From Washington, D.C., to San Francisco, Calif., a thirst for dignity is driving protest and heralding social transformation. In every major city and countless small towns, people are refusing to let their voices -- ninety-nine percent of the nation's voices -- be drowned out by the whispers of the most powerful one percent.
Everywhere, people are refusing to be taken for nobodies. They're demanding to be treated like somebodies.
A vision of a new America is emerging, one in which each person's dignity is affirmed and acknowledged. The nation's traditional rallying cry, "Give me liberty or give me death," has found a resounding replacement: "Dignity for all."
The growing movement to occupy Wall Street embodies this universal quest for dignity. The face of Occupy Wall Street is the "We Are the 99 Percent" movement. We are the ninety-nine percent of Americans who cannot buy political representation. We reject the chronic indignity of powerlessness. We demand that our dignity be upheld by those to whom we have entrusted power.
Whereas every effective movement must stand for something, it must also stand against something. The Occupy Wall Street protestors have a litany of problems that they're against -- greed, corruption, exploitation, discrimination -- and it might seem that the items on the list are amorphous and distinct. Without a single lens through which to view these apparently separate problems, the protest may succumb to centrifugal forces that dissipate the moral strength of the spontaneous solidarity shown to date.
Powerful interests are counting on disorganization and internal divisions to cripple this potentially transformative movement. But if an itemized list of the objectives of this movement has not yet been vocalized by protestors, a tacit consensus on what the movement is for and what it's against does, in fact, exist.
First, a note on what this consensus is not. Occupy Wall Street is not about the haves versus the have-nots, as evidenced by the fact that a fair number of one-percenters -- people whose wealth places them in the top 1 percent -- are protesting in solidarity with their fellow ninety-niners. The message of Occupy Wall Street is not that power differences should be eliminated or that executives should make the same salaries as entry-level employees. Occupy Wall Street is not, in the literal sense of the word, an egalitarian movement.
No, Occupy Wall Street is a dignitarian movement. Occupy Wall Street is about ordinary people standing up against abuse by people who hold positions of higher social, political, and financial rank. It's about a segment of the elite one percent abusing the enormous power that money affords it in a political system where dollars buy influence.
Truly, Occupy Wall Street is fighting the problem of our era: rankism.
Rankism is what people who consider themselves somebodies do to people whom they regard as nobodies. It often amounts to a degrading assertion of rank: a customer demeaning a waitress, a boss humiliating an employee, or, perhaps more pertinent to the OWS movement, executives using the powers of their office to enrich themselves or prolong their tenure.
Prototypical forms of rankism are bullying, corruption, cronyism, predatory lending, and insider trading. The world got a look at rankism's ugly face in the aftermath of the housing crisis as previously middle-class families suffered foreclosure and even slipped into homelessness while banks filled their coffers with taxpayer money.
Rankism occurs when rank-holders use the power of their position to secure unwarranted benefits for themselves. It typically takes the form of self-aggrandizement: for example, higher compensation for executives than the market requires, and perpetual job security. It is the opposite of service. Good leaders do not tolerate rankism; bad ones indulge in it.
Rankism takes years off lives. The indignities it sows excite indignation and, often, a desire for vengeance. Yet it's hard to imagine a world without rankism, just as, not long ago, it was difficult to imagine an end to racism and sexism.
Racism and sexism were long regarded as human nature, but in more and more places, these "isms" are losing legitimacy. To be racist or sexist today is to disqualify yourself from professional advancement, if not to forfeit your job.
If we can learn to stop disadvantaging people on the basis of race, gender, sexual orientation, or disability, we ought to be able to stop doing so, period, for any reason. Overcoming rankism does not mean doing away with rank or abolishing competition any more than overcoming racism and sexism mean doing away with race or gender. Rank itself is not the culprit; rankism is. The antidote to rankism is dignity for all.
The Dignity Movement to overcome rankism is an inclusive, unifying one that reduces the injunctions of political correctness to just one: "Protect and defend the dignity of others as you would have them protect and defend yours."
This does not and cannot mean countering one indignity with another. We can only bring about a net reduction of rankism by interrupting the rankism-begets-rankism cycle. This means protecting the dignity of the perpetrators even as we reject their rankist behavior. While this Is not easy to do -- because it means stifling the impulse to get even -- it is possible. What's more, nothing else works to end cycles of reciprocating indignities.
The familiar "isms" are not gone, but they are on the defensive. The next step is to make rankism as inappropriate in public life as are racism and sexism. The Occupy Wall Street protestors are standing up for our dignity. Once a movement is on its feet, it's usually not long before it's on the march for justice.
Disallowing rankism will take time, energy and boundless courage. But thanks to the Occupy Wall Street protestors, the indignities of rankism have, at last, come into focus, and our journey to becoming a nation that recognizes each person's dignity is underway.
The views expressed in this piece are those of Charlotte Hill and Robert Fuller and do not represent the views of
OWS is frozen cabbage.
Please don't try to attach any deep meaning to it. It is simply a symptom of an illness in America caused by a "only governement knows best for you and me" cancer arising from the progressive mindset.
And - let's face it. The rudiments of introspection have already formed in even the most insular of the progressive mindset.
At its very best, this is nothing more than a footnote in history.
http://www.obamaftw.com/blog/tea-party/occupy-wall-street-ows-vs-the-tea-party-a-brief-comparison
At the same time why is it wrong for OWS to complain?
Does it all lead to a better America?
2) Because our country gives more credibility to lawyers and accountants than to people that make things.
3) It is not wrong for OWS to complain. We should look at them as the product of a misguided media and a misguided government.
4) It will lead to a better America. Even the most insular liberals are finally acknowleging what they've wrought.
http://www.obamaftw.com/blog/economics/robert-reich-tax-cuts-rich-deficit-recession
It's not illegal to think you're better than someone else, and if it's really that important for someone to feel superior to me, I can afford to graciously leave them to their thoughts, they're none of my business.
I'm usually a little embarrassed for people who think class is about money, they're a lot more obvious than polite people let on.
Calling for the destruction of capitalism is not a message for a movement unless there are plans for building and creating. Venting rage and bitterness are not enough - and have nothing to do with dignity, let alone creating jobs or (gasp!) wealth.
The vast majority are already left out of this movement that is now essentially a branch of the Democratic party. No moderate or centrist or conservative would be allowed in to this left-wing utopia.
The wealthy left-wing elite are already taking advantage of this.
That is my story. If you support OWS - what is yours - in one line...?
n.
Benevolent, honorable behavior considered to be the responsibility of persons of high birth or rank.
As this was taught to me, "with rank comes obligation". Unfortunately, that has been forgotten. Hopefully, this movement will bring us back to a more open, transparent, and dignified place.
Bingo. In a nutshell.
The latest Time poll finds the Occupy Wall Street movement has a 54% favorable rating. In contrast, the Tea Party's favorable rating is just 27%.
Greg Sargent: "In fairness, the Tea Party has been in existence since before the 2010 elections, and even has had a seat at the governing table during the debt ceiling and government shutdown debacles, which clearly took their toll on the Tea Party's image. Occupy Wall Street is just getting started. But it does seem clear that a confluence of events -- the protests, Obama's jobs push, Elizabeth Warren's Senate candidacy, and the national backlash from the right all these things have provoked -- are pushing populist issues such as fair taxation and income inequality to the forefront of the national conversation."
Jon Meacham: "The Occupy Wall Street protests at last suggest that America's wealth gap is once again becoming an organizing political principle in the country. Crowds rarely have good answers to problems, and there is no doubt much to be skeptical about in the crowds making all the noise. But the noise they're making deserves a place in the broad arena of contending forces."
By sleeping in their own garbage and racking up disorderly conduct arrests? Not quite.
A suit and tie does not mean dignity, and it certainly does not make people more moral.
Well, one alternative is protesting without LIVING at the protest site.
>>>These people cannot buy politicianÂs like the people they are protesting against.>>>
These people have always had the ability to address their public servants, not to mention vote them out of office, if they're dissatisfied, and replace them with their own citizen candidates. Liberals are just infamous for whining about their pols, than racing out on election day and throwing those same pols another vote. Just like they'll be doing in 2012 with Obama, despite his fundraisingon Wall Street, and his Wall Street Chief of Staff, and his having sold their public option out to the insurance lobbyist, as ordered: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5PwqSCJmbxk Until they start holding their own pols accountable, they're not gonna have any credibility, much less a "message." Their message will be one of typical liberal hypocrisy.
21% of liberals in this country don't get to speak from 99% of Americans. Speak for yourselves.