[Campaignforrealdemocracy] Straw Man Times !

Mon Oct 24 10:20:14 UTC 2011

Hi again

Here below is another critical article from the Times, although this time:
(a) they mention the statement and (b) there is a very good video on the
web-page.

The 2-3 minute video is solely of activists in the camp talking (including
Robin Smith of these lists) mainly about capitalism or the system with no
editorial comment at all. The activists come across very well indeed. If we
up our game politically we can win the journalists over IMO.

Unfortunately the video is behind the paywall, so I can't share it. Although
it's a pound for one month subscription at the moment in case anyone can
bear the idea of giving murdoch money.

I have also pasted below today's news feature on the camp. Incidentally the
comments in the paper are ( and have been since the occupation began) more
broadly favourable towards the occupation which is perhaps why the video is
featured and the editorial today actually touches upon the camp's actual
political content, and process ( for the 1st time).

Ciao for now

Mark

*The St Paul’s protesters have no specific aims; no realistic demands.
Occupy London should clear up and clear off
Libby Purves
*

The trouble with being raised by the better sort of nuns is that you come to
expect not only high standards but almost crazily otherworldly ones from
anybody with a religious label round his or her neck. Examination of
conscience, confession of faults, loving your enemy, turning the other
cheek, offering up undeserved discomforts and humiliations for the Holy
Souls in Purgatory. All that.

Even when you discard your own religious label you remain hard-wired to
expect them in those who haven’t. So, just as in a briefly South African
childhood I was scandalised by one school full of racist Ursuline nuns,
going on about “kaffirs” while wearing pectoral crosses, so I now spend a
lot of time cringing at murderous militant Islamists, mean-spirited hellfire
Evangelicals, Catholic paedophile cover-ups and the rest.

When I was younger and even more naive, I remember my shock at finding out
the hard way what hawkish landlords the Church Commissioners were, that
religious publishers are not necessarily pleasant to deal with, and that the
BBC religion department can be as churlish as any other bit of the Corp. As
to those in Northern Ireland who glued “Catholic” and “Protestant” labels
over their un-Christian tribalism, the shame of it burns still.

Go on, jeer, I deserve it for crimes against cynicism. Just blame those
kind, clever, humble self-sacrificing Sacred Heart nuns of my schooldays.
But it explains why I was rather pleased when the Rev Dr Giles Fraser, Canon
Chancellor of St Paul’s, was initially so welcoming to the “Occupy London”
campers in Paternoster Square. He seemed to me to display the correct amount
of saintly recklessness and neo-Franciscan welcome.

Now Cathedral spokesmen are saying his “initial reaction” was not made in
consultation with the Dean and Chapter, and Dr Giddings of the General
Synod’s House of Laity speaks sorrowfully of “hindsight”. But a good few
Anglican voices are backing the original welcome, even though it is now
causing huge financial losses as the Cathedral closes, and may torpedo its
Advent and Christmas programme. All very well the campers scoffing “render
unto Caesar”, but in straitened times if the shop and café takings and
donations stop flowing, Caesar isn’t going to keep the heating on.

So my main irritation is with the Occupy protesters themselves, and their
bombastic announcement that they may well stay beyond Christmas. That’s not
Christian, kind or reasonable. Unless, of course, the camp really has the
power to be a more effective agent for change than all the serious political
campaigners, community groups, and churches.

So does it have that power? I have watched the encampment grow; listened to
all sides; noted the *Telegraph* poll saying more than 80 per cent think the
demonstrators should leave, and the *Guardian* one where 82 per cent back
them. I have trawled online for the views of occupiers in Wall Street,
Germany, Italy and Greece.

Some are interesting and focused, particularly on the overweening power of
corporations and the kowtowing of governments to big money. Most are less
impressive. I especially like the German lad who arrived without a tent or
sleeping bag because “there are always spares”, and is relaxed about time
because though he lost his job a while ago, he’s on full pay until the end
of November. Who, and what system, does he think is paying him to sit in
someone else’s tent being righteous?

I have read the UK group’s “manifesto”. It has nine points. It wants
“alternatives” to the current system, refuses to “pay for the banking
crisis”, does not accept any spending cuts, and wants an end to “global
injustice”, which it appears to say three times in slightly different ways.
It supports all other looming strikes and protests, and (in a brief happy
diversion into practicality) wants regulators to be “genuinely independent
of the industries they regulate”. Hear, hear.

It concludes with point nine, “This is what democracy looks like.”

But its “General Assembly” is not really what democracy looks like: or only
in tiny simple communities. In crowded, complicated nations democracy is
about graft and grunt, checks and balances, committee-work and the rule of
law, justice laboriously meted out, respect for individuals going about
their lawful business with no time to sit around in tents.

The slogan “Capitalism is Crisis” has a nice ring to it, but it is neither
true nor clear. Capitalism is one of many imperfect systems. It has its
faults, which elections and clear manifestos exist to check. Socialism also
has its faults, and so does the kind of anarchism that sets up camps on
public property and demands more special treatment than its normal users.

Capitalism, in the form of greedy and reckless banking, has certainly
contributed to the present need for public retrenchment and unwelcome cuts.
But so have each of us, in our way: in amassing household debt and making
massive consumer and lifestyle demands unearned by rising productivity. So
did the last Government with its reckless spending, waste, selling off gold
reserves, deregulation, careless immigration policy and unwise wars. So did
the Conservative Government before them, with its disregard for the national
industrial base, cavalier attitude to mass unemployment and worship of the
City.

Plenty of things need fixing, but protests have lost their focus. The Jarrow
marchers, Aldermaston CND, Vietnam protesters and Greenham women all had
clear demands, and it was obvious to everyone what would have appeased them.
Even the student protesters against fees were reasonably well-focused: it
was a limited policy they were hoping to reverse. The trouble with UK Uncut
and the idealistic, self-righteous campers of Occupy London is that it is
impossible to think of any clear, feasible action by an elected government
that would satisfy and shift them.

For it is, basically, a tented tantrum. A nylon-roofed, media-savvy,
Twitterati, festival-inspired, Glasto-generation sulk. I’m very glad that St
Paul’s was gracious towards it at first. But soon the campers should return
the favour by folding their tents and silently stealing away. And if they
really want public acclaim and sympathy, they won’t leave one single bit of
litter.

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/opinion/columnists/libbypurves/article3203723.ece

*Protesters threaten to keep St Paul’s closed for Christmas*

   - [image: St Pauls cathedral on Sunday morning as its doors remain closed
   to worshippers and tourists due to the Anti-Capitalism protest site outside
   their front doors.]
   1 of 6
   Protesters outside St Paul’s. The cathedral is losing £16,000 a day Times
   photographer, Matt Lloyd
   - [image: Activists start an overflow camp in Finsbury Square]
   2 of 6
   Activists have started an overflow camp in Finsbury Square Times
   photographer, Matt Lloyd
   - [image: Protesters hold a meeting on the steps of St Pauls’ Cathedral]
   3 of 6
   Manadatory Credit: Photo by Ray Tang / Rex Features (1476798a) Protesters
   hold a meeting on the steps of St Pauls’ Cathedral Occupy The London Stock
   Exchange demonstration, London, Britain – 23 Oct 2011 St Paul’s Cathedral
   forced to close for the first time since the Second World War due to the
   presence of the Occupy The London Stock Exchange Camp Ray Tang/Rex
   Features
   -  4 of 6
   The City of London has appealed to them to move on peacefully Andy
   Rain/EPA
   - [image: Tents belonging to protestors taking part in the ‘Occupy London
   Stock Exchange’ demonstration remain in place in front of St Paul’s
   Cathedral]
   5 of 6
   Their tents fill up the plaza in front of St Paul's Oli Scarff/Getty
   Images
   - [image: Finsbury Square]
   6 of 6
   Anti-capitalist protesters have set up a second camp at Finsbury Square Carl
   Court/AFP/Getty Images

 <http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/uk/article3203440.ece#>
<http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/uk/article3203440.ece#>
  * Ruth Gledhill<http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/public/profile/Ruth-Gledhill>
* Religion Correspondent
 Last updated October 24 2011 12:10AM

St Paul’s Cathedral could be closed for three months as the anti-capitalist
Occupy London protest camp continued to grow in size, expanding into nearby
Finsbury Square.

The protest puts at risk Remembrance Sunday and the Lord Mayor’s Show next
month and services in the run-up to Christmas.

The protesters showed no signs of abandoning their “mission”, remaining
unmoved by the pleas of Dr Marjory Foyle, 89, who spent more than 30 years
as a missionary doctor in Nepal. She wept as she told the protesters that
they were wrong. Speaking in front of the camp of 200 people, she described
going to see St Paul’s during the Blitz, the last time the building was shut
down, and then for only four days. “Every building bar St Paul’s was erased
and I said to myself the hand of God is on St Paul’s.”

Matthew Richardson, councillor for the ward neighbouring St Paul’s, said
that lawyers had advised the City of London Corporation that it could take
at least three months to move the protesters on. He understood that the
cathedral would remain closed as long as there were health and safety
issues.

The City of London authorities warned that the protesters, now into the
second week of their encampment, risk damaging the “integrity” of their
movement if they stayed longer.

The legal situation is similar to that at Parliament Square. If the
protesters do not decide to move voluntarily, City Corporation lawyers may
face months of legal battles to get them out. Stuart Fraser, chairman of the
City of London Corporation policy and resources committee, said: “The City
will accommodate lawful protest but this should not accommodate a long-term
campsite that blocks the highway.”

However, Islington Council, owners of Finsbury Square where the second camp
is located, seemed more sympathetic. Councillor Catherine West, leader of
the council, said: “We support the right to peaceful protest, balanced with
the needs of our community.”

There were no public services at St Paul’s yesterday, nor will there be any
for the foreseeable future but the Dean and Chapter are continuing to say
morning and evening prayer in the cathedral. People who turned up for
services yesterday were directed to nearby St Vedast Foster Lane. Some
worshippers held an impromptu evensong on the cathedral’s steps.

St Paul’s is losing about £16,000 a day because of the decision to close its
doors, 80 per cent of its running costs.

Organisers of the occupation announced the first edition of a newspaper to
be printed on Wednesday, *The Occupied Times of London*. The Museum of
London has asked for the first of the 1,000 copies to be printed

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/uk/article3203440.ece
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