Getting organized isn't a bad thing, but there is a lot of evidence that the Tea Party was organized by Fox Cable News and got financial support from the Republican Party (and has been mostly taken over by the Religious Right)... so their 'organization' was opportunism from corporations and an already established political party, pushing aside the real grass roots group and co-opting it.
True. It definitely helps if you can hire an event organizer or crisis manager that does it for a living. Obama did that in his campaign as well - with the grass roots movement. (I think the Republican Party was borrowing from Obama's play-book, although Obama did a better job.)
I've done a lot of this sort of thing off and on. In college - they had a spontaneous uprising against our school's investment in apartheid in South Africa. I remember standing up in a room filled with 500 people and stating that if they wanted to be taken seriously to stop camping out in the front lawn of the Administration Building playing guitare and singing folk songs, and to write letters to the alumni, the board, and sit in the President's Office while they did it. Flood them with letters - and state clearly in those letters their concerns and demands. Which they eventually chose to do - and about six months later, the school disinvested in South Africa.
I agree that this is mainly spontaneous...but I think it would be more productive if they flooded the media and congress both state and federal with letters demanding the millionaire's tax be reinstated, regulations be enforced on corporations, and mergers/acquistions be more regulated and disapproved.
All they are doing now is annoying people who happen to be working on or commuting to and from Wall Street - and those aren't the people responsible for the problem nor can they do anything about it. Just as all the students camping out in front of the admin building were not attracting the attention of the board who made the decision to invest in South Africa, they were annoying their fellow classmates.
So far they are doing the expected and being treated like idiots by the people who can change things, and applauded by well the choir (it's not you and me and my flist they have to convince after all). They need to do the unexpected to be taken seriously by the people who can change things.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2011-10-05 04:14 pm (UTC)True. It definitely helps if you can hire an event organizer or crisis manager that does it for a living. Obama did that in his campaign as well - with the grass roots movement. (I think the Republican Party was borrowing from Obama's play-book, although Obama did a better job.)
I've done a lot of this sort of thing off and on. In college - they had a spontaneous uprising against our school's investment in apartheid in South Africa. I remember standing up in a room filled with 500 people and stating that if they wanted to be taken seriously to stop camping out in the front lawn of the Administration Building playing guitare and singing folk songs, and to write letters to the alumni, the board, and sit in the President's Office while they did it. Flood them with letters - and state clearly in those letters their concerns and demands. Which they eventually chose to do - and about six months later, the school disinvested in South Africa.
I agree that this is mainly spontaneous...but I think it would be more productive if they flooded the media and congress both state and federal with letters demanding the millionaire's tax be reinstated, regulations be enforced on corporations, and mergers/acquistions be more regulated and disapproved.
All they are doing now is annoying people who happen to be working on or commuting to and from Wall Street - and those aren't the people responsible for the problem nor can they do anything about it. Just as all the students camping out in front of the admin building were not attracting the attention of the board who made the decision to invest in South Africa, they were annoying their fellow classmates.
So far they are doing the expected and being treated like idiots by the people who can change things, and applauded by well the choir (it's not you and me and my flist they have to convince after all). They need to do the unexpected to be taken seriously by the people who can change things.