Greetings from Occupied Seattle
I arrived at the Occupation this afternoon to find about 60 people chatting in small groups and milling around. I decided to take a trip to City Hall and see what was happening there. I found my brothers and sisters there to be a little stand-offish, so I used the Occu-Potties and headed back to Westlake Plaza. I spent the rest of the afternoon talking to people with questions, and in an Outreach meeting.
The General Assembly began at 1930 tonight, with camper speak-out, followed by working group report-backs. We proceeded to proposals, which moved rather smoothly, other than an angry gentleman (I use the term loosely) who interrupted, proclaiming that he has a good job working for a millionaire and we want to take that away. After some shouting, Peace & Safety helped the man out of the crowd. Small arguments followed about whether we should have let him speak, but it was a moot point by then, as he was gone.
Again, proposals proceeded smoothly. We passed a proposal to allow the Media working group, in particular the livestream brothers & sisters, to speak to the police for information gathering & reporting purposes. After small discussion, it passed with no blocks.
We moved on to two proposals from the People of Color caucus. The first was a declaration of solidarity with indigenous peoples, and an acknowledgement that the land we are occupying belonged to them first. The declaration was well-written, and, this brother believes, necessary.
There was another interruption, as the police surrounded a Native American man who was praying on a rug. Initially it was thought they were going to arrest him during his spiritual ceremony, but once they understood, they let him be.
The next proposal on the agenda was that we change our local movement's name from Occupy Seattle to Decolonize/Occupy Seattle. This was a contentious issue, and very emotional. There were impassioned pleas from the POC caucus that we honor the people who were here for hundreds of years before us by approving the change of name. There was much resistance to the idea, and the responses from the opposing side were just as impassioned. The discussion became heated, with charges of racism and even white supremism being hurled around.
I couldn't support this name change. I voted neither for nor against, choosing to abstain because it is such a divisive issue. I become afraid that one group of brothers & sisters is inadvertently pushing our movement off-track by introducing some just and necessary proposals before their time has come. We must do all we can to acknowledge the peoples who were here before us, the peoples from whom this land was stolen. They and their descendants deserve our humble apologies and our respect, and we would benefit greatly from the wisdom of their traditional ways. However, more education is needed. We must reach out to each other and connect to foster understanding before these divisive matters come to a vote.
The name change proposal was defeated by a 2-1 ratio of votes. There was anger, and there were hurt feelings.
Before we could get past this blow to the movement and move on to the final proposal, there was another disturbance: the Parks & Recreation workers were removing personal items that were not attended to (the consider these items to be abandoned), and throwing them away. Brothers & sisters ran to the defense of their items, breaking up the general assembly, which did not reconvene.
I chose to leave after the Seattle Police Department arrested a woman for sitting on a yoga mat. They will take nearly any pretense to harass us now, including putting down a blanket or mat to sit on instead of the hard, cold ground. This instance was perhaps the most violent arrest I've yet seen during the Occupation, as officers knelt on the woman's back while they restrained her with hand cuffs. The crowd looked as if it might get ugly, so I chose that time to come home and reflect.
At this point, I truly do fear for this movement. It is clear that, despite all that we have in common, and everything that we have come together to fight against, there are deep divisions between us. Our process during General Assembly has been streamlined, and discounting the interruptions our assemblies are running more and more smoothly now, but perhaps there needs to be a waiting period, or a graduated introduction, for some proposals. Perhaps some proposals, those that may be predicted to be divisive, need to be introduced several days in advance, with an invitation to converse with the authors before they come up for a vote. This method might help the authors explain their feelings in a less heated and crowded arena, perhaps avoiding some of the divisions altogether.
Brothers and sisters, the events of this evening require further reflection, that I might peacefully rest tonight.
Solidarity.
