WE ARE ALL SARAH MASON

As a child, I used to read about the ANC, about Feminists, about the Civil Rights Movement, The Black Panthers - without ever dreaming that I would see something as powerful in my lifetime, obsessed as our generation is with generic, mass produced crap like Us Weekly and Keeping up With The Kardashians. As Occupiers, however, we were all universally pleased - if skeptical and surprised - that 'The Protestor' was recognized as Time's Person of the Year. Many of us have put our family lives, our personal agendas, free time, careers and what little comfort we had left in this recession-ridden world, on hold in order to Occupy. Others were at rock bottom, didn't have any of these luxuries, and yet chose to dredge up what last resources, strength and emotions they had, to join the movement. Across the world, our brothers and sisters faced greater adversities and forged the way for us - in Greece, Argentina, in Tahrir Square, Madrid, and more.

As commercial, consumer-based and bullshit as the Mainstream Media may be, and whatever underhand agenda Time magazine might have for recognizing The Protester as the face of 2011, we appreciate the accolade - even more so, perhaps, because one of our own was the face upon which Shepherd Fairey's picture was based. But as the news leaked across the internet that the faceless protester had a face and a name and was, in fact, a real person from Occupy LA, the faceless protester became a hunted figure - even more so because Sarah Mason, the 25 year-old girl upon whom Shepherd's TIME cover was based, neither wanted, expected, nor had any interest in becoming, the media spokesperson and covergirl for a worldwide movement of many faces demanding, simply, change. Sarah was unaware that her picture was being used for the cover of TIME magazine, has not received financial compensation or other material benefits for that fact, and wishes to preserve her privacy at this moment.

In deference to, and solidarity with, our brothers and sisters across the world, we 'protesters' reject the attempts of the mainstream media to seek out and put our sister Sarah Mason in the spotlight. We are disgusted by the fact some 'journalists' have deliberately misquoted our sister by taking an early interview out of context, or claiming 'ownership' of Sarah, as with KPFK's unfounded claim that she worked for them.

Tonight, in reaction to a tabloid journalist attempting to interview Sarah, who has expressed a desire to be left in peace, many of us 'protesters' called the journalist with a message which encapsulates the essence of our leaderless, faceless, movement: WE ARE SARAH MASON.

We will repeat this action to all journalists who attempt to intrude upon our sister's privacy. If you would like to join us, call this number below and say you are Sarah:

Yalda Sadiq
Assignment Editor
Inside Edition
310-642-4176 Direct
310-642-4161 News Desk
Yalda.Sadiq@Cbs.com

I will update this piece with other contact details if and when they become available.

MIC CHECK! Skid Row Allstars Vs. LAPD Young Gunz

This afternoon, eight protestors connected with Occupy LA (including myself) took up the LAPD's invitation to a basketball game aimed "To bring together the public, law enforcement and homeless communities in an effort to strengthen relationships and bring awareness to those in need." The game was between "The LAPD Young Gunz" - a basketball team from the LAPD that trains all year round - and "The Skid Row Allstars" - a group of players from various missions across downtown LA, who do not have a consistent presence as a team due to time, space and money constraints. This carefully staged PR-event featured a dinner for 500 homeless people, served by (gun-carrying) LAPD at the Midnight Mission on San Pedro in Downtown Los Angeles.

We spoke beforehand to Community Organizer Bilal Ali who works with LA CAN (Los Angeles Community Action Network), an organization that is actively fighting the Failed 'Safer Cities Initiative' established in September 2006 by the Los Angeles Police Department, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, and City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo in the Skid Row community. Although SCI was promoted as a means to improve public safety and bring additional homeless services to the community, police enforcement and a crackdown on petty offenses has been the most significant and consistent element of the initiative, and no additional homeless services have ever materialized.

At the cost of six million dollars, 50 LAPD officers were deployed to a 50-square block area surrounding Skid Row (0.85 square miles) -- the equivalent of adding 470 new officers to the Rampart Division or 700 officers to the 77th Street Division in South Los Angeles, and bringing the numbers of police officers in Skid Row second only to that of Iraq, according to Ali. In addition, dozens of undercover narcotics officers were deployed to the same area, resulting in an unprecedented concentration of police resources in a neighborhood with relatively low rates of serious and violent crime.

This has resulted in a massive increase in arrests around the Skid Row area for relatively 'minor' everyday activities which are the natural result of homelessness: sitting on the sidewalk, sleeping in a car, public urination, throwing a cigarette butt on the floor, spitting out gum. An ignored ticket, however minor, results in a warrant for arrest, and the removal of the perpetrator from the street and into jail. Despite the LAPD's saccharine and insincere claim that SCI is "to create an environment conducive to change so that those without hope today may find it tomorrow.", it seems clear that homelessness has effectively been criminalized by the Safer Cities Initiative at the cost of 6 million dollars a year. 6 million dollars the City seems willing to spend in order to remove the homeless from Skid Row, and continue upon its single-minded path of gentrifying Downtown Los Angeles without adequately addressing the homeless problem and finding solutions for those 15,000 people - 75% of whom are African-American - resident on Skid Row. This is further evidenced by the outrageous behavior of City Council and Mayor Villaraigosa in reassigning 1 million dollars in Federal Funding earmarked for Skid Row - to the multi-million dollar NFL-contracted global architecture firm Gensler, in order to entice them to move their offices downtown.

While the action today was not specifically targeting the Midnight Mission, who have done some excellent work in rehabilitating many of the homeless suffering from alcoholism, drug addiction and mental illness, it must be noted that only Missions and Shelters who support the Safer Cities Initiative receive Federal and State Funding, and are graced with the presence of the LAPD, who have a long and outstanding history of being anything but willing to "strengthen relations" and "bring awareness" to the plight of those resident on Skid Row.

Here is the text of the Protestors Mic Check (video to follow):

We, the 99%, do not accept the criminalization of the 15,000 homeless people on Skid Row. Shelter is a human right, an by shelter we do NOT mean jail cells under the so-called Safer Cities Initiative. The police presence on Skid Row is highest in the world, with a greater deployment of law enforcement than anywhere but Iraq. We want real community change, not empty public relations efforts. We are here in support of the RESIDENTS of Skid Row, and all those who are doing what they can despite the violent selective targeting of City Council and the LAPD.

After mic-checking Chief of Police Beck as he stood in his basketball shorts ready to start the game, we protestors read out the text above, and were joined by the audience, one of whom gave us the finger, the majority of whom cheered us on with chants of "Skid Row! Skid Row!", and helped us mic check our statement - before we were told to leave or face arrest.

Bored in Wales

When bored, put on too much makeup.

Occupy the London Stock Exchange

I'm waaaaay behind on updating you guys. There's a lot of new writing over here.

First They Ignore You....

My new blog post at Occupy LA

You Just Don't Get It Yet....

But you will.

Here's a blog post I wrote about the misconceptions people are having about the scale of this movement.

My Solidarity Blog (below for link)

It's just after midnight and my head's whirling. I drove up to Topanga in torrential rain, rivers running past me on the PCH, mists rising up off the sea and cloaking my shitty little Ford Escort, blanket-like. I was en-route to CSA California to pick up fruit and vegetable donations from the kind folks up there. CSA, for you folks who don't know (and I had no fucking clue until this morning), stands for Community Sustainable Agriculture, and is basically a bunch of individuals just like you who want to support our local farmers, being pushed out by corporations and increasing land taxes. Those individuals band together to form a collective which shares the risks and benefits of food production. I won't bore you, but here's the wiki explanation. Essentially, it means local people helping local farmers and businesses stay afloat, and providing the community with good, organic produce which is far, far cheaper and tastier than the shiny, waxed, genetically engineered crap you buy at Ralphs, Trader Joe's and Wholefoods. I'm sorry, but apples just don't have that fucking sheen on them, Wholefoods. They don't. Nor do they cost the price of a small condo. I fucking hate Wholefoods. But I still go there, because it's easy, it's recognizable, it has all my hippy shit in one convenient location. I do, however, frequent farmers markets for all my fresh produce, and after meeting the folks at CSA, I'm now one of their customers.

I loved that early morning rainy drive through Topanga Canyon, my car smelling of apples and oranges and Kale. Los Angeles just rained and rained today like the heavens had had enough, they'd just burst. It felt cathartic, in some way. I got home to my rose-covered cottage in West Hollywood soaked to the bone, tired and happy. I mooched around getting dry with Mr Chips, cooked up some winter soup with parsnips and carrots and beans and sweet potatoes, and then went to meet a fellow screenwriter for coffee at The Grove.

I fucking hate The Grove, and though I love movies and writing them, I hate the screenwriting industry. It was an interesting coffee as this screenwriter professed to be the same way, but it was all we spoke about, and my mind kept drifting back to Topanga and the hippies, Burning Man, and Occupy LA. I was at the March Saturday, and since then have kept up to date by following it closely on Twitter, talking to the organizers and checking in with them, and trying to hustle up donations. I finally got an evening off work, and so scooted over with Chips and boxes of organic goodies about 6pm this evening.

I'm pretty tired, so 'scuse the prose. I'm going for brevity, not style here.

Firstly, it's friendly, it's warm, it's open, and it's full of debate. You walk by - maybe it seems intimidating. A bunch of dirty, wet, unemployed people in tents, holding signs. But look at them, and they're smiling at you. Smile back, hold out your hand, ask them questions. They'll sit you down and answer them, fetch you a cup of coffee, introduce you to people. Sure, there's hardcore activists here - the type who hop from protest to protest, cause to cause. And they're working alongside mothers, fathers, the unemployed, the blue collar worker, the middle class dude who just valet-parked his Audi down the street. Everyone's here not to press an agenda, a specific cause. They're here to express their discontent, and to come together to form a conscious movement which simply expresses the desire for change. They want America to change: not to rewrite the constitution, oust the President. Nothing crazy like that. They want America to be the land it was always promised to be: the land of the free, with liberty and justice for all. What is their main complaint? Their main complaint is that corporations - the 1% - have too much power. They wield political power, as recently proven beyond doubt with Citizens United. They wield global power, as demonstrated with the absolute autonomy of the Federal Reserve and the repercussions of this un-audited institution upon the world's economy. Their CEO's advise the President and affect policy decisions. And when they gamble with our money and they lose, they are given more, while we lose homes, and jobs, and our health, and self-respect. And nothing changes even when this comes to light. No one audits or shuts down the Federal Reserve. The CEO's right at the top continue to reap massive salaries and bonuses. They still advise the President.

Occupy Wall Street, and by extension, LA is not 'anti' capitalist, 'anti' globalization, 'anti' government. It's a movement, it's a voice, and that voice is saying 'this is no longer good enough. We demand representation. We demand a change. We demand that this system where massive corporations wield unlimited political, social and economic power - end'.

This is not a march, nor is it a protest, nor is it a mere 'occupation'. What I scorned a few weeks ago as a few trustafarians in a park, what I saw on Saturday, what I've read on twitter and facebook, seen blogged about on liberal media (fucking hate The Guardian) - has evolved rapidly into becoming a truly representative, democratic movement. Outside City Hall has become a camp for Revolutionaries, and I mean that not in the lefty, hemp-wearing, kombucha-swigging, trustafarian blind faith way. I mean Revolutionary in its purest form: as a fundamental change in power. This is the people claiming back their power and their inviting you to join in. There will be the crazies, the nutters and the loonies - and they will be listened to, and their views will be heard by the General Assembly. And as I saw tonight, Mad Vegan who hates meat-eaters will be told politely to deal with them and value her opinions, but not press them on anyone. Crazy group of over-zealous anarchists who hate the LAPD and decided to start a facebook rumor suggesting they'd used violence and pepper spray, will be told this will not be tolerated in a democratic group. Cop-hater will attack me on twitter because I tweeted that LAPD have been great to Occupy LA - as if their kindness somehow undermines or condones the police brutality in New York. This is not the case. We report as we find, and so far, LAPD and the City Council have been exceptionally well behaved, communicative, even supportive and open with us. Boundaries are clearly enforced only with the agreement of the group. Finances are completely transparent, and open for anyone to see. The group is growing everyday.

It's nearly 2am and I need to sleep - have a big day rewriting tomorrow. After tonight's General Assembly I sat and talked for a long time with a Farmer from Northern California. We spoke about pretty much everything under the sun. I told him my reservations about the movement, and he made me feel better by saying faith shouldn't be blind, I should be realistic, and not blindly follow. Mr Organic Farmer was the first person I'd spoken to since Burning Man who made sense to me, and then it struck me, this whole set up was like Burning Man without the art, the drugs, the desert and the costumes. It was Burning Man being put to the test: self-reliance to the core. Those two years I was dying and unemployed, god how I would have loved to have had Occupy LA to keep me alive, to have given me hope and solidarity, to have made me feel I wasn't alone.

Mr Chips, by now. was fast asleep in my arms, and I was exhausted and buzzing and happy, and Mr Farmer had to work, and I had to drive home.

I'm crawling into bed barely sentient, so I'm posting this without editing. But I will be at the Occupation every single day I can manage (bar this weekend, when I'm being sent to the desert to work). OK, so I'm going to Joshua Tree Music Festival, but it is for work!

I have a few plans on how to work with Occupy LA to get more people joining from what I think are under-represented classes: the employed, solvent, affluent, educated 10% with decent jobs and cars, and the very fucking poor and uneducated, so please join me over here where I shall be blogging for the duration of the movement, in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street and Occupy LA. I will be updating much more regularly than I normally do as I write about the growth of the movement, and I also plan to interview as many people as possible and tell their stories on the blog in order to show all the cynical fuckers out there who (like me) think this ain't for them, that they're wrong. This is for you. It's your movement. Join it. Walk up, don't think about appearances, put out your hand, and ask questions. Come down to Occupy LA and hell, I'll even buy you a cup of coffee. Or a kombucha.

(For the final time, I didn't edit this. I'm tired. I apologize for shit writing)