Occupy Toronto: A Pumps and Brogues Movement

“Our society is run by insane people for insane objectives. I think we're being run by maniacs for maniacal ends and I think I'm liable to be put away as insane for expressing that. That's what's insane about it.” – John Lennon, before his murder by Mark David Chapman 

Why do some people find these occupations so incomprehensible?

One person was asked in a media interview, “what are you protesting? what do you want?” His response was, “if you have to ask you’ve got to much money.”

This is partially true but doesn’t quite nail it. It’s also about the complete disconnect that some have about the world we live in.

Call it naivete or gullibility or sheer stupidity or willful and self-serving ignorance. It exists. It’s a fact. And anyone who doesn’t get the Occupy movement suffers from this disease.

I got it right away. No-one had to tell me that the Occupy movement is about having a true Democracy. That was the point of the Arab Spring. It was a Democracy movement. That is also the point of the North American Autumn.

And no, many of us aren’t buying the deceptive delusion, the snake oil, that we’re being sold by the big media, big government which represents big corporate interests, the wealthy, etc. that we have a democracy, that we have rights, that those rights are protected.

We don’t have any of things. We have them on paper. We don’t have them in reality. If we did, there would be no need for an Occupy movement to push the envelope for a true Democracy. One that doesn’t just exist on paper. One that exists for each and every ordinary Citizen in reality.

The Occupy movement includes but is not limited to:

1. the rights of the ordinary Citizen to have an effective say in our society.
2. the economic protection of the wealthy and the economic abuse of the rest of us through the misuse and abuse of the tax dollars of those ordinary Citizens whose voices have been silenced.
3. the rank moral bankruptcy and corruption that infests our governments, corporations, institutions, professional associations, etc. today.
4. impunity of big corporations and the wealthy from being held accountable for criminal acts when they commit them.
5. impunity of police, intelligence and other security agencies from being held accountable for enabling the rogue agents in their midst and their abuses of power, misappropriations of government funds, etc. by turning a blind eye to their abuses and criminal acts.
6. the rights of ordinary Citizens that are violated with impunity regularly and those who are paid by ordinary Citizens through our tax dollars refusal to protect us from those violations or provide us with what we need to protect ourselves or criminally collude in those violations of the rights of ordinary Citizens.
7. the silencing, marginalizing, smearing, harassing, malicious persecution, and other extreme and systematic abuses of ordinary Citizens who speak out against these criminal acts, this moral bankruptcy, abuse of power, etc. as well as innocent ordinary Citizens who are subjected to these abuses for no other reason than they can be.

Amongst other things ….

Just ask anyone who is there.

Most importantly, it's about giving the voiceless a voice which has an impact on our world.

I'm a Web and Software Developer and I'm unemployed. 

I'll be there in my Business Casual suit, office pumps and briefcase.

If I'm going to get arrested for peacefully protesting, that's the image I want the world to see.