Dear Occupy, I'm ready to proceed. #YouAreNeeded

Good afternoon all,
My name is Tracy and I would like to get involved in the Occupy movement. But I don’t know how to proceed.

I am what you might call an “Average American” in that I am married, my husband and I both work ( he in sales and me for American Airlines until I was injured on the job), we have two cars and a motorcycle, a house, one child in college which we struggle to help pay for and another child in high school. One might consider my husband a “conservative” as he has guns and believes in that as a right and he has voted Republican for his entire adult life. I am decidedly liberal. One might even say socialist. The point is, we both know that the deck is stacked against us no matter what our political persuasion. We will always be “working class” and all the corporations we deal with have a vested interest in keeping it that way. So when the big Occupy protests began a few years ago, my husband encouraged me to join in the local activities as much as I could. And I did. I found the movement locally disorganized, fragmented, and lacking in a mission statement and leadership.

Unfortunately, I think that regardless of intentions, the Occupy movement has also alienated many of the so called “average Americans”. Sure, there needs to be a consciousness change for many Americans to embrace anything not spoon fed to them by the media but I think the lack of the “average American” visible in the movement only served to keep the perception of the movement as one of “intellectual elites” or “disaffected youth”. This was another problem I saw with the movement. It did not address those issues central to getting the movement into the “mainstream”. For example, many people could not come to protests because of jobs or taking care of their children etc. Protests could’ve been scheduled throughout the day so people could come whenever they had the chance; there could’ve been activities for the children; there could’ve been more networking with more organizations who have similar goals. Catholic Charities would have been great to reach out to in my community as they run the largest homeless shelter network in the city. All this general disarray led many people to think this was just about young people pissed off because they hate rich people. I gave food and handed it out to the Occupiers and protested in my city but, obviously nothing has changed except the movement is not active in the public. With the possible exception of those deeply entrenched in the movement, it has all but disappeared in my city and indeed in the national news as well.

Income inequality is not going away unless ALL the 99% use their voices. I would like to help find a way to bring more of those people into the light. The government, with complicity from the media have divided and conquered Americans. Places like FOX and MSNBC (among many) keep us fighting amongst each other to divert our attention from issues that are pertinent to all of us.

I am not an articulate intellect, a disaffected young person, or a savvy blogger. I am a wife and mother close to retirement who is tired of being taken advantage of. I’m sure that most of the people in Occupy are “average Americans” as well; the rest of the country just needs to see that and know that speaking up isn’t a privilege, it’s a right.

Thanks for your time.

Regards,
Tracy

Hi Tracy,

Thank you for reaching out and sharing your story. I agree with many of your criticisms. One of the things we have to do if we move forward is accept everything good about what we’ve done in the past… as well as the bad. That’s the only way we’re going to learn.

Right now the most important thing you can do is to continue to take care of yourself, your family, and your children. These are tough times for everyone, regardless of belief (as you mentioned.)

But if you’re sure you still want to get involved with the movement, we’d need to know more about you, where you live, and what skills you have. Resumes are always a good way to do this if you have one. We’re also going to be doing a “census” of the movement in March and you should hear from us when that happens.

Until then, stay strong

Justine Tunney
Occupy Solidarity Network

Yo Occupy! Please post your own response to Tracy below. What are the projects and initiatives that you are most excited about in 2014?