Oh my, looks like the kids, potheads, drummers, zealots, mis-guided idealists, true believers, ideological fanatics, and opporunistic hangers-on in Zucotti Park are discovering that a movement directed by “facilitators” instead of “leaders” can become just as oppressive as any society led by the usual suspects among the capitalist tools.
New York Magazine reports that dissatisfaction has erupted in the Occupy Wall Street ranks following a General Assembly decision to impose limits on the drumming that has noisily marked the protestors presence for nearly a month. They’re also finding that even leaderless protest movements can degenerate into cash cows for insiders.
“’They’re imposing a structure on the natural flow of music,’ said Seth Harper, an 18-year-old from Georgia. ‘The GA decided to do it … they suppressed people’s opinions. I wanted to do introduce a different proposal, but a big black organizer chick with an Afro said I couldn’t.’
“To Shane Engelerdt, a 19-year-old from Jersey City and self-described former ‘head drummer,’ this amounted to a Jacobinic betrayal. ‘They are becoming the government we’re trying to protest,’ he said. ‘They didn’t even give the drummers a say … Drumming is the heartbeat of this movement. Look around: This is dead, you need a pulse to keep something alive.’
“The drummers claim that the finance working group even levied a percussion tax of sorts, taking up to half of the $150-300 a day that the drum circle was receiving in tips. ‘Now they have over $500,000 from all sorts of places,’ said Engelerdt. ‘We’re like, what’s going on here? They’re like the banks we’re protesting.'”
For more from New York, go here.
HT: The all-seeing one, Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit.com.
