WG/Strategies/Ideas/Declaration of Occupation

Occupy Boston Declaration of Occupation (originally posted in the Discussion by JSkeet)

The times in which we live confront us with a combination of crises the likes of which we in the United States have never seen before: a toxic mix of financial, economic, social, and environmental messes that demands a radical clean-up. While each of these crises has its own determinants, they also all share a common root cause: the domination of our social, economic, and political order by a system designed to serve a wealthy elite, at the expense of the vast majority of the population, here and around the world, not to mention other living creatures on this planet. In light of these interlocking crises, which threaten our lives, our livelihoods, our liberty, our human values, and our common future, We, the General Assembly of Occupy Boston, believe that "business as usual" is no longer an option. The corrupt order, and the intolerable crises amidst which we live demand a profound, collective response, a popular and participatory response of the sort the ruling elite can neither allow, nor even imagine:

Whereas, the problems of economic inequality, unemployment, and crushing debt, as well as corporate personhood, greed, and unaccountability, are all symptomatic of the larger corrupting influence money has on our political and social lives,

Whereas, this influence has consistently been used to impede progress toward a more just and sustainable society, and has often perpetuated crisis and war at home and abroad in furtherance of its own undemocratic agenda,

Whereas, the perusal of this agenda has had profound detrimental effects on all working and middle class communities - and particularly on communities of color, youth, and other marginalized segments of our population – as well as on the environmental systems upon which we as a species depend,

Whereas, those pursuing this agenda also own and control the media we require to inform ourselves about their many abuses of money and power,

And whereas, our peacefully gathered democratic assemblies are amongst the last uncorrupted arenas we have to educate ourselves and plan our resistance,

Be it resolved that we, the General Assembly of Occupy Boston, acting in solidarity with occupations across America and with peoples' movements worldwide, do hereby declare our opposition to all systems of power that function to maintain these oppressive and undemocratic arrangements, just as we declare our affirmation in the belief that a better world is possible, and that it is our right and responsibility to begin creating it. --- Based on: OccupyBoston Declaration of Occupation at wikispaces