Blame The Bankers And Politicians - Not The "Hippies"

Ever since the demonstrations of Occupy Wall Street started there have been those on the right (and among the 1%) who have tried to demonize the protesters. They hope that by demonizing the protesters they will take the country's attention away from the very serious economic and political problems the protesters are trying to point out. They have called them "socialists", "anarchists", and "anti-American", but perhaps the silliest charge they have made is that the protesters are just "hippies" (as though that would somehow make what they are saying less true).

I don't think these efforts to label and demonize have been very effective. People across the country can see in their own lives and those of their neighbors the truth of what the Wall Street bankers and the politicians have done to this country. That is why large numbers have joined or supported the OWS movement.

One of the best responses to the name-calling I've read can be found at the blog Thurman's Notebook (and I think he got it from DKos). I'm reposting it here for your perusal, and I freely admit I liked it because I'm an old "hippie" myself:

I don’t want to make this all about hippies… because it isn’t. The #OWS movement is a phenomenon all to itself. Blaming it on hippies is just typical weasel behavior from the champaigne-sippin’, caviar-dippin’ greedheads of Wall Street crowd – you know, the ones who got us into this mess in the first place. It’s just their way of avoiding responsibility, and boy howdy are they good at it.

But hippies, young and old, are involved…and that’s a damned good thing.

Let me tell you something about hippies. Hippies didn’t export anyone’s jobs, hippies didn’t lie us into an immoral war, hippies didn’t  conspire to steal anyone’s pension funds, hippies didn’t order anyone tortured, hippies didn’t steal so much that it crashed the economy of the entire world, and hippies don’t go on national tv and spew nonsense and propaganda for a very nice living.

So go ahead and blame hippies for everything…as if they had ruled us for decades. We should be so lucky. But we weren’t that lucky – not by a long shot. Instead, we got you.

So if the hippies have some advice for you Wall Street assholes, maybe you should listen. You could do worse. You did do worse. You did a lot worse.

Hippies told you to mind your planet. Hippies told you to make love not war. Hippies told you to not let greed grab you. But did you listen?

No. You and your minions in Congress and elsewhere turned your backs on responsibility. You abandoned the people and sold your souls to the highest bidders. Consequences be damned.

You should thank what gods may be that there are still hippies, that there are still people who put humanity over corporate profits, that there are still those who insist that we do the right thing rather than the profitable thing. We just may save the planet from assholes like you.

Meanwhile, our bought-and-paid-for politicians can’t do shit:

Global warming? Sorry.

Unjust wars? Nope, nothing to be done.

An oppressive and unjust Military Industrial Complex? C’est la vie.

Class warfare by the 1% against the 99%? It’s only class warfare when we say it is.

The disastrous drug war? Whatcha gonna do?

Loss of precious civil rights? Quit yer bitchin’.

Mercenaries on the streets of America? What’s to worry about?

Corporate takeover of the country? Yawn.

No, our bought-and-paid-for politicians can’t do anything that doesn’t involve shoveling cash into the coffers of the already filthy-fucking-rich. And by their inaction they would doom us all.

You greed-deranged fools who have done these things to us had better hope that the dirty fucking hippies come riding to the rescue. Otherwise we are all going to suffer a fate that only you deserve.

I don’t care what anyone says, there is something sweet and pure about old hippies like Ben Masel and others. People who still retain their principles and ideals and are still willing to stand up for humanity in the face of unrelenting tyranny. They deserve respect not scorn. Bless them all.