If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If leaders with an agenda begin to surface from Occupy and take the electoral route, will they become only well-funded democrats? Can Occupy have an impact without moving inside; without mounting a full effort to reform the system?
Instead of celebrating our connection and relationship to the changing seasons and cycles of nature -- as in the original May Day -- we have turned it into a spring holiday.
One positive side effect of Congress passing comprehensive immigration reform would be an increase in workplace safety and a reduction in the staggering number of fatalities and injuries suffered by workers on the job in the United States.
No one should have to be afraid at work. No one should be afraid to stand up. Not the people who are born here that go to work to support their families or the ones that come here seeking a better life for their families.
Unlike the rest of the world's democracies, the United States doesn't use the metric system, doesn't require employers to provide workers with paid vacations, hasn't abolished the death penalty, and doesn't celebrate May Day as an official national holiday.
Now in its second year of existence and approaching the second "May Day" celebration in which it has participated, Occupy Wall Street has both toned down and ramped up its rhetoric and goals.
Is there some subterranean -- even subversive -- connection between spring celebration of the Earth and spring celebration of work and time for rest?
Today's Maytime Faerie Festivals, including Spoutwood Farm's May Day Fairie Festival, the Maryland Faerie Festival, and the New York Faerie Festival, are outgrowths of this vibrant May tradition. They feature kings and queens, Maypole dances, flower garlands and beautiful costumes.
The brutal process of applying and waiting for acceptances is over. Now, seniors get to decide which college's offer of admissions to accept. While many adults and students often get attached to college names, they should both realize that colleges are so much more than their names.
What is at stake is not only the ideal of a political culture that respects and cherishes diversity, freedom and debate, but also the vision of a society where equality of opportunity is a work-in-progress through the social commitment of all.
OWS takes the traditional Marxist notion of class, simplifies it and inflates it into two cartoons -- the 99 percent and the 1 percent. In the process, it manages to ignore about 150 years of Marxist discussion and debate.
May Day 2012 didn't have a concrete agenda, but it opened a forum for voices that are typically silenced and ignored. And while racist hostility pervades the mainstream political arena, Occupy may be one of the only spaces left for immigrants to speak up without fear.
The LGBTQTSGNC contingent's May Day march marks an important moment in the confluence of LGBTQ, immigrant rights, and economic justice movements. Increasingly, LGBTQ organizations have brought light to migrant and worker issues within LGBTQ community organizing.
For LGBTQ, particularly transgender, immigrants, the partnership between local law enforcement, federal agencies and Immigration Custom Enforcement (ICE) inevitably lead to violence.
With no advance arrangements, it was a little sketchy if we were going to be able to do it at all. Would there be a shut down intersection? Would people show up? Would police stop us? Would others like it?
Media hypocrisy about the Occupy Wall Street movement is old news. But the New York Times hit the "refresh" button once again with its coverage of the May Day demonstrations in New York and around the country on May 2.
