Interview with Maria Allwine about October 2011

Maria: The country has reached crisis levels with respect to the economy, jobs, education, health care, the environment, and an Empire that is overextended. The current political climate has demonstrated itself to be too dysfunctional to effectively address these crises. The normal tools of advocacy - elections, lobbying, grassroots pressure - have become ineffective. Corporations control the political process and the media message. Corporations and the wealthy have nearly limitless resources. We have the numbers - the majority of people in America support ending the wars and using our resources for human needs. The point is to bring individuals and groups together who support peace and economic, environmental, and social justice so that our numbers will be greater than if we tried this alone. We believe that the time has come to engage in massive nonviolent direct action to build the culture of resistance in order to shift power away from concentrated corporate capital and create a system that respects human rights and the planet.  The time has come for us to bring the Arab Spring and European Summer to this country, to build on Madison and become so insistent and so many that we can no longer be ignored.  The time has come for us, the people, to demand what we want so we can all have a future for ourselves and future generations.  We already have over 4,500 people with us.  We begin the occupation on October 6 and this time we stay.

Maria: Our intention is to stay in Freedom Plaza as a unified presence and to not leave. We will use ongoing actions of nonviolent resistance to disrupt the forces that corrupt our political process and undermine our rights and human needs. We will demand changes that shift power away from concentrated corporate capital and free us to create solutions that lead to a just and sustainable future.  The power of this occupation derives from its complete freedom from the influence of any political party or interest group and from our ability to be so strong that we cannot be ignored by those in power.  We will create a lasting force, a culture of resistance, that will continue to move our society toward a peaceful, just and sustainable future.

Maria: This is an open-ended occupation and is completely people driven.  The occupation will last until we achieve our goals of moving us onto a path to a peaceful, just and sustainable future. Part of the action will occur during the occupation in Washington, D.C. and part will have to continue on after the occupation to ensure that our demands are met.  We are formulating a list of demands and welcome input.  We welcome people to organize their own actions during the occupation.  We are planning teach-ins and events for each day of the occupation and, most important, we are planning for assemblies, modeled on the M-15 movement in Spain, where individuals in Freedom Plaza formulate their own ideas and demands for the kind of society they want to live in. The Spanish government is being forced to take the demands of the Indignados (M-15) seriously – why not here?  It’s up to us to make our government see and hear us.  No party, no leader will save us.  It’s entirely up to us.For more information and to sign the pledge to commit to occupying Freedom Plaza with us, go to http://october2011.org.

Stephen: Are you expecting participants to come from a variety of progressive movements?

Maria: Absolutely.  Many groups with different progressive causes and agendas have joined us and are spreading the word among their own members, such as Veterans for Peace, Citizens for Legitimate Government, Black Agenda Report, Bail Out the People Movement, Code Pink, Firedoglake, US Green Party, National War Tax Resistance Committee, various unions, peace groups and a whole host of other groups.  Check out our website (http://october2011) and click on the “Organizations” tab to see some of those who have signed on.

Maria: Yes, we are.  Many of the real media outlets (not the lamestream media) have signed on to cover us and more are contacting us every day.  Here’s just a few, but the rest are on the website under the “Media” tab:  Alternet, Common Dreams, Truthout, Firedoglake, OpEd News, Michael Moore, LUV News, the Indypendent (of course), the Real News, War Is A Crime – and again, a whole host of others.

Stephen: Can you explain in more detail the popular assemblies?  Have the organizers determined how the assemblies will be broken up and the issues they each will focus on? 

Maria: The assemblies are the most important part of this occupation.  We have devoted a lot of attention to them and yes, we have determined how they will work – at least a solid framework.  We have 15 core issues – again, listed on our website under the “Issues” tab – that the assemblies will focus on.  People can sign up in Freedom Plaza for whichever issue or issues they want to work on.  During the day, each group will have a working session and each evening we’ll all come together and hear about that day’s progress on each of those issues. Ultimately a document will emerge that will be a blueprint for the world we all want to live in – and what we expect our government to do in order to get there.  Our intent is to provide a place and framework for ordinary people to finally make their voices heard and to bring their own ideas – which are always the best ideas – to solving the enormous problems we face as a country and planet.