St Paul's camp and anti-capitalism

[Huguenot]

'Occupy London in Lebensraum scandal as they assert sovereign birthright and annex neighbouring properties'

I have to say that seeking 'home education' is the worst excuse for this pathetic and pointless protest I've heard yet.

Are overprotective parents whingeing that their kids are scared of school really going to get us out of this 'current crisis'? Really? Really??

We're going to sort society by singing Kum Ba Yah at glazed eyed six year old children dressed in androgynous clothing?

[Loz]

This is the issue with the 'solutions' that the Occupy camp use - they are not scalable in any way. Their democracy involves everyone in the same tent reaching a 'consensus' by either folding their arms (for disagree) or making jazz hands for agree (I kid you not). Their solution to school woes is to staff it with unqualified volunteers and keeping things in check by asking them not to 'disrespect the community'.

It's a bit like saying you've solved the world's energy problems by showing how you power a small electric light with a hand cranked generator. Cute, but not scalable.

[TE44]

No Huguenot I'm saying not everyone is suited to whats on offer from our non private education system, some

believing it is better to look for alternatives.Bank of ideas is offering a space.

Loz I don't get what you are saying, there are many different opinions, people involved with this protest, a concensus is reached after everyoneone has an oppurtunity to debate, face to face. Or maybe you just prefer consultation periods the councils use.

[Huguenot]

Bank of ideas isn't offering a space, you stole it - you've simply usurped the reasonable compromises of property rights in order to get your own way. If everyone did this you and your 'protest' would have been steamrollered by people annexing your tents long ago.

It's rather childish of your supporters not to recognise that your 'right to protest' is upheld by the laws that you've just arbitrarily decided to dismiss when they're not to your adavantage.

I think Loz is probably highlighting the fact that our society is too interconnected for us to make decisions through hand gestures in teepees.

It may well be that you don't believe in nation states, but global resource and energy challenges and decisions for 6 billion 7 billion people are not going to be accommodated by such a process.

Frankly it's just silly.

[TE44]

I think the people who deal with complex, interconnected decisions have let us down.

There is a relatively small amount of people at Saint Paul, how would you suggest they reach a decision. Remembering of course the amount of people in that 7billion who feel they have no voice.

I do not think it will be a quick, easy process for changes that will make this this planet a more fair place to live, but there are many people aware of the hypocrisy and greed which is stifling ourselves and children.

Edited to say Why do keep saying "yours" huguenot, this is only my opinion.

[Huguenot]

I called it 'yours' because you called it "Our Safer Spaces Policy.."

I was just matching your claim of ownership - if it's not yours then I don't mind changing it back again?

Hypocrisy is not a unique attribute of the establishment - as I said, you claim a right under law to camp free of interference in central London, but you offer no opportunity for the owners of other properties that you covet to assert their own right.

Hence your own organisation is riven with sufficient hypocrisy to demonstrate that revolution is no cure.

As for the 7 billion people who have no voice, it's an illogical proposition. We all live in such a state of interdependence that it's only a lunatic fringe that can lay claim to do exactly as they please - and the occupiers of tent city and the plutocrats of the City are no different in their indulgence and exploitation of others to satisfy selfish pleasures.

[Loz]

Hugo understood my point. Hand gestures and consensus might work with 60 people. It won't work with 60 million.

[Marmora Man]

I like the point made by the QC making the case for the Corporation of London - viz: "we support free speech and the right to protest but we don't believe this extends to a right to establish a permanent campsite". I am also pleased that the judge hearing the case requiring an early hearing rather than accepting the delay proposed by the protesters.

For me it is simply unsightly, ineffective, small minded and incoherent. It should go.

[TE44]

i did make a mistake by typing "above of there website" instead of off, and forgot quotes. The owners have used there right, a court hearing to take place on the 19th.. This is not about doing what they please, in fact, th?ngs have got so bad because the powers that be have done exactly as they please. Is it enough to just talk and complain about it behind a computer, often ive noticed from discussions on this forum these threads go round and round, only speaking about whos right or wrong. A resignation that nothing could be done, regarding goverments, economy etc. which i believe leads to people beiieving they have a superior perception of reality. I can understand how people associate the protesters under the usual stereotypes, yes there are all sorts of people there but they have come together regardless of differences. Some havin similiar views to many on here, difference is theres more respect for individual views with the recognition of wanting to make it better.

[Huguenot]

We have a perfectly serviceable democratic system that allows us to create, debate and refine ideas to be absorbed by those people that run for office.

We then elect them according to their manifestos.

If the people on this forum want to do more than 'just talk and complain about it behind a computer' then they (and you) have every right to enter that electoral process. Not doing so is not a 'resignation', it's just a reflection of their priorities.

What you are proposing is to jack-in that process in favour of what you believe to be a better system - one that involves teepees and listening.

The natural conclusion of teepees and 'listening' when applied to large groups of people is a parliamentary democracy - which is exactly what we have.

So either you're complaining because you want what we already have - or you actually have no intention of creating a democratic nation at all and you're actually trying to create a state run by peruvian beardies.

[LadyDeliah]

Haha, do you really think we have a serviceable democratic system? When almost half the population of the country feel so disenfranchised and the parties so samey that they don't vote?

And the people that do vote get lied to and shafted.

When corporate and financial lobbyists have access to the politicians whenever they want but millions opposing their wars/cuts/laws are ignored.

Hahaha, serviceable democracy, hahahaha.

[Huguenot]

You may have misunderstood democracy LadyD. You seem to have confused it with 'getting your way'.

In a democracy of 60 million people, 29.9 million people can disagree with something and it'll still be working brilliantly.

As for not feeling they're being listened to, wtf do they expect? There's 59.9 million other people who also get to have a say!

By definition their opinion is omly worth one 60 millionth of everyone else's.

Even if we reverted to small anarchic agricultural communities your voice would only be worth one 3 hundredth of everybody else's and you'd still be complaining about not getting you way ;-)

[Loz]

The complaints about democracy from the Occupy camp seem to go something like this:

Occupy Person: Democracy in this country doesn't work.

Onlooker: Well why don't you run for parliament then?

Occupy Person: Because no one will vote for me. Everyone just votes for the same old parties. Democracy is broken.

I don't think it takes too much to see the basic flaw in this logic.

[Marmora Man]

This country has a democratic system - that many choose to ignore is shameful. That politicians are unable to inspire people to use is equally shameful.

I have diliberately chosen not to quote Churchill on democracy - but believe he was right.

Lady D - what alternative proposals do you have for determining the governing of UK?

[El Pibe]

Anyone who saw Adam Curtis' recent, rather scattershot, documentary series may remember the more interesting bits that dealt with the rather shortlived counterculture social experiments of the sixties and early seventies, that invariably collapsed due to the fact that in an unstructured democratic community of equal say, in practice the most aggressive personalities drove the agenda and got their way causing resentment and ultimately the breakdown of the communities.

Maybe each generation needs to learn lessons for itself, but it looks like the same thing is happening to the occupy camp a mere 2 months in.

It was supposed to be a protest against the evils of capitalism, among other things, but the St Paul?s Cathedral campers have been spending as much of their time on their own economic affairs as on the global financial system.

It was on Tuesday evening, after the campers had gathered for a meeting about money in their unofficial conference space, a Starbucks, that the equal people first came to blows with those who, to some minds, are more equal than others.

While some Occupy London demonstrators cradled cappuccinos and others drank nothing because they considered the coffee house to be a ?symbol of capitalism?, heated exchanges took place over the state of the financial system ? the one within the campsite.

The self-appointed finance committee, angry voices among the protesters have since claimed, had turned into an all-powerful and unaccountable force comparable to the ruling elite in George Orwell?s political satire Animal Farm.

Yesterday, amid a growing row over transparency and allocation of funds, the committee, which consists of between four and six people, stood down en masse. One of its key members, Tess Jones, 25, from New York, said, however, that she would stay on and help to form an interim committee after receiving a vote of confidence.

During Tuesday?s meeting, the camp?s first aid team and ?tranquillity? team, which is responsible for welfare and night patrols, had asked the committee for ?1,200 to buy equipment including walkie-talkies and trauma kits for treating stab and gunshot wounds.

The request came after what protesters described as threats and safety concerns at the site. The committee was accused of dithering and withholding money, putting campers at risk. It was claimed that it reduced funds for food, while other working groups such as the technology tent were able to buy expensive equipment.

Last week, the committee said that a drop in donations meant that it would have to be ?stricter? about funding. The camp?s bank balance was ?12,000, Ms Jones said yesterday, including ?8,000 in an account held by the London Camp for Climate Change and ?4,000 cash in a secure location off site. She added that about ?25,000 has been donated to the camp by well-wishers since it formed seven weeks ago.

As tensions rose at the meeting, Ms Jones was implicitly accused of using the donations to fund flights to New York, prompting her to storm out in exasperation at the ?wild rumours?. The first aiders and the tranquillity group stood down in protest at their treatment by the ?elitist? committee, though both have since reformed.

Yesterday, Ms Jones, who did a master?s degree in sociology at the London School of Economics, said that the allegation was completely untrue and that she and her mother had paid for the flights in question. After The Times was contacted by a whistleblower and made inquiries, the committee announced its disbandment.

Ms Jones said: ?We had a public meeting, and there was support and faith in the finance group. We decided that the working group will no longer be doing the finances . . . We are now trying to move forward, and deal with rumours and negativity.?

She said that the maximum balance ever held by the camp was ?17,000, but an anonymous whistleblower said: ?About two weeks ago we had ?21,000 in donations and there must have been more now but they said there would be no more money for the food tent or the tranquillity tent and that the legal team couldn?t use taxis or buy stationery.

?We want to know where all the money has gone. The people who made the donations thought it was going to feed us but one younger mother has had to leave because they said there was not enough food.

?It is becoming a nightmare and people are starting to leave. It is becoming intimidating. If you don?t agree with what the leaders say they shout at you and can be quite aggressive. We are now being ruled by an elite inner circle. They are telling us what to think.?

She said the two main leaders were two veteran anarchists in their 40s or 50s, and three people in their 20s. ?Paul [in his 40s or 50s] has written a charter which gives all the power to a tiny group of people,? she added. ?We are all calling it the Animal Farm manifesto. They are always smartly dressed. I don?t know how they manage it when we are all camping, and they go off and have these secret meetings at Starbucks. A small number have decided they are more equal and are controlling the rest of us.?

[Huguenot]

I suspect that LadyD would be 'more equal than others', and be the first to cry 'Fascist!' if she didn't get her way :))