How this movement started? The Occupy Wall Street movement is one of the largest demonstrations in the history of United States of America. This movement began September 17, 2011 in New York with just 1000 protestors which gradually increased and spread to different cities around the world. The protests are against social and economic inequality, high unemployment, greed, as well as corruption, and the influence of corporations on government. The protesters' slogan “we are the 99% “refers to the growing difference in wealth in the U.S. between the wealthiest 1% and the rest of the population. Here is a brief history of the Movement:  Initiation: Adbusters (A Canadian magazine) calls for an occupation starting September 17 which is also the Constitution Day in the United States. Initially only 1,000 protesters gather in Zuccotti Park to march on Wall Street. The movement was later supported by other independent activists and worker unions. For example a group called "New Yorkers against Budget Cuts" who were expecting potential austerity measures availed the opportunity and joined the protests.  Putting oil on fire: the next step was to gather public support that is why they come up with a blog entitled "We Are the 99%" refers to the growing difference in wealth in the U.S. between the wealthiest 1% and the rest of the population. This later becomes the slogan of the movement.  Spreading fire: "Occupy" movement spreads to Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, and St. Louis and many other countries around the world. Occupy Wall Street Demands The protesters want more equal distribution of income, more and better jobs, reduction of the influence of corporations on politics and bank reform. The clear message of the Occupy Wall Street movement is a fair economy and redistribution of American wealth. However, According to the corporate media the Occupy Wall Street demands have been unclear to the general public. This is an attempt from the corporations who control the media and through the same media they portray negative reports about the movement. Not only is this characterization false, but in essence these types of false media portrayals represent much of the reason protesters are taking to the streets in the first place. The demand of 99% protesters, many of whom calling for a fairer economic system. Protesters are calling for Changes to their government, American wars abroad, food regulation, environmental protection and democracy. • Fairer economy but the overwhelming theme of the Occupy Wall Street demands is most certainly a fairer economy. Specifically an economy which would alleviate many of the common burdens being placed on the American people today. Burdens such as toxic loan debt, housing debt, unemployment, starvation, and other forms of poverty which have left many Americans hurting in 2011. In a capitalist society, Uncontrolled right of private ownership and unlimited economic freedom has resulted into exploitation of weak by few large enterprises or individuals. People blame Wall Street for America’s financial break down, they think it is no more the land of opportunities and their main agenda is that rich are getting richer and poor are getting poorer. They don’t get their basic rights anymore, they don’t get proper salaries and wages, they are being fired, and their health is being declined since their insurance doesn’t cover up their expenses anymore. Inequality and de-stabilization will continue like this if USA does not take any action and grip their problems, honestly this protest is just a start towards what is coming in near that will be big enough to shake the big future because corporations and country’s economy. • Protestors demand aid in the form of tax revenue from the corporations or anyone who earn more than one million per year. • Redistribution of Wealth Therefore, huge gaps exist between the people. Majority of wealth and factors of production is Concentrated in few hands and they live a life of luxury. That is why Occupy Wall Street movement demands an economic re-distribution of America’s wealth, redistribution away from the top 1% into more average Americans. It indicates that, In the United States, wealth is highly concentrated in a relatively few hands. As of 2007, the top 1% of households (the upper class) owned 33% of all privately held wealth, and the next 19% had 51%, which means that just 20% of the people owned a remarkable 85%, leaving only 15% of the wealth for the bottom 80%. Linkage to other Movements Other movements in the past have attempted to create such impacts in different sectors. Some had impacts and yet some others were impact less. The noteworthy movements are as follow:  The Tea Party movement  Co-operative Movement  The Populist movement  Civil rights movement  Protests of 1968 The Tea Party movement: The Tea Party movement is a political movement which endorses opposition to taxation in varying degrees, reduced government spending, federal budget deficit and reduction of the national debt . Co-operative Movement: It began in England in the second half of the industrial revolution. Land lost its common use workers had nothing to sell but their labor. As a result labor was plentiful and cheap. It was an age of child labor, exploitation and poverty. The Populist movement: The movement began in 1980s in America. The purpose was to help farmers. It was a reaction to falling crop prices and poor credit facilities. Civil rights movement: The civil rights movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. The efforts of these movements did lead to improvements in the legal rights of previously oppressed groups of people. Protests of 1968: The protests of 1968 consisted of a worldwide series of protests, largely participated in by students and workers. The protests were to oppose war against Vietnam. Future of the movement The occupy Wall Street is a way for protesters to express their vision of the future. But I do not see long term viability of the OWS movement because:  All they do is occupy or camp then they will become boring and suffer sympathy fatigue  It lacks Focus and leadership it will continue to be nothing but a protest. What I have learned in my education career is that Significant change requires organization, leadership and focus.  This movement is against the corporations which hold control over government and mainstream media. The bankruptcy of an economic order threatens the very existence of corporate so they will portray it in negative ways.  The Occupy Wall Street Movement is against the economic system of America and demands redistribution of wealth through changes in taxation system and legislation which is not possible. Most politicians are bought.  The capitalism system of economy has been more successful than previous systems.  The cold winter is on the way so protestors are expected to remain inside their homes.  Other movements in the past have attempted to create such democratic, egalitarian institutions, the Populist movement of the late nineteenth century created a series of ingenious agricultural and credit cooperatives, which were eventually destroyed by the money classes and bankers. What Occupy Wall Street Movement will get is small changes in legislations to spread the protestors nothing more. Who's right about the Occupy Wall Street Movement We support the general message of Occupy Wall Street. We have seen a massive shift in wealth to the rich and especially the super-rich over the last 3 decades. Massive levels of unjustifiable power and inequality exist in the ideology that claimed it would all somehow enrich everyone has had thirty years to prove it works and it simply has not worked. We summarize our statement as: • The American system has been conquering the world, Afghanistan and Iraq is the prime example and taking the lives of human beings for so long, and most of these OWS protestors don’t care about that. They are quite content for the system to keep shitting on humanity, as long as they get their entitlements! And that's the moral hypocrisy I see. • We don't really see OWS as the start of a revolution or anything as such. But it's just a movement to us. All they do is occupy or camp then they will become bored and the movement will fail eventually. It lacks Focus and leadership it will continue to be nothing but a protest. What we have learned in our education career is that significant change requires organization, leadership and focus. • To conclude, we do not side with either of them. It is evil beyond all measure. And it is the product of the money system which will ruin any system in the world. You cannot have capitalism as system of economy and yet not have inequalities. The Federal Reserve prints money and fills banks with it. Banks lend out the money, and charge interest. People have to pay back loans with interest. At the end of the day it is all about money. Protestors demand free money. They want to become rich without struggling. They want salary for unemployment. References 1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupy_Wall_Street 2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_Party_movement 3. http://occupywallst.org/article/greetings-occupied-wall-street/ 4. http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/interactive/2011/oct/18/occupy-protests-map-world 5. http://www.buzzfeed.com/donnad/occupy-wallstreet-list-of-demands 6. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_cooperative_movement 7. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_rights_movement 8. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People's_Party_(United_States) 9. http://www.mlive.com/opinion/kalamazoo/index.ssf/2011/11/many_reasons_exist_to_applaud.html 10. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45617743 KGW-TV

Ameer Hamza: Opinion: STORY OF STUFF

Ameer Hamza: Opinion: STORY OF STUFF: PART A  1. USA has 5% of world’s population but they are using 30% of world’s resources and creating 30% of waste which means they are a...

AMAZING PETRUCCI (clean melodic solo)

Petrucci (Lost without you)

KAKA VS AJAX

Opinion: STORY OF STUFF

PART A 

1. USA has 5% of world’s population but they are using 30% of world’s resources and creating 30% of waste which means they are actually over taking the third world countries and thrashing their resources and it eventually makes those countries less valuable. They are using more than their own share which is not ethical.

 2. Annie believes that her country’s government doesn’t value the third world countries people because the government believes third world country people don’t own the resources even if they are living there for generations claiming that those people don’t buy a lot of STUFF as they don’t own the means of production which is strictly against ethical theory, because people need to be valued. 2000 trees are being cut down in Amazon, so there is no one who can take action and regulate the system properly which can help in using these resources in a meaningful way. 

3. Now the way these resources are being used is very dangerous for human health because they produce a lot of toxic waste and chemicals which produces the toxic contaminated products. These products are so dangerous for our health that they affects us in some way because there has not been any research on how to control this toxic waste and use it in human friendly way. 

 4. The pollution that is generated by industries is so toxic that we get exposed to it in a daily life and we don’t even recognize it, such as detergents, medicines etc etc... 

5. From the stuff that goes inside our body from food, the ingredients that are used in that food is also intoxicated, so the food that goes inside the pregnant mother eventually goes inside the baby that is being breast fed, the babies are getting the highest life time dose of toxic chemicals from breast feeding from their mothers, that is a clear violation of ETHICS. Breast feeding should be the most fundamental human active nurturing. It should be sacred and safe which should be protected by the government and industries by using less intoxicated materials and chemicals.

6. Another point that people who live in slums and poor conditions have no other choice but to work in these industries that uses highly toxic chemicals and materials and these women and men gets exposed to these chemicals everyday and eventually these chemicals get promoted to their children and people who live in that society, this process makes the living standards to the lowest level and that is the reason the their world countries societies are becoming very polluted. This way whole communities and societies get wasted. It’s unethical as people should be getting better living standards and non chemical and toxic food. 

7. The natural resources that are being used actually pays for the products that are being used by the people who living in first world countries, people get cheap rates to buy products, wow it seems so attractive but hey! They are using the waste and intoxicated products, the resources weren’t even used from their own land, so even if they use someone else’s land they eventually intoxicate their own people (making a fool out of them) just to make money. They have forgotten about how precious a human life is but who cares! They just want to make money. That is very much against ethics.   

8. The products that are sold cheap in big marts, it seems as if you don’t even pay for them but actually they don’t even pay their own employees properly, they don’t even cover their health insurance because they don’t value human lives anymore. People pay taxes to live in a clean society and get better living standards but they don’t get pollution free environment. The labor that is used to make the stuff is from third world countries so that people from first world countries can live and enjoy the stuff, but hey! Are those people who are actually producing the stuff humans? Don’t they have a right to use that stuff? It surely isn’t ethical in any sense. None of these contributions are being recorded anywhere because people from third world countries are not valued. 

9. The higher authorities, the leaders motivates their citizens to shop and that eventually creates 99% of waste within 6 months, now how cant this much percentage makes the environment polluted. We are moving to very low levels of living standards, we are breathing a polluted and intoxicated air, we are eating chemicals and toxic food and products, we are using and buying so much stuff that we are actually creating tons of wastes and it is rising fast each year. American economic advisor’s chairman said “The American economy’s ultimate purpose it to produce more consumer goods, ‘the ultimate purpose’ that wasn’t health care, education, safe transportation, sustainability or justice”. By making the stuff less useable and reducing the life and quality of stuff they actually make people consume more goods which creates more trash and waste to pollute the society. 

PART B 

1. Pollution/waste by using more stuff by people 

2. Man made toxics 

3. Declining happiness and weather changing 

4. Recycling 

5. New school of thought: sustainability, equity, green chemistry, zero waste, closed loop production, renewable energy and local living economies.   

Argument/Opinion:

I agree with the video because it has been created by people, the way third world countries resources are being used, by giving people low quality and life of stuff, the way they motivate people to buy stuff and creating stuff that can’t be recycled, no human rights for those who live in slums, by thrashing the waste and garbage and creating more toxic waste and pollution, the way people are being played with their minds (mind control). Indeed we live in a society where stuff is used very rapidly and there is no more human value, we live in a society where we breathe and eat the polluted and toxic air and stuff from the day we open our eyes till the day we will die. Stuff is made so that it can’t be recycled, living standards have been declined, people get sicker, there has been more exposure to kids, and we consume more stuff than ever before. This is all part of the old school of thought that was adapted to get people to use more stuff and boost the economies, they never thought about human health or rights. So we need to change that and by using some of the points by new school of thought we could initiate the change just about now.

Critical Summary "THE CORPORATION"

The documentary is about big corporations working as a backbone of 1st world country economies. According to the documentary the importance of corporations in all areas of life cannot be neglected, big corporations covers a large portion of life starting from Mother Nature, evolution of new things, industrial development and involvement of human resources. In most of the big organizations the main purpose of most of the operations is to earn profit & expansion by the provision of better services and oblique product to the end users, while doing so the top management of many corporations does not concentrate fully to the negative elements of the process. According to the documentary big tycoons of these corporations of developed countries like USA and UK have their production houses in those areas of the world where they get cheap raw material, labor and flexible labor laws.
Traditionally corporations were thought to be the place where people used to work and through which they were contributed to the development of their country. So corporation and workers were working for mutual benefit, these days trends have changed and due to huge disparity between the thinking of upper management and workers, the attention has gone in a different direction but top management of any corporation is least bothered about the basic rights of their workers, wages are not comparable to the inflation rate of the economy. Basic human rights and an appropriate work environment have not been provided to the labor class and frustration in employees is on the rise. The workers do not feel as a part of any decision making and hence no one feels inclined to both the mutual benefit of corporation and work force. Secondary the top management of any corporation is only about its stake holders and investors and least bothered about the damage they are doing to the people and environment, where according to the video shown the top management of any corporation is doing good for fewer people including its stake holders and owners while the majority of the environmental factors including humans and animals are being neglected, the origin of corporation was thought to be a single common unit of multiple people but the meaning of corporations have been changed, according to few corporate level stake holders their main objective is to generate profits no matter how, so organizations are neglecting their environmental responsibilities due to high rate of acidic/harmful discharge from the factories and production houses, the water pollution is on rise and the lives of people, animals, plants and sea creatures are in great danger. Likewise the smoke discharge from different factories is polluting the environment badly, so few of the top management people in corporations hold themselves accountable for damaging the earth as they were questioned by general public.
It was thought that corporations used to have huge responsibilities of environment and public, as time passed the care free attitude of corporations have made a general consensus that these corporations only work for their own benefit neglecting the basic public health issues, labor loss and environmental responsibilities. Child labor, low wages and unhealthy working environment are other key issues which are being unattended by the corporations as many of the owners of these corporations have never bothered to visit their productions houses or factories in poor or third world countries, they have not identified their problems of the working class and are really busy in doing the stuff which can make the profit doubled. The corporation has made them so powerful that they are controlling their consumer behavior by extensively advertising their products through print and electronic media. At times when a product is harmful for human life it’s portrait as healthy due to huge investment in its advertisement.

In other words organizations were called “Corporations” due to their nature and output cannot be called as corporations now days since the concept of mutual benefit for employee and employer has lost somewhere. Owners are working for the expansion and profit making and neglecting the part they should play for the betterment of their workers in terms of the wages, work environment. In addition to this the responsibility of the top management to protect human, environment, water, animals and other living life on earth has been neglected. It should not be neglected that corporations ultimately are built up on cooperation among various elements without a strong harmony among all factors of production of corporation cannot survive for long, they will dire need to re-evaluate and re-vamp the organizational system to have better human resource system.