We are people of this generation, bred in at least modest comfort, housed now in universities, looking uncomfortably to the world we inherit.
So begins the Port Huron Statement, the plan of action issued by the Students for a Democratic Society when the movement was born in 1962. We looked at it again this week, in hopes that the text could help us speak intelligently on the Occupy Wall Street protests that have spread to many cities, Dallas among them.
Nearly half a century after it was written, the SDS statement still reads like an idealistic manifesto for a generation. It is outdated in parts, relevant in others. “The wealthiest one percent of Americans own more than 80 percent of all personal shares of stock,” it proclaims at one point. After walking around the tent city at Pioneer Plaza, it is hard not to come away thinking that what we have is a new battlefield for an old battle. Only the percentages, or the formula, have changed.
The Occupy (Name Your Location) movement has generated a lot of coverage. There is no shortage of opinion on what it is, what it means, where it’s going and what it needs to do to get there (and soon!). The commentariat ranges from the president to vestigial hippies. Occupiers are compared unfavorably to the Tea Party, which unlike them has been successful in defining the national debate.
read on
Nearly half a century after it was written, the SDS statement still reads like an idealistic manifesto for a generation. It is outdated in parts, relevant in others. “The wealthiest one percent of Americans own more than 80 percent of all personal shares of stock,” it proclaims at one point. After walking around the tent city at Pioneer Plaza, it is hard not to come away thinking that what we have is a new battlefield for an old battle. Only the percentages, or the formula, have changed.
The Occupy (Name Your Location) movement has generated a lot of coverage. There is no shortage of opinion on what it is, what it means, where it’s going and what it needs to do to get there (and soon!). The commentariat ranges from the president to vestigial hippies. Occupiers are compared unfavorably to the Tea Party, which unlike them has been successful in defining the national debate.
read on
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