Tahrir Square - Fall 2011
Why would any group wish for America to become another Egypt? Or for Washington, DC’s Freedom Plaza to become “our Tahrir Square”? Have we been paying attention to what’s happened in Egypt and Tahrir Square? What’s happened has been violence, riots, and killings, which have resulted in the Egyptian people’s having gotten a military dictatorship. Why would any group do this? To create a violent revolution that will overthrow our current government and “usher in” a new and “better” government:
11/19/2011 – ADBUSTERS: “#OCCUPYWALLSTREET is a leaderless people powered movement for democracy that began in America on September 17 with an encampment in the financial district of New York City. Inspired by the Egyptian Tahrir Square uprising and the Spanish acampadas, we vow to end the monied corruption of our democracy … join your local #OCCUPY! We’re now in DAY 64.” See: http://www.adbusters.org/campaigns/occupywallstreet
10/6/2011 – Stop The Machine! (a.k.a. Occupy DC) – “I pledge that if any U.S. troops, contractors, or mercenaries remain in Afghanistan on Thursday, October 6, 2011, as that occupation goes into its 11th year, I will commit to being in Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C., with others on that day with the intention of making it our Tahrir Square, Cairo, our Madison, Wisconsin, where we will NONVIOLENTLY resist the corporate machine to demand that our resources are invested in human needs and environmental protection instead of war and exploitation. We can do this together. We will be the beginning.” See: http://october2011.org/pledge
Video – 11/19/2011 – Violence erupts in Tahrir Square
Video – 10/17/2011 – Occupy Wall Street vs. Tahrir Square
Article/Video – Amy Goodman – 26 October 2011: From Tahrir Square to Occupy Wall Street: Asmaa Mahfouz’s message to US protesters proves the links between OWS and the Arab Spring are meaningful, not fanciful
Article – Thanassis Cambanis – OCT 25 2011 – Tahrir Square Meets Occupy Wall Street
“The same non-violence non-profits who take CIA money when they can get it (I’m not talking about ICNC, which just shares an accountant, has parallel goals, and whose president used to work there; ICNC has enough junk bond money to operate on its own) also give non-violent communication trainings and are inserting themselves wherever they can in the OWS movement. In DC, this is particularly worrisome, since the think-tank/lobbying/pro-USG logic is so hegemonic. And I’ve received four email invitations this week to attend think tank and right-wing academic seminars on What the Occupy Wall Street Movement Means and Why it Should Matter to Me. Framing is everything. Who gets to speak, what they get to say, whether their whole movement can be invalidated because somebody got justifiably angry and threw a rock. We don’t need to be tackling the rock-thrower. People throwing rocks doesn’t explain or justify the police violence I saw and felt in Oakland last Tuesday. We need to be tackling the derivative Christian logic of non-violence (but lacking the possibilities of liberation theology) that chastises the oppressed for rising up against the oppressor, using fictitious narratives about Egypt’s and Eastern European countries’ “revolutions” as legitimation. And when people come to town claiming to speak for a revolution and making their way into lefty media with the same bland lies, we need to be asking who is paying for their plane ticket, and why the hell are they not back at home, where their “revolution” is not in great shape at all.” ~ Professor Adrienne Pine – American University, Washington, DC
Source: Resisting the Cult of Non-Violence
Article – The Serbian Connection to International Unrest
Article – Facebook and People Power- The View From Tahrir Square
Article – Global Nonviolent Action Database – Egyptians Campaign to Oust President Mubarak, 2011 – 2011-08-24
Video – OTPOR/CANVAS agent Ivan Marovic at OWS
Article – 10/24/2011 – OTPOR/CANVAS Egyptian agent Ahmed Maher is working with Stop The Machine in Washington, DC
Video: Egypt – After the “Revolution”
Video: William Engdahl: Arab Spring a western ploy to control Eurasia
Video: Otpor – The Revolution Business
Text – CANVAS Core Curriculum – A Guide to Effective Nonviolent Struggle (Student’s Book)
Audio – Occupy Wall Street/Occupy DC Marxist Ted Rall advocates violent revolution
Article – OWS – Occupy Oakland: Lumpenproletariat Mobs Incited to Revolt Against the Capitalist Ruling-Class
Video: The American Form of Government
Video: Which form of government is this?
Video – Dr King’s peaceful march on Washington
Video – Angry Masked Mob (Occupy Oakland) Invades Oakland Case Bank Branch
Video – Angry Masked Mob (Occupy Oakland) Invades Oakland City Streets and Meets Police
Video – Stop The Machine! Invades Public Museum in Washington, DC
Video – Stop The Machine! (aka Occupy DC) – Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) and Bob Avaikian supporter
Article – The socialist smashing of the American political system
“Those of us in the peace community, including those who directly support the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict, should ask hard questions about its role. Criticizing the ICNC and the associated Albert Einstein Institution is not to say that violence is an acceptable solution to social problems. In this regard, there are many radical anti-capitalist groups utilizing nonviolent action to fight their adversaries, though activists might exercise caution in advertising the good work of any specific activist organizations — in 2008, a young man called Sean Kirtley was convicted for “merely updat[ing] a website with details about authorised and peaceful protests” and subsequently sentenced to four and a half years in a British prison, of which he served sixteen months before being acquitted on appeal. Massive displays of nonviolent resistance have always been an essential component to challenging oppression successfully. One can only hope that Western citizens will learn from contemporary history and rise up to overthrow the ultra-violent warmongers who manage their countries too, mindful of the fact that nonviolent liberal institutions are routinely complicit in the brutality of the systems they ostensibly criticize.” ~ Michael Barker
Source: Capitalising On Nonviolence
America - Fall 2011
Pingback: Occupy Washington DC/Stop The Machine (Freedom Plaza) and Otpor/CANVAS « A. J. MacDonald, Jr.