Activists in New York have adopted the tactics of the Egyptian activists -- and of their Spanish and Greek fellow activists -- who occupied Tahrir Square as a center of protest activity.
Starting June 14, the New York activists, including many union members, have set up a permanent camp --
Bloombergville -- occupied 24 hours a day, as a base for protesting the "austerity" aimed at destroying ordinary people's living standards in order to maintain the unseemly profits of the bankers. Most notably, they are demanding the cancelling of thousands of layoffs of city jobs.
The protest is in advance of what is feared will be draconian cuts in the city budget that, for example, would eliminate over 6,000 teaching jobs while dramatically reducing the quality of education and social services. As one activist stated:
"We don't know exactly when the budget is going to be passed but anything that takes away one cent from important social services of the City of New York is an attack on the people of New York."
Here are some pictures of the camp, taken by my brother-in-law Jack Shalom:
The police have forced the camp to move a few times, but it is currently (June 19) located at Broadway and Park Place. Its current location can always be found here. Information about the latest happenings is always available at bloombergvillenow.org/
Stephen Soldz is psychoanalyst, psychologist, public health researcher, and faculty member at the
Boston Graduate School of Psychoanalysis. He is co-founder of the Coalition for an Ethical Psychology and is President of
Psychologists for Social Responsibility. He was a psychological consultant on two of (
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