Tag Archives: Live Different

Occupy Wall Street: What Do They Want?

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The corporate media sneers at the “punks and hippies” with “absolutely no purpose or focus in life” taking to the streets in NYC and dozens of other cities and ask ”What do they want?”

This is what they want.

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Declaration of the Occupation of New York City

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As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.

As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.

  • They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.
  • They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.
  • They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one’s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.
  • They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.
  • They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless animals, and actively hide these practices.
  • They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.
  • They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.
  • They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay.
  • They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.
  • They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.
  • They have sold our privacy as a commodity.
  • They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press. They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.
  • They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.
  • They have donated large sums of money to politicians, who are responsible for regulating them.
  • They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.
  • They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives or provide relief in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantial profit.
  • They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.
  • They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.
  • They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.
  • They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad. They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.
  • They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts. *

To the people of the world,

We, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power.

Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.

To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.

Join us and make your voices heard!

*These grievances are not all-inclusive.

 

Kiva.org: Lend a hand from across the world

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Minneapolis - You may have heard about microfinancing, the global phenomenon of providing modest loans to individuals and small businesses in some of the poorest areas of the world. Instead of having to go to the traditional money-lenders and paying criminal rates of return out of desperation for needed funds, more and more of the world’s poor are now securing fair terms on small loans from a growing number of organizations and local banks specializing in microfinancing. And it’s proving to be a safe bet for the lenders. The borrowers of microfinanced loans- the poor- are turning out to be some of the most responsible financial stewards around, with upwards of 90% full repayment and very little default. It seems that given a genuine opportunity to improve their lives, most people can be trusted.

Microfinancing is a great idea. But it gets even better. This is the age of the web, people! We’re all getting connected. Kiva.org has taken microfinancing one step further. Now you can become a microfinancier! Kiva.org is a non-profit organization that directly connects the people who have money with the people who need money, no matter where they are in the world, one person at a time. In their own words:

“Kiva lets you connect with and loan money to unique small businesses in the developing world. By choosing a business on Kiva.org, you can “sponsor a business” and help the world’s working poor make great strides towards economic independence. Throughout the course of the loan (usually 6-12 months), you can receive email journal updates from the business you’ve sponsored. As loans are repaid, you get your loan money back.”

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Here’s how it works. You go to www.kiva.org. There you will find a whole list of profiles with pictures and brief bios of people around the world (like the Cambodian couple shown here) in need of small loans ($100 – $1000 or so)to help kick-start or rescue their small businesses. Each lender gives only a portion, maybe $25, of the total needed. The portions are consolidated, and when the requested amount is reached, the loan is granted. The lenders each receive periodic updates up the status of the borrowers as the loans are being repaid. Over 99% of loans made are repaid in full. Amazing.

Just browsing through the bios was a moving experience for me. The people in the pictures were completely familiar. These are the folks I’ve been spending time with for the last couple years! The guy selling toiletries from a street stand made of a couple boards and some plastic. The young woman with an infant held close selling used clothes out of a spare bedroom. The indigenous poultry vendor from the Ecuadorean Andes. How wonderfully ironic that I had to come home to find a secure and effective way to help some of these folks out. While traveling, there were a lot of handouts, but I could never be sure how the money would be spent and I wasn’t ever around long enough to find out. Now I have a means of connecting in a meaningful way, of knowing exactly how the money is being used, and of sharing in the joy of it’s fruition.

IMHO, this is just an incredibly cool idea and one great example of the new tools and conditions emerging (thanks to the globalized net) that are providing a real basis for hope for a better world for all. I have four loans out already and can’t wait to see how the borrowers make use of them. When the money comes back, I’ll just send it out again, and sit back and watch how that hundred bucks gets used over and over again to improve the lives of people from Honduras to Azerbaijan.

Kiva - loans that change lives