Oakland: The Next Wild, WIld West?

The Occupy Wall Street movement was the first to reach media publicity, and after that other 'Occupy' protests and marches followed.

For us in the Chicagoland area know the of the Occupy Chicago protest, one which held the same basic values of the Occupy Wall Street, and kept the same non-violence as its predecessor. Up until now, I have no problem with this kind of act. It is for the most part legal, people voicing their oppinion, and while I personally think that their demands and intentions are very hazy and poorly operated, I must still respect their actions. However, recent Occupy Oakland events have me startle. As I read in this BBC Article , what started as a fairly peaceful 'Occupy' initiative turned into what I would consider a full on riot.

As the article reports, "Protests on Wednesday were largely peaceful until around midnight local time, when some of the protesters reportedly set a barricade on fire."

However, the protesters did not stop there, BBC quoted reports  the police saying they gave the order to fire tear gas and bean bags "following repeated orders for the crowd to disperse" and in the face of "continued assaults by rocks, lit flares, roman candles and bottles" While no formal number was provided, the primary damage estimates were valued to be around one million. Also, human damages were also listed-around five protesters were hospitalized-including an Iraq War veteran.

While many public officials were upset with the protest-turned-riot in Oakland, other members of the 99% movement said they, too, were disapointed. Comments like, "I think it will allow detractors to criticise the movement," and, "It's messing with our movement," are not far from earshot.

I'm all for freedom to assemble and right to free speech, but when people take and abuse these priviledges and use them to incite harm and violence, no matter what they are saying, I'm not sure if I could ever support something like this incident. What do you think? Is there any justification for these actions? Did they take it too far?

*Note* This was originally published in November. Reposted in addition to recent protest blog. 

Illegitimizing Protesting

A lot of talk has been going around about the NATO summit last week, mostly about how effective the Chicago police were from the news outlets. In our American Studies class, we talked about this sort of
construction, and how many sources failed to adequately report on the actually 'demands' or reasons why the people were protesting. This, our class called unfair.

But I'm not really sure how unfair it was on the reporter's parts. First of all, what were they supposed to say. There were so many different reasons for why people were protesting, with so many nuanced opinion, it would have been impossible for any single new outlet to fairly represent them all. Furthermore, it would have been impossible, I feel, for the newspapers to 'adequately' report on the opinions of the protesters without making some of the protester's arguments for them. In my opinion, it is not the job of media and news outlets to spread the message for them.

The second reason why I feel the decisions made by the newspapers were more or less justified, is an illegitimization of the protests. This is certainly more prevalent in other protests, it can still be seen in some way in this recent example. In the case of many anti-war protests, it's always ironic when protests turn violent in one way or another. The Oakland occupy movement's image was very discredited when general riots, looting and violence broke out across the city. While the NATO summit's protesters were not as extreme as Oakland, any amount of disruption, spray painting, or prompting clashes with the police tarnishes all of the protesters image, and in many people's views, which could include various news outlets, discredits the protester's cause.

While, of course, the news are always looking for the exciting, juicy stories, maybe there is a deeper, more thoughtful, meaning behind the newspaper's decisions of what to write about.

A Tall Demand for Education

Quite recently, basketball icon Shaquille O'Neal earned his doctorate degree in education from Barry University. While this event does not just mark a significant achievement for Shaq himself, we can see an overarching idea across america, a drive for education.

Many blogs I've seen recently talk about the importance of education, and many of them are right. Education is something that near all Americans strive for. College also represents a vast distance between economic and social class, and can be seen as a means to bridge that gap. For many, college is more than just a piece of paper and some letters after the name.

For Shaquille, it was three things, reports ABC news:

 “One, I promised my parents I would [follow my passion for education]. Two, I wanted to continue my education and three, I wanted to challenge myself."

Shaquille O'Neal, a man with much recognition already, stands for what many American's believe in, achieving higher education. While many would have stopped at the bachelor degree or masters, Shaq drives home the point that education is both important and rewarding, with many traveling in his footsteps.

How important is college for most people? What kind of pressures are people facing to go to college? Who else is setting examples as Shaq did?