Occupy Oakland

Occupy Oakland • Aaron Joseph

Dedicated to Occupy Oakland

Original Cover Art by Joanie Mitchell (Color added by Aaron Joseph) See more of Joanie’s work here: http://www.joaniemitchell.com Edited by Chris Collision & Tim Colwell To order a hard copy of this book, visit http://www.aarondavidjoseph.com.

To view an online version, visit http://www.issuu.com/adj.media

Written and Designed by Aaron Joseph in Oakland, California in 2011 and 2012 • © Copyright 2012 All Rights Reserved The electronic version of this text is free to link to. Please do not duplicate, take, or publish color screenshots of the photos as they are the also the original work of the author. Please contact Aaron via his website to discuss obtaining a free or low-cost PDF for educational and artistic purposes or use within the Occupy movement. You are free to publish excerpts of this text, but please make an effort to let the author know where it will appear. You may purchase a hard copy of this book at http://www.aarondavidjoseph.com.

Please report unfortunate errata at http://www.aarondavidjoseph.com

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acknowledgements Thank you to Chris Collision and Tim Colwell for the kind donation of your time and editing skills.

Thank you to Joanie Mitchell for letting me use your beautiful drawing of the Occupy Oakland encampment on the cover of this piece.

Joanie’s Website: http://www.joaniemitchell.com foreword by bay area artist jonie mitchel In Ocotober and November, 2011, Occupy Oakland was encamped in Oscar Grant Plaza (Frank Ogawa Plaza) in downtown Oakland. I was drawing the scene and Aaron Joseph, then unknown to me, was recording his experiences at the camp.

I was moved by Aaron’s eye witness account, clear, simple, honest, humble and resting deeply in his own truth.

The encampment is part of Oakland’s history now, Occupy is reinventing itself in new ways. But the spirit of Occupy is alive and strong. There is nothing that can destroy an idea whose time has come.

(Originally published in Joanie’s book, Occupy, which Aaron and Joanie collaborated on.)

preface I never expected this writing to be 51 pages long! When the spark of this idea came to me, I thought it might be a few pages. I just had a really strong urge to tell the story of Occupy Oakland to my friends and peers--especially those not involved with the protests. They seemed almost fearful of this beautiful and vital local encampment as well as unsure of the Occupy Wall Street movement at large. I also wanted to clarify my position on the Occupy movement for myself. This piece was primarily written over the period from just before the first the October 25th raid on on the Occupy Oakland encampment into the following week or so (roughly October 20th through November 10th, 2011). Tenses shift because I was writing about these events both during and after said events.

Some of my opinions have changed since the writing: I’m much more concerned than I already was about OPD’s actions toward protesters. I’m much more suspect of Mayor Quan. I’m also much less involved with Occupy Oakland in terms of direct action. This piece has become the most important work I can bring to Occupy Oakland. Now that it’s done, I hope to re-engage with the movement directly.

Initially, I didn’t feel right about trying to sell any of this writing. I wanted to donate my time and effort. This is a labor of love, definitely. After much consideration, I have decided to make this writing available to read for free online through my personal website (http://www.aarondavidjoseph.com) and for purchase as a hard copy and/or ebook. During the final stages--designing the layout; rewriting; archiving existing articles for footnotes; etc.--I attended an art show at Uptown Body & Fender during Oakland’s Art Murmur. Half of the space was devoted to artists who had participated in Occupy Oakland. They were selling their photographs and artwork. I realized that an economy based upon creative expression and our personal experiences at Occupy Oakland is a wonderful thing. I think it’s perfectly in harmony with Occupy’s ethos as I understand it. We won’t let corporations package up our ideas and sell them back to us. If anyone is going to profit from them, it ought to be us. Also, I’m a visual artist first and foremost, and this is my first attempt of writing on this scale.

Occupy Oakland

PEOPLE WERE FED FOR 13 CONSECUTIVE DAYS, DAY OR NIGHT, NO QUESTIONS ASKED, WITH NO MONEY CHANGING HANDS. Many who are not actively engaged with this/these movement(s) often remark that there isn’t a coherent, unified message for the Occupy Wall Street movement, and that as a result the movement might be ineffective. That our protests are “useless” as a friend of a friend on Facebook termed them.

Well, occupiers and protesters are there for many and varied reasons. Corporate greed, government reform, tax reform, poverty, housing, gang injunctions, bank reform, capitalism, and equality are just some of the many issues that have driven people to occupy public spaces around the world. All shades of commitment, engagement, and extremism are part of this movement. Some of us are there in solidarity and peaceful protest, facing off with police (who are part of the 99%). Some individuals (and very few from my experience) are there to antagonize others and shake things up. Some of us are just curious about the camp and the movement.

There are very nearly as many reasons to take a place among the Occupy Wall Street Movement as there are occupiers.

This is an indicator of the level and variety of dissatisfaction with our current governmental, financial, social, and other systems. This level and variety of dissatisfaction makes it difficult to distill one coherent, unified message.

However, there remain some clear unifying principles of and lessons from the Occupy Movement, and it is hasty, presumptuous, and incorrect to dismiss this Movement as ineffective or useless.

Since my experience has been with the Oscar Grant Plaza camp, I will stick to talking 1

about that camp and the surrounding protests in the city of Oakland. My time spent in and around the camp has been very special to me. To me it is a micro-society that governs itself in a largely successful way. Anyone (with some media and law enforcement exceptions, which I will discuss later) has a place in the camp simply because they choose to be there. People have direct control of their lives there. If a community-level problem arises in the morning, it can be resolved by sundown via group discussion, camp meetings, and other democratic practices.

Existing residents of the streets of downtown Oakland, occupiers, passersby and others for

whom a next meal is uncertain were fed at any time, day or night, for 13 consecutive days.

Light medical care, mental health, public security, conflict resolution and de-escalation services were in place. A place for children accompanied by their parents to safely experience the camp was offered. And no one was asked for money or to meet

any qualifications. Simply put, Oscar Grant Plaza has been a functional, effective environment; this is a claim the city of Oakland cannot always make.

This movement is not without its problems. There are things I don’t agree with, such as violence. There are people and groups involved that I would prefer were not, mainly those

involved in violent action. However, the massive scale of these protests and the variety of strategies used therein are indicative of deep, systemic problems that we will not let go unaddressed any longer. This is another aspect of the movement’s efficacy.

It is not useless.

MY UNDERSTANDING OF THE OCCUPY WALL STREET MOVEMENT It is said by many that the top 1% of Americans own 90% of the wealth in this country. It turns out that “the richest 1% of the US population ... own a third of US net worth.”1,2 America is a large, populous, wealthy country: therefore, our economy currently affects the global economy; and let’s try to remain mindful that our American definition of “poverty” is a pretty good living in large

swaths of the world. The wealthiest Americans have effectively achieved The American Dream-which, since the 50s, has seemed more and more unrealistic and naive for anyone who hasn’t already found financial success.

They don’t have to worry about housing, health care, food, or retirement. Members of the 1% might argue that their ancestors started from nothing; built their businesses from the ground up; worked tirelessly, etc. This

1 Simon Rogers, “Occupy protestors say it is 99% v 1%. Are they right?” The Guardian’s (UK) Datablog, 16 Nov. 2011 <http://bit.ly/x67eXt>. Spreadsheet file from the site: <http://bit.ly/AnjSeM>. Archive of the spreadsheet hosted at Google Docs: <http://bit.ly/AnjSeM>.

2 The World Top Incomes Database <http://g-mond.parisschoolofeconomics.eu/topincomes/>

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is probably true in many cases.

However, many of these businesses have made record profits after laying off many, many workers, outsourcing jobs, and so forth.,3 Many of these laid-off American workers have never been reinstated. Companies have learnt how to operate in a leaner and meaner manner.

Good for them, bad for us here at ground level.

Companies aren’t reinvesting those record profits in new facilities and research and development that would create new positions for the currently unemployed. They aren’t offering current employees better or more affordable health care plans. They’re offering the minimum amount of benefits allowed by law to their employees. They’re combining existing positions into single existing positions without an increase in pay. They aren’t even paying

taxes at the rate average people are. CEOs “earn” paychecks that are orders of magnitude higher than salaried and hourly employees.

Profits sit and accrue interest for those companies and their investors. Profits sit in the bank accounts of executives and shareholders and board members, accruing more interest, driving down the value of our little piles of cash. Profits sit there not doing anything but making them wealthier and us poorer.

And then there are the banks.

We end up paying them for the privilege of letting them make money off of it under the guise of ensuring its safety for us. They’re offering us great services like debit cards and online banking, right? And it really is to our benefit to let us overdraw our accounts that we keep trying to fill up but never

quite can. It’s to our benefit to save us the embarrassment of having our cards declined at all those fancy dinners that we’re supposed to be eating, right? We make noise about overdraft fees, they graciously give us the option to opt our of the overdraft “protection” programs, then invent new fees to make up for their loss of profit.

Now, about those overdrafts: we’re not blameless. We should be keeping a running total of our balances, but they made it convenient for us by giving us a seemingly up-to-date online statement of our accounts. But we end up getting overdrafts anyway. I once lost $300 in a month in overdraft fees from Bank of America. Like I said, I’m not blameless, but when I looked online, everything I saw said the money was there. I hear similar stories from my friends and acquaintances often. And

3 Compiled by Henry Blodget, “CHARTS: Here’s What The Wall Street Protesters Are So Angry About ...” <http:// read.bi/wSY6YP>

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Taken on my walk home the morning of the second raid of the encampment.

the banks didn’t design those online systems to be confusing by accident. That protection from embarrassment mentioned above comes with a cost, like protection money paid to the mob. They want us to get deeper and deeper into debt so we owe them more and more. Then they get bailed out with our tax dollars and don’t give anything back.

And about that American Dream: it’s not accessible anymore. The resources that were available to those pioneer business-starters aren’t available anymore. Some people have been systemically kept out of that resource loop from the beginning of this country and its economy (see: minorities, gays, women, the unfortunately go-to “usual suspects”). We’ve all made a lot of headway in getting on a more level playing field, but it’s still not level. And now that’s it’s less about race and gender and orientation and

minority status, the lines have been drawn between the rich and everyone else.

Money managers literally gamble with our money. They bet on the economy like we might bet on a football game. They bet that next quarter the economy will be good or that it will be bad. Those money managers individually make millions if they bet correctly. With our money.

Editor’s note: “Expert” “analysts” like these money managers--in companies like Moody’s or Standard & Poor’s--issue ratings and forecasts that are taken as infallible gospel by other companies, despite the colossal losses by and corruption in their own houses.

Lately, these agencies have taken it upon themselves to downgrade their ratings of various nations’ credit itself, damaging these countries’ ability to free up money to, yes, redistribute to those in need. One wonders if they’d be so aggressive with the

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red pen if their work promised to hamper the ability of the super-rich to amass further wealth.

- Chris Collision

We don’t get a share--not compared to their massive-profit/ minimal-loss situations.

LET’S TAKE A BREATH Let me preface things with saying that until Occupy Wall Street came along, I felt completely disenfranchised from and disenchanted with politics and the media. I grew up in the Bay Area, where there is a long history of political activism: From the Black Panthers in Oakland to the Free Speech Movement in Berkeley, to Queer rights movements. I was an activist in high school. I was taught that protest is a right and a vehicle for change. I came out as gay at 14 years old, helped found a Gay/Straight Alliance the same year in my high school, and helped organize a

trip to Sacramento to petition lawmakers to add language to the state’s constitution that would protect queer students in our school system. We spoke up and the bill passed. I literally spoke to a senator’s aide, was well-received, and I later saw the law take effect. I learned that activism could work.

Then 9/11 happened two years after I graduated high school. I protested with hundreds of others that evening in Berkeley. We marched from downtown Berkeley to University and 6th street and stopped traffic in the intersection there. I protested against retaliating with war. More dead citizens of this country and others, in my view, would not solve anything. I held a sign that said, “Do We Need More Dead to Mourn?” Call me a bleeding heart. I was young and impassioned, but I didn’t want to come out in radical full-force: I thought screaming about warmongers in this country on the

evening of that horrible event would be unproductive and not well-received by onlookers. I also wanted to show respect to those who perished in that horrible event.

I marched again a few days later in San Francisco. I saw what I-despite media reports--continue to believe to be at least 1,000 people in a peaceful protest against the coming war. That night, I watched the news and learned that what is reported isn’t always the truth. We were called a “small but loud” minority of a few hundred protesters.

It was so dismissive. Then came all the American flags and false and trendy patriotism for the next few years. Patriotism meant you supported the war.

My patriotism was demonstrated through democratic peace actions of protest. I no longer trusted the media. George W. Bush was elected. Twice. Under suspicious circumstances.

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I didn’t believe in the political system to the same degree I had in high school, and I felt that our voices were absolutely not being heard. That we were completely ineffective. I remember Bush or Cheney saying something to the effect of “Those protests will in no way sway our decision making.” We were called un-American by the government, the media, and our fellow citizens which always made me think of the House Un-American Activities Committee, which terrified me. And I didn’t want to be American in the same way they were American. Why did they get to define what American is, anyway?

Then I fell in love with Obama, was poised for change, and have since been let down. (I don’t hold the man in low esteem like a lot of other liberals do, but that’s another editorial. 12/17/11 update: After this indefinite detention of US citizens business, I’m not so sure I don’t hold

him in low esteem) Palin, the one-woman variety show “politician”, came along and I was--and continue to be--sickened by her antics. The fact that anyone can possibly think she would be a good leader to head us in the “right” direction terrifies me.

And now OWS. And my activist self lit up and it felt right.

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MY IMPRESSION OF THE CAMP I don’t see myself reflected in most of America. I’m a multi-racial, (my mom is white, my dad is black with some amount of American Indian ancestry) politically progressive and queer male-bodied man.

None of these attributes are more unique or important than the fact that I am right-handed or prefer cats to dogs, but they are visible and ideological differences that, when combined, inhabit none of what I see on TV, in movies, read about in popular literature or see on the Internet. I kind of have to go to one website for this, read this book for that, hang out with this friend to feel connected to this rather than go to one place for every kind of cultural identification. I don’t know if other people who are less “Othered” have similar experiences but I imagine they do. I could be wrong. I’ve always felt uniquely Other. As I get to know more and more people, I find this is not an isolated feeling. Everyone does to some degree. But it has been my experience.

I had it in my head that Occupy Oakland was going to start on Wednesday, October 12th. I don’t know why, I probably misremembered a flyer. I knew that I was interested. There was an internal spark I felt that I hadn’t since my 9/11 war protests. Then I realized it had started on Monday, October 10th. I had serious misgivings about even going down there. I just wasn’t sure what it was about. I wasn’t sure what I had to do with it. I didn’t know what form it would take.

I imagined either a bunch of local hipsters or serious revo-

lutionaries and that in either case I would stick out like a sore thumb. It turns out that both local hipsters and serious revolutionaries are in this movement, but they’re not out of place-I’m not out of place, and YOU wouldn’t be either!

Well, on Friday, October 14th, I was at a meeting about getting and staying sober (whose traditions prevent me from identifying myself by name if I identify them as a group. This group’s traditions prevent it from supporting outside causes, as well), and I overheard someone talk8

ing about creating a new sobriety meeting at the Occupy Oakland camp. I was very intrigued and this seemed like my “in.”

I made plans to meet up with this person the following day, and I got there and I couldn’t find him. So I walked around a bit and I saw this tent camp in front of Oakland’s City Hall at what had previously been called Frank Ogawa Plaza.

I was struck by the openness of the encampment. I guess I thought there would be some sort of door or line to cross, but I just walked in, feeling more in

place than out of place. I have to admit that all those tents looked imposing from the outside, but I was really curious and took a walk inside, noticing many signs about many and varied issues.

I saw the kitchen tent, the supply tent, the internal media tent, the info tent, the medic tent, the Berkeley Liberation Radio tent (I used to volunteer there on my friend’s radio show), and streets made out of wooden pallets. The ground was covered in wood chips or hay. Who had had the foresight to put down wood chips and/or hay on the ground?

I was impressed by the rapid physical organization of space that happened in five days. In a way this is what I’d been waiting for. Everybody was there. Everybody in the sense that there were hipsters and grandmas and hippies and squares and families and, well, you name them.

They were there. I made my way to the amphitheater, and I don’t know that I had ever taken notice of the amphitheater in

front of City Hall. I saw groups of people gathered together talking about the movement. I couldn’t find my sober friend.

I saw a small group of people with a cardboard sign saying “QUEER.” I walked near them, then away. I was hesitant to sit down with them. Would they think that was weird for me to just sit down? Did I have anything to contribute? Did I really want to get involved? Then I drifted back to the tents. Then near again. Called my sober friend. Left a message. Then without thinking I just sat in on the queer meeting. I thought to myself, “I’ll just hold my tongue and listen.”

By the end, I had chimed in on camp security issues, offering my idea for a buddy system even though no one, myself included, wanted to feel like they couldn’t take care of themselves, but the consensus seemed to be that it was probably safest to travel with others, 9

just in case. An incident had occurred involving one of this meeting’s members who was volunteering as a medic in the tent set up for that purpose.

Someone approached him while he was alone in the tent (which was really more of a booth, it wasn’t totally enclosed) and said, “I’m occupying this space now!”

He was basically saying that it was now his space and that the medic should leave. It came to light that there had been other incidents with this gentleman and that he had some mental health concerns. This is where I asserted my recommendation for a buddy system, and suggested that the situation could have been avoided or less threatening if the medic had not been alone at the time. Then I realized that my choice of words might have come off as “Well what the hell were you doing alone in the medic tent at 4 a.m.?” So I apologized on a group level to the medic. This gave way to a conversation about the intention to

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include and accommodate those living in their own realities. My feeling was that once someone became violent, they should be ejected from the camp, regardless of their perception of reality.

In the ensuing conversation I learned that there were people in the camp, organized by a committee called Safer Spaces, who worked to de-escalate situations like these. They were to be identified with green arm bands.

At the same meeting, I also managed to end up taking on the responsibility of designing a webflyer and helping with publicity for a march that we ended up planning at the meeting.

This was the foundation for the Occupy Oakland Queer and Ally March of Tuesday, October 18th.

There was also talk of a “Queer Villa” to be made out of a potential group of tents. It never materialized.

I went home energized, ready and nervous to take part in this

movement. I made the flyer, emailed it to my contacts gained from the meeting, and then realized it might be a good idea to create a slightly more anonymous email address from which to send out this information, because I was going to send it to every queer organization listed on the The Center in SF’s website (www.sfcenter.org). I became concerned about being labelled a “ring-leader” or being on “a list” if anything went haywire at the march, but it became really important to me to do this despite my concerns.

It is worth noting that since 9/11 I have never not been pulled for extra screening when flying so maybe I’m already on their lists.

But then: I did volunteer for The Commemorator (the Black Panthers’ newspaper) for a couple weeks.

Experience has shown me that no lawyers will have me on the jury now when I’m called up for jury duty. I did make a lot of 11

art about the Symbionese Liberation Army in art school. It’s mostly a fascinating story to me, I’m no self-styled SLA revolutionary or anything.

Am I really on a list? Am I overestimating my ability to get the attention of the CIA or Homeland Security or whoever maintains this mythical list? Do I like to fantasize that I am on such a list? A little. But I digress. Let’s just say that I have an active fantasy life, or I did in college.

The day after the queer meeting I was running some errands and my friend texted me to see if I wanted to grab lunch. I texted back saying that sounded good and that I wanted to go spend some time at Occupy Oakland.

She replied saying, “I’m not into occupying, of course, but we could grab lunch.” And that “of course” sticks with me to this day. I began to perceive that there was this knee-jerk reaction to the Occupy Oakland encampment and activities by many of

Flyer for the Queer March

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my friends and acquaintances.

The reaction seemed to be one of fear, concern, and a need to distance oneself from anything Occupy-related. This sentiment was echoed on friend’s of fiend’s Facebook pages, as well as twitter feeds, and Google+ Nearby lists. There were statements of support and solidarity as well, but both sides--supportive and distanced--were clearly visible to me.

I stood in a rally where a man who may have been Danny Glover (I heard a few days later that he had spoken, but I wasn’t sure it was him when I saw the speech) made a beautiful speech. Lawmakers from Sacra-

mento spoke in support of Occupy Oakland (this was before the public speaking procedures were really established at the camp and when it was decided that no one would be treated as a “celebrity” speaker). An oversized petition was hung and signed by many in the crowd. I forget each point of the petition but health care for all was there.

I signed it. A 60s style protester who was likely a protester in the 60s began a round of protest songs.

My friend and I met for lunch.

I told her how exited I was about Occupy Oakland but that I wasn’t sure what my place or level of engagement would be.

She decided she was willing to check it out. She’s a musician, and there was a band performing so we paused to watch that.

They incited some chants at the end that were largely about how Oakland belongs to “us.”

She was very enthusiastic about returning those chants. I asked if she wanted to check out the camp. She said was “scared to go in there.” I explained that it looked a little intimidating from the outside but it was really amazing inside. We started toward the tent city but she opted not to go in.

WHY I JOINED UP From 2008 to 2010 I worked as a contractor for a small web developer division within a major American corporation known for making cell phone handsets. I signed a small novel of a contract upon accepting the job, so I’m nervous about mentioning them here by name.

Having graduated from college with an as-yet-less-than-fruitful

Bachelor of Fine Art in 2006 and only able to find work as 13

a waiter or barista (work that I had been able to get before and

during college), I was thrilled at this opportunity. My contract was for two years. I’m not arguing that there was any contract violation; employment-at-will was part of the contract and completely legal in the State of California. A year in, large numbers of my coworkers were laid off. I watched that office become emptier and emptier over the next six months. My relative longevity was due to the fact that I took on multiple roles (at the same pay rate) and therefore could be kept around longer. I expressed interest in advancing there, but I wasn’t really given a choice about taking on more duties that I hadn’t really signed up for. They literally pushed these on me. Eventually my time came. I was laid off and given the option to work through the end of my shift or leave immediately (as opposed to being escorted from the building by a security officer), my choice. I took this as a tiny sign of appreciation from the

office manager.

The work was creative enough to satisfy my artistic side, and almost enough to pay my rent and bills for my practical needs.

I worked very hard there. It was always a challenge to make ends meet. I could have done worse and I was thankful for the work, but I did feel quite taken for granted there. Now I would love to have that job back.

The expensive and largely unused health insurance plan (I was healthy, thankfully and hadn’t needed to utilize it much outside of prescription coverage) my contracting company offered was gone at that moment. I had never had or been offered dental insurance during my time there. A raise was basically out of the question. I was hired at $13.50 as a Production Artist. Shortly before the layoffs began, I was told that I would be trained for technical support by phone for the self-service web sites we created. I also became 14

part of an “Elite Squad” (they really called it that) of designers who had more responsibility and copywriting responsibilities as well as more accountability for errors on the websites we created. I experienced that “leaner and meaner” company ethos mentioned in the beginning of this account. I asked for a raise and was told in turn by my contract company and the job site that the other was responsible for increasing my pay.

So no raise.

Another note about health care: I have struggled with depression since high school. After being prescribed many different kinds of medication and participating in a lot of therapy, I’ve found that Paxil is the most side-effect free medication that makes life livable for me. I’ve been hospitalized twice in college for depression so this medication is really not an option for me, it’s a necessity. Luckily I had insurance during my hospitalizations.

I continue to go to therapy at a not-for-profit counseling center in San Francisco. The therapists are volunteer social workers and they are doing invaluable work, but they are not psychiatrists and cannot prescribe or monitor medication. They are supervised by a psychiatrist but he can’t monitor all the patients, and the center isn’t licensed to dispense or prescribe medication. So I was left without a prescription for a time because I couldn’t afford a private doctor. Paxil is hell to stop abruptly. There are not official withdrawal symptoms but I have never felt so awful in my life as when I went off it.

nausea, headaches and extreme emotional sensitivity make my life almost completely unlivable. (not to make light of it, but maybe to lighten the mood: Rosie the Robot from The Jetsons once made me cry during one of these “withdrawal” episodes. She just tries so hard!)

They don’t tell you this when you start taking it. At least they didn’t when I started taking it. It was new to the market then and doctors (misinformed by drug companies who clearly didn’t complete clinical trials) promised no side effects. Avoiding that kind of torture shouldn’t be a privilege of the rich who can afford health care.

Going without it because I can’t afford it or don’t have a prescription for it hardly helps.

The resulting additional depressive symptoms are the least of the problem. Electric jolts, five in a second, repeated with every thought or spoken word throughout my entire body,

During the time between my layoff in 2010 and now, when it’s almost 2012, I’ve worked as a waiter and a barista again. I spent much of that time completely unemployed--more time unemployed than not--and it wasn’t for lack of looking. I looked in my field of Graphic 15

Design, sending out at least one résumé a day for months, hearing nothing back.

Unemployment Insurance has been saving my life. It’s not enough, however. I’ve been volunteering as a lab monitor and Photoshop instructor at an Oakland senior center (which has received massive financial cuts along with all other community services and state-sponsored education). I’ve organized two art shows of the seniors’ work in the community of Oakland. I’m trying to give back to the community services I’ve had to use. I’ve been utilizing Highland Hospital for my health care needs because I can’t afford private health insurance.

I haven’t been to the dentist in 10 years because I took dental insurance for granted when I had it and I haven’t had the option to get it through work since 2007. I’ve used local food banks because I can’t afford groceries sometimes.

Like every other student I know, I have massive amounts of debt totaling at least $50,000. I don’t see how I can ever pay it off. I’ve been able to delay payment for quite some time due to lack of income or because I’m taking classes at community college at least half time. But someday the extensions on forbearance will run out and I don’t know what I’ll do. Choosing to go to art school may not have been the best idea, but I do have marketable skills. I focused on fine art in school, but I also learned and have continued to learn design and 3d illustration programs.

There just aren’t enough available jobs. I’m lucky to have found employment at a local

newspaper as a freelance ad designer, and I’m so grateful for it.

I love it there, but they can only afford to take me on two days a week and that does not pay the bills. But I still have it really good compared to the millions of unemployed people in this country and around the world. I am also incredibly lucky to have family, especially my mother, close by. They help me immensely, financially and otherwise. They are by no means rich.

As part of the 99%, I am asked to pay my fair share of taxes.

I’m willing to pay more in taxes to ensure that public services can continue to serve those who need them, myself included. I am very pro-tax, in fact. There is

no incentive for the 1% to let go of their tax breaks. They don’t need senior centers or subsidized rest homes; they hire private care. They certainly don’t need food stamps, so they don’t see a need for their money to support welfare programs. They don’t have a vested interest in a good public school system; they send their kids to private institutions. They can afford health care. In fact, they are the health care system. At least where health insurance is concerned.

Of course they demonize socialized health care. They don’t need it and it would cut into their profits. No wonder these are the first things to be cut in difficult financial times.

HOW I JOINED UP I showed up. That’s really it.

What is really powerful to me about this movement is that there is a place for you simply

because you say you are part of it. You step into a march, a meeting, volunteer to work in the 16

kitchen, pick up trash, staff the medic tent, or sit with kids, and suddenly you are a vital part

of this community of protest.

Once you’re there--or working from a computer helping with organizing or participating in forums or designing a flyer--you are governing your life within the movement. You choose to stay in the camp knowing that it may be raided, or not. You

determine if you need to leave for work if you have it, or if spending time in the camp is more important to you. You choose to risk bodily injury by tear gas or bean bag bullets by standing your ground, or you leave for safer spaces. You can choose to check www.occupyo-

akland.org’s needs list and bring in donations, whether you drop them off and leave or choose to stay around a while. You can avoid the whole thing entirely. It is basic democracy in your face, participatory democracy in its purest and most exact(ing) form.

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 18TH QUEER & ALLY MARCH The day of the Queer March, I got off of my part-time job early to make sure I could be part of it. I ran home to make a sign: I arrived just in time to see the group facing off with two police officers dressed in black jumpsuits with “NEGOTIATOR” written on the back. I’m not sure exactly what they were negotiating as I only caught the tail end of the exchange. Suddenly someone shouted, “Fuck that!

Let’s march!” And we took off down Broadway, 50 to 100 of us.

We picked up a police escort pretty quick.

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I had had misgivings about a march designed to stop traffic at rush hour from the beginning, but I got over it quick. There were a number of police motorcycles following us at the rear of the group. Formations of motorcycles would break off and leapfrog to the head of the parade, seemingly to facilitate the flow of traffic around us as streets were closed off. It seemed that if we kept moving, they’d mostly leave us alone. When we paused

in front of Wells Fargo on Webster Street I felt really tense as the police drew in around us.

Some chants were as follows: “WE’RE HERE, WE’RE QUEER, AND WE’RE NOT GOING SHOPPING!” “WE’RE HERE, WE’RE QUEER, FUCK THE BANKS / COPS AND EAT THE RICH!” “WHO’S STREETS? OUR STREETS / QUEER STREETS!” “WE. ARE. THE 99%!”

A few people objected to “Whose Streets?” chants due to a perceived similarity to white supremacist language. The “fuck the cops” chants always make me uneasy, even though sometimes, caught up in the fervor of the moment, I chanted along.

The police are decidedly part of the ideological 99%, if not explicitly with the movement itself. The tension between demonstrators and police is already palpable in these situations, and those chants only escalate

things. I also try to stay mindful of the fact that “the pigs” go home to families and go to sleep after work or school or whatever like the rest of us.

“The Police” as an entity commit atrocities, yes. The individuals that make up the police are human beings. The police do serve and protect us often. All too often, individuals and departments also abuse their power. Of course there is a long history of police brutality in Oakland, and rage is getting vented at these protests. I don’t pretend to have an answer to the tension nor can I get behind either side’s behavior toward the other (antagonistic protesters or overzealous cops).

Well, during the time spent in front of Wells Fargo, a driver who got hemmed into a parking lot by our protest waved and honked and smiled in support.

She wasn’t angry that her commute was being delayed, she supported us, and that was great 18

to see. Pedestrians and spectators were largely supportive.

People who I would not expect, based on my visual perceptions of them, to stand in solidarity with us as queer people raised fists in support. Another gift of this movement is the opportunity for us all to interact on a level we usually wouldn’t reach. To see each other plainly, up close, to speak about our similarities and not our differences.

Once we moved on, we started to make our way toward the Snow Park encampment. The police made it clear that we were not to be let through. A line of riot officers blocked our entry onto Lakeshore Drive.

From a distance it looked like a line of officers two deep from one side of the intersection to the other.

We headed back to Oscar Grant Plaza and entered via the Broadway entrance to the plaza. As we rejoined the mothership we got a second wind and chanted “Whose Streets? Queer Streets!” to cheers from many of the occupants of the camp.

Protesters at the November 18th Queer March

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MY EXPERIENCE IN THE CAMP On the day of the Queer meeting I met a fellow protester who had a tent up at the camp. I asked if I might be able to sleep in her tent that night and she said yes. After finishing up my flyer and publicity at home I walked to the camp with some blankets, a lot of canned food and art supplies to donate, anything I could think of that I had been hoarding in my house as “earthquake food” but wasn’t doing anyone any good in the meantime. I considered bringing my flea market machete kept by the bed just in case (I never considered using it on police, so don’t misunderstand my intent). Then I realized that not only would that be completely ridiculous and also probably get me in a lot more trouble if I was arrested, but that I didn’t want to bring weapons into this space (and please understand that I’m not a machete-wielding psycho, it was $4 and I usually forget

it’s even there, it just gives me a little feeling of security). On the way out the door, I did opt to grab a tiny 1.5” pocket knife keychain my dad gave me years ago. I didn’t ever need it.

I got there around 1 a.m. I stopped at the kitchen to make my donations and then made my way into the tent area. A civilian with a walkie-talkie shined a flashlight in my eyes and asked, “Can I help you?”

I started to explain that I was headed to my tent. He asked where it was and I began to explain, feeling a little weirded out at his police-like attitude.

Another protester asked, “What are you, security?” It really was an honest question with little to no edge in his voice. The civilian seemed to have a chip on his shoulder and said, “Yeah, you got a problem with that?” They had an exchange, and I stood there, not being able to get past 20

on the narrow pallet boardwalk.

Someone else came along and watched the slightly escalating scene for a moment, then started to squeeze past the two in discussion. The civilian told the newcomer “get out of here and take your friend with you.”

The newcomer explained that they weren’t friends, didn’t even know each other, and he walked on. The civilian-cum-officer told me to go ahead. It was odd, to be sure, but I set out to find the tent.

I was reasonably sure I was at the right tent and I made a feeble attempt to wake the occupants. It was pretty half-hearted because I felt bad about the late hour and it would have been awful if I was at the wrong tent and they found me trying to apparently break in. So I camped out under the awning on the front of the tent. I laid out my blankets for padding and anoth-

These images are from the second iteration of the Occupy Oakland encampment at Oscar Grant Plaza.

er blanket to sleep under. I used my sign-making materials and backpack as a pillow. I got up and did a little flyering around the camp and then tried to get to sleep. All the unfamiliar activity around made it pretty hard to drift off. It took a few hours to achieve sleep at all, and I woke up probably every half hour, starting at the unfamiliar voices, walkie-talkie beeps and not-quite distant helicopter noises. I thought about the irony of having my apartment six blocks away, that I was planning to get up early, go home, shower and go to work after I helped hold our encampment. Ironic or maybe silly.

I thought about the people that have always occupied this park. We call them “homeless.”

I wondered how they felt about sharing this space. If they would think I was stupid for sleeping out there when I had a house going to waste. Then I would drift off. Then I would wake up

and continue thinking, thinking, thinking. I reached some amount of peace with my decision to stay there and maybe got two hours of solid sleep before going home and showering.

…

After the Queer March on Tuesday, October 18th, I ran into a friend who had intended to march with us but arrived late and missed the boat. She was as enthusiastic as I was and we began talking about setting up camp. We attended the GA, the General Assembly. Camp announcements were made, the meeting format explained, and then anyone who wanted to was invited to address the assembly on that night’s topic: Camp security and engaging with the rest of the city of Oakland.

The young woman who volun22

teered to facilitate that evening’s assembly seemed overwhelmed.

Part of me wanted to just dismiss her out of hand for being too young, too white, too ineffective for this movement. Hey, being half black and half white can give you a complicated world-view, all right? Sometimes I feel too white and sometimes I feel too black, or not enough, or too in the middle. She faltered in making her statements. She was largely ineffective in controlling and directing the assembled crowd. But she was up there trying to make a difference and organize a space for the citizens of Oakland to speak and be heard. No one else stepped up to do so. I wasn’t going to. I admire her. I look up to her. That is democracy and she is living it.

Another speaker, who I believe was the representative of the camp’s security committee, addressed the crowd. She explained that the civilian security patrols were “not the police! We

fucking hate the police!” That we shouldn’t be startled by their walkie-talkie beeps. That they were simply trying to protect the perimeter of the camp, and would raise the alarm if the police showed up in the night.

She explained that should the cops arrive in the night, it had was the camp’s concensus that we should exit our tents, make our way to the camp perimeter, link arms to prevent police access and chant “Cops Go Home! Cops Go Home! Cops Go Home!” She scolded us for not responding to a false alarm in this manner the previous night.

She said that there had been a lot of talk about protecting the women and children (and let me note that I did not witness any children at the camp at night. I sincerely believe that everyone had the sense not to make their children put their own safety at risk by sleeping in a place likely to be raided by the police) and

that to some degree that was true. But, “Fuck that! I want to see women patrolling the camp!

This is 2011! Women can absolutely do that job!” And I agree with this sentiment wholeheartedly. Oddly enough, someone chose this moment to have a fight within the camp.

Half the crowd, myself included, got up to see what was happening. I witnessed this phenomenon multiple times as internal conflict and, unfortunately, unwanted sexual advances, were certainly an issue in the camp.

But the fact that the Occupiers cared enough about their fellows and the camp itself to actually get up and dissolve the situation speaks volumes.

We don’t do this when we hear a commotion on the streets.

Maybe one or two people come out of their houses, hover on the porch and think about calling the police. Just think how we

might be able to change things if the whole block went out in response to violent noise on the street. People would think twice about trying to victimize people on that block again.

There was a “stack” of speakers that anyone could join and speak in for three minutes related to the meeting’s topics.

I got up several times to join the stack but chickened out at least twice. I never actually spoke. What I intended to speak about was that “I’m not into Occupying, of course,” my friend mentioned via text. That there was a knee-jerk reaction among many of my friends and peers that said, “Of course I don’t want to go protest!” or “That camp freaks me out!” I find this to be very concerning.4 There is obviously a feeling that the camp is separate from the general public when I feel that

4 In the time since I first began writing this I have participated in several Facebook debates--as much as one can really “debate” on Facebook--about obedience to the law. Take the UC Davis pepper spraying of students in peaceful

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the opposite should be true. I was going to suggest that we invite our friends and peers into the camp. Walk them through it, show them the things that we are proud of. I will address this more in the Critiques and Concerns section below.

So while the stack was speaking, my friend’s friends showed up from San Francisco. They had not been involved with any part of the protest but were curious.

My friend said she had a tent and expressed interest in spending more time at the camp. She said she’d need to do a lot of planning beforehand in order to maintain her life outside the camp. She’s so right. It’s definitely a balance between life as “normal” and life in the camp.

At least it was for me. Some

stayed there 24/7.

As I mentioned, there are a lot of personal choice, comfort, safety, and livelihood issues involved in camping and marching in this movement. It is my feeling that any level of engagement is a positive thing. I own up to the fact that I have it really easy. I live so near the camp and can access my house so easily. I have a part-time job and I’m lucky to have it in times like these. I’ve discovered I’m not willing to lose that job for the sake of this protest if I can help it--at least not at this point.

And they’re quite supportive of my involvement. My point is that my friend wasn’t going to be able to stay that night or maybe even the next week, but we agreed that I would pick up

her tent that night and set up camp.

We made agreements about allying our tent with other queer people. That I would be allowed to offer her space in the tent to others while she wasn’t there.

Just basic housekeeping things.

So I went home and made preparations, getting into the camp around 1 a.m. again. This time I felt the need to be visibly queer. I put on what had become my camp “uniform” of all-black utilitarian clothes with a purple bandana around my neck for queer identification and potential tear gas defense. I had a solar-charged flashlight with a built in carabiner hanging from my belt loop. It’s funny. I’ve always taken exception to neckerchiefs (and especially the black

protest: There were a few who asserted that people should always obey the police and if only the protesters had done so, there wouldn’t have been an incident. I can’t argue with that logic in terms of the sequence of events: If everyone had dispersed when requested, there would have been no pepper spraying. But I take offense at the notion that police, by virtue of being police, should always be obeyed. I don’t care how many times the police warned the protesters that they would be pepper sprayed. That doesn’t make it right or just. If the law is on the side of the police in that situation, the law needs to be changed in my view. And that’s why we sit down or in or stand up or march in protest despite the warnings. I was going to screenshot and redact the names from that Facebook conversation but it has since been deleted.

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and white Keffiyeh-style scarves that have no affiliation to their middle-eastern tribal origins, but I digress) that people have taken to wearing as fashion statements. Now this simple bandana seemed liberating and necessary. I haven’t been one to wear my sexual orientation on my sleeve since my high school activist days, but this really seemed important. I wanted to be seen and counted among these ranks of solidarity--across and despite our usual boundaries.

I was able to set up the tent pretty easily. There was a guy sleeping on the steps of the amphitheater nearby. He woke up and chatted with me a bit. I invited him to stay in the tent that night. I was uneasy because it’s so rare that you just invite a stranger to come sleep in your home. But if ever there was an easy and appropriate time to put my money where my mouth was, this was it. He tried to start

up a conversation, asked what I did, etc. I told him but it was late and I was tired and didn’t really feel like talking. I asked him a few questions in return and he told me that he had been “panhandling for the last seven years.” He told me that he used to work on the docks down at Jack London Square and that those docks used to employ everybody. He told me about a local job placement service that he used to work for. He was a really nice guy. He had really bad athlete’s foot. His toenails were in bad shape. That night if I went to the bathroom or the next morning as I was coming and going I could see him trying to conceal his feet. I must have awoken him with my rustling. Living on the street for seven years will do that to you, and I could tell he was ashamed of his feet. I left him as he was as I went off to a free yoga class at the camp and later to a camp meeting. I didn’t see him again.

I can’t remember his name.

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I stayed for the next two nights and on the first night alone in the tent I wanted to take care of something. My friend who owned the tent and I had decided that I’d post my protest sign in front of it, only it had been made part of the structure of another queer tent in the meantime, so I had brought some paint and more poster board that I had found a week earlier on the street. I recreated the sign to say something like:

ANOTHER QUEER, SOBER, MULTIRACIAL, UNDEREMPLOYED COLLEGE GRAD FOR HOUSING, JOBS, EQUALITY, AND AN END TO GREED

I posted it outside the tent and lay awake listening to people discuss it, self-conscious person that I am. I heard an exchange in bits and pieces: “...that’s why it’s in big neon letters,” “ ... OB-

VIOUSLY,” “but at least it’s nice to have a queer perspective ... ” A few days later my sober friend who was organizing the camp sobriety meeting came back into town and I met up with him. I told him he could stay in the tent if he needed to. We actually weren’t friends, I barely knew him. I didn’t know how he’d react to my being queer.

It was basically a non-issue for him. Me being generally uneasy around “dudes,” we parted ways pretty quick after chatting for a bit. We went and grabbed a soda and got to know each other a bit. He’s really cute, too.

Which made me nervous. But I wasn’t there to try and make romance happen, especially with

a straight guy.

I feel like saying that I was attracted to him feeds into that notion that every gay guy wants to jump EVERY man he sees, which is simply not true. I really just want to make this story human. He told me about how the guy I had seen him chatting with earlier tried to “turn him out.” This guy was flirting with him, asking if he could go visit him at work. And my “friend” was like, “I guess so but I’m not into guys.” He was a perfectly nice guy but there was a hardness to his voice and demeanor that I felt threatened by. Not because of him. Just my expectations around men. Old coping skills from high school that

don’t apply anymore. I haven’t seen him since. But I sent him texts asking him to keep me in the loop about the meetings.

I painted a sign for the meeting so people could find it and texted him to let him know where to pick it up but I didn’t hear back. And I didn’t stay in the camp again so I don’t know if he ever got or used the sign.

The camp has since been raided and the tents slashed and trampled.

While staying in the camp I took better care of myself than usual.

There wasn’t junk food around so I didn’t eat junk food. There was a free yoga class offered at 8 a.m. I desperately need to exercise and my excuse is that I can’t

5 Since the initial writing, I have come to understand this about the “white movement” idea: It is perceived that nonwhite people haven’t taken to this movement as readily as whites have. This is because suddenly there’s this galvanization around financial inequality. It is also perceived that this has always been the case for “minorities” and now that it’s hit many more white people, a movement happens. What took so long? Where was everyone when it was a “non-white” issue?

The above note is sort of a cobbled-together understanding I’ve picked up from newspapers and websites. I’m not sure if I agree as I saw many people of color in the camp and at rallies and marches. I saw a pretty honest cross-section of Oakland as I think of it. There have always been poor white people. But I can certainly see some interesting points here.

26

afford a gym or classes, knowing full well that I can do it for free on my own. But I attended this yoga class and it was great.

Part of my sobriety program is spiritual, which has been an internal battle. I’ve spent much of my life upset with organized religion, finding my own spirituality, being let down by it, being sure I didn’t need it, and having internal philosophical debates about whether spirituality is a necessary component of basic morality: don’t hurt others. I’ve started meditating, even praying to a higher power as I understand it. Trying to understand it. Being angry at it.

Disbelieving. Pretending. Avoiding. In any case, my fledgling spiritual practice became an important tool to stay connected to myself in the camp, to stay grounded and not get swept up into a fervor that wasn’t mine. I still fear that my atheist friends will turn out to be right and that I’ll have egg on my face when they prove there is no god. And

I often avoid spiritual practice, but there it was a necessity. I brought the incense my friend taught me to use in meditation.

Brought my prayer beads and did my cobbled-together morning and evening meditation/ prayer/moral inventory mishmash.

Camp Meeting Well, after the yoga class there was a general camp meeting scheduled on “the steps” which I assumed meant the amphitheater. I finally found the small gathering near the flower shop in the plaza. No facilitator had been chosen so, another young, white, and I assume queer woman stepped up. Her co-facilitator did very little co-facilitating but again, I wasn’t about to step up and do it, and no else did either.

The facilitator repeatedly asked us to form a circle around her so it would be less hierarchical. She wasn’t leading, she was facilitating. Most people stayed on the comfort of the stairs. A young 27

black woman volunteered to take minutes on her laptop.

The meeting consisted largely of people I perceived to be white. This is a point of internal and external concern: This movement of “the people” is largely white.5 This meeting ran similarly to the GA. Announcements, then stack for proposals of meeting topics. Then stacks for each meeting topic followed by a vote on any motions for each. That was the idea anyway.

Zachariah Running-Wolf--of the Occupation of the Oak Knoll at UC Berkeley, former mayoral candidate, and Native People activist fame--spoke heatedly about the fact that Oscar Grant Plaza, formerly Frank Ogawa Plaza, was formerly and still is the land of his tribe and that they gave their blessing to the occupation. He wanted to make his people’s ownership clear. He was so impassioned that he did not feel the need to follow the meeting’s protocols.

He expressed concern over his people’s medicine wheels being defaced around the city of Berkeley. He was met with many “point of process” hand signs.

(I’m going to delay explaining what these hand signs are for effect.) This was not on the agenda. The meeting was scheduled to be over by noon. When the facilitator tried to interject Running-Wolf said, “You’re not going to stop me from speaking on my own people’s land!” Or words to that effect.

The facilitator, after trying to break into Zachariah’s speech, was conferring with her co-facilitator and representatives from another group.

A woman from Occupy Berkeley was very upset with what she perceived as this non-democratic meeting. She felt that the facilitators weren’t doing their jobs, the meeting was badly run, private conversations about group matters were happening, and she was so moved that she

was in tears and gesticulating wildly. She objected to the use of hand signs without a visual aid explaining what they meant.

She was personally, verbally attacking the facilitator, who was visibly shaken.

Another gentleman chimed in with something else that was not on the agenda or was off topic. People kept “point of processing” him and he didn’t understand what that meant. I had inferred what it meant by this time. The co-facilitator spoke up and said “This is point of process!” while making a triangle with his fingers. The gentleman said he didn’t understand what that symbol meant. “What I’m doing right now is a point of process, this, right here.” Totally not descriptive. Finally, someone explained in basic terms what this whole hand thing was.

There are hand signs that have become largely standardized within the meeting structure of the groups at the camp. Wig28

gling fingers mean agreement with the speaker. Index fingers and thumbs in a vertical triangle means “point of process” and indicates that a speaker is moving off of the current focus or processional step of the meeting. Rapid pointing with index fingers at the speaker indicates a direct, informational response is available by the pointer. Thumbs down or arms in an “X” means there is strong disagreement with a speaker (it may mean “block” in a voting session, but at my last meeting there was no “block” option, only a dissenting vote). In a voting session, thumbs up was a “yes” vote. A sideways (not up or down) thumb was an abstention.

Thumbs down was a “no” vote at which point dissenting reasons should be discussed. A 90% consensus was necessary for a motion to pass. Motions had to be seconded.

Someone offered to create a visual aid of hand signs for the

next meeting.

We eventually reached the first agenda item: establishing a Financial Sponsor. Apparently this had been discussed at the same meeting the day before, resolutions formulated and taken to a later Financial Committee, where it was decided to propose that the Berkeley-based Anarchist collective, The Long Haul, be a temporary Financial Sponsor.

The woman from Berkeley-we’ll call her Berkeley--objected strongly. She had personal issues and experience with The Long Haul, calling out its leaders (Anarchists with leaders?) by name and stating that people are pushed out of the organization. Particularly people of color.

(I’ve been in their Info Shop exactly once, to pick up some keys to Berkeley Liberation Radio.)

She was breaking the meeting’s format again, getting point of processed. People responded.

She felt attacked. Threatened to leave. Long Haulers both agreed and dissented with her stance.

Her feeling was that they should not be in possession of any donations for Occupy Oakland.

This scene went on for quite some time. The co-facilitator objected to the meeting format and called it quits. He felt there was a lack of consensus and that people were running roughshod over the meeting’s process. He had done little to enforce them.

Another gentleman stepped up.

Together, he and the original facilitator guided things back

on track. She was almost in tears and I admire her. I admire Berkeley, too.

The issue at hand was that people wanted to make donations by check or in some other way that Occupy Oakland would need access to a bank account for. A Financial Sponsor would hold that account for us. Occupy Oakland is against big banks, so a bank account would be counter to our aims. 6,7,8 The minute-taker objected to any donation format that would enable the donor to claim a tax exemption. To her it seemed that donations should come from the heart out of solidarity rather than based upon a tax break. My feeling is that it can be both.

6 A note about circumstances since the initial writing: There has been a bit of a kerfuffle since this meeting took place. As I understand it, a $20,000 donation from Occupy Wall Street was placed in trust with a lawyer sympathetic to Occupy Oakland. He happened to have a Wells Fargo account and that’s where the money was deposited. Everyone had a field day with this.

7 Reddit.com user Nuxxy, “Occupy Oakland Has A Wells Fargo Account” Nov. 2011 <http://bit.ly/wQZMp3>.

8 Facilitation-Committee, “GA Minutes 11.7.11” 7 Nov. 2011 <http://occupyoakland.org/2011/11/ga-minutes-11-7-11/>.

Archived at Google Docs: <http://bit.ly/wqlYm5>.

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The Financial Committee Reps continued to state their case for the need for a Financial Sponsor and their position that Long Haul should take on that role temporarily so we could begin taking donations immediately.

They wanted a vote but Berkeley and others wouldn’t have it until the Long Haul situation was discussed.

I moved that we rename the position Interim Financial Sponsor and set an expiration date on it so whoever took on that position would not be permanent. Lots of wiggling fingers!

Berkeley objected to any plan that involved the Long Haulers.

A vote was finally taken. I was a vote-counter along with the facilitators as I was not involved with the Financial Committee.

The motion did not pass, so no Interim Financial Sponsor was elected. I abstained because I did not feel I had enough information about Long Haul and I did feel Berkeley’s concerns were

valid. Long Haulers even agreed with her summations of some of their fellow Long Haulers. Dissenters were polled about why they voted “no” so the Financial Committee could return with a different proposal at a later date.

30 occupiers. LOTS of thumbs down, including mine. His drug and alcohol proposal was less extreme, but I objected to words and concepts like “must be sober to do this political work.” I’m sober but I don’t pretend that everyone should or must be. I’m It was voted to prioritize the sober because I’m an alcoholic. I remaining agenda items. Then love to drink and I would absoit was voted to combine the lutely be drinking at the camp violence and safety topic with if I wasn’t in recovery. I would the drugs and alcohol topic. A also be completely ineffective gentleman proposed motions, and useless, but that’s my deal. I the language of which I strongcan’t speak for others. I stacked ly objected to. There was a lot of and said as much. Lots of wigpartying into the early morning gling fingers. Apparently Ochours in the camp. Drinking and cupy SF banned drugs, alcohol drugging was obvious. Internal and cigarettes from their camp. conflicts, physical, verbal, and I would love that, but I can’t sexual were strong concerns. speak for everyone. I would like De-escalation people and Safer some restrictions on substances.

Spaces people were helping to Some people use them recremitigate these problems but ationally, some use them memore needed to be done. His dicinally. It’s complicated. After proposals were extreme. His pro- his proposals were voted down posed violence solution included due to language, It was voted the use of two-by-fours to keep by consensus that an additional violent offenders at a distance meeting directly after the mornwhile being encircled by 15 to ing meeting would convene to 30

rework the original statements.

I stacked to announce the pending creation of a meeting of people wanting to get and remain sober that would meet at Occupy Oakland. I made it clear that the meeting would not meet in support of Occupy Oakland as the organization’s traditions prevent supporting outside causes. Lots of wiggling fingers.

I asked if I could pass around an interest sheet so I could contact folks when the meetings began.

(I may have overstepped my sobriety organization’s tradition of “attraction not promotion” there.)

The rest of the agenda items

were addressed as time permitted and the meeting was adjourned. I opted to take care of my life away from the camp, secure in the knowledge that issues of violence and substance use would be responsibly addressed.

special to me. I had feelings of guilt that I should have stayed for more.

This messy, uncomfortable meeting and others like it are democracy in action. My issues were being addressed at a community level. I had a voice and an effect on how my life and my community is governed. Not by proxy, not by mayor, not by representative. That is so powerful.

All told I spent four nights in the camp. They were really

BEING A QUEER PERSON OF COLOR IN THE CAMP At the Queer meeting there was talk of creating a Queer Villa or group of tents. We spoke about incorporating recommended practices like traveling in groups for safety. The villa never materialized but I feel it is important for us to be visible and stand in solidarity with each other as queer and with the rest of the movement as the 99%. Oakland has problems with homophobia. There is no denying that.

Yet there are a lot of queer residents. We are in this fight alongside everyone else. We don’t want to set ourselves apart, but I feel that we need to be seen in this struggle.

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I straddle many “affinity groups”. I’m a person of color.

I am gay. I am black and I am white. I am the grandchild of Eastern European immigrants and the son of a black man from the South in New Orleans. I have a lot of viewpoints and one unique viewpoint at the same time. Visual artist Kara Walker calls this multiple consciousness of race her “Internal Plantation.”

I think I’ve got an Internal Plantation for the slave and master or black and white in me, an Internal Concentration Camp for the displaced citizen and queer in me, and an internal struggle with having certain advantages

and opportunities like an education and a house while others don’t.

Since I cross all those lines on some level I can speak for us and stand up and be visible so we can come together. So I find some amount of strength in this protest simply by taking part as myself, some more from the strength of numbers. And you just can’t argue with our numbers.

those people sleeping outside on the steps were already asleep and I shouldn’t wake them up to ask if they wanted to go back to sleep somewhere else) I had romantic notions, or rather fantasies that I’d meet someone amazing in the queer ranks of the protest. We’d have have the most romantic story to tell about how we met at Occupy Oakland. It was a silly thought but I couldn’t help feeling lonely.

On an even more personal note, during the nights that I stayed alone in the tent (which I felt selfish for, and I made myself feel better by telling myself that

TUESDAY, OOCTOBER 25TH MARCH, PROTEST, AND POLICE STAND-OFF I arrived at the Tuesday, October 25th, protest on my way home from work around 7 p.m., having heard that protesters had been gassed earlier. I thought it was over. Then I got there, saw massing demonstrators and joined in. We marched around town and back to the camp site. I was drawn toward the front of the face-off with police. I don’t hate them. But I wasn’t going to be told to vacate a peaceful demonstration.

The camp was not without its issues. I know the city can’t stand

by when its codes are being broken. But I believe in that camp.

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Problems were being solved there as a model for a different

kind of society--something to learn from at the very least. I wanted it back. I didn’t believe we would get it back but I had to make a stand. I took off my sweatshirt and tied it around my nose and mouth, preparing for tear gas as best as I could. I stood and chanted, peace signs in the air like Richard Nixon.

From the beginning of this movement and my involvement, I wasn’t sure if I was willing to get arrested. By this time I had decided that I was willing to be arrested under certain conditions. I wasn’t willing to put myself in that situation if I had to work the next day. I worked hard for this two day a week job.

I love it there. I don’t feel that they are stealing from me. They are an extremely liberal local newspaper. They are reporting truthfully on this movement in San Francisco and Oakland.

I can do good there. Call me “part-time” in the movement, “chicken,” “fake,” what have

you. I’m OK with my decision. I was not willing to get arrested when I had a class to teach at the Senior Center the next day.

I had made too many commitments to my students to teach them and help them get their work ready for our art show. I’m giving back to this community there. But there were many moments in the face-off that I would have stood my ground, gone limp and been dragged to jail.

point, we will be massacred with live ammunition. He’s right to be concerned about people who may not realize they are risking bodily harm, but he’s not the judge and jury of anyone’s commitment to the cause. He told those who said they weren’t ready to die to leave the front line. Perhaps I’m being naive.

So I stood there, sometimes linking arms with my fellows.

Mostly throwing peace signs with my fingers. Many journalists and photographers thought People with children at home shouldn’t put themselves at risk this was a great photo op. Cation: “Local Oakland resident ties of being arrested. Stay toward shirt around face, looks militant, the back of the protest and make sure you have a way out at holds fingers in sign of peace.” I all times. Now that my teaching looked around. I saw the handsome sailor in full Navy uniresponsibilities are over, I feel form carrying a “Veterans for more willing to place myself in Peace” flag. Everyone wanted danger. to be near him. I edged my way There was a very odd man who near him. I’m no lover of the seemed to be giving blessings to Army. I will not go to war. I don’t people after asking if they were believe in killing. Blind patrio“willing to die” on the front line tism, especially within the Army where I stood. I wasn’t willing as well as directed at it with car to die. I don’t believe that at this 33

Taken the night of the first port shutdown after a succesful closure of the docks.

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Taken the night of the first port shutdown after a succesful closure of the docks.

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The police line on the night of the first raid. The woman directly in front of the police barricade is smudging the officers with sage. The photographer later took a picture of me throwing peace signs with my sweatshirt tied over my face to guard against tear gas.

Tear gas on October 25th. This is the second of three gas and rubber bullet attacks that night.

antenna flags and “support our troops” stickers terrify me. But here is a veteran who denounces our current wars. I love him.

The squad leader or police chief does warn us ad nauseam that he has declared this an unlawful gathering. That we will be arrested if we do not leave via 14th Street immediately. That chemical agents and physical force will be used that could result in grave bodily harm.

According to my friends who were at the first gassing around 6 p.m., there was no such warning.

calm, turn around and walk briskly away from the gas cloud with my hands and arms around my face and head in case of falling gas canisters. I turned back and watched as more gas canisters fell into an already dispersing crowd. I think I remember seeing the tear gas fired into the protesters who were helping a downed protester that I would later see in online video. I saw myself walking with my hands over my head on the news that night.

We dispersed down 14th street.

We regrouped, and marched around the city. People waved in support from apartment winSome time between 7 and 9 dows near the lake. Some came p.m., I wasn’t paying attention out to join us. Many raised fists to time, tear gas and bean bags were fired into the crowd. There on their porches. We cheered them. I don’t hate the police but was no apparent provocation other than us standing there and it is hard not to be angry when chanting. Nothing was thrown at they fire tear gas at you unprovoked. the police immediately prior to the tear gas being launched our There was some dissent about way. I had planned my exit in what to do and where to go next. advance. I managed to remain Below San Pablo Avenue, it was 38

argued, there was nothing but empty lots and warehouses. Up Telegraph Avenue was nothing but small businesses and the hospital. Via Mic Check (a call and response crowd communication strategy) it was the consensus that we would return to the camp site to retake it. We started to approach the park from the rear but from this approach we would be fenced in on both side with few escape routes. Emphatic pleas from the sudden and self-appointed organizers shifted the crowd away from the rear entrance. Some anarchists--identified by the crossed and circled A on their black hoodies--had liberated some metal barricades and were carrying them in the march. I never really understood what the purpose was. Sometimes it seemed they used them to hem in the crowd. At the coming face-off, I think they were used as a secondary barrier between us and police, briefly.

I ran into a friend up near the front of the face-off. We hugged hello. He asked if I knew anyone with an extra bandanna. I didn’t. He wandered to the front.

This bolstered me to get up to the front again. I stood in that line for at least the next hour.

I began chanting Nam-MyohoRenge-Kyo. It seemed natural and it calmed me and I figured it couldn’t hurt. I threw peace signs. I wanted the police to see it. I wanted the agitators and the rest of the crowd behind me to see us all in peace. I was angry that the police stood their ground. I looked at them individually and I could see some of them visibly shaken, perhaps even in tears behind their plastic face shields as we chanted, “You. Are. The 99%” I started to really ask them in my head, “Why are you doing this?” The squad leader droned on and on about us being arrested … chemical agents … bodily harm ... we will arrest you on behalf of the people of the state of California

… BUT WE ARE THE PEOPLE OF OAKLAND! WE ARE THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA. WE ARE THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA! That statement about the police doing this on behalf of the people of the state of California ceased to make any sense to me.

I saw people seated in meditation, doing handstands, the Navy veteran, the black man standing next to me, the young white woman to my left, the queers, the straight boys in face paint bordering on makeup, the woman in the wheelchair, the hippy with her sage bundle and caftan smudging the cops, the young black men. ALL IN A LINE WITH EACH OTHER. It was lofty and beautiful.

THE WORLD IS WATCHING seemed to be an effective chant.

I believe this is why there was such a delay in gassing the crowd the third time and why we were able to hold our line for so long. There was so much 39

media present and three news copters in the sky by my count.

People were texting me about the live feeds they were watching.

Then I came back down to the level of my life outside the occupation. I had a project due in class the next day. The crowd started chanting “fuck the police!” and it was just enough to get me to go home. I had done my part for the night. There would be more. There is momentum. The crowd was gassed and shot up with rubber bullets again about an hour later, and we’ve all seen the footage.

PUBLIC PERCEPTION ISSUES Fear of the camp.

At the General Assembly where I got in and out of stack several times, what I wanted to say was something like this: Among my friends and peers, there is a knee-jerk reaction to Occupy Oakland. It’s largely negative. It’s almost nameless but it makes people want to stay away. They’re afraid that we’re a bunch of violent ruffians.

They’re afraid to come into the camp. All they see is a barrier of tents. They don’t see the kitchen where people have been fed 24 hours a day, no questions asked, no money exchanged. They don’t see the meetings. They’re afraid to join them. They don’t know what we’re protesting for, and we’re protesting for many things, including their lives and livelihoods. The City is painting us as dirty and unsanitary. Let’s show people the truth.

I strongly suggest that we bring people into the camp as our guests. Let’s show them what we’re so proud of. Show them that they don’t need to be afraid.

Tonight’s topic is engaging with the rest of the city. We can’t do that if they don’t trust us.

They are us. We are the city of Oakland whether we live in the camp or not. There shouldn’t be a divide here.

“Occupy Oakland is made up of a bunch of inconsiderate, violent thugs.”

During the marches and protests on Tuesday the 25th, I saw some violence against the city itself and against police. This has to stop. It is minimal, it is the exception rather than the norm, but it is entirely counterproductive.

The police are on edge, they seemed to be itching to disperse 40

us with tear gas anyway. Why would we want to provoke that?

I witnessed a few, like 3 to 4, incidents by individuals in a crowd of 1,000, incidents of provocation toward the city and the police above and beyond peaceful occupation of space. People who hid themselves behind the ranks at the front of police standoffs threw a few bottles and food at the police. I have my suspicions about them being planted agitators but I can’t really prove any of that, and certainly there are people in the protest who don’t agree with my peaceful stance.

I saw this happen three times.

The police actually showed restraint here.

I saw one man walk right up to the line of police, pull an old sandwich out of a bag and throw it in the helmeted and visored face of an officer, who did not respond. Upon my second return with the march to the plaza

to face off with police, after having been gassed and fired upon an hour earlier, I witnessed a young man run up to a street sign that was anchored in the sod of a grass island in the middle of Broadway. He shook it violently until it fell to the ground. I yelled at him to stop.

“Don’t fuck up the city!” I wish I had said “our city”. He kind of skittered around the crowd and settled in next to a concerned looking young woman who seemed to know him.

I think there are some people who just want to see a riot. I don’t want that. I don’t think those people care about the movement. I think they’re just angry and angsty. I didn’t see

anyone else engaged in that sort of activity. I apologize on behalf of these reckless individuals.

I have heard reports from friends that their friends were maced by occupiers. I can’t imagine this but I apologize if this happened and I don’t believe my friend would lie. The same friend has been meeting with her folk dancing group at the occupation site since way before the OWS movement started.

She says her group was asked to leave by occupiers. We must remember that virtually every citizen of Oakland is a 99%er, and a potential protester. In any case, there shouldn’t be an “us and them” mentality. Only Us.

That friend of mine and her Facebook friends hate Occupy Oakland as a result of witnessing or being the victim of violence or intimidation by Occupy Oakland. This makes me sick.

I must reiterate that I have experienced more moments of peaceful protest and beauty than ugly violence.

ON POLICE & THE CITY We can be angry at Jean Quan. That’s what she’s there for. She’s the figurehead of our local government. Any mayor would likely respond as she has. Was it the right response? No. Would she be doing her job if she didn’t address what her government had decided was a public health issue? No. Did I see feces on the ground in camp? No. Did I see rats? I

saw one. (It is not uncommon to see rats in any frequently-used 41

public space.) Is firing on peaceful protesters with “non-lethal”

weapons ever OK? No. A man named Scott Olsen is in the hospital in serious condition from a bean bag bullet to the head.

I never witnessed medical personnel being denied access to the camp. I saw someone loaded into an ambulance. He was on the outskirts of the camp, I don’t know if he was moved there by us or if that’s just where he happened to be when he fell ill.

I want to say it again: I don’t hate the police. I believe that like some of our aggressive protesters, there are people in their ranks who want to see a riot.

People who abuse their power or don’t have the will or the financial security or the strength to follow their conscience rather than orders.

I do take exception to the notion that as an authority figure, a police officer commands any more respect than you or I. A police officer is effectively you or I in a bullet proof vest, a uniform,

carrying a gun and driving a car with lights and sirens.

jobs are often cut alongside education.

Something happens when all those trappings are worn: They forget what it’s like not to wear that armor. They learn to be on edge at all times, always looking for a threat. What a fucked up way to live. Killing a police officer should not carry a heftier sentence than killing a civilian.

That is a sick double-standard.

If anything, killing a civilian ought to carry the same weight as killing an officer. Officers like Johannes Mehserle should not get off for murder. Officers and departments if they are to remain in power need to really “serve and protect,” not terrorize. If Occupy Oakland and OWS achieve their goals of equality, an end to poverty, healthcare for all, and the like, crime rates will fall. People won’t fight over scraps if wealth is distributed equitably. And police won’t have all that power. Their departments are underfunded. Their

However, I don’t know what makes someone want to stand in opposition to their fellow citizens like police often find themselves doing. I’m not sure what makes one want to sign up for that job. It might be in the name of justice but justice seems so rarely to be served by police in this town. Is it a quest for power? Authority? A failed attempt to clean up the streets?

I don’t know.

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I’ve called the police. Because who else do you call? I’m thankful for them sometimes. I’ve seen a different way to handle things without police in the camp. It would be nice if we could institute some de-escalation practices in our local communities. I don’t know how to do that.

At the end of the day, those cops I faced off with need their jobs.

I can respect that, even if I find their choice of profession questionable. I respect their humanity. I can’t hate them.

A memorial to Scott Olsen, who suffered a serious head injury due to less-than-lethal bean bag bullets.

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MY CRITIQUES AND CONCERNS ABOUT OCCUPY OAKLAND, THE CAMP ITSELF, AND OCCUPY AT LARGE Banning the Media I think banning the media from the camp was a huge mistake. I know from experience that they don’t always report the truth.

The big local news channels are owned by companies like Disney and AOL/Time Warner.

Those big companies don’t want what we say about them on their newscasts. We can’t control how our message and activities are portrayed in the corporate media. I get it. But it created a huge barrier to entry for people who weren’t sure about joining up, people whose only access to our movement came from TV. Denying access to the media further made sure the reporters were not on our side. It was a huge lost opportunity to get some kind of message out to those on the fence. Part of our complaint is that our rights are being trampled, especially

where protests, marches and rallies are concerned. And yet we were trampling on the freedom of the press. Citizens absolutely have the right to enter the camp, and the press are citizens.

I understand that some occupiers may be undocumented, wanted by the police, or simply averse to having their likenesses recorded. However, the same rights we have to film a police officer in public apply to us.

There are plenty of people in masks and bandannas.

and I remember remarking that I was surprised that in the era of George W. Bush such a movie could even be released.

But let’s keep our movement grounded in reality. Guy Fawkes was real, yes, but there is only a superficial bond between him and us, the American Revolution again British Imperialism notwithstanding. (And the more research one does, the less one wants to be associated with Guy Fawkes’ political and religious beliefs and aims.)

Guy Fawkes Masks

Outside Medical Treatment

Speaking of masks, I don’t agree with using Guy Fawkes’ image mediated through a movie called V for Vendetta as a symbol of our protest. I think that image has much more to do with Hollywood than anything we’re talking about.

I think it makes us look like clowns. I enjoyed the movie, 45

There is the perception that city medical personnel were not allowed in the camp. I don’t believe this is the case but we need to make that clear.

Violence I’ve discussed violence at length

above, but it bears repeating. At this point it is completely counterproductive. It makes Oakland as a community fear and despise us.

I have read in many forums and online discussions that to denounce violence wholesale is to stand in opposition to those we claim to stand in solidarity with in Libya, Tahrir Square, and other sites of the violent overthrow of unjust governments.

That to denounce the use of fire and barricades against teargas and police is to criticize such strategies in the Middle Eastern and African protests.

I absolutely believe that there is the potential for such strategies to be necessary in our struggle in the US, but I don’t believe that we have reached the tipping point where we should consider using these strategies. We share similar struggles in this country to those in other countries, but they are not the same struggles in all cases. I know that we can

work with new and existing systems of change to fundamentally alter our society. We do still live in a democracy even if it is broken. My feeling is that if, and when, universe forbid, our government sends our own troops and dangerous mercenaries like Xe, formerly known as Blackwater, against us, and when those antagonists open live fire on us, then our own retaliatory violence may be justified. I pray that we can avoid such government intervention, but I don’t put it past our current and forseeable government.

Having been near flaming barricades in Oakland protests, I can attest to the fact they did not “burn the teargas out of the air.” Those who created the barricades admonished some of us for not defending them. I think we might have been more inclined to consider defending those barricades had they not been on fire. In my view, all the flames did was create an emer46

gency. There was no way the police and fire department would have considered retreating with twenty foot flames in the air.

I support the occupation and siezure of private property to house, educate, and promote solidarity among members of our communities. I support the peaceful sitting-in of forclosed homes.

Drinking, Drugs And Partying Occupy Oakland’s party atmosphere makes it difficult for sober protesters to live at the camp. Being blind drunk or high increases the likelihood of injuries and fights, and endangers everyone’s safety. I’m not saying substances should be banned, but moderation should be encouraged, and perhaps should be restricted to tents.

We’ve shown we can police ourselves, and I think we can come to an agreement. Not all of us wish to stay up until 6 a.m.

Affinity Groups Lastly, I saw a meeting announcement about a meeting for white people to discuss and presumably combat racism.

Now I’m not saying that this meeting shouldn’t take place.

And I’m not saying that I even know exactly what it was about.

I’m just saying it made me uncomfortable.

I had seen a similar event posted at Mama Buzz, a local café, before any of this OWS stuff started. My concern is mainly that it could serve to further compartmentalize different parts of the protest. I’m there as a queer person of color. But that includes many different sorts of sexualities and races and identities.

The movement is already viewed as being largely a white affair. Whether that’s true or not, I’ve seen this sentiment on many of our online message boards and websites. People

often accuse whites of gentrifying people of color right out of their neighborhoods. When art spaces and then white kids start showing up in predominantly black neighborhoods, rent goes up and businesses change ownership and format.

I don’t count myself out of that phenomenon. I’m an artist and I can’t afford much in the way of rent. So I go where the rent is manageable and that tends to be in “minority” neighborhoods.

I’m half white. So I imagine that this might be what these white meetings are meeting about; mitigating that gentrification effect or perception of that effect.

Another topic is probably what whites can do as whites to combat racism. This is pure conjecture on my part. My black half gets nervous when people start organizing around whiteness.

Should that be the case? Maybe not. But it makes me damn nervous. So I want to know exactly what’s going on at these meetings. And that means I should 47

attend them. But I have to wonder how I and other people of color would be received. I just think it behooves those present at the meetings to be VERY clear about what their goals are and to communicate those goals clearly to the whole community.

There’s a double standard here, definitely. A people of color meeting doesn’t make me nervous at all.

IN CONCLUSION This really is what democracy looks like. It’s messy, it’sfrustrating, it takes a lot of work, care and vigilance. It was never meant to be removed from our hands. Democracy is more than being allowed to vote. It is recognizing that we created the right to vote for ourselves. It opens you up to criticism and things you might not want to hear. And it is plainly under attack right now. I’m very relieved that we are in the streets about it. There is much work to be done.

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