of the protests because that's not necessary to crush an infant movement. Occupy is such a movement.

You move to that only when the usual police brutality, rubber bullets, tear gas, and mass arrests on trumped up charges isn't working. Then you slowly crank up the oppression machine. Cranking up the oppression too fast can cause a backlash of outrage, and the result is you end up like Gaddafi at worst and Bashar Al Assad at the least, a man who is now facing a full-blown civil war against his authority.

[coalition_unwilling]

27. What has amazed me (and soured me on the Demcoratic Party as a party) is the

total and utter silence by the Party apparatus in the face of massive police violence against largely peaceful protesters.

One would expect at least a few howls of ritual outrage from a party claiming to represent the interests of the working class. But, here in California, the silence has been absolutely deafening.

Thank you for this very thoughtful post. It is the 'crank up of the oppression machine' that concerns me vis-a-vis Occupy. I was hoping for a bloodless revolution, a 1688 if you will. Instead, I fear we are going to get our very own Tiananmen Square, perhaps as soon as this summer at one of the two political conventions.

Won't it be ironic if the Charlotte security apparatus goes ape shit and kills a few Occupy protesters? Of course, the MSM will be waiting in the wings ready to breathlessly invoke the all-powerful and ubiquitous l 'black bloc' to justify the killing. If the black bloc didnt' exist, it would be necessary to invent it

[dkf]

7. What do you think that will accomplish?

[Texasgal]

8. Voting locally

is the first start. We just held our states election on Tuesday and a very small percentage of voters turned out.

Vote LOCALLY. Vote the bastards out! Your President cannot fix it all!

[AndyTiedye]

11. I Protested the Vietnam War, I Protested the Iraq War

Protests used to be considered news, and get lots of TV coverage.
Not anymore.
Now they only want to cover protests by teabaggers and other right-wing nutbars.

[Johnny Rico]

12. Far worse than it is now.

I'm not the type to get my jollies by protesting.

[Initech]

13. Where do I sign up?

[coalition_unwilling]

16. I've been protesting off and on since 1983. My protesting seems to spike during

Repig presidencies, although I've been doing quite a bit with Occupy Los Angeles in the past 6 months.

As to what it will take to get the masses into the streets, I still hold out hope for Occupy with its 99% tropes, based on the responses we were getting before the pigs (with the connivance of Villaraigosa's Junta) busted the camp up. May be a vain hope, I know, but right now it's all I've got.

[Selatius]

19. When the U3 unemployment index reads 16% unemployment, or roughly approximate.

Because if the popularly followed U3 unemployment index is sitting at 16%, then that means the REAL unemployment rate out there in the street is somewhere north of 30%. People will be desperate and pissed off.

It'll be like the 1930s all over again, except in the 21st century instead.

[NNN0LHI]

21. It was already bad for millions of us 30 years ago when I was laid off just short of 6 years

I didn't see anyone out in the streets back then.

[dinopipie]

23. Civil and Obedient Protests in the streets is 100% pointless

TPB are not scared of Civil and Obedient Protests, it will take massive civil disobedience in multiple cities and states all over the US including going after the 1% and their families where they live.
It is also going to take people willing to fight and die for what they believe in.
Anything less will be a waste of time.

[Johnny Rico]

28. What does "going after the families of the 1%" consist of, exactly? Could you be more explicit?

[dinopipie]

30. Exposing them and shaming them for

reaping the rewards from being the spawn of the 1%.

[Johnny Rico]

31. Surely that's already being done.

In alternative media, there already exist numerous examples of finger pointing and cries of "Shame on you for being rich!".

Anything else?

[ananda]

25. Agree.

You'd think at least the vast majority of students would be super activist
against the way the college and loan industries work.

[TBF]

26. Conditions will dicate as they always do -

and yes it is going to take a lot more austerity before that happens.

FAUX news is one big culprit as to why folks are so apathetic. When I have a hard time getting around DU without bumping up against phrases like "nanny state" and "personal responsibility" (and other members of this site tell me "oh that's not so bad&quot I know we have a serious problem here.

[Egalitarian Thug]

29. When the majority of the comfortable are personally affected.

We're still not there, but it gets closer every day.

K&R

[davsand]

32. I think most people are motivated ONLY by direct personal impact.

Sad to say it, but most of the folks in the US are hard pressed to put down the remote and bag of chips unless they are pissed about something that directly impacts them. It has to be their job loss or their kid living in the basement because there are no jobs to be had. It is going to take THEM, personally, being hungry before it matters.

Welcome to American in 2012.



Laura