[lbo-talk] David Graeber interview on OWS

shag carpet bomb shag at cleandraws.com
Mon Oct 3 17:46:46 PDT 2011


i don't understand what SA and Doug are on about....

why do you care whether or not they have a laundry list of complaints or a three point program?

why does a political movement have to conform to your demands.

SA, you say that you'd be happier if they had three points of criticism of wall st. or something like that... i'm on stupid web mail and i don't feel like fucking looking for the post... anyway...

who gives a shit if you're happy about what they are doing. right now, the only thing that matters to them is what they're doing and why they're doing it. some guy sitting in washington D.C. who is not actually involved and doesn't intend to get involved isn't a person they care about it. i can't see why they should care about people who will never get involved. they're speaking to people like me who *will* support them, who will help out and get involved, who *will* send them money...

if their theory IS that the system they are working with is completely illegitimate, then why demand anything at all of any group, person, organization, or institution that you think is illegitimate? that's the theory: to ask this or that organization is to concede that power lies with those organizations. it is, from the get go, to say, "you're legitimate."

why do that? the whole point is that to ask is to empower those institutions, people, orgs., and practices. if you come to a situation and say, "please mr. government, would you make these laws for me?" youre' saying that power lies with this other entity, government. you immediately concede you are powerless. if you ask, 'please mr corporations, please create jobs for us." "please rich people, start giving us some of your money" - you're just acknowledging that you are powerless, that you must beg these people, orgs, and institutions.

if you just turn your back on all this and say, fuck that noise, we're going to get together and hold a big party and talk about what's pissing us off because, sometimes, you don't really know why you're pissed off or what you want until you've have a good long scream about it. so maybe it'd be good to find out who's out there, who else is thinking like us.. sometimes, what matters is to speak to one another and creating a shared set of sub-cultural understandings, symbols, and practices.

because one thing we know from the history of social movements is this: they have to have a shared set of subcultural symbols and practices. they have to have a shared language. protests, as several studies have shown, are not only about speaking to some targeted organization or institutions, it's mostly about speaking to each other - the people who share a point or points of view. and that's good because it creates solidarity. and a movement ain't going to go anywhere if they don't have practices that create and recreate solidarity over the long haul.



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