Occupy Dallas: Thanks for Your Witness blog from @ericfolkerth

Just a short blog today to publicly thank the folks at Occupy Dallas for organizing a march in support of the Dallas Police, and to offer some brief reflections on it.

As you may have heard, 23 members of Occupy Dallas were arrested Tuesday, in front of a downtown Chase Bank location for blocking customer access to the bank. They were charge with disorderly conduct, and held overnight.

I recognize that not everyone will be supportive of that kind of direct action, and might question that tactic. But one of the long and proud traditions of American civil dissent is non-violent protest that ends in arrest.
As some will recall, I've marched with Occupy Dallas several times now. (A previous reflection here)

Tuesday, I visited the camp for about an hour, just as people were returning from the arrest scene, just to listen to folks and help them process what had happened.

While I was not there at the Chase Bank, by all accounts it was peaceful and non-violent. Those involved accepted the fact that their actions might lead to their arrest, and they spent the night in jail. And as I was leaving the camp to go to my home Tuesday night, some of the Occupy "brothers and sisters" were preparing to walk back over to the Lew Sterrett jail, to sleep outside, holding vigil there, in honor of their colleagues in jail that night.

Occupy Dallas (Hannah Allen) from Occupy Freelance Journal blog

 The Occupy Dallas protest movement, currently bunked up at Pioneer Park on Young Street downtown, had quite the week when city officials told them they needed a $1 million insurance policy in order for them to continue using the city park as their place of residency.

The lack of coverage by the mainstream media over the last few weeks has left several citizens of our fair city in the dark concerning the now global Occupy movement.

This movement was started almost a month ago at Zuccotti Park in New York City where protesters told the world they were there to Occupy Wall Street until changes were made. What Occupy Wall Street is about is complex. It is not a leftist movement. It is not a right-wing movement. It is not a socialist movement. It is not an extremist movement. 

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A recording of Occupy Dallas by Rene from thesoundmyheadmakes.blogspot.com

 Fascinating ... thanks @rene_coronado

A recording of Occupy Dallas

I'll preface this by saying that this is not a political blog, its an audio one.  This post is about the unique audio I was able to record yesterday.

Yesterday I was sitting around deciding whether to go record the Texas State Fair or to head downtown and record Occupy Dallas - a protest group that's formed locally in solidarity with Occupy Wallstreet.

After checking their blog, I found that Occupy Dallas was planning a march on Goldman Sachs and I decided that I'd opt for that because I didn't know how many big opportunities I would have to record a good protest locally and in a fairly safe manner.

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Occupy dallas march comp by Rcoronado

Report after Bringing Donated Water to Occupy Dallas by @douglaslucas

On October 11 2011, with the help of a friend’s warehouse club card, I purchased 392 20-oz bottles of water (and elsewhere, some gas) using donated money entirely, for the purpose of bringing bottled water to the Occupy Dallas (Twitter) group. I was going to make a table of the ten donation amounts, complete with mean, median, and mode, but my other friend who’s a whiz at statistics told me that with such a sample size, I’d be making a complete fool of myself to post anything other than gross and net. Here you go: $100, $100.

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What If the Occupy Dallas (or Wall Street) Movement Targeted Homes of Dallas Billionaires?

The growing anti-extreme wealth or, specifically, anti-corporate greed movement Occupy Wall Street today targeted the homes of New York City’s wealthiest with about 500 protesters converging on Manhattan’s toney Upper East Side, marching past the homes of JP Morgan’s Jamie Dimon, hedge fund manager John Paulson, media mogul Rupert Murdoch and David Koch, co-founder (or inherited) energy firm Koch Industries. The movement is spreading to college campuses and other cities, including Occupy Dallas which has about 100 people plus tents set up in Pioneer Plaza. I got to thinking today, what if Occupy Dallas decided to take a march down Park Lane in Old Preston Hollow and then move on up to Strait Lane? The New York City protesters at least have all the titans gathered in one place!
In Dallas, I guess, they’d start with Tom Hicks, who owns the most expensive home in Dallas at 32,966 square feet valued just under $40 million. That would be the 9 acre Crespi Estate off Walnut Hill Lane.

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Occupy Dallas – There’s Somethin’ Happenin’ Here from Biking in Dallas

Three years after the economic melt-down brought on by a handful of financial institutions a group billing itself as Occupy Wall Street took to the streets of New York to protest what I interpret as a sense of economic financial injustice.  Since then similar groups have taken root in several metropolitan areas. Claiming solidarity with Occupy Wall Street, Occupy Dallas went live October 6th and much like Occupy Wall Street, their agenda lacks clarity.

What it is aint exactly clear…

The Occupy groups are concerned about corporate greed and the high concentration of wealth in the hands of very, very few people.  But their skill set does not lie in framing the problem nor the solution very well and they’d do well to look to other movements for tips.

When people were protesting the Vietnam conflict the message was clear: “end the war” and even “hell no I won’t go” was a common and easy to understand expression.  The civil rights protests during the 60s were

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Is the #OccupyDallas march a teachable moment for children?

According to the Dallas Morning News, hundreds marched in Dallas on October 6 to show solidarity with the national Occupy Wall Street protests that began last month.  The protestors, like their Manhattan brethren, are fed up with corporate greed, financial market bail-outs and the inequity of wealth among American citizens.  The crowds, topping out at 400 to 500 people were cooperative and there were no reports of violence.
For a middle school or high school aged student, this situation has all the makings of a great lesson in democracy.  It is an undeniable testament to one of most fundamental structures of our democracy:  freedom of speech.  Whether or not a parent agrees with the protestors’ message is irrelevant.  Teaching children that every American regardless of race, religion, or economic status has the right to peacefully demonstrate is the real lesson.

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