The Philadelphia Bee Volume II No. 2
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Occupy calls for July 4th convention
Occupy supporters and activists plan to assemble on and near
Independence Mall in Philadelphia June 30 to participate in the first
“National Gathering” of the Occupy movement. The event is to begin
with a march in solidarity with Healthcare-Now!, an organization that
advocates a national single-payer health care system, and end July 5
with a 99-mile march from Philadelphia to Wall Street in Manhattan.
Organizers hope to create a “blueprint” by consensus of participants
in order for occupations across the country to work collectively on
movements goals.
Daily workshops and teach-ins ranging from economic education to
citizen’s legal collectives are also on the agenda, along with talks
by Reverend Billy from the Church of Stop Shopping, Alexis Goldstein
of the “Stop Bank of America” campaign, and others.
A number of “direct actions” are also planned.
The principles of Occupy Philadelphia haven’t changed since its
inception, said Occupy Philadelphia organizer Larry Swetman during a
press conference today at Independence Mall, citing
“horizontalization”, transparency and democracy as values the movement
still holds fast to.
“Our principles are from the ground up,” he said. Occupy is
involved with communities and neighborhoods, affecting people around
the country they have no direct contact with, he said.
As an example of how Occupy Philadelphia has influenced public
policy, Swetman said organizations “more prominent” in confronting
city and state authorities over budget cuts and other issues
concerning public schools in Philadelphia - Fight for Philly, Phare
and the teacher’s union- have allowed Occupy a “seat at the table”.
“We fight for the community that we belong to to affect change on a
national and global level,” he said, calling Occupy a “global people’s
movement”.
“People are waking up to overthrow oppressive yokes,” he said.
“It’s a message that affects everyone on the planet,” he added
later. “Paradigm shifts don’t go away that affect culture.”
Occupy organizer Nate Kleinman, who made an unsuccessful run for
Congress in April as a write-in candidate in the Democratic primary,
later told reporters that yesterday a group in Maui contacted Occupy
about joining the movement.
Occupy is more than “people with pink hair standing outside,”
Kleinman later said. “There’s only more coming down the pike.”
Reading from a prepared statement, Julie Alford-Fowler, a member of
Occupy Philadelphia’s National Working Group, said 61 occupations and
assemblies nationwide have endorsed the National Gathering proposal.
The gathering will be “collectively crafting a vision for the future
and breaking bread”, she said.
Concluding the prepared statement, Swetman referred to the five-day
event as a “sitting down at the table of sister and brotherhood
together” and “the next s tep on the long road towards justice.”
Swetman said between a thousand and five thousand people associated
with Occupy from around the country are expected to be in Philadelphia
for the gathering.
An “Occupy Caravan” will be traveling various routes throughout the
country to bring activists to Philadelphia, an Occupy press release
said.
“We are not announcing the exact location(s) where protestors will
be sleeping. We do plan on taking city sidewalks as a last resort”,
the release said.
Occupy participants are known for “Bank sleeps” - camping overnight
on sidewalks in front of banks to protest what they consider to be
unethical banking practices.
Reading from a separate prepared statement, Anne Gemmel, political
director of Fight for Philly, likened the “undue power and greed” of
King George III in 1776 to that of corporations today. “What choice do
people have when our very own Governor gives away billions in tax
breaks to gas companies while schools go under?” she said, adding that
Fight for Philly will be working to demand an increase in the minimum
wage this summer.
During a phone conversation later Gemmel cited a recent $1.7 billion
tax break for Shell Oil proposed by Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett
as an example of the way corporations benefit from government
largesse. “The crisis is corporate greed and corporate influence,” she
said. “Corporations have too much influence over government,
particularly over Republicans,” she said. Pennsylvanians are denied
needed teachers in classrooms, clean air and water while Shell Oil and
other corporations are given special treatment and tax breaks, she
said.
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