Occupy £ondon

Yesterday I visited Tent City. For the Zonies, Tent City means something quite different here. There's no Sheriff Joe or men wearing pink underwear. In Tent City London lives the prisoners of capitalism—those protesting the elite 1%.

The Occupy protestors have been camped outside the beautiful St. Paul's Cathedral for two months now. Their post has caused quite a controversy in London. The city has tried desperately to evict the protestors, causing discord among the St. Paul's clergy and even prompting the cannon chancellor of St Paul's Cathedral Reverend Dr Giles Frase to resign because he didn't want to see the protestors removed by force. He soon became the poster child for the movement, prompting a discussion on "ethical capitalism" that never really caught on.

The protestors were issued an eviction notice for last week. However, they refused to move and now will become embroiled in a months-long legal battle over their encampment.

Anyway, in search of a "human interest" story for my reporting class I tagged along with a classmate who was headed to St. Paul's to speak with some protestors who she thought might have an interesting story. I was excited. I hadn't spent much time around the Occupy Movement and I was very excited to hear what these people had to say.

However, I was very disappointed by what I saw: the anti-capitalist protestors dodging into Starbucks for their morning coffee to charge up their Mac and Toshiba laptops, others sneaking home to take proper showers in clean flats. Are they so entrenched in the capitalistic society that they can't even recognise themselves as the products of the very idea they wish to abolish?

Speaking of "ideas," the protestors have adopted Guy Fawkes as the symbol of their anti-capitalist movement. The protestors can be seen wearing Guy Fawkes masks (like V wears in V for Vendetta). But as far as I can remember, V knew a thing or two about protesting and inspiring a revolution. You have to have an idea you believe is better than what the current establishment supports. Of those protesting, few can articulate anything beyond  that they are "anti-capitalism" and seek to "reform the banks." What does that even mean? They don't know, so don't ask further questions.

The majority, and I do not mean all, only most, have not thought about what they are protesting and how they plan to bring about reform. It's a real shame because they have supposedly been living in tents for two months to make a point, a point that they cannot intelligently support. Even their sympathisers are losing interest in their plight  because they have so obviously failed to come up with any sort of idea or reformative plan.



Later that evening, after being kicked out of someone's tent for asking too many questions, I was back near St. Paul's for dinner with some friends. One of my friends had tried to take money of the HSBC around the corner but the door to the ATMs was locked. A man  passing by said, the bank had to lock its doors because the protestors were sleeping in the banks at night. SLEEPING IN THE BANKS! What kind of a message does this send? We hate bankers, but let me take shelter from the cold London winter in a bank.

Then, as we were eating our dinner at Pizza Express, which is directly across from Tent City, we noticed three protestors casually walk into this national pizza chain and sit down for dinner. Midway through our dinner we saw a crowd gather around a Waitrose truck parked outside the restaurant. Onlookers said a female protestor had thrown herself under the truck and refused to move. When the ambulance arrived she jumped up and ran away.

I agree massive reform needs to take place, but if these are the people leading the movement then I'm afraid I've really lost faith.