fukn occupy

i feel like people really detest occupy, it's like that name you don't dare invoke. and if you were associated with it by peoples and the state? you might as well be walking around with a toe tag. whenever i try to write about it i'm fucking angry as fuck. 

like radicals who initially were ousted or who rejected the development of occupy were never encouraged to continue to develop their analysis of the movement, how it was white privileged etc. and how those dynamics played out. instead of hearing the analysis and reflections of people who were within that experience (which granted, weren't alienated or pushed out completely by the dynamics of privilege that were at the camps NAMELY at the General Assemblies by the first week) they get dismissed in favor of the same radical analysis of occupy that was present by the first two weeks and stagnant. instead of growing or reflecting, you know, praxically, that same analysis just repeated. And we know- we know that to be 'accepted' by radical organizing we have to dissociate ourselves. But let me tell you- all the people that experienced that shit and i mean not like drop off some food every now and then, are forever fucking changed, for better or worse.

Newsflash though shit changes, it wasn't just a white liberal privileged college movement. there were so many goddamn tribes that formed out of a rejection of the process of the general assembly, so many poor, houseless and pushed out disenfranchised people. but who gets representational power?

the fucking white lib college educated people who THE MEDIA focused on completely. yeah, and just like that it's all wrapped up for you huh? homogenizing all the tactics, experiences, erasing all the people of color who fought liberalism and who ousted the unions. who fought for an anti capitalist framework. all the students, the youth who came out and lived there, who left their homes and who ditched school. 

that shit wasn't homogenous- it was global. it was a bajillion different things and the dynamics between liberals and rads played out differently in every fucking region. i went in anti partisan and i emerged anti capitalist and for autonomy and abolition of the entire social order. that's not something to fucking ignore. if you were there, if you were present, and if you fought, don't let the state erase your entire experience on their terms. it's fucking suffocating, it's like experiencing a loss and everyone just looks at you like you are traumatized and angry and urgently anti state for no reason.

all the people came from their different organizations trying to get a piece. the OLA action committee was just a bunch of different groups initially trying to get OLA social capital to endorse actions for their orgs. initially there was not 'occupy' actions because all the different groups were just using it as a platform. and when we fought that conservative (liberal) camp we were targeted as the 'provocateurs'. and when they ANNOUNCED the camp was closing (with their city liason committee bullshit) the media followed suit, and so did the people, and all the people who had some sort of organizational safety net just retreated back into their organizations completely able to dissociate from occupy and leave the autonomous peoples holding the bag and the reputation that those organizational FUX built.

i mean im not really bitter, i'm just sick of the stigma. part of movements is you do things wrong, but you do things. first, do no harm. and we failed at that by how the initial police brutality committee was targeted, but we followed that shit up by ousting those managers and literally exposing how SEIU was manipulating the city and the movement. you probably don't even know what i'm talking about but THATS THE PROBLEM. The herstory is erased because of the stigma surrounding it, because of the EFFECTIVENESS of repression and misinformation by the state apparatus and their capitalist media machine. and it has only been a couple years. 

They say it's dead, but then the state invokes it on their terms when they want to serve their ends. They don't want occupy to die, they want resistance to be associated with it because they were able to successfully navigate and marginalize the narrative that emerged from it. I'm sick of feeling shame for having participated in something. I'm sick of feeling like i shouldn't talk about it because it will affect my revolutionary credibilty.

fuck credibility, they only win when we erase and censor ourselves. it's SO IMPORTANT we speak out about our experiences directly. I liked the article about 5 ways Occupy failed to attack liberalism or whtever, but all that article demonstrates is how much REMAINS TO BE WRITTEN.  i want to hear criticism from people who participated so we don't leave the representation in the hands of those who would have us slandered and erased.

i mean lets' be clear, everything we do here is temporary and has unknown lasting effects. everything we do is an ATTEMPT, but to build, we cannot forget our attempts. that being said, i think we're daring to do a radio discussion on occupy. i dig criticism, send it, whatever, but if you're going to be dismissive and mocking i'll probably eat your face.

people who wanna talk about 'why no movement' or the 'unified left' but when at a rally or protest and people start getting harassed for being in the street or not following the leader especially at liberal 'events' that usually do more to commemorate the organization than the "issues" or "struggle" and the 'leftists' are just silent while the liberals yell at you, touch you and threaten you for not falling in line or having a controversial 'fuck the police' sign LOL

fuck your left unity just saying

in general tho protest politics suxc

I like rants because sharing them provokes other people to share their rants and articulate their thoughts and perspective and thought process. and so on.

and these ideas are often more practical or easier to relate to than theorydom

What can we do to promote 'food justice' in our communities? Can we support local vendors, who are harassed by the city and the police for trying to make a living by feeding their communities non corporatized food?  Can we try to network amongst the spaces we do have access to, community gardens, meeting hubs, accessible spaces for direct gardening action and community feedz?  In an era where our food is increasingly genetically modified and controlled by capitalists, more direct involvement in our food supply is necessary. NO, not better labeling creating an alternative market for some subsidiary of these food conglomerates for those that can 'afford it'.. no more food justice movements that just serve as platforms for middle class demands and capitalist advertisements... it has to be local.  And even if we cannot feed all the people, it is important that we attempt to build these alternative avenues and support networks. At the very least, it is an important contradiction to explore- that we are forced to exchange our labor and our time for 'the right to eat' and that even if this context of capitalism, we are only permitted to eat what they put forward- what they poison and put on the shelves. as is usual, i believe all we have is our attempt, and strategy. There are contradictions afoot. We have to eat some of the shit they are selling- so we can organize food collections from those who can spare some of their cans or foodz to connect themselves into food share networks, mutual aid and solidarity instead of the poor constantly being at the mercy of charity-type programs or reliance on government assistance or whatever dominant food paradigm idea/trend imposed upon the population. Most importantly, we connect people to other people instead of believing that we could ever provide enough food for the people. We find ways for people to provide and search out food, to grow the network. We can glean whatever food that cannot sell from the over production of a system that does not even TRY to meet our needs, but only serves profit. I think to combat that expectation by serving each other, instead of the 'other', those with titles and money and power, would be an act of rebellion itself. Instead of political groups capitalizing off of poverty to create sets of demands, we can engage these contradictions and do direct things to alter the structural effects of capitalism- namely resource deprivation, criminalization, etc. in order to make our movements more participatory, to make the power systems irrelevant, to ease the burdens imposed by capitalism through our own struggle (instead of by asking for MORE from the state, which only further enables their power), and to do so in order to wage a dual struggle, one that destroys both (capitalism and the state) while demonstrating their irrelevance, by returning to the land, and listening to the voices of those most impacted by environmental racism and this system of borders and supremacy and displacement/colonization/food suffocation/deserts.  Our movements will be stronger if we can feed each other. This includes collectivization of resources, expropriating resources from our oppressors, inverting the values and contradictions of capitalism and repurposing spaces for community instead of for capitalist exchange. How do we grow a movement capable of both seizing and decolonizing spaces- those left abandoned by the state, empty lots, churches with parking lots instead of gardens.. etc/ creativity! how do we grow a movement capable of holding space, temporary autonomous zones, and defending those spaces? The use of space, the decolonization of space, how it has been misused to serve supremacy... all of this must be challenged. and perhaps by attempting to feed ourselves / to farm for ourselves / to liberate space/ we create deliberate acts instead of those created by the desperation of capitalism. /rant/thoughts? [im so all over the place- food, insurrection, organizing against the police/criminalityetc.etc.etc.] anyway if anyone has ideazzzzz this is not just a rant, let's do thingzzz.

okay white people that keep trying to tell me what the real definition of racism is please just stop. getting your feelings hurt over someone calling out white supremacy, privilege or whiteness is not the same thing as experiencing racism. someone calling you a cracker or commenting on your skin color, or invisibility, is not racism. 

prejudice exists. i will fucking give you that. but Racism is power and prejudice, it comes from a place of structural and institutional power. Whiteness as a culture has been built on the backs of brown and black people, genocide and constant erasure via overseers and forced assimilation. If you benefit from whiteness, then you benefit from a system of white supremacy and institutional power that has and continues to routinely devalue black life and the lives of people of color. recognizing that is the bare minimum you can do.

how about instead of crying about reverse racism or whatever else bullshit you want to make up to make yourself feel less uncomfortable with being white, you sit the fuck down and listen to how people of color who have been subordinated under social and economic hierarchies define Racism and their oppression. 

white privilege doesn't mean you weren't poor, less able bodied, or marginalized.. it means that when it comes to race you are able to pass more easily in this white supremacist society that doles out privileges and power. it means that even if you are targeted by police, you probably aren't systematically targeted by police. it also doesn't mean you are treated the same as other whites, because you might be part of marginalized populations (like the houseless) that are disproportionately targeted (by society and the police). 

if you 'don't see race' or think you live in a 'post racial society' or think privilege 'shouldn't apply' then you're living in a dream world to escape facing privilege, power and white supremacy. You know who doesn't have the privilege to live in that dream world? people of color, people who have been colonized and displaced and dehumanized consistently as subordinated populations under the rule of property and power.

one can't be 'RACIST' towards white people because it doesn't come from a place of institutional power. i know it's hard to understand when you want to shove forced equality down everyone's throats, but that's called assimilation. and i've had ENOUGH of that. in this society we're NOT all treated the same. if you want to erase privilege, then abolish society. in the meantime confront your privileges and work to betray them publicly in open space instead of apologizing for them and trying to equalize racism. what the fuck. 

whiteness is when i post something about being called an 'anti white racist' for speaking critically about whiteness, white supremacy and racism and then some other entitled white person decides their going to educate me. there's a reason i didn't post this entire rant and i just posted a two-liner quip. maybe it's because I wanted to avoid white entitlement. GUESS WHAT it's unavoidable. 

endrant/

the language of power determines how we view 'violence' or classify resistance

everyone wants to talk about the masked youth called 'outside agitators' breaking shit and throwing down with corporate windows that feed poison to our communities. everyone is calling out the violence of oppressed groups, like throwing a water bottle like it justifies thugs with GUNS suppressing and policing people while they tear gas us and build drones like if we're not pacifist then somehow STATE INSTITUTIONALIZED VIOLENCE IS JUSTIFIED? WTF? you know what they don't want to talk about? the organized intentionally white supremacist thugs with underground networks and stores of weapons. that KKK shit. the police patrols and their racist profiling and criminalization to maintain and expand their authority. wanna know why? because the former provokes desire, autonomy, direct action, growth, reflection and transformative revolt. It builds resolve against police fascism and white supremacy/control/the narrative of privilege and power. it shows us that we can practice defiance and we can act. that we are not as powerless as they tell us we are.  the latter is what founded this country. it's the culture of white permissable violence that maintains the status quo, a culture of genocide and displacement that defends property, that made humyn beings property, and will fight to oppress black and brown people by either forcing them to wage under capitalism or serve in prisons.  doesn't it make sense why one is presented as threatening while the other is ignored and actually systematically reinforced? we allow for dehumanizing violence and racism. but we punish acts of defiance. this is what your 'nonviolence' means to me.

i hate facebook. i hate how it has evolved. i hate social media. I hate that people see your statuses and piece them together to create perceptions of you that they don't even realize are formed by internalized societal projections/assumptions. i hate that people use facebook to organize, instead of strategically as a projectory platform. I hate that facebook made everyone feel comfortable like they can be friends, and non-serious, and non-security conscious. I hate that some people can be tyrants on threads and on others, tyrants are apologized for and defended (depending on social capital). i hate that constructive dialogue has died out because at the first sign of disagreement we begin to avoid conflict. 

i hate that we've lost the ability to discuss ideas in a depersonalized way. like the idea is suspended in the air before us, and we can contribute and reflect and evolve it, but it does not belong to any of us. i hate that disagreements on organizing strategies are demonized and use divisively because we're still operating on outdated patriarchal notions of 'respect' and silencing, supremacy, control and 'safety'. 

i hate how people talk shit like this is some clique circle nonsense when this is a SOCIAL war and all the shit talking you do you might as well be just gathering intel, or helping COINTELPRO type analytics.  I hate when people talk or act like shit using like one fact about your life they feel sleuthy about finding out about you, and then this shapes an expectation of your behavior that when you interact with them in real life they are constantly measuring you against. i hate social capital, ego, creating cults of personality, organizing that depends on the domination of space, working a room. i hate how people want you to lead other people and when you don't they will slander you, because you just became useless to them. 

I HATE WHEN YOU CHECK OPPRESSIVE LANGUAGE OR BEHAVIOR CAUSE YOU BELIEVE IN COMMUNITY AND SAFE(R) SPACES FOR QUEER/MARGINALIZED/POC and you are written off or mocked or even more alienated because 'we're all friends' or 'it's funny' or 'we don't have time for that right now cause this is a political action'. Fuck you, intersectionality is an ongoing political action. if YOU see fit to make me feel even more ANTI SOCIAL because you tolerate or protect behavior that made someone uncomfortable, don't be surprised that we disagree. Just because we disagree does not mean i hate you, check your fucking ego. 

Stop making assumptions about people based on their facebook. Ask me in person goddamnit because if you are making assumptions about my behavior, ideas, gender, sexuality, race, class or ability (mental health or intelligence) I CAN feel that shit YO. If you think me going to an action or event is something for you to comment on, or an opportunity for you to pull me aside to tell me all of your theories and perceptions of me, please stop. if you think that my brain matter is something you think 'we need' then please stop. humyns are humyn, my redefinition of work is voluntary, i am not a resource. I am grateful to all of the input and amazing people i've met, but to heal and move forward and learn and evolve i am venting this shit out.

like after some shit escalated last year someone called me right after because the livestream was fucked and asked me what happened, so like an IDIOT, because i don't know how or who to trust with all the sectarianism and backbiting and NONSENSE, i tell them what happened. the next day they are talking shit, along with other sectarian fucks about whether shit was organized or not. like please, if your immediate response after police escalation is to blame the organizers (NOT EVEN KNOWING WHO THE ORGANIZERS ARE), or the people, don't fucking call me. don't fucking front with me or call me comrade. just be real so next time i don't take the time out of my night after being shoved and fucked with by cops to answer your phone call. because that shit STILL fucks with me. get out of my face, state targeting is enough without your juvenile fucking bullshit.

and don't ever fucking tell me that bullying is discipline.

dear amerikans, like what like what makes it okay what makes it okay to be silent what makes it okay, or beneficial to you, to not be critical people are purposefully profited on and kept in a class system people are kept poor so they can work for 'the man' C A P I T A L I S M you are not free if you have to sell your time to live like seriously, people are taught to educate themselves away from poverty we just abandon the poor even the poor abandon the poor trying to climb up over each other to get out but the SYSTEM creates POVERTY and the police enforce SOCIAL CONFORMITY people are gunned down in the street for being black or brown people are stopped, frisked, searched, raided, attacked and murdered by the police they tell you it's for protection, for safety for fucksake THIS SYSTEM IS UNSAFE and silence is inexcusable this whole goddamn system is structurally unsound and it'll break your back and we, us people, we are not going to take it anymore so you can turn your face from us you can blame us with the media and the police you can look down when they call us extremists but we're still gonna do it S E L F ORGANIZATION breathe Change your MIND goddamnit IF YOU TRY TO PROTEST ANYTHING IN THIS WORLD OUTSIDE OF THE INEFFECTIVE POLITICAL PROCESS YOU ARE ATTACKED IN THE STREET. there is no left/right there is no state justice there is no hope in LAW there is only neoliberal fascism a bipartisan dictatorship a regime of terror this is the hand we have drawn i have been attacked in the street i've suffered trauma and flashbacks and nightmares i have learned that i am NOT FREE and i am THANKFUL for the ability to SEE to have DESIRE and ANGER and to FEEL to suffer ABUSE without silence anymore to no longer be sorry about being uncomfortable about making you uncomfortable you thank the fucking 'troops' fighting overseas for oil, and drugs, and control NOT FOR ME you justify imperialism and bloody brutal war and you just keep buying what the media and police are selling you because what? fear? stability? goddamn your bourgeois comforts. i hope the meek and the earth swallow you alive. i hope when the police state comes door to door they mistake you for a dissident and you get a fucking taste. celebrating, waving your flags. you don't get to hold onto your children and justify your silence you treat your children like property you treat each other like property love? i have so much love inside me that it expresses itself as rage. full of grace, I've lost faith just to lose faith again FUCK TIME AND MONEY GET INTO THE STREET

"That’s because privilege tends to determine: 1) which groups are — and are not —collectively denigrated or targeted for the unlawful actions of individuals; and 2) how big and politically game-changing the overall reaction ends up being. "This has been most obvious in the context of recent mass shootings. In those awful episodes, a religious or ethnic minority group lacking such privilege would likely be collectively slandered and/or targeted with surveillance or profiling (or worse) if some of its individuals comprised most of the mass shooters. However, white male privilege means white men are not collectively denigrated/targeted for those shootings — even though most come at the hands of white dudes."

"Every person of color I've spoken to is hoping the Boston bombings were not by a person/people of color. Though, just that these bombings even happened are already negatively impacting Muslims and Asians because of the historical association had to being perilous foreigners; immediately speculated to be the "foreign" perpetrators. Funny though, how when it's speculated to be a domestic attack, I'm triggered by the othering implication that domestic/American can't mean Muslims and/or Asians. This is how shaming and othering has operated.... as I mentioned before, Asian Americans are really insecure about not being viewed as American. Thus, the more insecure they are, the more they try to fulfill the role of the good model minority. Also, the latest potential comprehensive immigration bill is more "merit-based".... more model minority rhetoric, the more "skilled" and "hardworking" you are, the more you "deserve" to be in the U.S. Means of silencing communities of people..."- Anonymous Person on Facebook

i have a problem where my jaw/teeth/gum hurts but it's that really good sore tooth pain and i keep pressing on it and- alsdfjaksdjflk.

anonymous amerikan, today, 03.27.13

okay then... i'm gonna get a 40oz and then we'll see about the rant

great idea bootyregrit

Thoughts

I am a frustrated layered deconstruction of whoever I used to be. What is liberation? Searching interpersonally, collectively and communally… embracing discomfort, wading through the falseness of our constructed reality. Rejecting the disconnections of capitalism, its uneasy suffering, and embracing the tension found in our willful revolt, exploring it, yourself. losing control of the narrative just to find your own history. Learning your triggers, the placements of your oppression, your internalization, and engaging it critically. Facing yourself, your fears, your intimacy issues, your community. The philosophy and theories of revolt are there, the practice reflexive, the trauma eerily causing ruptures in our perception. We struggle towards revolution, combating the false management of liberal perception that assimilates us. We are deviant, queer, apostate, anti hierarchical anti fascists and id love to not give a flying fuck. But I hurt. I find myself in situation after situation, layer upon layer of dilemma. I hear them, I want to share them, I want to provide empathy. But its too much right now. Pain doled out in doses, daily. I can’t help my urge for processing: adapt, problem solve, critically reflect and deconstruct. Because I can’t constructively meet that goal, I pause, I feel such pain. I cant keep rinsing and repeating, some things too close to the chest to keep afloat. Two weeks ago I got news of someone very dear to me going to prison. That sentence does not amount to much, after all how can I describe the meaning of a connection or person adequately with words. I don’t know how to talk about it, about whether I could have seen it coming, about the abandonment of our youth, about guilt and regret, about mourning. About pain. I can’t help but wonder at myself, perhaps mentally preparing myself for a life of imprisonment or death simply for the opportunity to expose and dismantle an oppressive regime. And then they take you, the drug war, the war on our youth.. another victory and as much as I find cause to do, as many wrenches I throw in their machinery, as hunted as I will be, they still can steal and kidnap and disempower… driving our families and communities to make decisions from desperation. I feel so immeasurably frustrated, angry, and helpless. What more can I do? is there another way to live other than willfully? Other than through rejection of expectation in search of cooperative transformation? meanwhile, the prisons and systems keep humming.. No amount of buildings taken or people fed would physically stop a transport bus. It hurts. I just thought I would have more time, to share the despair of capitalism and authority..to share with you, the support network I so selfishly built in resistance while you drowned in suburbia. I wish and the more I think about it the harder I rebel against myself. Everyday I try to feel better. But the small things that remind me wash away anything good. I’m trying to outlive the binaries, challenging my own perceptions of good or bad, positive or negative but the pain, when it hits in waves of despair is difficult to register. I’ve never thought that dark feelings, despair and grief are bad things, I think they make us grow. But I forgot what it was like to be depressed, to feel something take hold of your body willing it not to move. I can feel the descent into misery, I do not feel well. I do not know how to make it better, how to control feelings triggered by spaces, how to be. I’m trying really hard and sometimes it fluctuates, but the grief hits me in the face, and with all the anger from resisting, I become overwhelmed with the sheer absurdity of my present constructed reality. there are so many good things happening, but I can’t see them right now.

duct tape your face for the revolution

i went on an awesome action today. playing with our identities, we build pockets of resistance in the margins of capitalist space. the streets are our canvas. it's beautiful. it gives me hope. but the pigs come, they kettle. the infighting continues. the police state traps us.  our 'work' follows us home. do you see, yet? we are being pressed in on all sides, and sometimes i cannot breathe. everyday is a race of the mind, it's too real. but i already made my choice.

everyone else giving up makes me want to give up. i can feel it. THAT'S HOW THE STATE WANTS ME TO FEEL- DISEMPOWERED AND ALIENATED. and sometimes, i don't know how to feel. i also don't know what else i would do, and i know that i can't stop because things have already been set in motion. but goddamnit, this is painful. it's not about 'occupy', but fuck everyone for saying 'the movement is dead' this is a revolution. and on the real, fuck you for making us face our fears alone.