My response to "Paul Little", columnist for the NZ Herald regarding this tripe article that he wrote about Occupy in yesterday's Herald - http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10772341



 To say the least, the article purports blatant falsehood after blatant falsehood. Worse yet, it follows the same format as that espoused by complicit American social media companies as the current agreeable format for discrediting Occupy.



 Here follows my rebuttal to this latest episode of the NZ corporate media smear campaign against us.



Mr Little, it is heartening to know that you have visited our Facebook page. It is really important that ALL New Zealanders know that the internet can provide them with an encyclopedic and unadulterated picture of Occupy worldwide with content from millions of eye-witnesses and partcipants. Ordinary people, the vast majority with no prior association with each other, are collectively documenting and recording the evolution of the Occupy movement - the first 21 days of which your publication blacked out, as did the TV and radio news. It was that blackout that taught me to abandon 30 years of listening to/watching 1ZB, TV1, TV3, as I swiftly realised that the monumental events I was witnessing on the internet, were never going to be accurately reported by them, if at all.



At the present moment, 100s of 1000s of USA protesters are preparing to simultaneously shutdown every port on the West Coast of the US, to display their outrage. Outrage founded in not only the major political and socio-economic crimes that have been going unpunished, or the giant Ponzi scheme that is run by our banks, globally - but outrage at the fact that merely for raising these issues, for having a public voice, over 6,000 unarmed peaceful protesters in the Occupy movement worldwide have been arrested and/or detained, beaten, pepper-sprayed, tear gassed, shot in head with "less-lethal weaponry" (which means, probably won't kill you but might), rubber bullets, charged into by horses, stripped & sexually humiliated, fired, and/or smeared by corporate media.



You write: "I don't know why they call it an Occupy movement. The only thing they are occupying is their days, which are taken up with sitting around." That sitting around, Mr Little, has resulted in over 180,000 You Tube videos about Occupy, over 3000 cities worldwide simultaneously participating in a single protest movement; unmatched in history; and regular people of all ages, races, religions, political persuasions and idiosyncracies coming together to WORK towards a common goal.



Fixing the planet.



All our 'sitting around' has produced, just in our singular occupation, nearly 20 Working Groups of 3-15+ people each, staffed with citizens generously donating their skills and their time to provide for our population what institutions in possession of millions of our tax dollars, have failed to accomplish. Someone described it to me as "a true Truth and Reconciliation process" & that is exactly what it is - a place where people can put aside their differences & societally-imposed barriers to communication, transcending class, upbringing, victimisation or circumstance, working together. Overcoming social stigmas to achieve consensus with others.



You state "The protesters are mainly middle class - you can tell by counting their piercings - and are almost exclusively rather dim, which you can tell by listening to what they say, which is next to nothing." Well, I don't have any piercings, Mr Little. Nor do any of the other members of my Working Group, that I have ever noticed. As is the case with most Occupy protesters, I am a taxpayer, I am a ratepayer, I am employed and I am disgusted by the direction this country (and the vast majority of the world) is going. As fascinated as you seem to be with your fantasy of the personage of those who support Occupy, a less "dim" human being, would be more concerned with the messages than incorrectly stereotyping the messengers.



The rest of your article follows the Right-wing American corporate-financed social media guidelines for smearing Occupy. This starts by a pretense of sympathy with Occupy so as to appear to be coming from an approachable position - in your case, you say "Occupy Wall St was an almost exciting idea when it first occurred. Blocking activity on the real street of commercial shame had something going for it. As a metaphor, it was eloquent, almost poetic."



But what that is then coupled with, a denouncement of the movement; in your case, the completely glossed over "But the trouble with spontaneous protests is that they tend not to be well organised" as if it is a completely normal every-day occurrence for 3000 cities worldwide to burst into simultaneous protest against the corrupt political/economic system.



Next, you denounce the participants as "anarchists", claim that those who have joined did so by, in your words, "Oh, look a bunch of people getting together somewhere and staying there. Let's do that." rather than as a result of eye-witnessing historical events and injustices, live, online that continue to go completely unreported by organisations like yours.



Wake up to the reality Mr Little. The bought-and-sold media establishment is borderline defunct. Millions of people are seeing for themselves what you are paid to not tell them about. The game is up. How dumb do you actually think your readers are? (Oh, I'm sorry, not dumb, dim...)



In the greatest of ironies, all the brutality towards the movement, the bigotry, the distracting rhetoric, the demoralisation, the physical attacks, the online attacks, the litigation, have proved time and again to only help to grow Occupy. You end your article end with a demand to be convinced to participate, well without realising it, Mr Little, you ARE participating in the change, in your own way.



As a direct result of you writing a morally-fraudulent article, someone will read this response. Someone who may not otherwise have known to type into Facebook the word "Occupy" and then the name of any city they've ever loved, and see what is going on there.



They might not know to click "Everyone (Most Recent)" towards the top of the Occupy Auckland Facebook page to see all submitted posts, media content and user conversations.



They might not know to Google the movie "I am not moving" or "The Inside Job" or, if they'd like to see something even more amazing, to Google the words "Occupy Bat Signal Brooklyn Bridge".



They might not ever have seen the countless hours of live and unedited footage of the Occupy movement, available on www.ustream.com www.livestream.com & hosted through the websites of individual occupations (google the name of any occupation to find their website). This pure and raw footage is constantly uploaded 24/7, by citizen eye-witnesses livestreaming from around the world.



It is no longer for us to be told the news, at a scheduled time, in a manner and format befitting the financial backers behind the production of it. We no longer sit watching made-up caricatures of Ken and Barbie: the Y2K versions, parrot to us; we are far MORE satisfied by watching real people tell real stories and relate events as they happen - not "post-production". We have learned the secrets of our emancipation Mr Little.



You conclude by saying "You will have to give me a few options for doing something about it, preferably ones with more effect than going somewhere and sitting down." Well only you, can make you stand up, Mr Little. So if you take yourself down to an Occupation, check out the Working Group whiteboard, pick one that suits your skillset, put your name down to get involved, or go to the Workshop tent and schedule a free lecture on a topic that you ARE actually an expert on, then you will be able to begin participating in some of the "sitting around", and I guarantee you, you will be the better for it.



Occupy is a conduit, a vehicle, an infrastructure. But it is within your heart that the real "change" must first occur.



Author: [Suzie]

Admin @ Occupy Auckland Media Working Group