Support groups

Protesters Standing Outside a Recent Wall Street Event at the St. Regis Hotel in New York

The Occupy Wall Street Movement continues around the world. Here is a map that depict the various locations around the world where there have been reports of "Occupy Wall Street Protests" taking place:

Although most of the protests around the world have been non violent, there have been continued clashes with local police in different cities across the US and the world.

Demonstrations in New York City continued with nightfall, as thousands of "Occupy" protesters massed at a downtown plaza and then peacefully marched across the Brooklyn Bridge -- aiming for a grand finale to a long day of activism that led to more than a hundred arrests and injuries to at least two police officers.

In a tacit admission that the protests will be difficult to sustain over the winter, organizers are now focusing their efforts on planning a "spring offensive" with fresh targets.  Details of the campaign will be unveiled later this month, according to the activists who say they will spend the winter consolidating their position, broadening their support base and refining communication between Occupy grounds nationwide, using online tools being developed by their IT team. 

The protest outside the Port of Oakland represented an escalation in tactics as a movement that had largely been about marches, rallies and tent camps targeted a major symbol of the nation's commerce.The violence that followed the closing of the port raised questions about the direction of the movement and whether the clashes, so far mostly isolated in a city with a history of tensions between residents and police, will galvanize protesters or hurt their cause.

Occupy Wall Street Demonstrators held vigils for an Iraq War veteran seriously injured during a protest clash with police in California as some Occupy encampments came under growing pressure from authorities to abandon sites in parks and plazas. A crowd of at least 1,000 people, many holding candles, gathered Thursday night October 27, 2011 in Oakland in honor of 24-year-old Scott Olsen, who is hospitalized with a fractured skull.

Overseas, protesters hit the streets in London, Paris, Rome (where clashes with law enforcement officials were reported) and other European capitals. Marches were also held in Asia, South America, and Australia.

In Nashville, police cracked down on an Occupy protest camp near the Capitol under a new policy setting a curfew for the complex. They moved in a little after 3 a.m. early October 28, 2011 oand arrested about 30, who were later released after a judge wouldn't sign the warrants. About 20 protesters who stayed on a nearby sidewalk were not arrested and were still there later in the morning as state troopers stood guard at the steps to the Capitol.

Background on the movement: In the Summer of 2011, the Canadian-based group Adbusters Media Foundation, best known for its advertisement-free anti-consumerist magazine called Adbusters, proposed a peaceful occupation of Wall Street to protest corporate influence on democracy, address a growing disparity in wealth, and the absence of legal repercussions behind the recent global financial crisis.  "The Wall Street protests sort of inspired everything," said Kai Wargalla, who co-created the Occupy London Facebook group. "It was just time to start here. We need people to step up and speak out."  According to the senior editor of Adbusters, "they basically floated the idea in mid-July into their email list and it was spontaneously taken up by all the people of the world, it just kind of snowballed from there.

Activists from Anonymous also encouraged its followers to take part in the protest which increased the attention it received calling protesters to "flood lower Manhattan, set up tents, kitchens, peaceful barricades and occupy Wall Street". 

Although it was Originally Proposed by Adbusters Magazine, the Demonstration is Leaderless 

Other groups began to join the protest as seen above by

the Nurses of America and it  Includes the

NYC General Assembly and U.S. Day of Rage 

The protests have brought together people of many political positions. A report in CNN suggested that protesters "got really lucky" when gathering at Zuccotti Park since it was private property and police could not legally force them to move off of it; in contrast, police have authority to remove protesters without permits from city parks. 

International Media Center in NYC

The protest which started September 17, 2011 in the Wall Street area of New York City has been spreading to other cities around the country and it's getting world attention.  See below a protest that has taking place in cities as far west as Portland Oregon.

Perceptions vary as to the specific goals of the movement. According to Adbusters, the central demand of the protest is that President Obama "ordain a Presidential Commission tasked with ending the influence money has over our representatives in Washington". Liberal commentator Michael Moore had suggested that this is not like any other protest but this protest represents a variety of demands with a common statement about government corruption and the excessive influence of big business and the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans on U.S. laws and policies. Peripheral demands such as raising taxes on the rich, raising taxes on corporations, ending corporate welfare, support for trade unionism, and protecting Medicare and Social Security in their traditional forms are expressed by some participants.

Occupy Maine is asking for an investment in public transportation infrastructure and the return home of Maine National Guardsmen from wars overseas. Other protesters are calling for an audit or elimination of the Federal Reserve, affordable healthcare, dismantling the military-industrial complex and to end all wars. Despite the various lists of demands, some non-partisan groups and supporters of the protest have expressed concern that the proposed agenda items are not addressing some of the root causes. Political activist Lawrence Lessig argues that the problems on Wall Street have been caused by corruption in Washington that has been perpetuated by a deep conflict of interests. He further states that because both parties depend on Wall Street's money to fund their campaigns, they will not dare to cross the interests of Wall Street.

DECLARATION OF OCCUPATION:  Los Angeles

As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies.  As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known.

• They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.
• They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.
• They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one's skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.
• They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.
• They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless animals, and actively hide these practices.
• They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.
• They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.
• They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers' healthcare and pay.
• They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.
• They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.
• They have sold our privacy as a commodity.
• They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press.
• They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.
• They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.
• They have donated large sums of money to politicians, who are responsible for regulating them.
• They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.
• They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people's lives or provide relief in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantial profit.
• They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.
• They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.
• They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.
• They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad.
• They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.
• They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts.*

To the people of the world:   We, the Los Angeles General Assembly occupying City Hall Park in Downtown Los Angeles urge you to assert your power.  Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone.

To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy:  We offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal.

Join us and make your voices heard!

*These grievances are not all-inclusive.