#OccupyKwanzaa

Ujamaa is the fourth day of Kwanzaa, and it's probably the day I'm the least enthused about every year. Ujamaa means "cooperative economics," and this day was originally dedicated to "building and maintaining our own stores, shops, and other businesses, and to profit from them together." And...I can see how that was a great strategy in 1966, but in modern times, that's just a little too separatist for me to really rally behind. I do like to support small (and often black-owned) businesses, usually just because their products are unique or more holistic than those of large chains, and I love shopping at farmer's markets and craft fairs when I'm in cities that support awesomeness like that, so I guess I could play that up to celebrate Ujamaa. 

But that doesn't make for much of a blog post, so I thought about it some more. I even did a little bit of research on contemporary understandings of the term "cooperative economics," and was delighted with what I found:

"Cooperative economics offers everyone a fair and equal chance to work and enjoy life through relationships and the goods of this world. It is recommended to stop governmental and private corruption, unnecessary plunder, community pollution and resource depletion." (Source)

I can't believe I didn't realize this earlier. Ujamaa has #OCCUPY written all over it. "The 99%" as a concept is about as "cooperative" as you can get, and people from all walks of life coming together to fight for the "little guy," trying to make this country's economic system work for the masses, rather than against us, protesting corporate personhood and other evils of capitalism...this is OUR economic fight. It's about demanding fair wages, fair lending practices, corporate responsibility, fair tax policies, balancing the budget without screwing over the people on the bottom rungs of the economic ladder, and most importantly, EQUALITY OF OPPORTUNITY. It's about not letting ourselves be stepped on/over on other people's way to the top. And it's a worldwide movement, just like the Diaspora has made us worldwide peoples. 

And people of color ARE involved in the Occupy movement, even if the mainstream media isn't really perpetuating that idea:

Source

Source

Source

Source

Source

 

I feel like I'm missing out on what might be my only chance to join a mass protest.

When I started really learning about the Civil Rights Movement in the context of African-American Studies classes here at Princeton, learning about all the discontent and political fracturing that my high school history classes and textbooks had glossed over, if bothering to mention them at all, I wanted to be a rebel. I gained enough insight into the atmosphere of the time to finally decisively cast my lot with my father, who marched with Malcolm X, instead of my grandmother, who was one of King's disciples. I would never deny that I most likely owe the very circumstances of my life to Dr. King, but regardless, I want to FIGHT.

When Princeton experienced the one big racialized incident of my time here during the Winter of my Sophomore year, I was all over the t-shirt/sign-making and wanted to draw lots of attention to the small group of us counter-protesting. I remembered hearing about the Black Student Union taking over Nassau Hall to protest the Vietnam War and wanting a tiny piece of history like that to call my own. But alas, my classmates were meek and apathetic, and our under-participated-in protest will be remembered only in the archives of the Daily Princetonian (and even those articles will be remembered more for their racist comments than for the actual content). 

No one wanted to fight. And so I started to buy into the idea that all the good causes are done, even though everything I know about the world begs to differ. Maybe out-and-out activism in the form of anything other than an academic work just wasn't for me.  Maybe "the movement" as a social construct had died out.

And then representatives from the 99% of the country that is currently being shit on by the tops of the corporations on Wall Street finally realized Marx's dreams of class consciousness and began to come together to rise against the system that is keeping us down. It started with a few angry students, and is now in its 3rd week in NYC and has spread to major metropolitan areas all across the country. Support is pouring in from all over the world. More than 700 peaceful protesters have been arrested in NYC alone. There are ingenious signs, catchy slogans, supplies, celebrities, meditation circles and chanters and marchers. 


The Movement is back, and every time I read a blog post or see an article about #OccupyWallStreet, a very large part of me aches to be there. Maybe this is our fight. I know my presence could never make or break things, that one more person doesn't actually change the game at all...but maybe it would change me. Durkheim calls it "collective effervescence," the feeling of exhilaration one gets from being in a crowd. I think I need to be reminded that people care about things. Normal ordinary people, not just those of us in the Ivory Tower. I think I need that jolt of recognition that things MATTER. I want to feel that I'm part of this larger thing that existed before me and will exist after me and has to exist, must exist...I need to feel a part of something I want to perpetuate. And I know I already have things like that, but none of them feel important the way this feels important. 

I don't hope to ever see a crisis bigger than 1% of the country owning more wealth than the other 99%, or more than half of Black and Latino men in prime employment age (18-35) unemployed, or teachers being laid off by the hundreds, or college students dropping out because tuition got too high, or people who graduate being unable to get jobs, or housing falling to absolute shit, or people interpreting abuse by the government as abuse of the government. This is our crisis. This is our movement. And I can't really justify the expense of going, but these images and words move me beyond expression.

Photo by vincemie

 

Original here.

Original here.

 

Brother West at #OccupyWallSt

I had class with this man on my very first day at Princeton. I went to class half an hour early on Mondays and Wednesdays so that I could sit in the front row and be near to him. I'm fairly positive I've gone to every speaking engagement he's been at in my time here, and though I've only taken that one class with him, his influence on my intellectual mindset has been incredible. No other professor has ever matched his ability to make me literally stumble out of lecture, trying to reorient myself as a physical being within the new way I view the world because of what he just said. I don't always agree with his viewpoints, but that is one of the most powerful orators I've ever met. (Dr. Michael Eric Dyson rivals him.) My journey from being an American who happened to be black to being a Black American was critically influenced by this man, who calls me Sister Reid whenever we see each other, and I'm not sure I'll ever have the opportunity to truly thank him for that.

Anyway, enough of my gushing. I will leave you with an image, because it says more than I'll ever be able to:

 

Despite my previous post,

I wonder which side of this line I fall on. I go to the number one University in the world, and there is less than $200 in my bank account, and even that is already promised away. I have a job, but also a giant bill coming my way in November, and as much of the money I make as possible has to be saved in light of that.  I suppose I fall into an ambiguous middle category called "privileged".

Reblogged from Indie. Radiant.