By accepting all comers, as recommended in the last post, the gene pool of earnest protesters was certain to become diluted by malingerers and mere malcontents. It may have been glib to exhort people to “Just Show Up.” Confrontational face-offs in city parks, vacant lots and boulevards of broken dreams were sure to occur when these unruly assemblies squared off with officialdom bent on enforcing public health and safety regulations. But it was called for all the same.
Make no mistake -- the boulevards will be cleared, if not by official edict, by the relentless cycle of the seasons. The last chance before the freeze to exhibit outrage at rampant greed and runaway free market dogma through outdoor housekeeping is upon us. Some demonstrators have been better housekeepers than others and the movement is being defined by the habits of a messy few.
Demonstrators are making the most of the opportunity through resistance to the order to decamp.
But it’s time to practise indoor housekeeping again. There will be other opportunities to demonstrate. Income disparity is as certain as death and, yes, taxes. That’s because of who holds power – and who doesn’t. It’s time for the boulevardiers to stand down before things get any uglier. Violence should never be the hallmark of this movement and that too is inevitable the longer the standoffs prevail.
The importance of the occupy movement is that it marked the moment when the conversation of the generation began in earnest. In that alone it has accomplished something momentous.
