Occupy 1

We schedule our meetings. They hold the line. We bicker. They act.

That band of rag-tag, dirty idealists have been sitting there in a park adjacent to the seat of global financial power for three weeks now, determined to change the world--and they have. They don't seem to know how they are going to do it, but the mere thought of them there, sitting, talking, fighting off the autumn cold, is enough to keep the rest of us hopeful and dedicated.

They want a voice. They want to be heard. They want to believe in democracy, like back when America was great, before the arrogance set in, before the guys who fought in Europe faded into senility and we took their courage and turned it into a sense of entitlement.

There is a lot of fear, both inside and outside of this movement. The outsiders, the 1% and the political elite are scared because, yes, this is indeed their worst nightmare. Much of the un-supportive or skeptical 99% are scared because the thought of restructuring the social constructs, the economic architecture, and the political system currently dominating our world is scary. However, it is inevitable and the folks at Occupy Wall Street and their supporters in nearly 1000 cities worldwide are probably going to get a lot more than they bargained for.

Every major step in human history has been preceded by a significant advancement in the way in which we communicate.

35,000 years ago, homo sapiens evolved their modern-day vocal chords, allowing them to communicate using complex sounds that represented symbols, both concrete and abstract. This resulted in order out of the chaos, the ability to teach others methods and techniques, the beginning of an oral history where something someone learned was not lost with that person. Man separated himself from the animals. This new development even caused the extinction of human's faster, stronger cousins, the neanderthals.

Somewhere around 6 or 7,000 years ago, language became written. Some visionary Sumerian decided to create a series of symbols to represent the words coming out of people's mouths and literacy was born, and with it, civilization. Ideas were saved for future generations. Advancements, improvements, plans, messages, belief systems, political power, literature, religion, and everything else that is civilization did not have to be lost in translation. Next were the Babylonians, the Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Christian revolution when Europe became connected by a common belief system, but the message was limited to the few who were trained by the church to read and the fewer controlled by the church to write their propaganda.

Enter Gutenberg, a German inventor in a small town on the Rhine called Meinz. His printing press opened up the possibility of mass messaging. Books besides the bible were printed, not hand-written by scribes in the church's pocket. Pamphlets illustrating new ideas began to circulate as the general population learned to read. The protestant reformation occurred, then the Enlightenment with its scientific leanings, it's humanism and the idea that not everything was God's doing and that maybe, just maybe, humans should take responsibility for themselves.

Now we are experiencing the growing pains of the information age. All of human knowledge stands ready at anyone's fingertips. Communication across oceans is instant. Groups of thousands, perhaps someday even millions, can simultaneously share and experience each others' messages. The truth about everything from working conditions for sub-Saharan African diamond miners to the exorbitant luxury of America's 1% can be sent and received to and from nearly every individual in the world. In short, the blinders are off! Governments and institutions can no longer realistically control the flow of information. Their self-serving policies will no longer go unnoticed.

Combine this ability to gather knowledge with a society weary of its inequality and primed for change and it is reasonable to assume that we, as a species, stand on the precipice of the next great social revolution.

We can not even begin to predict the ramifications.

It is possible, taking the optimist's view, that this smaller world could render irrelevant many of the fundamental social, Geo-political, and economic structures that we have come to accept as unchangeable and axiomatic, even to the point that we would never consider the possibility that there might be other options. What good are borders when economies and peoples are so co-dependent that the economic failing of one nation ruins all the rest? Why fight for resources when their eventual depletion will be instantly catastrophic for every individual on the planet regardless of nationality or ethnicity and these same resources are necessary for the smooth operation of the global economy? If that's the case, why not share them?

Because this is how economics is now viewed, as one complete system where the only boundaries are the outer edges of the atmosphere.

It seems completely within reason that capitalism, communism, free-markets, welfare states, currency value discrepancies, corporations and every other "real-world" institution that props up our sense of order and gives us the feeling that one ideology is better than another or that there are even choices will be soon rendered moot. Perhaps, optimistically, some kind of global cooperativism will emerge.

However, the power structures currently in place are deeply rooted and will not give up their power so easily. What's more is that they have massive arsenals of killing tools at their disposal.

This is all merely speculation. However, it seems apparent that this is no longer just about Wall Street or campaign finance or the Federal Reserve or lobbyists or the democratic ideal. It's about change on a scope that we have not seen in nearly 600 years. 

Such prospects, thoughts, musings, or even the rants of a psychopath if you view them as such, are scary and I think it is safe to say that that the process that will eventually tear down those structures has commenced. But while the lives of all humans will no doubt be forever changed, be encouraged that all that is in the hands of the people will be well.