Public Anger And The Occupy Wall Street - Essay Example

Public Anger And The Occupy Wall StreetThe past two years have seen a huge increase in public activism as people, common citizens have taken to the streets to protest against corrupt and inefficient governments. Public anger is directed at acquiescent government that seems to work with seemingly crooked corporate firms and the net result is that large scale cons and fraudsters who dupe the treasury of billions of dollars go away relatively unscathed. The government either does not want to bring in strict regulations or legislations that severely punish such recalcitrant organisations and the net result is that the common taxpayer is taxed to poverty while the cons live a life of luxury.

This anger seems to have driven the occupy wall street – OWS protestors who in an demonstration of frustration attempted to lay siege to the wall street business centres of Manhattan that is regarded as the financial capital of USA. The idea was obviously to goad and move the government and to convince them that people the limit of patience of a docile public has been reached (Moynihan, 17 march 2012).The OWS movement was a continuation of the anger felt by a frustrated public across the world.

This was seen in the Tahrir square of Egypt, the Arab Spring movement of Saudi Arabia, protests in UK, Spain, Greece, India, Pakistan, Libya and many other nations. In many places, these movements have succeeded in bringing in some level of change. In Egypt, the President Mr. Mubarak was forced to resign, in the Middle East, changes were brought in the manner in which people were governed, in Greece, the government was forced to change its stand on the Euro. In a way, such movements have brought in changes though not to the extent those were planned.

These mass based movements can be traced to Mahatma Gandhi who used non-violent protests to throw out the British from India. China had the Tianmen square protests that ended in a massacre. Such movements become successful when there is a mass based movement and more people in different cities join the movement. Zit must be a movement by the masses and not by a few. Some discipline, leadership and an agenda is needed else the movement becomes anarchy and lewd acts, violence and anti social elements take over the movement.

It is interesting to see how the common person on the street is affected. When such protestors block roads and they do not allow traffic to pass, people cannot go to work, to school, and the ill cannot go the hospitals and so on. When traffic is blocked, the government machinery grinds to a halt. Police can be called in but they can do little when the number of protestors is in thousands. There is a possibility that food may become expensive because transportation of goods has slowed down, petrol pumps run dry and banks remain closed.

A thousand inconveniences are faced by the common masses. My suggestion is that they should put up with these problems, come out in the street and protest peacefully. When elected representative see their voters coming out in protests, they fear the mass that the angry voter represents. Bad decisions are put off and the burden of the taxpayer is eased. Governments also realise that they should make banks accountable for bailouts received, and curb the fat salaries that corrupt top management obtain.

Therefore, movements such as OWS presents an opportunity for the otherwise docile and long suffering voter who is filled with fatalism and apathy and who would otherwise believe that the all mighty elected government and the corporate firms are in an invincible position. ReferencesMoynihan, C., 17 march 2012. Scores Arrested as the Police Clear Zuccotti Park. The New York Times. 16 October 2012. Retrieved 16 October 2012 from http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/17/arrests-made-as-protesters-mark-occupy-wall-streets-six-month-anniversary/