Occupy Wall Street - Have I Missed a Thread?

10/15/2011 03:57:43 PM · #1

We are currently in Barcelona (Spain) and got caught up today in a protest that started with a few hundred people and grew to many thousands as the day went on. Have you seen similar protests today?

10/15/2011 04:26:01 PM · #2

Meh....

10/15/2011 04:33:36 PM · #3

Originally posted by kenskid:

Meh....

Why?

10/15/2011 04:54:43 PM · #4

I am shocked - no Europeans on DPC?? Doesn't anyone care?

BAMartin

Apple iPhone 5

10/15/2011 04:56:57 PM · #5

I guess because those of us in the US have been seeing this in every major city in the US for the past few weeks, the excitement has worn off.

10/15/2011 05:10:01 PM · #6

Originally posted by BAMartin:

I guess because those of us in the US have been seeing this in every major city in the US for the past few weeks, the excitement has worn off.

So what do Americans plan to do? Let the bankers continue with their greed and lack of control? Get your unemployment even higher? Have more than third of population live in poverty? BUT WAIT - it is their own fault! Poor, unemployed, homeless - have themselves to blame for that! Isn't this the American Way?

Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM

10/15/2011 05:19:23 PM · #7

Well...when I see the occupiers on smartphones, carrying video cams and eating Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream, I kind of got the feeling that they really don't know what they actually want. They rail agains the corporations and then I see them using the products of the corporations. They are also all over Facebook and Twitter...two more giant corporations that made their CEOs BILLIONS. Other than that....Meh.....

Originally posted by MargaretN:

Originally posted by BAMartin:
I guess because those of us in the US have been seeing this in every major city in the US for the past few weeks, the excitement has worn off.

So what do Americans plan to do? Let the bankers continue with their greed and lack of control? Get your unemployment even higher? Have more than third of population live in poverty? BUT WAIT - it is their own fault! Poor, unemployed, homeless - have themselves to blame for that! Isn't this the American Way?

rooum

10/15/2011 05:22:07 PM · #8

Originally posted by MargaretN:

I am shocked - no Europeans on DPC?? Doesn't anyone care?

Oh, i care a lot but i try not to get involved with many politics-style threads on DPC anymore. Too many right wing dicks. And me being a far left-wing dick it never ends well. Too frustrating.

I like looking at the pretty pictures though.

amsterdamman

Canon EOS-5D

10/15/2011 05:42:10 PM · #9

Originally posted by clive_patric_nolan:

Originally posted by MargaretN:
I am shocked - no Europeans on DPC?? Doesn't anyone care?

Oh, i care a lot but i try not to get involved with many politics-style threads on DPC anymore. Too many right wing dicks. And me being a far left-wing dick it never ends well. Too frustrating.

I like looking at the pretty pictures though.

I can not believe you think this way! I am completely of the opposite view and have little or no room for compromise. I demand you engage in fruitless endless debate!

o2bskating

Canon EOS-350D Rebel XT

Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6

10/15/2011 05:43:44 PM · #10

Originally posted by MargaretN:

yeah that's pretty much how they treat me here. it's my fault i can't find a job because they are all outsorced anyone want to sponsor me to move to another country? i think japan would be nice!

rooum

10/15/2011 05:47:35 PM · #11

Originally posted by amsterdamman:

Originally posted by clive_patric_nolan:

Originally posted by MargaretN:
I am shocked - no Europeans on DPC?? Doesn't anyone care?

Oh, i care a lot but i try not to get involved with many politics-style threads on DPC anymore. Too many right wing dicks. And me being a far left-wing dick it never ends well. Too frustrating.

I like looking at the pretty pictures though.

I can not believe you think this way! I am completely of the opposite view and have little or no room for compromise. I demand you engage in fruitless endless debate!

If i were less sober i would take you up on that. As it is i'm going to bed so you can all debate the iPad wielding, ice-cream guzzling, insurrectionists without me! ;)

tnun

Ricoh GR III

Pentax DA 18-135mm F3.5-5.6ED AL [IF] WR DC

10/15/2011 06:00:36 PM · #12

Yeah, Kenny, them occupiers even got shoes!

KristinaG

Canon EOS-7D

Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS

10/15/2011 06:21:13 PM · #13

They are everywhere.
Just spent my morning photographing 'Occupy Davis' for our local newspaper.
If people are interested I could post some pictures

10/15/2011 06:23:17 PM · #14

Post 'em. I think it's interesting.

Originally posted by Fiora:

They are everywhere.
Just spent my morning photographing 'Occupy Davis' for our local newspaper.
If people are interested I could post some pictures

Nikon AF Nikkor 50mm f/1.4D

10/15/2011 06:24:48 PM · #15

Yep...made by kids in China and providing the CEO with a lifestyle the occupiers couldn't even dream of having !

Originally posted by tnun:

Yeah, Kenny, them occupiers even got shoes!

raish

Olympus C-2500L

10/15/2011 06:34:46 PM · #16

A great big shift/rift has occurred in the economic paradigm of western nations, or of Europe and the US.

You had your capital and your means of production, and you had those who administered the capital and those who did the producing. That's sort of mr. Marx's analysis, but it's a handy and lasting model.

Problems can arise if those who own and administer the means of production are in a position to exploit those who do the producing.

Various things have cropped up in the various industrial nations. Revolutions, for example, or perhaps a little humanitarian decency as inspired by the likes of C Dickens's social commentary. After the depression in the US it was found (postulated?) that it was necessary to reward labour at least enough to enable the labouring sectors of the population to contribute by buying some of the industrial produce, as production has little value when there's no one to purchase the product.

While there was disagreement about how much the owners of production should give back to those who did the work, with some saying that captains of industry would lose the motivation to create work places if they were too extensively taxed, and others saying that those who administered the wealth generated by industry should contribute to maintain the centrally administered infra structure of health maintenance, education and training, transport networks and so on, which enabled better production. There was at least general agreement that the economy is healthier the more currency is kept in circulation, i.e. the more products are consumed the better off we all are.

That's over-simplified, even if it's complicated enough. What we ended up with in the last two or three decades, is a banking 'system' (I include inverted commas because it might arguably be said to have become less and less systematic the more that it has been deregulated), base on an increasingly abstract monetary value. When you borrow money from the bank to buy a house the bank creates the money when it credits your account. All this money that is thus created has to be paid back with interest.

Everything's more or less hunky dory as long as the economy is expanding. Increased production, increased efficiency, inflation of values - the wheels go round and we all ride.

America (US) is experiencing, I think, what the UK did a while back. Nearly all the cars on the road in Britain used to be British and there was industry all over the place. Most of what's left now is subsidised and I'm buggered if I know what it's subsidised with. As I saw on another thread, your ipads are made in ... (insert Asian country of dubious social morality) ...

What's happened to the paradigm is that the actual production has been removed from the nation state in which it was initially administered.

US - and increasingly UK - politicians are bought with campaign funds. The donors can pull any senator's funds and put herhim out of a job.

The economic overstructure - the fat cats or whatever - no longer need the infrastructure as they invest their(?) capital abroad and get the work done there. All they need the local population to do is to consume the products and pay for them so they can invest more money in more production in sweatshopistan and so on.

It's all wrong.

BrennanOB

Canon EOS-1D Mark II

Tamron SP AF 28-75mm f/2.8 XR Di for Canon

10/15/2011 06:38:29 PM · #17

How does what the protesters are wearing influence their message? The fact that they use products from major corporations is about as surprising as finding that fish are often wet. The protesters are protesting the fact that the only options Americans have are the products of a very few providers, and that the corporations have not only limited the consumer choices we have, but are now limiting the political choices we can expect to have.

If you can dismiss their opinions because they use they only products available to them, then you are dismissing their protest based on the very thing they are protesting

Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 USM Macro

10/15/2011 07:06:44 PM · #18

So they're upset because they can only get their shoes from:

3
361 Degrees
A
Adidas
Airness
Alden Shoe Company
ALDO Group
Allen Edmonds
ANTA Sports
Ariat
Avia (shoes)
B
Bally Shoe
Belle International
Bontoni
British Knights
Brown Shoe
Brooks Sports
C
Camper (company)
Canterbury of New Zealand
Caterpillar Inc.
Church's
Circa (company)
Colchester (footwear brand)
Colchester Rubber Co.
Cole Haan
Columbia Sportswear
Crocs
Cydwoq
D
Damani Dada
DC Shoes
Dunlop Sport (Australia)
E
Edward Green Shoes
ErreÃ
F
Fallen Footwear
FBT (company)
Feiyue
Fila (company)
Florsheim Shoes
G
Geox
Globe International
Gluv
G cont.
Goodwill Shoe Company
Grand Sport Group
Gravati
Grinders (footwear)
H
Heelys
Herbert Levine (company)
Humanic
Hush Puppies
I
Insolia
Invicta (company)
J
J. M. Weston
Jello Shoecompany
Johnston & Murphy
Lauren Jones
K
KangaROOS
Kappa (company)
Kashi Kicks
Kickers
Kinney Shoes
KNIE
L
LA Gear
Leder und Schuh
Legea
Li Ning (company)
John Lobb Bootmaker
M
M.Dia
Steve Madden
Melville Shoe Corporation
Mephisto, Inc.
Merrell (company)
Montrail
Moon boot
Munich (sport shoes)
N
Naot
Newton Running
Nine West
O
Original Penguin
Osiris Shoes
P
Pearl Izumi
P cont.
PF Flyers
Pony International
Puma SE
R
Red or Dead
Reebok
Reef (company)
Rockport (company)
Rossi Boots
Russell & Bromley
RykÃ¤
S
Sanuk
SAS Shoemakers
Saucony
Sebago (company)
Sessions (clothing company)
Shiekh Shoes
Shy (company)
Sidewalk Surfer
Skechers
SLAM (clothing)
Starbury
Start-rite
Superga (brand)
T
User:Teafragger/Sandbox
The Original Car Shoe
Thom McAn
The Timberland Company
Tod's
TOMS Shoes
Troentorp Clogs
U
UK Gear
Unification Shoes
United Nude
V
Vans
Veja Sneakers
W
Stuart Weitzman
X
Xtep

Originally posted by BrennanOB:

Nordlys

Canon EOS R10

10/15/2011 07:17:55 PM · #19

Originally posted by kenskid:

So they're upset because they can only get their shoes from:
...

Just curious, which of these had you heard of before you looked them up?
And where did you get the list?

(Me, I *always* get my shoes at United Nude.)

Nordlys

o2bskating

Canon EOS-350D Rebel XT

Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6

10/15/2011 07:19:20 PM · #20

that is one impressive list

Melethia

Canon EOS-80D

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

10/15/2011 07:20:44 PM · #21

Hey, where's Ecco on that list? That's the company I get my shoes from. And Birkenstock.

KristinaG

Canon EOS-7D

Canon EF-S 55-250mm f/4-5.6 IS

10/15/2011 07:23:05 PM · #22

But the occupy movement isn't really protesting shoes, so that is an non sequitur example of variety.
They are primarily protesting Banks, the loopholes banks get from the government, and the helplessness of the population to getting around working with banks.
Kenskid, I challenge you to find an equally impressive list of banks. But remember, just a list of different names doesn't really cut it. Many banks have different names and yet are run by the same few people. They are not seperate "companies"

Message edited by author 2011-10-15 19:23:41.

Art Roflmao

Canon EOS-6D Mark II

Canon EF 24-105mm f/4.0L IS

10/15/2011 07:27:33 PM · #23

I think what they really want is "more cars that run on sustainable stars"