News Feb 23, 2012 at 4:00 am

Portland's Call for Protest Helps Shape National Occupy Agenda

Comments

1
Yes please, by all means children.
Go attempt to "shut down the corporations."
Or open a history book about the last few times that's been done.
2
Well now, looks like they've found some direction.

Some tips if they want to be taken seriously by the general public:
1.) No masked anarchists. You look like a bunch of troublemakers when you do that, like you're about to break something. Be completely open about who you are and conduct youselves in a civil manner.
2.) Don't break or vandalize anything. Don't glue ATMs like a bunch of high school kids. This is self-defeating.
3.) Lose the red Bolshevik flags. Usually there are a few of you carrying them as you march. Last I checked, that doesn't play well in most of America, it gives most people one more reason to be dismissive.
4.) If you really want to be taken seriously and even take a stab at irony, dress in business casual attire. Leave the hemp ponchos at home, comb your hair, wear khakis and a polo shirt. I'm not kidding. Not only will the likelihood of tear gas and arrests be reduced, but you will make more of a connection with the average citizen. All of those people who usually look at you in annoyance as they try to get to work might take a second to hear you out if you all look like them. Just sayin'.

Hope it all goes down without incident.
3
Here we go again.
Down Twinkles.
4
Well said, Average Citizen. It's amazing how few dipshits in black bandanas it takes to discredit a much larger group of average Joes and Janes with legitimate grievances. Take his words to heart, folks. Yes Men tactics will get us a lot further than Black Bloc shenanigans...
5
Hi, I just wanted to jump straight to the comments section to register my knee-jerk reaction to the headline. I would like to be as dismissive as possible while at the same time being neither clever nor insightful. If there's any stock jokes about bongos and body odor, I'd like to include a few. I may or may not read the article later. Okay, thanks guys!
6
Tommy - is it me that is supposed to be a 'yes man'?
Just because I have grown disallusioned by 'occupy' tactics and muddled themes, please don't take that to mean I don't share the core values of the beginning of this movement.
I too, as a blue-collar worker, am pissed off about tax structure and what I see as unfair distribution of wealth.
So, to me it is with great regret that I have to distance myself from this movement that claims to represent me.
If it were only the black bandanas, drum circles, or other stupid shit that went with this 'occupy', then I would be more forgiving of the extremes of the whole.
But it is so much more that I find disagreeable, and it pains me to see a 'movement' come about in my lifetime - one that I really want to embrace - do nothing more than play into the hands of power that be.
7
Fb: Google "The Yes Men".
8
"ALEC is not a lobby; it is not a front group. It is much more powerful than that. Through ALEC, behind closed doors, corporations hand state legislators the changes to the law they desire that directly benefit their bottom line. Along with legislators, corporations have membership in ALEC. Corporations sit on all nine ALEC task forces and vote with legislators to approve “model” bills. They have their own corporate governing board which meets jointly with the legislative board. (ALEC says that corporations do not vote on the board.) They fund almost all of ALEC's operations. Participating legislators, overwhelmingly conservative Republicans, then bring those proposals home and introduce them in statehouses across the land as their own brilliant ideas and important public policy innovations—without disclosing that corporations crafted and voted on the bills. ALEC boasts that it has over 1,000 of these bills introduced by legislative members every year, with one in every five of them enacted into law. ALEC describes itself as a “unique,” “unparalleled” and “unmatched” organization. It might be right. It is as if a state legislature had been reconstituted, yet corporations had pushed the people out the door. Learn more at ALECexposed.org."
9
Well, well, the juvenile anarchists strike again:
http://www.katu.com/news/business/Rocks-shatter-windows-at-banks-coffee-shops-140864923.html

I wonder if Occupy will publicly plead, if not order them to knock that shit off? Cue local news leading with stories about vandalism rather than what ALEC is and what it does...
10
@ Average Citizen -Occupy has no control over them any more than they have control over anything else
11
@10. I realize this. But an Occupy leader (if there is one) speaking in front of a camera at City Hall, with Sam Adams in the background, publicly denouncing this type of vandalism and asking for anarchist groups to cease and desist would go a long way towards getting the movement a little more cred in the eyes of the general public.

It's one thing to write an email saying you didn't do it. It's another to openly marginalize those who did, while you're surrounded by community leaders such as the Mayor and Chief of Police. Surely Sam and company would go for it.
12
Gladly, seems there wasn't much of a dust-up. Still, you don't exactly want the type of elements depicted in photos 4 and 12:
http://photos.oregonlive.com/photo-essay/2012/02/occupy_portland_rally_on_f29_d.html

And again, the masks! Seriously guys, stop taking cues from the Mujahideen. When you don't show your face, it makes it seem like you'd rather not have people associate you with your actions. What is there to hide?

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