Foley Squareに集まった群衆は次第にその数を増し、時の経過と共に四方八方からデモ隊が合流してきた。学生も多い。５時半頃になって、授業をボイコットしたCity University of New York (CUNY)の学生２０００人が加わった。高騰する授業料と膨らむ一方の学生ローンは学生にとっても深刻な問題だ。
この運動に賛同を表明してきた神父などの宗教指導者達。仏教僧もいた。
６時の時点では1万人に膨れ上がっていた。
歴史は受け入れるものではなく、自らが創るもの。
「世界」は自らが名付けるもの （“To name to the world”） というパウロ・フレイレの言葉が 今ほど心に響く時はない。
Hawaiian musician and guitarist Makana performed a song inspired by the Occupy Wall Street movement, "We are the Many"at the APEC world’s leaders’ dinner, where he was invited to play the background instrumental music. Afterwards, Makana said,
“I found it odd that I was afraid to do it at first.
I found that disturbing, and that’s kind of why I did it.
I didn’t like the idea of being afraid to sing the song I created…
If that’s what we’ve come to in the world, where we are afraid
to say certain things in the company of certain people,
I think that’s a dangerous place to be,
and so, for me to move out of that space,
I had to sing the song. And that’s what I did.”
APECの世界首脳晩餐会に招待されたハワイの人気ミュージシャンのMakanaは、予定されていたBGMの代わりに、Occupy Wall St運動に触発されて創った“We are the Many”という曲を歌ったというニュース。その後のインタビューで彼はこう言っている。
(This is a reflection piece on OWS that I am sharing with other members of the Maxine Greene Salon. I hope to write a Japanese version soon.)
Liberty Plaza ‘commune’ Yesterday, I went to Zuccotti Park, which came to be known as 'Liberty Plaza,' with other members of Maxine Greene Salon. Let me share with you my reflection on it. First of all, I was amazed to see and feel how the “occupation” has developed in terms of its size and energy despite the recent snow in NYC. There were a lot of people, over 500 I would say—a much larger crowd than the last time I was there 3 weeks ago.
There were definitely more tents, vendors, tour buses, and cops.
Zuccotti Park is now a hot spot for tour buses
And, to our surprise, at the center of it all was Crosby (Stills) and Nash singing and showing solidarity with Occupy Wall Street (OWS). Watch this video clip.
The entire system was much more developed as well. It has indeed grown into a “commune” to quote one member of the Salon. There was an information desk, “people’s kitchen,” “people’s library,” community affairs, compost electricity generation spot, and even a “think tank.”
People's Kitchen and the weekly kitchen schedule
It was clearly becoming more and more organized and sophisticated. There was a daily schedule board that listed detailed activities by the hour as well as a weekly schedule board which showed how different people were contributing different talents. In addition to the daily General Assembly, there was a media strategizing group, internet group, arts and culture group, outreach committee, public safety, kitchen crew, “know your rights” legal training workshop, and even daily meditations.
Community in the making
In contrast to OWS’s lack of focus due to its loose organization often criticized by mass media, what stood out for me was rather an incredibly inclusive community made possible by the very looseness. The diversity of participants, or residents, was enormous.
Besides the ‘normal’ participants calling for economic equity for the ‘99%,’ there were various special interest groups: “Decolonize Wall Street” group by Native Americans, veterans against war calling for a withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, more child-focused “Support Public Education” and “Occupy for Innocence,”
“Chefs against GMO’s” criticizing the danger and greed of the food industry producing genetically modified organisms,
as well as plain hippies and homeless people who have found a place for themselves. Amy Goodman, the main host of an independent news broadcast Democracy Now, thinks that this loose organization is the strength of OWS as “it’s uniting many different movements” because “there is a place for everyone.” (Video) I agree. Despite the coexistence of groups that are not only different but even in conflict with each other, communal decisions have been made on a daily basis through a consensus-building at the General Assembly. These are the people who are willing to live this extremely difficult and time-consuming process.
Countering the ‘faceless enemy’
Mass media’s another common criticism toward OWS is its lack of leaders, but Amy Goodman thinks the opposite here as well. Rather than its weakness, she thinks it is the very uniqueness and strength of this movement: “[the people] are empowered to feel that they are their own leaders.” Apparently, there have been undercover cops in Zuccotti Park, but the problem is that they cannot find one leader who is responsible for the deed. This reminded me of Mary McCarthy’s critique of bureaucracy: "Bureaucracy, the rule of no one, has become the modern form of despotism." Only this time, ‘the people’ are countering the ‘faceless enemy’ with the very strategy that has long tortured them.
People in dialogues
Another thing that stood out for me was how people were engaged in dialogues almost everywhere in the park.
It reminded me of something my mentor once told me. When I was a junior high school teacher in Japan, one of my routines was to observe the practice of my mentor’s kendo team (kendo is a Japanese martial art that uses bamboo swords). “Notice how many conversations are beginning to take place,” he pointed out to me one day. As I watched more carefully how the students were engaging in one-on-one duals, I began to see a number of pairs converging for questions and advice after each move. Watching them with a smile, he said, “These students are finally starting to think, and change.”What I saw in Zuccotti Park was exactly that—people engaging in serious dialogues to think what they can do to improve, to change.
Messiness of the “world”
Of course, when people with conflicting perspectives coexist, there are many disagreements and moments of discomfort and it’s not all that pretty. But it doesn’t have to be, for such messiness is an undeniable part of the unfinished world we live in. Hannah Arendt was well aware of this when she conceptualized the world to be inherited by children as something messy, containing not only the good and the beautiful but also the bad and the ugly, hardly perfected in harmony but still moving in all kinds of directions. Still, visiting Zuccotti Park, I could not deny the sensation that disparate forces were beginning to converge to shift the society in a major way.
Creation of a space
It would be a mistake, though, to assume that everyone in the Liberty Square was a ‘wide-awake participant.’ There were many ‘visitors’ wandering around, just like me, to see if there was a space for them as well. With eyes so curious and agitated, many seemed to be looking for a ‘participant’ with whom they could hold a conversation. Perhaps, any slight gesture from the other would spark a conversation. These were people on the verge of taking risks. Mass media have criticized OWS’s lack of concrete political agendas, but I think they are missing the point. I think that a true meaning of Occupy Wall Street movements lies in the creation of space for air and reflection in the vacuum created by the Corporate Sate. Asked where he thinks this is going, David Crosby said “This movement is so much larger than the Park. The Park is just a spark.” I agree that the space the participants have created go well beyond the limits of the Park. They now exist in various large cities, other countries, vast virtual space on the internet, and numerous individuals’ consciousnesses. And these are public spaces for dialogue and change.
Feeling pleasantly agitated, I returned to the Liberty Square next day, but this time as a teacher, to show my two-year-old daughter what our ‘world’ looks like.
今週の水曜日は、僕にとって一つの節目だった。以前にも紹介した震災から半年にちなんだシンポジウム、‘Dealing with Disaster: Caring for Japan Post 3-11′が終わったのだ。今回、その体験について書いてみないかという話を、僕が奨学金でお世話になっている米国大使館から頂いた。イベントの企画・運営を通して、様々なことを考え、感じ、学んだので、忘れないうちに、まずこの場で綴っていきたいと思う。
主催はConsortium for Japan Relief (CJR)といい、震災直後にコロンビアの様々な教授や学生によって結成された組織だ。結成当初は、被害状況の把握や情報交換、そしてメンバー達がそれぞれリーダーシップを取って行っている復興支援活動の状況を報告する場であったが、それらの活動が落ち着きを見せ始めた６月、アカデミックな環境に生きる自分たちにしかできないことをやろうと言って動き始めたのがこのシンポジウムだった。
東日本大震災以降、僕がかかわってきたグループの一つに、Consortium for Japan Relief （CJR）というのがある。コロンビア大学をベースとする教授・学生から成るグループで、震災直後、コロンビア大学School of Social Workの学長であるJeanette Takamura教授と、コロンビア大学循環器科の本間俊一教授の呼びかけで生まれた。
