General Assembly @ Freedom Park – November 17, 2011
The note taker apologizes if anything in the notes are incomplete. It is very cold today and hard to focus and type!
- CALL TO ORDER. Hello from Freedom Park! Hakuna matata – everything should be all right! We have some friends in jail but more working on getting them out.
- Reading of pledge and guidelines.
- Announcements
- Vigil tomorrow night in Lumpkin, GA for School of the Americas watch. There is also a van leaving from here on Saturday to head down to the School of the Americas protest, which this year is being called, “Occupy Fort Benning.” On Saturday night there will be a gathering of Occupy and other groups there. If you are interested in going, contact Tim when he gets out of jail!
- Larry makes DVDs related to progressive issues & knowing your rights when interacting with police. Ask him if you’re interested.
- Great concert last night @ Wonderoot $500 in donations – which combined with the Ben & Jerry’s event earned $700 yesterday!
- Party for Jason “@ Hole in the Wall” on Saturday – it’s his birthday!
- Committee Report-Backs:
- LEGAL: Nine people arrested today @ Georgia State event. Legal is working on getting them bonded out and finding out details about court, etc. IMPORTANT: If you are arrested in the next 24-48 hours, call Shab’s number 770-356-0577. The previous jail support numbers will not accept collect calls!
- EDUCATION & TRAINING. Committee just started meeting. Putting together some workshops/teach-ins on various topics. Dates not set.
- ACTION: Great day of Action Today. Two Wells Fargo flash mobs/ mic checks (no arrests), action at Georgia State / Courtland Bridge (9 arrests), and finally, event in solidarity with the unions at Verizon & Home Depot (no arrests).
- MEDIA: Had a meeting earlier this week about working to share and rotate roles, share responsibilities, etc. No meetings in past days – trouble contacting folks. We should meet soon, figure out a strategy!
- Tech: Sub-domains set up for committees on websites (i.e. action.occupyatlanta.org).
- Other business:
- People met the other night to talk about concerns related to racism, classism, lack of proposals at GA – should be an ongoing discussion.
- Concern about joint Tea Party event on website – Tea Party movement has been racist, sexist, they openly carry guns, to protests, etc. We don’t want anything to do with them and we are concerned about this advertised “joint action.”
- Thanks for all you do, what you are doing is important excited that you are here near where we live – and in a place where we can park easily!, police have noted they will arrest people here after 11pm.
- Related to Tea Party – we need to have a discussion about “balance of power” and what needs to be proposed through GA or not. I was in Detroit last week and they have to pass actions etc. through GA (otherwise an event or release can only be associated with a committee). We can try something and if it doesn’t work we can change it, but we need to figure out how GA / proposals should work. Also, OWS passed a “Statement of Autonomy” and it is great and we should think of adopting it here.
- C7 is coming by with food and tents.
- Point of Information: The Fed March has been mentioned at both Action committees and during General Assembly. The last time was 2 days ago and there were no reports of problems. If people had a problem with it, it wasn’t made public, hence why the event moved forward. The “joint action” aspect will be removed from the website.
- Also, what was said about the Tea Party as a whole is prejudiced — just because someone belongs to the Tea Party inherently implies nothing about their views. No information has been found about state or local chapters of the Tea Party that merits those prejudices.
- Point of Information: The national Tea Party and local chapters are different, and the Tea Party itself started as a grassroots movement before being co-opted by the GOP.
