Please disseminate to everyone in and interested in the Occupy Wall Street movement. Thank you.
APRIL 8, 2012—FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
OCCUPY THE EAST END TO MOVEON.ORG:
WE WILL NOT BE HIJACKED!
We had been silent. We had hoped that the organizations that are attempting to co-opt and dilute the Occupy Wall Street movement would stop. The Occupy movements across the country are fighting for better lives of the 99% of Americans who work for a living. We had hoped that these interlopers would recognize that what they are doing is wrong.
But they have not done the right thing. Now it’s time to speak out and fight back.
A Democratic Party-affiliated organization, MoveOn.org, is actively attempting to hijack the Occupy Wall Street movement. This brazen co-option attempt began by mimicking the Occupy movement’s terminology and rhetoric, not to embrace it, but to channel our movement’s energies toward backing Democratic candidates and policies. MoveOn says: “MoveOn stands in solidarity with the brave protesters at Occupy Wall Street, but we’re not Occupy Wall Street and we’re not trying to become Occupy Wall Street.” If that’s true, why are they posting articles with titles like “Which Corporations Occupy Congress?” and sponsoring events with titles like “We Are The 99%?” This is “Astroturfing”* at its worst. MoveOn is creating confusion on purpose.
Ground Zero in MoveOn’s takeover attempt of Occupy is focused on the eastern end of Long Island in New York. Occupy the East End represents the OWS movement in the Hamptons and Shelter Island, which happen to be the most popular summer playground for the 1%.
Its most recent attempt to co-opt our movement is by scheduling a “99% Spring Training” by a MoveOn front group called “99% Spring” on April 15, 2012 at the same location and time where Occupy the East End has been holding its General Assemblies since the group formed in October of 2011. Occupy the East End delivered an unprecedented unanimous block—every OEE member at the GA issued a personal block—to a MoveOn representative who “asked” OEE to participate—after MoveOn had scheduled the event. The MoveOn rep refused to change the date or time and informed OEE that “you will be taken over [by MoveOn] whether you like it or not.”
We cannot be bought! We will not be co-opted!
Moveon.org is a political lobbying organization that routinely backs Democratic candidates and was originally funded by the billionaire George Soros. MoveOn.org is considered the “lead lobbying group” for Obama’s reelection campaign, and has overt ties to various Wall Street entities.
Occupy the East End is in no way affiliated with MoveOn.org, nor does it wish to become so. The attempt to take over OEE is a hostile takeover attempt to capitalize on the Occupy movement as a whole. Occupy Wall Street and Occupy the East End as a movement rejects the political system as a broken structure that needs to be overhauled from the bottom up.
Call To ACTION
Occupy the East End urgently requests the support of all Occupations and occupiers to rebuff this attempt to CO-OPT OUR movement. All Occupiers are asked to join us at the Windmill on Long Wharf in Sag Harbor, NY on April 15, 2012 at 12:30 pm to make your voice heard at the General Assembly of the REAL Occupy movement!
*Astroturfing: The creation of lobbying groups that appear to be separate from corporate interests, but that are actually funded by them. As opposed to “grassroots” political activism.
9 Comments.
Why can’t we get along and fight the real enemy, the Republicans? I hope down the line they change their mind and join forces with Moveon.
Occupy is over anyway. It’s like trying to sell 80’s pop or something, it had its day. It’s already spring and we had the mildest winter in ages, yet Occupy is nowhere to be seen – at least on TV. Where’s the revolution? Where’s the riots? Where’s ….. Occupy? I’ll tell you where. They’re either at their jobs or smokin’ a doobie at home, saying “that was fun for a while”.
The job market is picking up. The cops cleared out Occupy using a national strategy that busted its balls for good. Hell, it’s already spring. Winter is not that far away which is when Occupy packs up anyway. It’s over. Before it even started.
@Albert
Because Occupiers would rather be irritated then effective.
Seriously, this press release tells you everything you need to know about why Occupy is an irrlevancy. Here’s a hint: its by choice.
@ex
Mister, you don’t get to decide when a particular movement is “over with”. So it’s not on TV? Of course not. Do you really think the Powers That Be want it to be televised?
As for jobs. No, there hasn’t been any increase. It’s just another lie told by the PTB.
Frankly, i think you should get off your duff and start your own movement rather than bitterly complaining about another movement you don’t subscribe to.
Dear Susan, Meanwhile, while continuing to focus on Obama – as if he really has the ability to change everything you are angry about – the Supreme Court passed a law allow strip-searches for just about any infraction or percieved infraction of the law. You play right into the hands of the real power-brokers when you focus on the President, as if he can force the legislative and judiciary branch to do whatever he wants. Look what happened with Guantamano – he DID sign an executive order to close it, only to find that no one would do it. Do you really think he can control the world price of petroleum and fly over buildings in a single bound? Shutting down the federal reserve and putting banking and investment people in jail would have been more effective, but too late now – so keep focusing on Obama, and see where that will get you! :^)
“Frankly, i think you should get off your duff and start your own movement rather than bitterly complaining about another movement you don’t subscribe to.”
@Stark: You obviously have not read my previous posts, or only read what you wanted to read. I made my position 100% clear: Americans are not worth “getting off my duff for”, but if they WERE – I’d give everything I have (which is a lot, as it happens). But I don’t see shit worth getting off my duff for. Why? All I see is people who want to become nice obedient consumers. I see people who just want to be part of the system, make lots of money, buy that Lexus, a nice McMansion, trips to Europe, and (as one poster said) enjoy the 40 different types of cheese available at the wine shop.
My answer: Thanks, but no fucking thanks. I’m not getting my life fucked up, thrown in jail, maced, and so on – just so some dissatisfied consumers can become satisfied consumers.
American life is a fucking fraud, a fraud that has served me well. Until I see people recognize that fraud and really demonstrate they want no part of it – I’ll be MORE than happy to sit on my fucking duff. Of course, Americans simply do not HAVE the mental facility to see the fraud they live in, so I’ll be sitting on my duff for a long fucking time!
Enjoy your 40 types of cheese.
@exkiodexian: Let’s get something straight – according to you, Americans aren’t worth getting off your duff for, but they ARE worth defrauding? After all, you stated “American life is a fucking fraud, a fraud that has served me well.”
So you gleefully participated in the ass-raping of American consumers whom you now self-righteously decry?
Exactly what, on a moral level, distinguishes you from a war profiteer?
Susan, this guy isn’t complaining about Occupy, he’s MOCKING it. He thinks he’s above it all. By his own admission, he helped pillage the US of A, and now he’s sitting on his proverbial pile of gold, piously lambasting the very system that enriched him, and excoriating the very people off whom he leeched! To him, all those of us who didn’t profit as he did are fools, and doubly so – first for not embracing the prevailing paradigm at the expense of our fellow humans, and now for wanting to fight the powers that be, in order to bring about beneficial change for the masses.
He is telling us, in summary, to eat his shit.
No thanks. Tell you what, ex – how ’bout you eat MY shit.
1. OWS has the same problem as political anarchists: as soon as they try to organize themselves to accomplish something, they are no longer anarchists: anarchists are not organizable!
2. Move-on is a Democratic Party lapdog. I learned that at the first and only local Move-on meeting I attended.
@Whimsical
I don’t think the Occupy movement is irrelevant, they just need to evolve. They’ve teamed up with the labor movement, I’d like to see them team up with more established groups like Moveon and the Democratic Party and improve them. The people who are trying to hijack the Occupiers are the anti-Obama contrarians who just don’t want get anything accomplished and just want to complain.