by The Autonomous Workers’ Group Within both the national and local Occupy movement there has been a great deal of rhetoric concerning the Black Bloc, calling it an act and mentality of masculine, white-privilege, typically as exercised by basement dwelling youth. Many have chosen to physically attempt to remove this element from the movement, or…
Category: Essays & Letters
Good Shit with Illona: Sacrifice
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by illona Trogub This is Part Two of an on-going series about sustainability and what it looks like to actually start living instead of consuming. illona is an immigrant from the former USSR. She dreams of a better world and a united Cascadia. The black, glossy wet asphalt keeps my bike steady as I pedal…
Transparency vs. Security: The Two-Headed Beast
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By Adam Rothstein Another terminological quandary that Occupy has found itself snared within recently is the issue of Transparency Culture versus Security Culture. Similar to other issues that we are slowly teasing out, explaining, and working through, the impasse with this issue is that viewing the argument in opposing terms has formed a poor understanding…
Diverse Ideologies Fuel Diverse Tactics
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by Ahjami Umi A wise man in Africa once told me that, contrary to popular opinion, everyone functions based on an ideology. He said that even the simple act of using the bathroom is a political action that requires an underlying thought process. If you don’t believe that, try finding a welcoming bathroom when you’re…
Let’s Occupy Ourselves with Occupy Wall Street
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by Lauren Paulsen Our eclectic media is puzzled. What is it these people (unwashed rabble) are protesting over there at the financial district of New York City? Longshoreman-philosopher Eric Hoffer provides us with the easy answer. People who are down and out do not raise their voice when they are totally desperate and bereft. I,…
Beauty is in the Eyes of the Beholder
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By Anonymous There seems to be a beautification, or as some call it, gentrification process that is taking place in our neighborhood. We have lived here for almost 11 years, and although that hardly qualifies us a indigenous to Portland’s Hawthorne district, we have noticed some changes we aren’t happy about as current residents. My…
Getting from A to B
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By David Glenn Cox It was just a few hours of one day, February 29th. It was leap day in downtown Portland and we were gathering under the Burnside Bridge and being Portland, it was raining. I’m learning a little about this town now: Portland is unique it is a quiet city, quiet and unhurried.…
Occupy’s ‘Shut Down the Corporations’ Action: Building Change One Action at a Time
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By Vargus Pike It can be said the Occupy movement’s national day of action, “Shut Down the Corporations”, was a success for many reasons. On the local Portland level a thousand people braved some of the worst weather of the year to demonstrate against a few of the corporate and legislative members of the American…
Occupy’s ‘Shut Down the Corporations’ Action: Success or Failure?
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By Shamus Cooke The Occupy movement’s national day of action — “Shut Down the Corporations” — is a difficult action to assess. Was the action a success or a failure? The first question that needs to be answered is, what were the action’s goals? Many of the activists who performed civil disobedience during the day…
The Pretend Society
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by S. Brian Willson I was once a young man, very much like the young men and women who have gone to Iraq and Afghanistan as US military soldiers. I grew up believing in the red, white and blue. I believed that the United States had a sacred mission to spread democracy around the world.…
