Protest is broken all over the world.
In Western democracies it's broken
because our governments no longer
have to listen to street protests.
It's broken in other countries because
of the tremendous resources that are
put into suppressing protests.
This idea that if you can get enough people into the streets
unified around a central message
then our reluctant government will have to listen to us.
Actually, that is no longer true.
We have to realise that there's only, now going forward
I think, two ways to actually gain political power.
And that is: to win elections or to win wars.
My name is Micah White.
I'm the co-creator of Occupy Wall Street
and the author of The End of Protest:
A new playbook for revolution.
In one of the largest shows of people power yet,
a million-man march is underway
in strife-torn Egypt aimed at turfing out the government.
In 2011, we saw the Arab Spring was happening in Eygpt
and we realised this is it, we can bring it to America.
So we initiated Occupy Wall Street.
The protesters went down Wall Street.
The marchers are protesting what they say is, quote "corporate greed"
that they say has led to the stagnant economy and lack of jobs.
Who the f*ck are you protecting?
You're protecting f*cking fascist Nazis!
We called for people to come out on a specific day, September 17th.
But initially actually the movement was ignored.
Like, it wasn't a big deal.
It only became a national and an international big deal
after a series of accidents occurred.
So the first accident was that a police officer
pepper sprayed some women
and that footage of them screaming in pain was played
on national television.
And then the second was when 700 Occupiers
were arrested on the Brooklyn Bridge.
That's ultimately what propelled Occupy from an idea
to a global social movement.
It spread to ultimately 82 countries, in almost a thousand cities.
Hundreds of people inspired by the Occupy Wall Street movement
are protesting in cities across Australia against corporate greed.
The people united will never be defeated.
In 2011, we believed so fundamentally
that Occupy was going to transform society
just like the Arab Spring was transforming the Middle East.
And yet now from our vantage point it didn't.
Breaking news, a crack down against Occupy Wall Street protesters.
Earlier this morning, hundreds of New York City police
started clearing the park where the protesters had been living for almost two months.
All my sh*t's in there, all of my friends are in there.
That's my f*cking home.
Occupy did not get money out of politics
we did not change the hierarchies of power
we did not change how decisions are being made.
It failed, but in failing it taught us something very important:
It taught us about the limits of contemporary activism.
This movement is already having an effect
and it's going to continue to grow.
It has to do with basically the end of democracy.
The governments are not required to listen to protest
and on the contrary, in Western governments
protests have become a kind of spectacle.
Welcome to the revolution of love.
Now let's look at the Women's March in retrospect, now that it's been a little while.
Nothing has happened.
Not only has nothing happened but it actually functions
to dissipate the passion and the militancy of millions of women
who could have been diverted into a path
that would have led to actual power.
Everyone went home and they received an email from the organisers
and the organisers said, 'Now let's all send postcards to our elected representatives.'
That captures basically the fundamental failure of the Women's March.
It was a squandered and wasted opportunity.
It was also, I think the development of a kind of
professional activism.
It's an industry that makes money from
protest but only if those protests don't actually spiral into social revolution.
They make money through building their email list
being able to sell their list to sponsors
and there's a whole economy.
Some activists want to be able to make a living doing their activism.
Which makes it very dangerous.
Why is it that Black Lives Matter had to arise basically out of a few women on Facebook
and not out of any of the pre-existing organisations?
It's because established activist organisations tend to be so risk averse
that they would never call for something that might actually spiral
into something like Black Lives Matter or Occupy Wall Street.
Hands up!
Don't shoot.
Now when you talk to activists
the goal is somehow about changing consciousness
and like raising awareness and changing the discourse.
Yeah it's a good thing
but imagine if Marx had just sat around
complacently like, 'Well. I think I'm changing the discourse.'
No!
He dreamed of an actual revolution!
This is why the Russian revolution happened
because they dreamed of actual revolution!
Social movements can do more
than just get people to march in the streets.
We can have social movements that involve winning elections
drafting legislation
governing communities.
It's a game. It's just a game and we can hack it.