The Message from Seattle 614
Much of America was surprised by the disturbances in Seattle this week, especially the sometimes violent street protests and confrontations over what seemed to be a mixed bag of environmental, technological, economic and social issues.
What were these protests really about?
It was widely suggested in the mainstream media that many of the demonstrators had no idea what they were protesting, that they were just acting out, or mimicking other protest movements. Three "anarchists" in ski masks named Spider, DangerZone and Nimo gave interviews all week to reporters, usually in shadowy light from secret locations.
Is there anything more endearing than watching reporters interview menacing Net-based anarchists with Web sites? Why does one get the sense these kids will be chuckling all the way back to their dorms? Finally, we know why Dr. Evil had his headquarters in a Starbucks in Seattle's famous needle.
All week, "analysts" have been zeroing on this alleged anarchism, hinting darkly of nihilistic conspiracists, union thugs and a wanna-be-like-the-60's generation that has no real knowledge of global politics or indigenous social issues to call its own.
But it seems more accurate to say that many journalists missed the point. They seemed to have no idea what they were seeing and covering in the streets. The protestors weren't aping the battles of the 60s, but raising new, in many ways much more complex ones. They relate to corporatism, humanism, Net regulation, the environment, globalization and technology.
Street brawling aside - the birth of political movements is usually neither pretty nor coherent - this new kind of leaderless, bottom-up movement could best be described as Techno-Idealism. Defined on the Net, this new movement has already launched its first red-hot idea - that corporatism has run amok.
There was, perhaps inevitably, the notion, not the first or last time this will be suggested in coming weeks, that all of this poorly-articulated, diffuse and anarchic anger could only have come from the Internet.
"The confusion about the protestors' political goals is understandable," wrote a New York Times columnist Thursday, "this is the first movement born of the anarchic pathways of the Internet. There is no top-down hierarchy, no universally recognized leaders, and nobody knows what is going to happen next."
The writer had a point. Perhaps one reason politicians and journalists have been so viscerally hostile to the Internet is that many of them foresaw this techno-driven political response to the rise of very big business: an era of absolutely unbridled, unprincipled and rapacious bigness, immorality, inhumanity and greed. The era of the mega-merger, takeover and acquisition without regard to consequence has created companies of unprecedented size and reach. Their rise has raised a host of social and moral issues, few of which have been seriously addressed - until Seattle.
Perhaps this political movement was inevitable coming from the children of the Boomers, who talked a lot about revolution but ended up doing a lot more business.
Protestors at the WTO conference were hardly vague. They were vocal and specific in citing the damage and suffering corporatism has caused all over the world - to human rights, working conditions, the environment and notions of security, privacy and personal and creative freedom.
Sorting through a wave of e-mail from Seattle and watching and reading shocked, increasingly angry accounts of the WTO protests, the message from Seattle is striking, especially when it gets past the media screen.
Apart from its physical targets - there were efforts to trash Starbucks, Nike, Gap and McDonald's stores and franchises in several days of near-rioting in Seattle - the most striking thing about the protestors was their diversity - all ages, all types, a lot of different causes.
But the causes weren't unrelated: they were nearly all connected, in one form or another, to perceptions of threats to freedom and to corporate greed and immorality, and to the failure of domestic or international governmental authorities to curb or respond to either.
If the protestors were lacking a single coherent 60's style political theme, (stop the War, racism is bad) the 90's version was impressive: a visceral, intensely political - and yes, increasingly Net-centered - response to Corporate Bigness is underway.
It's dangerous to generalize about all big corporations. And many of the Seattle protesters are enthusiastic free-marketeers. What they're opposed to is out-of-control business with no morality - the motto of our times. Some big businesses have advanced research, helped the environment, supported human rights, generated good jobs and economic opportunity, created valuable new products. But spontaneous social movements don't always draw fine distinctions.
In the past generation, corporatism - for which the WTO has become a metaphor - has been blamed for a daunting list of social wrongs, even crimes.
The institutions and entities that are supposed to be monitoring and regulating powerful corporations in America - government and journalism come to mind - have been, in different ways, muted and corrupted. They have failed to do their jobs or meet their historic obligations. Corporatism has invaded the workplace and transformed business with relatively little serious public discussion or oversight.
Small wonder the protesters were furious.
The Techno-Idealists can't look to Congress to monitor corporatism. Big business is now the dominant contributor to the political process. Journalism isn't about to do it. Most major national American media outlets have been corporatized and acquired by the very institutions they're supposed to be monitoring. Book publishing, now almost wholly owned by multi-national media conglomerates, isn't about to pick up the slack.
The protestors in Seattle seemed to articulate these issues with considerable clarity, even if many people in authority didn't want to hear it, preferring instead to huff about violence and irresponsibility.
Oppressive corporatism - foreseen and warned about by great writers from Orwell to Huxley to Sir Arthur Clarke to John Raulston Saul - has grown beyond even their imagination. Corporations have staggering resources and power to shape the modern world, despite the fact that they have no political agenda or ideology apart from dominating markets and maximizing profits.
But that's what makes these mega-entities so venal, even dangerous. By necessity, they exist in a moral vacuum in which almost everything is morally acceptable except making less money, and human and moral concerns are subordinate to profit. As corporations have become more global, and more and more of what they do occurs out of sight of democratic processes and scrutiny, they have become even less accountable, thus less moral.
"The WTO is Satan," e-mailed a Seattle protestor yesterday. "Not only because it threatens freedom by trying to help corporations damage human and labor rights, control property, tax the Net, corporatize technology, control intellectual content and ruin the environment, but because it's a stand in."
For what?
"Bigness. Indifference. Greed. Crummy jobs. Arrogance. Child labor. Being put on hold for hours when you call. Loss of freedom. The freedom of technology and commerce to grow unfettered. The WTO isn't responsible for all these things, but it's a pretty good focal point to start the fight. It's the tool of these companies, the mouthpiece."
"For the last 20 years," e-mailed a middle-aged Boomer, "ordinary Americans have been treated like toilet tissue by the 20 per cent that owns the whole damn country and its government."
And not just "ordinary" workers.
Middle-class and affluent workers have been down-sized, re-engineered, terminated, re-located and threatened by global corporations practicing new "flexible" (a/k/a: everyone is insecure, vulnerable and dispensable, everyone's role and mission is continously subject to change) personnel policies.
"It's not an issue of left or right," e-mailed Mark, a college student arrested during the first day of the protests. "It's an issue of top to bottom."
This idea is, of course, instantly familiar to anyone who's spent any time on the Internet, perhaps the most radically lateral, that is to say, many-to-many rather than top-to-bottom, social and economic system in the world.
The protestors in Seattle made some telling, nearly irrefutable arguments. Corporatism has, in fact, damaged the environment by creating incalculable amounts of products that pollute and trash the earth. Corporations have increasingly acquired and sought to monopolize whole elements of culture, from movies to books to the press. This has sparked an epidemic homogenization of popular culture - not a dumbing down, but a dulling down - as controversial, profane, sexual or other "controversial" cultural offerings from books to movies to music are eliminated or pushed to the margins so that safer products can be mass-marketed.
In the United States, corporatism is celebrated for generating a booming economy in which profits are greater than ever, but work for most people is much worse: transient, poorly paid, unrewarding.
Younger workers are forced into dead-end and poorly paid positions with little chance of advancement or meaningful work, while older workers are down-sized, re-engineered, laid off in droves. Countless millions of workers - from kids to the elderly - have been victimized and brutalized worldwide by modern corporatism and the ruthless way it competes.
The protest movement that popped up in Seattle isn't anti-globalism.
It's distinctly and specifically anti-corporate.
The roots of the demonstrations lie in the notion that companies are behaving immorally: Nike, which has been accused of making products in sweatshops, the human rights campaign that targets Royal Dutch/Shell in Nigeria. Or Microsoft, which has been accused of monopolizing software and information markets for years, but which is only now facing tepid government regulation. Ironically, some of Microsoft's employees joined in the demonstrations in Seattle.
There have also been protests against Monsanto's genetically engineered foods in Europe; individualistic (mostly geek-generated) struggles against the recording industry's cabalistic efforts to control music.
Other issues cited by the protestors: individual liberty, economic dignity, patent control, the freedom of intellectual property, higher wages, job security, labor rights, environmental protection, and some check on the rise of corporate power and influence.
Does this protest movement have its roots in the "anarchic pathways of the Internet?"
Sure.
The political potential of the Net has always been pushed aside by obsessive preoccupations with pornography and business. On top of everything else, the eruption in Seattle demonstrates the ability of activists and ideologues to form their own grass-roots communications networks out of the sight of traditional institutions. The WTO protests didn't come out of nowhere, it was just that nobody in authority was in a position to see them coming.
Many of the protestors in Seattle are - using new technologies like the Net - beginning to do the work of politicians, regulatory agencies, legislators and journalists. Perhaps that's the real message to the WTO and the rest of the world.
But if you listen to many of the messages and e-mails, they aren't all that scattered. They do have a lot in common. They are challenging Bigness and asking whether or not increasingly powerful corporations shouldn't be held to a higher standard of moral behavior; whether government shouldn't act to preserve freedom and elevate human rights rather than conspire to suppress them.
These questions are not foolish. They're powerful and timely. Public discussion of them is long overdue. Corporatism is a civic menace. It pushes the individual aside. It spawns greed, passivity and conformity.
The demonstrators aren't raising old issues, but very new ones. The real question isn't why protestors exploded in anger, but what took them - and us - so long?
tongue in cheek humor (Score:2)
People seem to have a clue. (Score:5)
Perhaps one of the most enlightening things I heard (on tuesday) was that a local militia was considering entering the protest are to defend the protesters' rights to assemble and to free speech.
Rioters are not the Protestors (Score:2)
The protests weren't the riots, the riots were radicalists. There were valid protests there. People seem not to realize it.
Needless to say, she was very very upset about it. She had travelled all the way out there from Wesleyan, and then got classified as a radical.
*sigh* people claim they know all from looking at a segment of trees or the forest. I don't claim I know the radicalists or the protestors, but I do know that people are being shortsighted. Let's see the whole thing.
So many things couldn't happen today
So many songs we forgot to play
So many dreams coming out of the blue
Seatlle woes (Score:3)
This article is no exception. However, he seems to be excusing the violent and destructive behavior of some of the "protesters" ("rioters" is more accurate in their cases). I don't care how angry you are over what the WTO is doing -- that does not give you justification to destroy others' property.
Sure, there are rare cases when violence is necessary, but protesting against the WTO and what it seems to represent is not one of them! The individuals who will feel the pain from the damage that was caused have done little, if anything, to hurt the public -- and the corporate leaders who the protesters should be angry at won't feel a bit of pain.
Let's face it; in any large grouping of people -- particularly people who are there to protest -- there will be some who can't control their impulses and do some things that are just plain wrong. And because of them, the real protesters' views get obscured behind the poor behavior of the others.
That's the real tragedy.
Powers&8^]
Shades of '68 (Score:2)
The '68 DNC was significant not only because of the rioting, and the Chicago 7 (or 8, depending on who you ask) trial, but because it was the first time that mass media (television in particular) had allowed images like that from our own soil to be broadcast right into the living rooms of everyday american homes.
The yippies to some extent (certainly more than the policemen beating unarmed protesters on camera) realized the opportunities afforded by this new kind of media coverage, and may have sought in some ways to provoke the police into more vicious attacks (the weathermen, for example, would chant "pigs eat shit. pigs eat shit. pigs eat shit." at approaching police lines), because they knew it was all being broadcast on the NBC Nightly News. "The Whole World Is Watching" takes on new significance in this light.
While I don't think the WTO protests are anywhere near the calibre of the '68 DNC, the situation is similar in some ways, as Katz pointed out. The event seems to have centered around a new type of media, a whole new way of communicating drastically altering the way we organize ourselves . Net coverage of the event has been particularly extensive (what are we doing right here?).
To quote Robert Anton Wilson [rawilson.com] (roughly) "Marx was wrong. Society is not determined by its means of production, it's defined by its means of communication."
Anthony
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Segmentation fault (core dumped)
You know your're at a lame riot when... (Score:2)
(with due credit to David Letterman [cbs.com])
Christopher A. Bohn
Comment removed (Score:3)
Violence (Score:2)
In the us , violence is rare (for protest I mean)
The funny thing is that some of the protesters where european - because being heard in Europe isn't enough, If you want your ideas to travel around the world, it's easier if the TV that does the images recording is an American One - Because for so many things the US dictates the world:
lets take the simple beef problem. In europe 20 years ago it was prouved that giving cattle some hormones was dangerous for man's health
that kind of production was banned in europe , not in the US.
Now days the US producer (which do make money but only because they use hormones) want to come back on our markets - we don't want to ! and the WTO will try to force us
that inaceptable !
Benefits and drawbacks (Score:3)
A lot of the protesters have been really upset about the some of the problems of the WTO. It may be dominated by the goals of the corporations, but this is true of most governments as well. The WTO is simply a larger-scale version of what happens in Washington, D.C.
I also have to wonder how many of the protesters who decry the "incrasing corporatism" aren't aware of how many benefits they get from the same corporations which they are attacking. This is more than asking how many protestors were wearing Nike shoes; did they drive to Seattle? Where did all of the gasoline come from; can they really say that they aren't part of our car-centric culture? Did they fly? Who made the airplane they flew in on? From how many countries did parts for that airplane come from?
This is a complicated issue, and it seems to me that many of the protesters weren't necessarily presenting a very thoughtful dissent to what the WTO is trying to do.
Consider... (Score:3)
I agree that corperations need to be kept in check (just like the government, unions, religion, and anything else with power and influence) but before we blast them as the Great Evil, look at some of the good they can do - ideally, a corporation wants money, it gains this by producing a product and selling it. it sells it by making its product something we want.
Of course, this usually gets muddled somewhere along the way, just like governments usually somehow forget to protect everyone's rights and freedoms and religions loose sight of their original intent, and what have you. This is the price we pay and the risk we take whenever humans decided to act together towards some goal.
My point is, coroprations have achieved some pretty spectaculary forms of efficency (things individuals simple could not have accomplished on their own), and they have done some pretty shoddy things as well. Keep this in mind before condemning.
Just my humble opinion
We're doing what we can... (Score:3)
This is a valid point. The first time I personally heard the 'net advocated as a tool for social change was in a tent at the 1994 Glastonbury Festival; and it was a refreshing change; yes, computers can be used as tools to bring about social and environmental change; used properly they can be extremely effective for the purpose, despite their (current) exclusivity.
The network that brought the Seattle protests into being started as a meeting of about two dozen people in a London community centre in July 1998; from three groups; Reclaim the Streets [greennet.org.uk], Greenpeace (London) [mcspotlight.org] (no connection to Greenpeace International) - a group better known for the McLibel [mcspotlight.org] trial and People's Global Action [ymca.int].
We didn't know where it was going, but reckoned that it would be a damn good way of opposing the MAI [citizen.org]; to use the global nature of the 'net to provide a global counter to the WTO. We got in touch with groups like the Zapatistas and Karnataka State Farmer's Association in India; and suggested an action on June the 18th 1999; to coincide with the G8 meeting in Koln (in Germany).
As the records [j18.org] show, we managed to get about 43 countries onboard; and there was a good feeling about it; that we'd hit upon a good way of co-ordinating resistance to the WTO; which is why a repeat action was staged in Seattle on November the 30th.
If a popular resistance is to be mounted to the WTO, the our resistance has to be as transnational as capital.
- A London J18 activist, Debian fanatic and regular
An Account of the Riots on Tuesday (Score:5)
As you know there was a large dispensal of tear gas and pepper spray. For me, this came later. All day the police were trying to section of the crowd. They eventually contained most people to the pike pine corridor, and then to pine. I can't say this for sure because there was so much confusion, but I found no exit from pine street twords the end. The police then cut through the middle of pine street (don't know where), and then pushed half of the crowd twords the market and belltown, and the other half up the pine street overpass. The crowd (myself included) was sitting peacefully with some istance from the police when they decided to move us back. They wanted us out of downtown obviously from the looting (none of which I saw firsthand), but also because they initiated a 7PM curfew on downtown. NOBODY ever announced this to the crowds. I didn't find out about it until the 11 o'clock news. They never said "please withdraw" or leave or anything. Very suddenly the cops began to lob teargas into the crowds. They didn't aim twords the front to try to push the crowd ahead, they were simply filling the streets with it. I brought a gasmask, and promptly put it on. The crowd of course retreated up pine.
The teargas flowed, and the crowd retreated until we got to the I-5/Pine overpass. The crowd began to stop along with the gas. There was a 100 foot space in between the police and the crowd. There was a standoff for several minutes, until people started to throw bottles and empty tear gas cannisters at the police. Several people were also launching fireworks at them (smart move). In return the police started firing rubber bullets tipped with pepper spray. They also started firing MASSIVE rounds of CS gas (possibly pepper spray, I felt a burning on my skin, whereas what they used downtown only seemed to affect my lungs, minimally at that), again into the center of the crowd, not the front line. There was an all out stampede up pine street at this point. The police continued to fire until the crowd had (semi)dispersed. In the confusion I was hit with several of the rubber bullets, so if any media source has said they weren't firing them, they're LYING.
I went home and later went down to broadway (near seattle community college) where there was a scene of mindless desctruction FAR different from the almost entirely peaceful protests downtown. People were lighting dumpsters on fire, smashing up bus stops, throwing things, etc. The cops arrived, and not looking to get another whiff of tear gas, I decided to go home.
For the most part the crowd remained peaceful all day. There were a VERY SMALL minority of people throwing fireworks or bottles (mabey 10 out of 10,000). When the bottles were thrown, myself and others yelled out for them to stop (and they did). We as a whole remained peaceful, and our only crime was sitting. The fact that a few people decided to launch fireworks into the police probably set off the entire thing. I'm still trying to make sense of it all, as most of the night was filled with an air of complete chaos. -Ryan
It's a FIRST!!! (Score:3)
Guiness Book of World Records Entry: December 3, 1999 - Jon Katz writes an article without using the term "Geek" or referring to how helplessly misunderstood they are.
I suppose I'm a geek, but I've always felt a little uncomfortable with the way that Jon Katz approaches the topic of geeks. Debate however you want on whether he is actually a geek or not, but I don't feel that he is, and since I don't feel that he is, it sounds very strange always hearing characterizations of people like myself from somebody who's on the outside. I'm not trying to be elitist, just that if you're not a geek, your characterisations of geek behaviours should be just about as valid as, say, a politicians characterizations of geek behaviors, which is to say not at all.
Whose Morality? (Score:2)
While I don't usually agree with Katz, I must agree that large corps should be held to a higher degree of morality. That said, the question is: WHICH morality will they be held to?
Large corps are mostly international in nature, and people in (and within) different countries all have different standards as to what is "moral". Is McDonalds immoral because the cow is a sacred animal to some? In fact, are ALL meat producing companies immoral because some people believe that eating meat is wrong? On the other hand, there are some people (I know a few) who have practically no morals. Do we want to use them as a basis for international morallity?
I gues what I'm saying is that having companies adhear to a certain moral standard is a good idea, you can't enforce it and make everyone happy.
Anti-economic (Score:2)
-russ
Double standards. (Score:5)
1. Regarding the independent ISP whose business is endangered by flames and letters to customers - defensive "that's too bad - the Internet is a rough place" and "that's one ISP who well never buckle under to the Feds again" remarks. And lots of "that's just a small minority - Slashdot shouldn't be judged by the actions of a few" remarks. That line is very often repeated whenever stories about flame-avalanches directed at writers and journalists is brought up.
2. Regarding the attacks on Starbucks and McDonalds - "those punks have no respect for property;" "the protestors are just acting up without knowing what they're talking about." Little discrimination is made between the "flaming" few and the nonviolent thousands. Tears are shed for the insured, corporate-buck backed mega-franchises that have to replace their windows and lose a couple days of business.
I think this betrays a deep bias in geek thinking: non-physical "violence" is ok in a way that physical or direct confrontation is not, even if the former is more destructive to peoples' lives. Maybe because a lot of geeks are body-loathing recluses who posture themselves as pure intellect. (Hell, I used to be that way.)
Maybe the fact is that people in the high-tech field are a little incriminated by these protests has something to do with it. People who are getting what they want often tend to promote the ideology that people get what they deserve, and any reference to large-scale economic inequities compromises that stance.
Anyway, quite UNLIKE Columbine, I do see the WTO event as a sea-change of sorts. An interesting way to end a millenium.
I'm astonished. (Score:3)
Yes: corporatism can be a bad thing. And yes, I think that a revolt against it was what the WTO Riots were largely about. You see, I believe that humans are intensely valuable. I believe that we are far more valuable than money, far more valuable than can ever be defined by "McWorld".
And so, it troubles me when I see the world turning to a dominant consumerism. When I see morals, ethics, and everything else replaced in public debate by "It's the economy, stupid". When I see the interests of anyone or anything subjected to the heartless, amoral desires of big business.
And there is a solution to this guys. It's called "break the cycle". We, as individuals (hopefully) interested in the worth of man beyond his pocket book, need to step out of consumerism.
What does this mean? Well, for starters, pay off your credit cards. And your car. And your house. That's right: be debt free. (I'm not, but I'm working on it as fast as my overpaid fingers can get me there). And don't think you always need the latest toy. Buy quality instead of the cheapest thing you can get that will look good. Trade in your plastic steak and frozen cake for a vegetable garden. Live small, think large.
Don't get me wrong: I don't have a problem with money or possessions. They are necessary, and it would be folly to eliminate them. But they are a dangerous servant and a terrible master. When we are dominated by our pocketbooks, we become moral wretches of the worst sort. We will do anything to maintain our illusory life-styles. Or, as the Book put it: "the love of Money is the source of much evil."
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
Free trade isn't a cure-all and never will be. In some countries, free trade would stand to destroy local economies because of technological disadvantage, limited human and land resources, et al. Walmart in bangladesh, (if it) stands to make profit may be siphoning a very large portion of that money to a US walmart headquarters, and largely to a few people, taking that money out of their economy, and into the hands of likely a few people who's propensity to save is a lot higher than say, has a billion dollars in the bank. This is even before considering human rights violations in the name of the all mighty dollar.
Regulation is definitely a major issue, and protests are a way to gain support for a group of particular causes. If you think what they did was futile, then why did Clinton say that he was willing to set it up so some of the pleas of protesters were heard at this and future WTO meetings? Scream enough, and eventually someone in power will hear and possibly care.
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
Sorry - trade has sometimes benefitted human beings. Done right, both sides benefit. But very often, one set benefits at the other side's expense. Or both sides benefit short-term, but suffer far greater long-term consequences.
You might ask them how fair it was, and whether they benefitted by it.
Okay - that was a cheap shot. It wasn't trade alone that decimated Native American society - nor was it conquering armies with muskets. It was disease. The conquering armies and unscrupulous traders just took advantage of a situation that disease created for them. But the point stands. Trade is not always beneficial to everyone involved. Remember how you felt when you traded baseball (or Magic, or Pokemon) cards as a youth? You may have got rid of your duplicates in exchange for cards you didn't have, but you may also have traded away rare and valuable cards for common ones. Trade can be beneficial, but it can also be harmful. This should be kept in mind.
devil's advocate (Score:2)
Corporatism has, in fact, damaged the environment by creating incalculable amounts of products that pollute and trash the earth.
The thing to keep in mind when making sweeping statements like this is that these corporations could not produce these products if we didn't buy them. I've heard the argument that we're just too ignorant to buy better products, or that there simply aren't enough alternatives available, but I think that with the advent of the "one world economy" this argument is becoming less and less relevant...
Corporate workers aren't some seperate sect of society, living in seclusion and secretly working to fuck with us all. They're you and me, average joe's just looking for a job and a few extra $$ usually.
Corporations have increasingly acquired and sought to monopolize whole elements of culture, from movies to books to the press. This has sparked an epidemic homogenization of popular culture - not a dumbing down, but a dulling down [...]
Again we come back to the question, "Who's buying this shit?" The only possible answer is: we are. I agree with Katz, it sucks, and I've spent years kicking and screaming and complaining about it and finally come to one realization: "We (for the most part) *want* to be dumbed down." It's like the end of 1984, we love big brother, as much as we'd like to deny it. Why else would so many people watch shows like Jerry Springer and Friends? Why do so many people so desperately look for any way possible to avoid the horrific burden of thinking for themselves?
Anthony
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Segmentation fault (core dumped)
Unfortunately (Score:2)
As much as I respect other peoples opinion on how "evil" or not corporations are. Unfortunately hurting jobs, and stopping 8.5 million dollars of commerce (as of yesterday) in Seattle doesn't help the situation any. If they want to make their voices heard they must, absolutely must try to convince people through nonviolent, easy, nonconfrontationist, means.
Listening and watching people who are, as I see "so-called" anarchists really irk me. Wearing their Nike shoes, Casio watches made in Taiwan - etc. If they were so damned Anti-corporation, and anti-order, and anti-civilization - then please go live like the amish.
I honestly believe that the WTO is a good thing for the most part. This is something that you will never hear any other time, I really do not like overbearing government etc. - but let's be honest. The WTO exsists to shatter trade barriers - thus improving the economies, the point of all of this is not "patent issues, and corp. rights" -- as one Seattle commercial downplays the meetings agenda. Let me make one thing perfectly clear, not many in America are poor. Those who are, or those who have been to the extent of a third world nation may understand that when you are poor _you do not care about certian things_ - you want to eat and drink. Animal rights, human rights, and the environment take a back seat to survival. If we improve the economies of third and second world nations - the rest will fall into place. And why are they so poor in the first place? Well because they owe other countries so much money, and the 30 - 50 odd year old debt is so inflated that they can't pay it... so first cancel the debt, open trade barriers, and then things will start to improve.
But back to the anarchists, and even the protesters... Please, you say that the wto is there to take away human, animal, and environmental rights? Get informed - look at the hard facts. I will leave my soapbox with a quote that I heard once "Your garbage cans are the gourmet of the world"
It's getting tiresome... (Score:5)
... to watch Katz continue to shoehorn whatever's in the news today into his standard schema of "geeks" and "tech" and whatnot, no matter how well the topics fit together.
"Techno-idealism"? How on Earth does what's been happening in Seattle have anything to do with technology? It has more to do with social science than computer science -- people feel threatened because a faceless Other is making rules that affect their lives, and they have no recourse if they don't like the world the Other is building for them. So they go to protest -- peacefully -- and then people on both sides overreact (as is common when crowds face police) and things get out of hand. Where in this description do the words "Internet" and "technology" fit? They don't. The growth of technology is one big story in the modern era, but it's not the only story, and we don't need to pretend somehow that all events in our lives spring from a Prime Mover called Mother Internet -- or that the only way to invest significance in an event is to somehow associate it with the tech world. To do so cheapens both the important changes that tech has wrought on the world, and the other movements and ideas that affect our lives and times.
Seattle is an important moment. It could very well mark the end of the political era we think of as the "90s", which began with the Gulf War and George Bush's New World Order, and the start of the next era, the backlash to the globalization, corporatization, and McDonaldization of the planet. That's the story that'll come out of the Battle of Seattle, not that some rioters had Web sites or carried PalmPilots or whatever. Of course some of them have Web sites. A percentage of any random sample of people these days will turn up some with Web sites -- but correlation does not imply causation, and those Web sites did not spark the flames in Seattle, Jon. Those flames were sparked by the anger and fear of people who feel themselves being stripped of their freedom and dignity by tiny elites and the social forces those elites command. Let's keep our eye on the ball.
-- Jason A. Lefkowitz
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
[wry laugh] Oh yeah, look how it benefited them. 90+% mortality, entire tribes wiped out, many of the rest confined to concentra ... er, reservations. A few of the remaining descendents of survivors are managing to do well only by exploiting loopholes in the laws of the descendents of their "benefactors" and taking advantage of people who can't do math. Maybe you want a different example?
Trade in general is good, but it has serious limitations and drawbacks, including the fact that the lopsided conditions and results of some trade can make it very, very hard to even point out those very limitations and drawbacks (let alone do something about them). The Seattle "rioters" realize this.
The Demand Side also has to take responsibility (Score:2)
Acting on the rage does not - in the long run - hurt the corporations. Nike will go to their insurance company and get a check, the "anarchists" will get the blame, and people's sympathies will go out to that company and the minimum wagers who were put out of work by these events. Nothing will change.
As the demand side in this thing we - in every country - can and should act. To those of you who say nothing can be done just look at the fundamentalist types in Kansas. Action can be taken politically and economically.
Political action can be taken in a couple of ways. Deluge your local rep of whatever with letter writting, e-mail, anything. Get a meeting and explain why the WTO is not a good thing. Focus on the bad things that can and are happening to her or his constituants. But better yet run yourselves. Maybe a House or Senate seat is out of reach now, but with all the apathy around do the fundamentalist thing: focus on a weak area. Like just getting a bunch of people out to hijack a local Democratic (or even better Republican:) party nomination. These are just two of almost unlimited possibilities.
As for the economic side, people aren't going to change their spending habits unless you give them a good reason. Outrage is nice, but most people don't really give a damn about some third world child labor. To get them onside you have to - and I know this is painful - "sell" them on the idea. If you go to lower income people and tell them that the Nike shoes that they have to scrimp and save for cost less than a dollar to assemble and the company that sells them scoffs at the idea of hiring American labor, prove to them that this corporation, for all its commercials, doesn't give a damn about them, then their sales will suffer. If you force them to change their business practices, they will take care of the competition. If they are subject to economic restraints that do not affect their competitors they will use their clout to change that.
Anyway.... putting the drones out of work at one corporate location doesn't really do a lot. Proactive actions must be taken.
IMHO as per
Constructive Criticism only, please:)
J:)
Free trade IS the way to go, but... (Score:2)
What does this mean for businesses? It means that it's most profitable to move all their jobs overseas. It's the nature of business to seek as much profit as it can get away with, so this is what's going to happen.
In other words, the WTO is in theory good, but in practice is little more than "Let's Screw America." Or the 95+ percent of American people that don't own businesses, at any rate.
If the WTO actually made sure its members enforced fair business practices, that would be one thing. In fact, it would do a much better job by this than it does now, because it would truly reduce world suffering (note that I didn't say eliminate; no treaty can really do that). As it is now, all it does is give more people overseas sweatshop jobs that don't even deserve to be called crappy (so bad, in fact, that their suffering isn't ended or even reduced, only changed in form), and creates more employment for Americans. The net effect: an increase in world suffering. Mostly centered on America (where most of the new suffering would be created), but in other places too, and reducing suffering nowhere except perhaps the homes of the insanely rich.
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
In any event, a lot of the Third World nations aren't utilizing what they've got -- hell, there's at least one nation that hasn't had anything even resembling a government for years, let alone a stable, healthy economy; and plenty more are hurting similarly. If a corporation comes in and taps that resource, it can create whole new sectors of an economy, helping to create jobs and increase cash flow *into* the region. In addition, figure on the tax revenue to the local government, and if it invests in infrastructure instead of threatening its neighbors, the people should benefit as well.
Oh, and on Wal-Mart: it's public. You need far less than a billion to gain from WMT's growth.
... (Score:2)
This is an age of mega-corporations, where people are sectioned up into "demographics" and statistics - your voice does not count unless you make more than a billion dollars a year or are a hollywood star. It's no suprise that voters have become disillusioned with our system such to the extent that minority interests are better represented than those of the "silent majority". Ad hoc groups like the so-called "moral majority" or the "christian coalition" have seized this unprecidented voter apathy to put forward their own agenda, further adding fuel to the fire.
"To fight to remain yourself, in a world trying to make you like everybody else, is the hardest fight you will ever be in."
Welcome to the 21st century - would you like to pay with cash or credit?
Re:Katz- Just Another Elitist (Score:2)
From the Merrian-Webster dictionary:
Philistine:
2 often not capitalized a : a person who is guided by materialism and is usually disdainful of intellectual or artistic values
Don't know why did the word suddenly crossed my mind, though. Mmmmm...
non-tongue-in-cheek seriousness (Score:2)
In fact, I'd probably say it's the precise opposite, and here's why.
At the center of the debates were three issues: The rights of (more highly skilled and paid) U.S. workers in the face of corporations increasingly moving abroad for labor; preserving the environment in the face of aforementined corporate practices; and occupational health and safety and child labor laws. There were many, many other issues, such as tariffs and the like -- but the protestors represented (at least according to the Washington Post) these three interests first and foremost.
Let's see why none of these are really 'techno-idealism.
First of all, the desire to move corporations back to domestic borders (from the perspective of the workers) is because we are highly educated and skilled relative to the other unskilled workers of the world. Our janitors have a better lifestyle than your janitors, and so on and so forth. In a [whips out microeconomics textbook] perfect market environment, the natural solution would be that the unskilled labor would move abroad, and the more highly paid workers, driven by their incentive to still make a livelihood, would become more highly skilled. The world is starving for computer jobs -- yet the protestors are not attempting to eschew their (for the most part; there are many exceptions) factory and service sector jobs in favor of retraining for the computer sector.
Whether they should or not is a matter of personal opinion; however a true 'techno-idealist' would be so enamoured by technology as a means and an end that they would not be in fear of being laid off in favor of a developing Global South nation.
Readjusting an entire economy to accomodate a technological paradigm shift isn't easy; a lot of people will be left jobless and bereft; but IMHO once the riots and pundits and yabbering of Katz passes in a few years we'll deal with it. "Luddites" anyone? I'd hardly call them Techno-Anarchists. Although I'm sure Jon Katz's ancestor, Horatio Alger Hiss Katz III wrote in The Daily Colostomy-Tribune, "These Followers Of Ludd, They Are Ye Technoe-Anarchistes, And Their Love of Geeke-Dom Is Fain Magickal." People want jobs and will use any means necessary. Using a web as a warfare platform is a use of technology, yes, but is a lot lighter use of technology than actually retraining for a computer sector career.
Techno-idealists also would not combat (again for the most part) environmental issues in the way the protestors did. If we are to take Jon Katz' definition that a Techno-Idealist is one enamored of political issues and technology to the same order of magnitude that Katz bandies about the words "Columbine" and "geek", then we would perhaps view the motivation of these aforementioned idealists to find a TECHNOLOGICAL solution to matters. Rather than start a riot, another ideological issues is the use of alternative, lesser-polluting fuels -- which are techologically feasible at this point in history but which the corporations don't view as cost-effective. So the (rather erroneous) view is promulgated that these technologies are "future technologies" when in fact I can have a fuel-cell today. A Techno-Idealist would use aforementioned Technology (Magickal or otherwise =) to promote public consciousness and outrage about the fact that we use the petrified remains of dinosaur shit to create smoky and oily futures for ourselves, when everyone should be using a hydrogen fuel-cell and making (gasp) water.
Burning, smashing and harassing people, web page defacement and the like do not promote public awareness of HOW we can fix the environment. At best these techno-anarchists have said "There's something wrong with the environment thanks to Joe Suit here."
That's great, but what do we do about it? I didn't hear about a Return To Pastoral Bliss summer camp. Where do I sign up?
In the end, if technology advances as it does, the only pollution will be heat pollution And that's mandated by Law. The Second Law, in fact. But to get this technology to move the way it does, we need public awareness. And the Techno-Boobs aren't doing that. In fact, simply blathering about how the WTO is satan(TM) is probably the least productive thing to do.
Finally, it can be said that the 'workers rights' view of the WTO, that the WTO promotes child labor and other such travesties, are not combatted in a 'techno-idealist' manner. Again, the key is awareness -- but the wonder of technology is that it allows people all over the world to be made aware. Making US citizens aware via protests and other 'web wars', legitimate or not, is good -- but the true potential of technology isn't being exploited. No one, to date, has used the wonders of technology to let the members of the exploited nations realize what a shitty time they're having. In other words, the protestors are preaching to a 'largely indifferent' choir. But techno-idealism would cause the workers of the country to realize how bad it is once they see images of American life, etc -- and they will not have any incentive to work.
Once they decide not to work until conditions are made better, arbitrage takes hold and the other nation's wages go up (because workers demand it), thus jobs move back to the US in some proportion until a new equilibrium is reached.
To date, no one has used technology to reach the afflicted workers. Companies are only there because wages are low, because workers there don't realize how bad it is and are willing to work there for that cheap.
To change policy best, change economics; to change economics, change incentives. This is advertising. This is canvassing. This is protesting done in a technological manner -- namely efficient and expedient without the middleman.
But of course, Katz must think that rioting and technology go hand in hand, after seeing the ape-show at Slashdot.
But what am I but a poor graduating college student with a background in computer science and public policy.
The third area of protest is
Time to /. Benjy Again! (Score:4)
Re:Anti-economic (Score:3)
It's a "well-established" theory, maybe. But actual applications of the theory are about as rare as actual applications of communist theory. When most corporate droids (or most WTO reps or most politicos) talk about "free trade", it doesn't mean what an (unowned) economist means when s/he talks about free trade.
The last thing in the world that a corporatist wants is free trade. They want to be able to trade freely, they don't want everybody to be able to.
The folks in the streets in Seattle understand that.
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
The protesters raise unsettling questions about our economic power. We can and do trash faraway environments by proxy. Is it right to have children chained to machines in a textile factory? These people are supplying our demand. The normal response seems to be not my problem, but should it be?
In purely humane terms we should not abuse other nations, even if their governments are willing participants. In purely economic terms, it benefits us to have trading partners with stable, sustainable economic growth. The word sustainable is key because many developing nations go for the quick buck, only to have to need bailing out when the resource runs out.
Your cards analogy doesn't fit because it assumes a fallacy of equal supply. We westerners always hold more and better cards, so we ought to play fairly.
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
Oh, and last time I checked, the majority of wal-mart employees didn't get stock options, or even decent wages -- so I doubt they will be profitting much from it. Even if public (which I realized and corrected in a comment right below mine), it is very likely that money isn't going directly back into the economy.
Re:Rioters are not the Protestors (Score:2)
Re:People seem to have a clue. (Score:2)
They're already portrayed, often enough, as potentially violent gun loonies. They don't need to simultaneously:
* join in illegally blocking traffic, helping protesters while hampering everybody else
* escalate an already violent confrontation involving rioters, peaceful protesters, city cops, and Guardsmen
* do this on national television
and thus give, say, an excuse for a *serious* crackdown. Instead, certain militias have actually been working *with* law enforcement in various cases 'round the nation, partly to help convince them that they're not opposed to *all* government.
Re:Seatlle woes (Score:2)
Some anti-WTO people put up signs in an academic quad here. It would have helped their credibility rise above "absolutely none" if they had at least realized that the US isn't a democracy, never was, and never was meant to be; it's a representative republic partly to avoid the tyranny of the masses -- as they'd know this if they read the writings of the Founding Fathers and knew anything about government or history...
Re:Shades of '68 (Score:2)
The civil rights movement trying to bringing about racial equality used these tactics too.. The only way they could get the government to do something was to provoke the police and white mobs in the south. The freedom riders whom sought for better treatment on the interstate buses are a perfect example. Mobs came on to the buses, kicked people's heads in and torched another bus. The government took a little more action to stop the violence after these incidents. I don't see any real changes happening though solely because police officers used tear gas generously. it's more for pr now.
Re:_THIS_ is valid protest? (Score:2)
Evidently what's wrong with this picture is that you left your lens cap on.
The destructive types were a miniscule minority of the people in the streets, and were the least likely to have coherent grievences. It seems that mostly they were just taking advantage of the opportunity to trash other people's property.
Much of the protest is not about not liking the way gov'ts are working, but about the way corporatism is working, and about the serious lack of open process in the workings of WTO and similar very influencial organizations that are making very important global policy decisions.
Re:Maybe there's a chance for Marxism yet.... (Score:2)
And the Soviet Union didn't fall?
And the Soviet Union didn't strive for bigness?
Sorry - I just don't see how the body of this post supports the title. There is no chance for Marxism, but that's primarily because there's no chance for any system over the long haul.
The Greek, Roman, and Persian (not to mention the Egyptian, the Inca, and the Mississippian) empires fell, but they were hardly failures, and they didn't fall because they strove for bigness. The United States will fall someday too, but it wouldn't be right to call it a failure. Striving for bigness may doom empires to failure, but striving for smallness dooms them too. Just faster.
From the article... (Score:2)
You mean Politicans, Regulatory agencies, Legislators, and Journalists are supposed to riot and trash a bunch of McDonalds and Starbucks?
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
Trade for trade's sake does not make sense for society. It may satisfy an individual's desire for power, but humans have other needs such as physical and mental health. The one with power may be able to use his/her/its power to escape the negative consequences. But society as a whole ends up on the losing end when its needs are disregarded by the powerful in favor of making the power play.
-Jennifer
My Thgoughts: (Score:2)
Who the hell do these people think they are? Its like people are needing to invent new reasons to riot because we haven't had a good hum-dinger in a while. We are going through some of the best times in the history of humanity right now... that is not debatable. Unemployment is at an all time low, information and education is available to almost everyone seeking it, the vast majority of epople are optomistic about their future, education is easier and available to more people than ever, travel is easier and cheaper than ever (so you can leave if you don't like it), crime has been in decline for over a decade, social budgets are higher than ever, wages are at an all time high, employer sponsered profit sharing plans are growing at a fast rate, investing in general has opened itself to a wide aray of more people and classes, people are living longer and healthier, retiring earlier, environmental initiatives are going through at a faster rate than ever and the general state of living for every single class in our society has gone up.
What the hell are these people complaining about!? Shit, you want a cause to take to the streets, go back to the 20's, 30's and 60's. Those were some REAL causes. Not some whiney spoiled movement bitching about how things are not perfect.
The United States is one of the most successful cultures of all time. The economic model of the United States has slowly spread to other countries, and as that is embraced by them... their social as well as economic freedoms have increased right along with their rates of living. A while back I talked about a study done by the Heritage Foundation in which freedom is shown as the surest path towards prosperity. Well, that is freedom of the individual AND freedom of business.
People bitch that corporations are mean. So what the fuck do you want!? Shall we increase our government, tax the people more so we can keep these companies from laying off people (at a time when jobs available exceed the unemployed). Is that what these people want!? Because I bet the majority of them also bitch about their taxes, and how the government should stay out of their lives! Well, you can't have it both ways folks!!! Utopia is not a possibility... sorry, I hate beaing the bearer of bad news.
We have a system in place that has been extremely succesful, based on the succesful systems employed by other great cultures as the Persians, Greeks and Romans. It is not perfect, but it is working for the best.
So while these people piss me off to no end, I am able to see their value and my anger subsides a little. We need the extremists, as much as I wish we did not. We need people to bitch, moan and complain about every freakin' pot hole in our system. We need them to make noise and get noticed, or absolutely nothing that needs to be done will get done. Without the extremists, there would not be the compromise, and those with power would absolutely start to take advantage of that.
So while I think this whole business in Seatle is way out of line... I begrudgingly accept it as a necesarry aspect of our society... which dammnit, has done a good job so far.
Re:Katz- Just Another Elitist (Score:2)
I like "edgy" art at times, and believe it has a place, but not necessarily in everybody's living room. That's up to them to decide
Ah, but that's exactly the point. I believe in freedom of choice too, and I have no problems with everybody going to see the latest summer blockbuster as long as I can still get to see my iranian pseudo-documentaries. The problem is that the big monopolistic media corporations won't let me.
With all the talk about the Microsoft trial, it would be interesting to see what would happen if one tried to apply the antitrust laws to the usual practices of Hollywood majors. Monopolistic practices? Attempts to block the competition from reaching the consumers? You bet.
Don't get it wrong. Us elitist arthouse moviegoers are not against other people's freedom (I did like "The Phantom Menace"). Hollywood corporations are the ones going after our freedom.
Re:Unfortunately (Score:2)
Something as simple as paying the extra 10% and buying from the local grocery instead of the big chain is a good start. Wearing shoes made by a small company instead of nike works too.
Don't shop at walmart. Don't eat at McDonalds. (Incidientally: I have seen what a McDonalds hamburger looks like after sitting out for 2 years: exactly the same as it does in the restaraunt. As my health-food-nut friend says: "If the germs won't eat it, why would you?").
You'll be healthier, happier, and have a lot more money.
Re:Consider... (Score:2)
The ability to band together in large groups to create technology and do big science is absolutely essential. Neither business nor the concept of a corporation is evil, no more than the concept of government is. However, when a government is out of control people are entitled to use any means necessary to correct the situation. This can often be accomplished by education, protest, or voting, but if it can't be other means are fair play in an ethical sense. As corporations become more powerful than governments the same should be true of them.
The problem with corporations is that there is no feedback mechanism to control them other than the purchase of their products. Lobbying governments, which have questionable jurisdiction over multi-nationals in any case, is no more effective than suing them unless you have untold riches at your disposal. You may win a settlement, but the chances of changing their behavior are miniscule.
Boycotts used to be effective but since corporations discovered diversification it has been less so. The other problem is that the bad effects from a corporation may take place a long way away from the people who are buying the product. If you can make a cheap and good product in a distant country by raping their environment or abusing their workers, the product is still likely to sell well at home. So if the corporations globalize it is important that individuals also globalize their information network. Fortunately, we have the internet. Unfortunately, we're not using it effectively enough.
In the US, and some other countries, we have a document expressing rights of the citizen that may not be abridged or restricted by government. Perhaps we need a bill of rights referring to multi-national corporations, and some way of collecting and publicizing violations of it.
Re:Advertising (Score:2)
This is a very interesting point, I agree wholeheartedly. It brings the changing practice of marketing into a very interesting light. With the overabundance of information in our society and day to day lives, marketing has effectively (imho) become a kind of guerrilla (sp?!) information warfare. As with all warfare, truth is the first casualty (although I suspect marketing as we know it killed truth before it even started).
The point with this kind of marketing/advertising is not to provide the consumer with the information necessary to make a rational purchase decision, its intent is to be loud enough that you notice it amontst all the other information screaming for your attention, and therefore have a slightly greater statistical probability of buying the product (duh). It's practically subliminal. This is the same tactic used by political candidates to gain name recognition.
Brand/name recognition has become so retardedly valuable in this world of mass marketing that I feel it's significantly responsible for the IPO craze and general tech stock over-valuation these days. They're not buying traditional capital value in companies, they're just giving props to the power of name recognition...
or something
Anthony
^X^X
Segmentation fault (core dumped)
An objective view (Score:2)
I completely agree with the right of the protesters to have their voices heard and try to change things. Everyone has (or should have) that right. But I have to question their methods and their thinking...
Re:Consider... (Score:2)
Well, at least you had the balls to post such a stupid and pointless comment under your login account and not anonymously.
:)
Re:Consider...--what corporations are doing (Score:2)
The Europeans don't like US beef for a very good reason--if you talk to a garment maker, you will find out that in the US in the past 30 years women's torsos have gotten longer and meatier (showing on people exactly the effect we feed the hormones to cattle to produce). Our bioengineered soybeans and corn scare the hell out of me, here in the US, but you can damn sure bet the government will do nothing about it**unless** there is a popular groundswelling that demands it, and it will beCongress and not the FDA or department of agriculture (whose administrators are political appointees) which acts. I heard some wheel of one of the genetics engineering firms (Monsanto?) say "Its only a protein!" Hell, that's all that causes mad cow disease (and cooking doesn't help--its only a protein), and human population experimentation like this is just ezxactly the sort of thing we hung Nazi's for after WWII.
We saw NAFTA, where we in the US no longer have the right to complain about the pesticides, environmental practices, or fertilizers used in Mexican agriculture and industry.
I live in Colorado, and one of our National Forest districts has a wonderful plan to reduce useage of their forests by people, and yet they glowingly approved the plans for Vail to expand its operations in spite of environmental outrages it would cause (and the local environmentalists now view the Forest Service as the enemy). In other words, and this is literally the pattern for the future in other districts, save the forest for the corporations.
This is not about cars or sneakers or hamburgers. It is about human decency, and a respect for human values which seems totally lacking in much of the corporate dealings of today. It is not about abolishing trade or even about restricting useage of the environment, but about the attempts to remove all of the checks and balances which had previously existed on corporate conduct. Hell yes that will impede trade--so what. The more for me now set might just have to wait a few years longer to make their billions.
I know the past 20 years in the US have been so lopsided, that anybody in America who can't fork up $30,000 or so every couple of years in campaign contributions just doesn't have a voice in our government at all. And there are a lot of psychological things which make us reluctant to strongly condemn a plant closing where $15-$20 an hour manufacturing jobs go overseas (or to Mexico) where they turn into 70 cent an hour jobs. What has happened is that a threshhold has been crossed, and people now understand (explicitly or implicitly) that their government is screwing them over and why.
The risks of all this is those in power are totally unaware of the disenchantment of their constituents (next year might be a really interesting election if McCain can be heard or if Gore can get over being Clinton's lackey fundraiser). It usually takes a couple of years for our politicians to get any kind of message at all, but these deomonstrations will hopefully be a wake-up call.
My fear in all of this is that we have been so totally pro-business for so long that there will be a radical reaction which will break the long spell of economic growth we have enjoyed. It needn't (the Republican tax cuts would be wildly inflationary, and certainly would put the screws to most of us borrowing rather than lending money, although business would probably only take a lesser hit, since they can raise prices a bit). But, I don't see anybody out there with any identifiable sign of an original idea, and that is what it would take to keep our present economic regulatory tools intact (modest tax cuts to stimute, modest Fed rate increases to cool off).
Personally, I'm almost glad I'm a peasant with no substantial stock portfolia to worry about. I feel that we are at a crux, where either government will start to listen to its constituents again, or there will be serious conflict.
Re:It's getting tiresome... (Score:2)
One also wonders why Mr. Katz is apparently unfamiliar with very similar protests raised in the earlier part of this century by such noted muckrakers as Ida Tarbell (ever heard of Standard Oil?) and Sinclair Lewis (ever read 'The Jungle'?).
Let's face it, nothing here is new. Intelligent and highly literate people have been writing about Big Business versus The Little Guy for a long time. The only difference is that Tarbell and Lewis never wrote Jon an e-mail. That's a pity -- his analysis suffers from a severe lack of perspective.
--
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
ITS NOT ABOUT CORPORATIONS!! (Score:2)
Yes, this treaty will help third world countries (they aren't signing it just to give money to america). Sure some sweat shops might spring up but people work in these sweat shops b/c it is better than what they have without the sweat shops in all but a few countries they are not forced to join the sweatshops.
Yes it will help even the working class in the US as we get more goods at cheaper prices. If steel jobs go oversees this is because steel will be produced cheaper there. This means we will get steel cheaper and more jobs will open up here doing what americans are more efficent at doing than foreign workers. Heck worse comes to worse open up the WTO and decrease the tax rate on those who earn less and increase it on those who earn more. The WTO makes the pie bigger for EVERY country so with proper governmental policy no one should be left out to dry.
For more in depth discussion read this informative salon article. [salon.com]
Another First-hand account (Score:3)
Re:My Thgoughts: (Score:2)
Who the hell do these people think they are?
I was a participant in the labour march in Seattle on Tuesday. We are human beings. We are citizens. Sorry if our opinions are not important enough for you to listen to. It is that kind of elitist attitude that is behind a lot of the anger you see.
Its like people are needing to invent new reasons to riot because we haven't had a good hum-dinger in a while.
The vast majority of the folks at the various rallies and demonstrations were not violent or commiting vandalism. Many actually left the peaceful protests to try to help curtail the vandalism and violence. Again, your elitist implication is that all us plebes are bored from our affluence and need to get our rocks off. This is hardly the case, as even the corporate media are starting to realize.
We are going through some of the best times in the history of humanity right now... that is not debatable.
Yes it is.
Unemployment is at an all time low
First of all, those statistics are apples and oranges. In case you have forgotten, the Clinton administration changed the rules for unemployment stats in the mid 90s. The immediate result was a drop of 1-2 percentage points. The actual figures are probably closer to 10-12% as this has always been a dubious statistic.
Secondly, even if this were true, the fact that someone is employed is no indication of their well-being. Many of the poor have jobs. If I fire someone with a 40K job and hire 3 folks at 10K, unemployment has dropped dramatically, but I am making another 10K per year at the expense of the folks working for me.
This kind of abuse of statistics is another thing that we all are complaining about. We are told that we all have jobs, so we should stop complaining. The same is true of most slaves.
information and education is available to almost everyone seeking it,
Nonsense. Try the public schools in Hartford Conneticut for example.
the vast majority of epople are optomistic about their future,
True, but they are also very anxious about the present. Perhaps part of their optimism comes from feeling that they can actually change things. As you indicated at the end of your post, this is still possible and a Good Thing.
education is easier and available to more people than ever, travel is easier and cheaper than ever (so you can leave if you don't like it),
Because of globalization, it is no longer possible to leave. The destruction of this part of the American mythos that is behind some of the frustration in this country. Besides, if we have a better way, it is our democratic right to articulate it and implement it. if you don't like it, you can leave.
crime has been in decline for over a decade,
True. Not that you would know it from the corporate media. The reporting in Seattle is a good example...
social budgets are higher than ever,
In total dollars, yes. In per capita expenses, no.
wages are at an all time high,
Nonsense. It has been repeatedly shown that wages have been slipping for the majority of Americans for the last 30 years. Last year wages finally recovered to 1989 levels - all this in the midst of the longest recovery in US history.
employer sponsered profit sharing plans are growing at a fast rate,
This is a good thing. I wait for the day when companies are democratically run. Until then, it is still a case of some pigs being more equal than others. And before you call this utopianism, there are many companies run this way in the world today. Mine is one of them.
investing in general has opened itself to a wide aray of more people and classes,
Not in any meaningful way. 80% of the wealth in the US is still controlled by less than 10% of the population. When you add in the fact that the Supreme Court has ruled that money == speech, you can see why the other 90% of us have to take to the streets to be heard.
people are living longer and healthier,
Yup. This is mostly due to public health projects from the turn of the century.
retiring earlier,
Huh? They just raised the retirement age for Social Security to 67 from 65!
environmental initiatives are going through at a faster rate than ever
Here in Washington I watch them get gutted by property rights activists all the time, so I rather doubt that this means anything.
and the general state of living for every single class in our society has gone up.
Measured how? 60 hour average work weeks? Two hour commutes? Lower job security? Nonexistent health insurance? Oh, I forgot. We all have washers and driers now. How nice. Do our bosses just have another $500 of appliances too? Or are they buying bigger mansions with our sweat again?
I have to get back to work now...
Re:Free trade IS the way to go, but... (Score:2)
All this going on about decent wages for third world countries is just a clever way to say "we don't want to lost american jobs." If this actually hurt third world countries they wouldn't sign the treaty would they?
Secondly, and this is the biggest misconception of them all, is that it doesn't screw america. Suppose some american jobs get exported oversees...this means that the people overseas can produce this product cheaper then we can. Hence we can buy more of the product. Some american workers might lost their jobs but someone else will hire them (the number of people with good job records who are actively looking but cannot find jobs is almost minimal). Thus america produces just as much as we did before AND we get more products shipped in from overseas. We are a richer country and workers can buy things cheaper.
My question is why do people insist in believing simplistic arguments about the economy (which is an extremly complicated system) when they wouldn't do the same thing for the weather or anything else (in fact the economy is probably deceptive to analyze as people intuitivly think of money as having fixed value when the amount of goods a dollar can buy varies). I realize I run the danger of being hypocritical, however, most experts seem to believe that lowering tariffs is a positive step.
(this is not meant to imply anything about the previous post he was merely stating an opion the comment was more directed at society in general)
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
So lets suppose that WalMart 'siphons' money away from bangladesh. This means that people in Bangladesh are buying walmart products. It seems to me that if they are more total goods and we are getting some little slips of paper (or promises to pay little slips of paper) the people there are happier (you can't eat paper). MONEY IS A RED HERRING!! all that matters is where the goods are and who gets the goods.
Secondly many of the human rights cries are actually disguised pleas from US unions to protect there monopoly on certain products at the expense of third world countries!! IF these people didn't want to work at the exported plant then they just wouldn't....the fact that they work in the factory is proof of the fact that they prefer to do this over what they were doing before (or at least enough of them do to change the economy).
Re:You're missing the point (Score:2)
The less developed a country is the more likely it is to participate in enviornmentally poor activities (excepting countries to poor to have significant industrial infrastructure). Once people are feed and sheltered only they do they start worrying about protecting the forest and the trees and the ozone layer.
Hence in order to reduce enviornmental degradation help third world countries become richer. How? Open up trade so factories can reloacte there and take advantage of labour!!
Why I think this needed to happen...... (Score:4)
Fast-forward to the 1980's, and the free-market boom. All of a sudden, the corporations start swallowing each other whole, and they grow, and mutate, until they are bloated multinationals (Yes, I know there were multinationals before the '80s, but...) or they have become part of the multinationals. By the '90s small businesses depend on partnership or buyout by a multinational as the only method of guranteeing success. Prior to this, multinationals were primarily for basic needs (food, chemicals et al). Now, in the '90s due to continuation of free market policy, multinationals have hit critical mass, hence we face multinationals that deal with everything, from music, to computers, to pretty much anything we have. Everything on my desk is owned/produced by a multinational at some stage. Problem is, the multinationals have the same business-above-all ethic as they have always had, which means standardising, dumbing-down and nipping innovation in the bud (if innovation refuses to be bought).
Everyone is expected to purchase multinational product, and is persuaded by a barrage of advertisements designed to extract money from them, sometimes in the most devious way. (Can anyone put their hand up and with a clear conscience say that advertising directly to children under the age of 10 is a Good Thing(tm)?)
But it's doesn't end with the erosion of people's choice and rights to choose what they eat, drink, listen to or watch. That is a crime in itself. Censorship is a bad thing in a totalitarian state, however, I think that censorship for profit is equally disturbing, if not more so. Companies censor for profit by deluging the public with the 'news' that their product is the ONLY one worth having, and because they have more money than a smaller rival, their product dominates the market, simply because the public are unaware that a choice exists.
What scares me the most, however is the fact that multinationals control the media. Jesus wept, they can actually control what people THINK!! (Bearing in mind most of the world's population will believe what they're told, if you say it loud and brash enough...) Corporations like News International are putting the personal beliefs of their CEO into print, TV and films and people are taking it as gospel. That's scary. (Example: By conjuring up images of WWII, and by repeating it over and over, over a period of months, The Sun (UK tabloid owned by Rupert Murdoch's News International) attempted (and pretty much succeeded) to persuade every one of thier readers that joining the European single currency was a bad idea. The real reason? Murdoch has so many $$ tied up in the US that anything that may weaken UK/US relations also weakens his financial position. It's amazing the number of people who haven't worked this out. And of course, every paragraph on why the euro was evil was followed by a long piece on how the US system was the one to emulate (Funny how it supports the system most friendly to global megacorps....)
Anyway, sorry, I'm ranting again. But think for a second. The global music industry is now effectively 3 companies (Sony, BMG and Universal) - The reason we get 3 different versions of the most successful thing of the time (Britney and Christina - 2 different multinationals)
The computing world is dominated by one company which (hopefully) has now bitten off more than it can chew.
Global book publishing is now owned by but a few companies
Scary, isn't it?
we bagged us a mcdonalds and a starbucks (Score:2)
Re:hrm. (Score:4)
Some quotes from an article written by Kai Mander: former director of communications for the institute of culture and trade policy (so you don't think they are my own).
Wal-Mart: Global Retailer -- Kai Mander and Alex Boston
Mr. Sam Walton by the time of his death had amassed a fortune of over 23.5 billion.
"When it seeks the necessary permits to establish a new store, Wal-Mart portrays itself as a friendly addition to a local community. It contends a new giant superstore will provide good jobs and sorely needed income to a regional community and that local retailers will benifit from Wal-Marts lower prices. But study after studt confirms what hundreds of americans learn the hard way: Wal-Mart leads to a net loss of jobs, decreased income for the community
"Typically, wal-mart locates at the outskirts of town and sets prices below cost to draw a customer away from the commercial center. It offers 2 for 1 deals, loss leaders, category killers, anything that will attract customers. From automotive supplies to clothing and pharmaceuticals to kitchenware,
"According to an Iowa state University Study quoted in Wal-Mart Watch (December 1994), five years after an opening of a new Wal-Mart, stores within a 20-mile-radius suffer an average of 19% loss in retail sales."
"Journalist Maria Gilardin reports that in Anamosa, Iowa, a JC Penny, two men's clothing stores, a shoe store, and a dime store closed shortly after a Wal-Mart opened."
"Wal-Mart Officials contend that when a new Wal-Mart opens, sales of nearby business increases. The Iowa State study confiremed the spillover traffic resulting from new Wal-Mart stores did increase the sales of adjacent businesses selling goods and services that were not available at Wal-Mart. However, many of these owners now fear for their livelihoods as Wal-Mart stores expand goods and services offered.
"Wal-Mart employs more than the big 3 auto makers combined. Company spokespeople proudly claim that in some parts of the United States a Wal-Mart exists for every thirty five thousand people, providing needed jobs to local economies. Contrary to company statements, however, the entry of Wal-Mart does not provide a net increase in a region's jobs. In fact, some studies have shown that for every job created by Wal-Mart, as many as 1.5 jobs are lost."
"The jobs Wal-Mart does provide are at the bottom end of the economic scale. Notorious for wringing the most work out of its employees for the least pay, Wal-Mart rarely pays its workers more than minimum wage. The average income for a full time worker at Wal-Mart in the United States, even with a well-publicized profit-sharing plan, hovers around $12,000 -- well below the poverty line." Blah blah, basically what mcdonalds does only hiring part-timers
"In a recent [1997] purchase of Canada's Woolco retail chain, its refusal to buy seven Woolcos that were unionized put one thousand Canadians out of work. Many of the remaining Woolco staff were forced to accept lower wages or lose their jobs. Wal-Mart converted Woolco auto-repair shops to more profitable oil and lube operations and cut mechanics' wages in half. IT fired 500 well-paid Woolco warehouse workers then charitibly offered to rehire them at minimum wage. Wal-Mart told 750 former Woolco supervisors they could keep their $28,000-per-year salaries only if they worked an extra 12 hours per week in addition to their regular 40.
Some more stuff -- interesting stuff like, all their mexican stores were supplied by a Laredo, Texas warehouse..
LOLOL. I didnt remember reading this, seriously -- but
"The telivision program Dateline NBC ran an expose on garment sweatshops of bangladesh, where nine-to-twelve year old boys and girls worked long into the night and were paid as litle as five cents an hour." Includes quotes about china and some other third world countries..
"NBC found that most of these garments in bins sporting glossy, bold "Made-In-America" sings.
should I go on? I have about 30 more pages in this article, as well as 5 reports on this topic -- as well as a book or two on similar companies. I think the WTO and GATT were talked about at least 30 times in this article. I'd be happy to provide whomever wants with more info.
The Seattle Riots and the Chicago Riots of '68 (Score:3)
- The police deliberately allowed a small group of perhaps 40 black-clad punks into the area and allowed them to smash windows and burn dumpsters in order to get an excuse to brand all protesters as "rioters".
- Once they had their excuse, rioting was deliberately provoked by the police using tear gas, rubber bullets, and pepper spray in an effort to get an excuse to invoke martial law.
- Once the corporate media had compliantly reported that all of the protesters were "rioters" (rather than the 40 or so black-clad punks who were the only rioters in the area), the mayor and governor declared martial law (or, rather, "a state of emergency"), and dispatched the National Guard to clear the streets. Possession of a gas mask was also declared criminal intent, and you were immediately arrested if you had one. National Guardsmen and police officers blocked all entrances and exits from the area and stopped all who wanted to get in to ask them for identification and about their business in the area (shades of USSR!).
It was not reported on the national media, but one of the so-called "riots" was actually residents of the Capitol Hill neighborhood protesting the police presence in their neighborhood. Nothing to do with the WTO at all, but that didn't matter, the cops were in full-bore panic mode and coming down with jack boots on anything that looked like it might be public expression.To get leads on the "real scoop", follow Salon's links [salon.com] to various independent news sources from the OTHER (non-corporate press) side.
All in all, I think this may be the sort of turning point for labor activism in America that Mayor Dailey's violent breakup of the '68 protests in Chicago were for anti-war protests. The big difference is the way these were covered. In Chicago, the pre-corporate-media national news covered jack-booted thugs whacking peaceful protestors over the head with jacksticks. In Seatle, the corporate-owned national news media did not show those events, and instead showed the rare events where the forty or fifty black-clad thugs that the police had allowed into the area looted and vandalised things.
-E
A bunch of hooey - the real skinny (Score:2)
The real protesters had real reasons - just as my friends who live on Capitol Hill had to leave their apartments due to gas attacks and had reasons to be upset at the gestapo tactics of the police. Just as people I know on City Council were yanked from their cars for being black and well dressed and thus obviously protesters. Just as my coworkers were gassed just for waiting for the bus.
So stop the diatribe and point out that you're not even a real Seattleite. I live in Ballard and I'm moving to Fremont (both Seattle) - most of my friends live on Capitol Hill or Queen Anne or First Hill. We pay the salary of the police that gassed us and we're not thrilled that our city budget just got blown for a bunch of corporate greedmeisters - heck, I've got tens of thousands in overseas companies, and they'd probably gas me - but I still got into the Westin with Scott yesterday and did lunch with the WTO delegates.
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
The last time I checked, Wall Mart employees are not prohibited from buying stock in the company.
Which would you suggest the financially savvy Wal-Mart employee invest? The grocery money, the rent money, or the car payment?
Re:It's getting... started (Score:2)
I have my own contribution to the revolution. It's called ompages.com [ompages.com]. The goal: total and undeniable individual control over his or her own commerce and communications; to snatch one's self, one's image from the purview of all things corporate. And guess what, technology is the tool we've chosen for peaceful liberation.
Katz is right about one thing. Corporations were created so that man can gain a sense of immortality. The corporate form is a kind of 'virtual reality' that has been around since very early in British history. The virtual reality is of an immortal unnatural person. In the legal texts there are two legal terms for what we commonly call 'persons', there are 'natural persons' (i.e., humans), and 'corporate persons' (i.e, marked automatons), and this terminology has been around since at least the 1700s if not earlier. I believe there may be foundations in Roman jurisprudence for this terminology.
Know this. When you work for a corporation, in the eyes of the law, you are the servant of an unnatural master. Let the natural persons rule and the corporate persons serve, not the other way around.
NAY! (Score:2)
and double nay!
No, now wait a minute. (Score:2)
When the revolutionaries "broke" laws, they were breaking unjust laws. Namely, that England did not have the right to impose such law on them in the first place. Compare this to our laws regarding assembly. We are a democratic nation, and the laws were promulgated justly and for good reason. We, as a nation, can't allow every group, minority or majority, to have their way by force of numbers.
The people in Seattle could make themselves heard by simply protesting in an organized and reasonable fashion. In other words, they have to leave a means of entrance and exit (according to law). Futhermore, the people have other means to address their concerns. They can cast their vote, if they are indeed as significant a part of the population as indicated, they can sway the elections considerably. The early revolutionaries had no such options.
Force is not the way of developed nations--it is disruptive of our democracy. Put this in perspective. If we allowed such "protests", relatively small groups of people can force the hand of democracy by force of numbers. Civil rights would have never happened. Abortion clinics, and other such controversial places can be trivially shutdown by only a handfull of people. [Atleast the pro-lifers (though I disagree with them) are acting directly against the percieved injustice, by attemping to block entrance and consequently the "injustice".] What do you propose we do when some nutty group (e.g., the KKK) tries to force their viewpoint like that? Is the majority supposed to come down there and push them out of the way? That would result in inevitable violence and damage. The practical alternative is to have such laws, and police to enforce them.
The fact of the matter is that reasoned debate, application of just law, and protest in accordance with justice have proven an effective means for securing democracy. To deviate from this, to allow the few [perhaps there is broad support for these protestors, but we have no vote on this yet] to bully an entire city and governance, is sheer insanity. Regardless of your personal views on the subject, you must be consistent above all else.
Actually, it's all about the Stadiums (Score:2)
So, if you're a sports fan, just remember - we will riot against your control of our city - and we will take no prisoners!
First ones up against the wall during the revolution will be those with SkyBoxes and Corporate Team Sponsorships. Then we Open Source the sports teams - no private ownership - no Ken Griffeys selling out Seattle for Big Bucks.
Sorry to nitpick: (Score:2)
I know this is not really the point of your post... but for those who choose to live a little less modestly as you, here is some advice:
Debt is an effective tool if used wisely. Why do you think the majority of succesful companies and governments have debt?
By all means, pay off your credit cards. People often ask me what their best first investment should be, and I always answer, "Pay off your credit card debt". Hell, where else can you easily make 15 - 19%!!??
But for other purchases, do not be afraid to take on debt. Especially with mortgage rates being so low. I will use the example of a house (one a lot of us have experience with):
Who makes out better; the person taking on debt (a mortgage) or the person issuing the loan (the bank)?
I think everyone here can tell me the owner makes out better... not the lender. In most cases the value of the house increases at a faster rate than the mortgage rate, making the debt clearly worth it.
Already addressed this.... (Score:2)
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=99/12/02/16
Thanks,
Congratulations, you've bought the bull***t. (Score:2)
The difference between Chicago '68 and Seattle '99 is that in Chicago, the national media was still independent and thus covered the "riots" in loving detail, including details that were unflattering to Mayor Dailey and the Chicago police department. Now they are corporate owned and report what their corporate owners want them to report. The corporate overlords support the goals of the WTO, so they report that anybody who opposes the WTO is a rioter. Ask Jon Katz why he resigned from his high-paying job with a network news department, why don't you?
Personally, I support the goals of the WTO, but that does not change the fact that Gestapo-like tactics are being used against peaceful protesters and that the corporate media is blithely going along with the "party line" that these are rioters, not peaceful protesters.
-E
Re:My Thgoughts: (Score:2)
As I said, those are my initial thoughts when I see something like this... after thinking it through more, I know that what you did is a nesecary aspect of our society (and I maintain it is a good one). While it is nothing I would "take to the streets" for, that just proves you are more extreme than I am. Compromise is how things get changed, and without extremists there would be no compromise.
So lets see if your rioting does anything good.
By the way... not only do I like this, I absolutely love it:
Besides, if we have a better way, it is our democratic right to articulate it and implement it. if you don't like it, you can leave.
Hey... (Score:2)
Re:Thought Provoking? (Score:2)
--flamethrower on --
May I suggest you a). take time to think about what Katz is trying to say, and b). post a more coherent, well thought out response, with specific disagreements and reasonings, I'd have more respect. As it is, Katz gets my vote.
Having read some of Jon's books now, I'd hesitate to accuse him of "just being a reporter stating the obvious". You might consider the term "essayist", because AFAICT, reporters tell what happened, essayists try to draw out the deeper meaning of what is happening and why. Consider:
--Flamethrower off--
Funny thing is, I don't always agree with that Jon Katz has to say. But I admire him (and /.) for the fact he's willing to put his thoughts to the web for us to think, rant, rave, and flame about.
Re:My Thgoughts: (Score:2)
Well, I wouldn't really call them my actions. "My thoughts" seems to work pretty well... they certainly are not "your thoughts" now are they?
I am so SICK of people like you, who live in their own sense of contentment and assume that the rest of the world must be getting along well, and if someone is complaining they're just whiners busting a gut without any cause. It's people like you who kept black people enslaved for generations.. "Aw, fuck, whining niggers.. they don' t have it so bad!" FUCK YOU!
Oh no, someone who might disagree with you. Great way to react to it though. I certainly enjoy calling people I do not like racist, ignorant pieces of shit. It sure helps drive home the points I try to make
I am not going to even adress the fun and neat assumptions you make about me without ever having met me. But I do not mind debating (although yes, it certainly is fun to revert back to 5th grade name calling now & again).
And as to the Romans, Greeks and Persians and their perfect systems? You're even MORE of an ignorant fuck, because anyone who has studied any amount of history knows that the famous democracy of Athens and the Republic of Rome were FABULOUSLY corrupt and wrought with murder, ballot-rigging and scandal to top ANYTHING we've seen today.
Then how did they flourish for so long if things were so god-awful bad? Yes, all those things did happen... but, the real down fall of those society's was the advent of totalitarian rule.
As to the comparison's to other decades; my parents rioted for human equality during a time when our nation unofficially advocated a form of slavery. Do not even try telling me that these riots come close to the importance in that.
So you SHUT UP, you big, hairy, smelly ASS-FACE.... waaaaahhhhh......
Re:My Thgoughts: (Score:2)
I don't mean to imply that it is. But I do strongly feel it serves as a wonderful model for others to look at.
Extremists piss you off ? South Africa has had its fair share of them, most of them are still in
power, a different set to the last lot agreed but still extremeists, but the injustice to human rights that occured under Apartheit would never have been solved if not for the extremists.
And again, remember I said those were my initial reactions. I do realize the huge value extremists are... despite that I may not agree with a lot of them.
Re:No, now wait a minute. (Score:2)
One problem I've got is that the cops seem to be overreacting, and innocent people [salon.com] are getting treated as rioters.
Re: (Score:2)
OK... (Score:2)
The Message from Seattle: Girding For The Fight Of The 21st Century
Is this really _Katzbot_? o_O
Re:It's getting tiresome... (Score:3)
In that discussion, most posters didn't overplay the importance of technology/internet in this issue. But indeed, as you say, Katz couldn't resist, and thats unfortunate.
Of course communications technology was an integral part of compaines ability to grow from small and local to international and controling incredible amounts of capital and resources. But that technology isn't directly related to the issue today.
The internet wasn't the catylist for this demonstration, the fact that the WTO can be accurately described (in my opinion) as evil was enough to get "apethetic" Americans back out in the streets and demanding rights for everyone.
The internet does have incredible potential for being a catylist for social change. Unfortunatly right now the internet for most people is chatting on AOL and buying stuff at *.com. Technology can't change this, the people have to want to change. Katz needs to review what technology can and can't do. Hopefully this protest really is the start of a new movement. But this is about the people, not the technology.
... and Wednesday (Score:4)
Note that while the police have (wisely) backed way off in the last 24 hours, they still have a lot of questions to answer. A black Seattle City Councilmember was pulled from his car last night and nearly arrested for attempting to go to a WTO reception. Fortunately there were other politicians there to witness it, so his complaints won't be ignored.
There is another rally tonight for protesting police aggression. Volunteer Park at 8. Hope to see some of you there.
Warning: the following is long and includes occassional profanity. Thank you for listening.
So I went to an impromptu demonstration tonight, the message of which was "get the fuck out of our neighborhood". While not as wild as Kevin's experiences yesterday (don't expect to see *me* on the cover of USA Today), I thought I'd let you all know about it.
Though the media has more or less ignored it, the police kicked ass on Capitol Hill, away from the convention center, both nights of the conference so far. Tonight I heard that they were beating up a gathering of people (one would almost hesitate to use the word "protesters"; they weren't doing much more than being a bit of a crowd) at Olive and Broadway. There was no mention of crowd violence, but people were being removed in ambulances, and I got angry. My reason for going was fear that the media might try to ignore it again. I felt that the more of us there were, the more likely it was to make headlines.
I drove to Seattle and parked at the north end of Broadway. I didn't see much at first. People were talking about it some but there were no concussions or cheers that I could hear at first. As I walked south, I ran into an aquaintance. I asked if he knew what was going on and he said he'd been doing his best to avoid riot police (understandable...), so he didn't have any specific details. I got to the intersection where the initial altercation took place, and there were no cops or protesters visible. I kept walking south.
The crowd was at Pine and Broadway. At first it was hard to tell what was going on, but eventually the situation became clear. Riot police were stationed two blocks east at 10th and Pine. Behind them was the armored vehicle poice have been using to fire the concussion grenades and the tear gas cannisters. At Broadway, there was a large mass of people watching from what they percieved to be a safe distance. Then the next block and a half towards the police was filled sparsely with people, then about 10 yards from the police there was another smaller mass of people. A lot of people didn't really seem to know what was going on. I learned that the police had forced the crowd down Broadway (good thinking, police) and then had established their position here. I found a spot about halfway between Broadway and 10th where I could stand on a large stone and see things pretty well. at this point I estimate that there were about 5-600 protesters.
Shortly after I stationed myself, the Blackhawk helicopter arrived, with the brightest goddamn spotlight i've ever seen on a moving vehicle. It was clearly sweeping nearby buildingtpos for snipers or whatever, as well as the crowd. About 10 minutes later, the first round of gassing started. I should note for the out-of-towners that it is at this moment illegal to buy, sell, or posess a gas mask in public in Seattle. The police weren't moving, just dumping a lot of gas canisters in front of the front group of protesters. There were some people kicking canisters away. The police appeared to be using a lot more gas than they had been at other protest sites. It became impossible to see the police through the gas. There were also concussion grenades being used. More people were showing up to watch, though. Some idiots broke a car window on the other side of the street and were immediately surrounded by angry protesters. Some kids near me threw a rock into a window and then looked really sheepish (and dumb). Mostly we watched. A dumpster was rolled out into the street at the front of the crowd.
For a while, there would be a flurry of gas, then a pause; some of the gas would clear, and they would start again. It was very loud. The protesters were fairly quiet, which suprised me. It was pretty intense to watch, with the line of cops just standing there and a handful of protesters hanging out right in the gas cloud. It sounded like war, too; huge booming percussive blasts.
Another pause and then the police advanced. They volleyed gas and grenades farther out in front of them than before and the line of rito cops started moving. There was some initial panic. People were running. A number of people, including me, yelled for people to walk and people calmed down a lot. The police were paving their approace with a ton of gas. I walked north down a small street between 10th and Broadway, and got hit with a hefty dose of tear gas. I was breathing through my scarf, so it wasn't too bad in my lungs, but it was difficult to keep my eyes open. I cut through a parking lot over to Broadway, where it didn't appear the police had reached yet. I walked north on Broadway along Seattle Central Community College. There was tear gas here, too. I shared my scarf with someone next to me as we walked. The breeze was blowing in the direction I was walking.
I circled around the main building of the school and headed back to Broadway. By the time I got there, the police had fallen back somewhat and the crowd appeared to be substantially smaller. I found Joey and we talked about what had happened. It became apparent that the crowd had grown to several thousand, maybe more. The police were back to their original positions. We headed up to the front and I lost track of Joey. Shortly, the street between 10th and Broadway was filled with people, though not densely packed. I talked to several people around me who were angry at not being able to get home. The crowd started engaging in a fair amount of chanting. There were a lot of attempts by some protesters to get everyone to stand on the sidewalk. A lot of time passed. Rumors started circling that the national guard was coming.
Eventually the police made statements through a loud speaker. They told us we were all guilty of unlawful assembly and we must leave immediately. Everyone tensed up, as this has consistently been followed within seconds by teargas, rubber bullets, and police advances. But they didn't come. After a long while the hellicopter returned and circled. People were still anticipating action. I went and made sure the streets leading away weren't blocked. I was afraid they would trap everyone and make a mass arrest. The crowd had thinned quite a bit by now, maybe to less than a thousand. I hung for a while and then walked away to a vantage point about a block away. I watched as the crowd chanted loudly, then after a while I decided that it would end when all the cold, tired protesters realized that nothing was going to happen and left. About 5 minutes later I was at the Lillian visiting Kevin and Lanie when we head the loud concussive sounds that the teargas and grenade deployments make. One cable news station had the story about how it ended... They broke up the demonstration. I don't know if they arrested anybody. That's the end of the blow-by-blow.
Also, I posted the following to discussion groups at the New York Times and NPR web sites. It's not the most coherent thing I've ever written, but it's late and I had a long day.
I just returned from Capitol Hill, a dense residential area where, for the second night in a row, police used tear gas and rubber bullets (I got souveniers!) in an attempt to disperse a crowd that was peaceful and frustrated. I estimate that at it's peak there were at least 3,000 protesters, mostly neighborhood residents who were angry that they were being treated like criminals.
The police hospitalized a number of protesters, tear gassed virtually everyone, and repeatedly asserted that everyone there was guilty of "unlawful assembly", because some protesters were standing in the street (most of the standoff was spent on a quiet side street, though the early beatings occurred on the main street in the neighborhood). The protesters made it very clear that all they wanted was for the police to go home so that they could go home. They chanted "you go home, we go home" and "whose streets? our streets". A King County Council Member attempted to negotiate with the cops but was told that they had no interest in any resolution other than everyone dispersing immediately.
Whatever feelings I have about curfews and no-protest zones, I think this is intolerable. The word that best describes the scene in my mind was 'invasion'. To enter a residential neighborhood where a small crowd is peacefully gathered and create a sitution where hundreds of passers-by are tear-gassed and many people are prevented from going home (due to the arbitrary nature of where the police took up their position), and then to blame it on the protesters, is criminal. And the worst part is, I am afraid the media is going to ignore the story.
These are the things the police did wrong:
1. Sending riot cops
2. Initiating violence against protesters
3. Failing to realize that their withdrawl would put an immediate end to the situation
4. Tear-gassing eveything that moved
It was wonderful to see that there were many hundreds of people who came out to protest when they realized what was going on. I spoke to a number of locals who told me they didn't care about WTO protests, but they weren't going to stand for police telling them that the streets and sidewalks in front of their homes were off limits. This is two nights in a row that police have attacked peaceful protesters in this neighborhood, and I suspect that if it happens again the protesters may attempt to take direct action against the cops.
What kind of help? (Score:2)
The Kulturwehrmacht [onelist.com]
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
Not necessarily government. But letting big business police world trade is like letting the foxes guard the hen house.
To revive the card-trading analogy... maybe the world playground doesn't need heavy-handed adult supervisors to protect the kindergarteners from losing their best cards to savvy fifth-graders, but some of the other schoolyard traders might like to know where the cards they're bartering for came from. If they knew that a kindergartener got defrauded out of his best stuff, they might choose (not the same as being forced by big-brother) to avoid trading with the ripoff artist. The schoolyard might be able to police itself if the traders are informed. But multinationals, like schoolyard bullies, have no interest in allowing consumers to know who might have been hurt in getting their products to market faster and cheaper than the other guy.
Now the developing world might object to being compared to vulnerable kindergarteners, and there might be a better analogy out there, but the fact remains that Europe and America have had years to get their negotiating skills polished. The developing world and the former Soviet bloc are still learning. They've got a lot of catching up to do, and they stand a good chance of losing out big-time if consumers don't take action.
And they can't very well take action if they're uninformed.
Re:Benefits and drawbacks (Score:2)
Some of the more radical critics of corporatism have drawn a comparison with slavery. Before the Civil War, many in the southern U.S. defended their "peculiar institution" on the basis that slaves were actually treated better than free workers -- they were fed, clothed, housed and generally looked after like the valuable assets they were, whereas working people took what work they could find, were underpaid, overworked, exploited, and liable to be fired and left destitute at any time if they uttered a word of protest. This argument is still true enough for a lot of people today, and it was even truer at the time, but it didn't stop people from combating what they saw as a true evil. Freedom is better than bondage, whether to a master or to a corporation.
Since the fall of Soviet Communism, there's been a lot of crowing in the west about the victory of democracy over tyranny. This is true enough, but it's far from the whole story. Communism gained as many adherents as it did (and still has quite a few, China being a frequently-neglected example) for one major reason: because it promised to increase political freedom by reducing economic inequality. Under the likes of Lenin and Stalin, of course, ordinary people ended up with neither freedom nor equality, but the dream remains. ISTM that Seattle is a sign that economics may be returning to its rightful place at the focus of the debate about freedom, which for too long has been equated with free markets and nothing else. Many people who call themselves libertarians are really fighting for their own liberty to exploit others, and the people who are being exploited are getting tired of it. People should have a say in the decisions that affect their lives, whether those decisions are made in parliament or in the boardroom.
Re:Katz- Just Another Elitist (Score:2)
Really? In what ways do you see this manifested? I have heard this charge levelled many times, and have yet to hear a good defense of it.
Well, in what ways does Microsoft limit people's freedom to choose their OS? [g]
Now seriously: just as an example, a common practice followed by Hollywood film companies in Europe (and I suppose that in the U.S.) is to sell films to exhibitors in groups. Thus, they can tell to the theater owner: "you have to buy and show these 20 pieces of crap that flopped in american box office, because otherwise we won't sell you the Big Summer Blockbuster". Or, as anotehr example, the coordinated hype campaigns that we're seeing more and more lately: Big Blockbuster, made by Studio A, carries on a soundtrack sang by artists from Recording Label B, which belongs to the same company than Studio A, and is hyped to death by magazines of Publisher C, which has a strategic alliance with the aforementioned companies, etc., etc. Result? The small film made by a company that doesn't have all these synergies working for it gets shut out.
Now, to be fair, none of these practices make it impossible, in absolute terms, to make a choice as a consumer, but certainly it makes it more difficult. You can easily install Linux on your PC if you like, but finding a manufacturer willing to sell it to you without a Windows 98 license (aka Microsoft tax) is not that easy (or wasn't until relatively recently).
Re:Yeah, but.... (Score:2)
Yar. And it's just as sad that their parents let them do it.
Come on. If you don't like what TV exposes the little buggers to, don't let 'em watch it, or supervise their watching. It's not like they're being kidnapped at night and thrust into Clockwork Orange chairs while a continuous loop of advertising plays.
Parenting, and the education in Life that parents impart, is crucial -- blaming the corporations for poisoning the minds of your children is abdicating your role in raising them.
gomi
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
gomi
Re:You're missing the point (Score:2)
We have a finite number of trees,
Wrong. Trees do grow, you know. Most paper, f'rinstance, comes from farmed trees that were planted to be cut down.
a finite amount of oil and coal, a finite amount of iron, aluminum, titanium, and uranium.
These aren't finite in any meaningful, we're-about-to-run-out kind of way. If we were running out, prices would go up. They've been going down consistently over the long run. Inevitable conclusion: we're not running out. And we won't for a long time, if even 5% of total crustal abundance is extractable, nevermind things like:
It's not like these things are far off -- we'll have them by the turn of next century, and we're definitely not running out of crap by then, at any conceivable rate of use.
Hell even the amount of solar energy hitting the earth in a given day is finite (huge, but finite).
Sure. And the Sun has a finite lifespan. What's your point? These 'finite' limits are so far beyond our current and projected needs there's no reason to let doom-mongers set national priorities of 'conservation' that result in more scarcity than leaving things alone.
gomi
The definition of democracy. (Score:2)
Main Entry: democracy
Pronunciation: di-'mä-kr&-sE
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -cies
Etymology: Middle French democratie, from Late Latin democratia, from Greek dEmokratia, from dEmos + -kratia -cracy
Date: 1576
1 a : government by the people; especially : rule of the majority b : a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people
and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections
2 : a political unit that has a democratic government
3 capitalized : the principles and policies of the Democratic party in the U.S.
4 : the common people especially when constituting the source of political authority
5 : the absence of hereditary or arbitrary class distinctions or privileges
Webster's dictionary has it as:
2. Government by popular representation; a form of government in which the supreme power is retained by the people, but is indirectly exercised through a system of representation and delegated authority periodically renewed; a constitutional representative government; a republic.
A precise definition of democracy might be had by consulting the OED. Democracy is government by the people; a form of government in which the sovereign power resides in the people as a whole, and is exercised either directly by them (as in the small republics of antiquity) or by officers elected by them. In modern use it vaguely denotes a social state in which all have equal rights, without hereditary or arbitrary differences of rank or privilege.
My definition is in fact the most widely accepted definition. Furthermore, it does not conflict at all with any of the pertinant definitions put forth by the widely regarded academic authorities on the English language. If you wish to argue semantics, you should atleast be fully apprised as to the actual situation. This is particularly true, given that you haven't an inkling as to my education.
Thank you for your kind words,
~Fall
Re:ITS NOT ABOUT CORPORATIONS!! (Score:2)
Re:Yeah, but.... (Score:2)
Well, you settle back into them cushions. I hear the hooks don't bite quite so much into your eyelids if you relax.
I'll be in the next room, trying to find the projector.
gomi
We live here, Katz doesn't (Score:2)
Understand, Mr Katz, these protests are also about our city. A city RUN by baby-boomers who've grown to benefit from (and endorse) a vision they happen to like, whatever the realities of Seattle today. That vision accounts for what the official media portray, it is what even "lefty" city council members endorse, it is the source of all that "Seattle, such a _nice_ place" bullshit you hear.
Reality is very different.
Reality: a city run from behind closed doors by developers - like Mayor Schell, who panicked after a few phone calls from his downtown business cronies and imposed unconstitutional restrictions on citizen movement and expression. He and his colleagues supported unconscionable police behavior, denied basic amenites and legal rights to detainees and endorsed leaderless police attacks on neighborhoods where nothing was even happening.
Reality: a "beautiful" city with the second-worse traffic in the nation, losing its historic buildings to stucco condominiums built below code standards - its actual landscape hostage to the every whim of a few billionaires (Schultz of Starbucks, Gates & Allen of M$soft, Condit of Boeing, McCaw of cellular fame, etc). Yeah this *is* about technology, and in a complex sense
Reality: a city of big talkers out-of-touch with daily reality...guys who invited a bunch of international delegates to a half-built Convention Center which is essentially a construction site
Reality: a city with plenty of official media, none of which is honest, so that the majority of the population feels disenfranchised. Most people organized, communicated and monitored events online - as usual here, official sources proved irrelevant.
Reality: no "official" media outlet published the full story about:
- The WTO delegate pulled a handgun on (nonviolent) protestors
- A "warehouse" building local artists were recently evicted from was taken over as an organizing HQ (constantly referred to as "an abandoned building")
- 12,000 people make a "human chain" around the entire football stadium parking lot - it hardly gets an inch of ink
- protestors are held in buses for 10 hours with no bathrooms, food or access to counsel
- a black city councilman on his way to a WTO meeting is handcuffed by police who throw his business card on the ground
Reality: right now, Friday, four arrests have been made *inside* the WTO convention center; another huge march is underway in the "no protest" zone. What's on the website of Seattle's largest paper? "Mr & Mrs Santa" being led back into a downtown store. A store which happens to buy a lot of advertising in their pages.....
All global politics have local constituents. If you're going to generalize about what happens here, get an informed Seattleite to do it - not Katz. Plenty of truthful posts from here have hit the
Re:Ahem (Score:2)
Sure. That's the point -- tree farming means old-growth forest isn't being chopped down for pulp. Not to mention alternate fiber sources such as (by now tiresome in its mention) hemp, or kenaf [visonpaper.com]. Similar things apply to hardwoods, which are also farmed. Old-growth forest is less intensively logged now than it was 50 years ago. Greed itself leads there -- farmed wood has controlled growth circumstances, while natural-growth forest bends every which way and is more susceptible to disease, wildfire, and such. It makes better economic sense to farm wood rather than chop down old-growth forest, especially once you factor in the negative PR involved in logging old-growth stuff.
As far as Simon's book being rubbish.... We'll have to disagree on that. His analyses matches observed fact better than, say, Paul Ehrlich [zpg.org], whose persistence in preaching doom and envirochaos even after being proved wrong time and again marks him as a serious kook. And Simon is backed up by both physics and economics in his claims -- if you do a little digging and independently verify what he says, and what his detractors say, you might be surprised.
The long-run record shows that, every time supplies of something we previously thought necessary have grown scarce, one of the following things happen:
We've been about to run out of oil, for example,
since the late 1800s. Gas prices are at an adjusted-dollar historic low.
We might run out of oil tomorrow. But I'm not going to bet on it.
Historically, when stocks of run low, prices rise, raising the incentive to find more , use more efficiently, or do without . This has happened for a great number of different resources, throughout history, repeatedly. Past performance is no guarantee of future results, but I'll pick the historical record (especially over such a long period of time) over half-baked analyses every time.
gomi
Optimism? We need to PLAN change. Why not here? (Score:2)
Once the corporate disonformation system is dismantled and people really begin to see what our ages-old philosophy of greed has done to us, the corporate system really has no chance of surviving. Perhaps distributism will take its place; perhaps capitalism will even die off eventually.
Its nice to say things like that. Warm and fuzzzy, like most illusions and few truths. Katz is perhaps too optimistic: the hard, more factually based truth is that the system is not going to give up and fall down as soon as a few protestors start showing up in a few cities. The corporations have power, and histroy has been nothing if not a record of _just_how_far people will go to hold on to their power, at whatever cost to the current morality of convenience. Champion the liberating power of information technology all you want, we need planning. The system has all the resources, historical inertia on its side, and it has the advantage of being the defender. McTimes, the Gore and Bush campaigns (both brought to you by Shell (tm)), The disillusined rhetoric of those who have tried to change things and have failed (read: the advice of the boomer generation), social power/money, the established literary base (bought and propped up by the affluent, who like to think of themselves as *good*) which proclaims that our system is th best ever thought up, tax collectors, the army, the police---all of these are forms of power, each capable fo inflicitng violence of one flavor or another on any attmpt to steal power from those who have monopolized it for so long.
We need a plan.
There are plenty of smart people here. Perhaps we can start providing some real ideas, stuff taht might work, ways to Fight against the corporate machine and all the ways the Status Quo has of attacking proponents of change. With the help of people like the folk at Znet, maybe we can actually get something done. This is as good a place as any to begin the fight against corporatism. Slashdot is pretty much immune to corporate attack tde to its size and popularoty, something not true for most independent media outlets, and we have long discussed the issues behind corporate stupidity and greed (patents, world-domination efforts, monopolies: read the $ in M$!!), privacy abuses, and the dangers of unregulated self-interest. We are an educated communityu, many of us with enough influene within the corporate world to actually change things...something present in almost no other commmunity as committed to social change as Slashdot is.
We are Geeks! Hear us roar! Lets F$%! some shit up! (constructively, of course ;-)
"Do not doubt that a small, comitted group of people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." -Margaret Mead
Re:The definition of democracy. (Score:2)
NAY (Score:2)
Be sure to check out Corporate Watch [corpwatch.org] for more non-mainstream info and opinion about WTO and related issues.
Zontar The Mindless,
There's no them. (Score:2)
We, the people, have made choices. Some of them have been bad. The entire idea that "corporations" are at fault is an attempt to throw the blame at someone else.
Sit back down. Take your licks. You earned 'em.
Wanna do something useful? Let's start by seeing how we can foster freedom and choices for people. Hey, guess what! Corporations. Free trade.
More choices, better. Fewer choices, worse. That's the end result of individuality.
Am I an individualist? You betcha. And if you want to take away my right to band together with others, be it a corporation or a marriage, you're gonna have to kill me first.
Re:The definition of democracy. (Score:2)
Town/City Government -- from police to school to treasurer, etc. there are ELECTED officials
County Governement -- Schools, police, etc. there are ELECTED officials
State/District/Territory Governement -- State Senate etc. DITTO
Federal Government -- Senate/House/Executive DITTO
Need I say more? Is there a government on the Earth that has better representation of its people? Please give me an example if you will. I'm dying to know where the power does not reside in the people as a whole with respect to the definition of democracy.
Please, tell me you're opressed, so I can laugh.
Do you vote?
Re:hrm. (Score:2)
I do agree with you, that it is 'legal' to compete fairly (when they do). Countries like Peurto Rico have rejected the Wal-Mart altogether because of the strain on local businesses -- and the fact that local businesses would create more jobs, and more community wealth -- instead of funneling profits to big business shareholders.
How, exactly, (Score:2)
I was there. The police used started to use gas and beat people at 9:10 on tuesday, 2 full hours before the first windown was broken.
Umm, yes. (Score:2)
I have little doubt that some of the police went a little overboard, but nor do I doubt that the protesters left them with few choices. The police had to walk a very fine line. On one hand they must maintain order, on the other hand they're heavily outnumbered by a mob of angry people. It is difficult to treat everyone with white gloves in such a situation (as you would under normal circumstances). Particularly in a city such as Seattle, which, unlike many cities on the east coast, has never once had to contend with this kind of situation--the police and the city were illequipped to deal with the situation (they didn't show enough 'force' at the get go). Though a few individual police officers may have stepped over that line, the police on the whole were right to enforce the law. I seriously doubt that the Supreme Court will frown on Seattle's actions (not on an individual basis), if it ever reaches that stage.