Saturday, November 19, 2011

With expulsion from Zuccotti Park and numbers dwindling, Occupy Wall Street movement looks old

Experts think protesters should take their show on the road

Thursday, November 17 2011, 10:13 PM

 Wall Street workers flashed their ID's to get onto the street during Occupy Wall Street's day of action in Manhattan, NY Nov. 17, 2011.
Kevin Hagen/New York Daily News
Officers arrest another Wall St. protestor during day of marches in lower Manhattan.
With their expulsion from Zuccotti Park and their numbers dwindling, the future of Occupy Wall Street seemed uneasy at best just two months after its birth.
What will likely linger, no matter what happens to the demonstrators, is the anti-greed message they brought to the national agenda.
“I sure hope it’s not the end of Occupy Wall Street,” said history professor Jay Moore, 59, who came down from Vermont to witness Thursday’s march on Wall Street.
“It’s not just here in New York, it’s all over the place,” he said. “It will take a while to see where it all shakes out. This is history in the making right here.”
Others suggested that two months was long enough for the protesters to wear out their Big Apple welcome.
Mitchell Moss, NYU professor of urban policy and planning, said it’s time for the protesters to take their show on the road.
“At this point, I think they should quickly migrate to the Washington Monument,” he said. “There’s ample space, and close proximity to the decision makers.
“That should be the next stop on their magical mystery tour.”
Moss said the protesters were successful in bringing attention to the issue of wealth distribution in the U.S. But he felt additional demonstrations like the one aimed at shutting down Wall Street would work against OWS.
“New Yorkers are a work-oriented people, and there is only a limited amount of patience with people who want to disrupt the city,” he said.
Tourist Bill Lett, 61, of Denver, thought Moss’ idea of a trip to the nation’s capital made sense.
“I think Washington, D.C., is going to be the place where it ends up,” said the retiree. “That’s where the power is. The money flows in Washington.”
Radio host and Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa suggested the group’s future was damaged by their Tuesday eviction from Zuccotti Park.
“The lack of a place where people are gathered 24/7 is really going to hamper the movement,” he said. “Now they’re on the go, like Bedouins.
“Why not go to Crotona Park in the Bronx?” he suggested. “Nobody’s going to evict you there. But the moment you leave the Wall Street area, things start to dissipate.”
Newsstand owner John Suda, 50, watched the protesters Thursday and proclaimed the movement still had legs.
“Just look at all the people,” he said. “Even with the rain pouring down, still all these people come out. This amount of people won’t just disappear.”
Financial analyst Anthony Lyons, 39, offered a different take.
“These characters are a joke,” he said. “All week we hear about how they were going to shut down Wall Street, and what do they do? They walk around in circles, chanting to themselves.
“This isn’t a movement. It’s a fad.”
Baruch College professor Douglas Muzzio said OWS could be finished in terms of bringing its message to the masses. He noted that on a visit to Thursday’s protest, the NYPD appeared to outnumber the demonstrators.
But time, he said, would provide the real test for the movement and its message.
“It has resonated,” said Muzzio. “The question is does this resonance lead to results? And I can’t say if it’s going to have long-lasting policy and political impact.”
lmcshane@nydailynews.com

Go here for video:
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/expulsion-zuccotti-park-numbers-dwindling-occupy-wall-street-movement-old-article-1.979479

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/expulsion-zuccotti-park-numbers-dwindling-occupy-wall-street-movement-old-article-1.979479#ixzz1e9J34i8m




No comments:

Post a Comment