IT’S JUST A FACT: Last year, only five out of every hundred trades made on the New York Stock Exchange actually happened in downtown New York City, on the floor of the NYSE, right on the corner of Wall Street near State. Gone are the days when the NYSE necessitated brokerages “clustered around” Wall Street in order to hand-deliver paper copies of stocks every week. Most of the action now takes place not just outside of the exchange but often nowhere near the Financial District. Could be in Midtown Manhattan, or Midtown Dhaka, but location really isn’t the factor it used to be in making money move.
Yet, with its cobbled, narrow streets, suited workers bustling around and Gilded Age architecture, Wall Street looks like more of an old studio backlot take on New York City than what the city actually looks like these days. In other words, Wall Street is a perfect set, for anyone looking to make a scene. Which might have something to do with why the recent protesters chose it.
Occupy Wall Street has—against many odds—gained quite a bit of momentum over the last three weeks, even if the “they” who organized it are still as loosely defined as the “demands” they have. We know that they’re indignantly pissed off at a financial system that failed to hold anybody in a position of power accountable for some of the current economic problems its titans helped to create, and then, profit from. And we know that “Wall Street” is, yes, a location, but moreover, meant to symbolize the entire financial system…even if its most reviled villains are, say, closer to the Staten Island Ferry or up on Park Avenue near 47th (“OCCUPY TWO BLOCKS FROM THE WALDORF” just doesn’t have the same ring to it).
What we don’t know is what they plan on doing to further their cause, beyond raising awareness and ire for an issue most of the world is already well-aware of and irate about. Or how long they’ll last. Or what the long-term effects of any of this might actually be. The protests’ effectiveness as anything other than a Liberal Arts-educated encampment that’s provided NYPD with overtime hours and many lower-to-mid-level workers serious transit consternation is, well, debatable.
We do know, though, that there are ways of making a difference in the day-in/day-out of that nebulous entity known as Wall Street that take a little more chutzpah than sitting around a drum circle and earning your cuff marks to share on Twitter. If Occupy Wall Street really has ambitions of changing the way our world deals with commerce, trade and free markets, well, we have a few propositions for them, to see if they’ll leave their urban encampment-cum-Shakedown Street, get off of their Carhart-covered asses, and show the world what a real disruptor is. And they don’t even involve violence!
That said, we obviously don’t endorse doing any of these ourselves. They are, after all, just ideas, but ones worth considering. After all, change requires more than a few days in the park, no?
I know, you’re trying to be satirical here. But using a violent metaphor (occupy) to describe what you propose to do to “hot wives” is just misogynist.
Let’s hear your ideas.
Observer has the wrong premise – the demonstrations are to get the attention of 99%, not 1%. The 1%er will not provide a solution, they are the problem.
Why not occupy the HQ of the AFT or the AFL-CIO or the UAW? Those pension funds are a big part of the 1%. Or maybe Nancy Pelosi’s office?
Pension fund are the right ones to be making money on Wall Street, not a relative few ubber rich with many houses to choose from every night while unemployed people with children try to live in their cars. The idea that unions are to blame is as false as your picture, Dort.
Union pension funds need to make money. Thus, hedge funds, which isn’t bs.
Ideas?
@dfdc819fa7a86b8e5bc7d31e031fac9f:disqus is totally correct .. the movement is about getting the 99% involved in conversation. The longer and wider the 0.0001% continue to protest entirely non-violently, the more of the 99% are reached and drawn into conversations. The strategy is working way beyond wildest expectations without mass media attention.
The ideas are illustrated if you click on the “next” link at the very top of the article… fyi
They’re not bad ideas. 
This is how it started in Egypt, no?
I smell change in the air! Not reform, but the smoldering fire of revolt…
The revolution won’t be televised, lol
And if violence enters the equation… blood will run in the streets
Damn shame
The “Editors” didn’t write anything. I read it, and went back and re-read it. They really offer no answers, no solutions, and the article is just a bunch of air. Then – go above the article to the box with the picture of Gramercy Park and go through the slide show. There the “Editors” take rude low slams at the protestors. Then, using such adjectives as “smelly, dirty, loudmouth malcontents,” the “editors” give the protestors ideas of where, in the “editors” humble opinion, they should be protesting instead of Wall Street.
I can’t help but to point out – the “Editors” with all their humble advice – are sitting behind their desks, eating meals at home, and sleeping at home, comfortable in their beds. In contrast, the “smelly, dirty, loudmouth malcontents” are spending their days outside, eating outside, and sleeping outside. They don’t go home to their comfy beds, like the “Editors” that wrote this “article” do. No, instead, they are trying to make a difference for ALL OF US – well – I should say – for 99% of us.
I agree with Alangrant9 and the others – you, the “Editors” have it wrong. Why get the attention of the 1%? They are the problem, and they won’t do anything to change things. It’s the other 99% that WILL make a difference for the rest of us.
Shame on you “Editors” – shame on you.
I was thinking about organizing mass savings withdrawals from offending banks, though I don’t know if that could really have much of an effect since, for the biggest and baddest of the banks, consumer bank accounts represent a small fraction of their assets.
I was thinking about organizing mass savings withdrawals from offending banks, though I don’t know if that could really have much of an effect since, for the biggest and baddest of the banks, consumer bank accounts represent a small fraction of their assets.
The authors of this so-called article should certainly recognize a smirk when they see one since they seem skilled at writing with a smirk. Would it be too much to ask that you give the same consideration to your fellow citizens as you do to the TEE Pardy?
You are rude beyond belief. I’m a 71 year old great grandmother and some of my grand children now adults are involved in this movement. Perhaps it’s “the editors” who should be called a bunch of dirty kids with smelly friends. You certainly could not be called serious journalists on the cutting edge of a sea change in this country. I suppose if you’d been in Egypt you would have written about towel heads and kissing camels. What exactly is your level of education anyway?
These are not good ideas, they are ideas intended to get the possibly unsuspecting and naive’ protesters in trouble. Sorry, since most protesters know what they’re talking about and are for the most part of average or better intelligence, I think you’re in for a long wait to see any of your ideas take root. As everyone has said, nobody wants the attention of the 1%, the intention is to unite the 99% in power and reason, this is only a beginning, but it’s a great one.
No? Gimme a break. Nice French affectation at the end. Is someone getting paid to write this fluff? If they are, it sounds like their research went no further than a few clicks of the mouse.
I did some research—spent the better part of the afternoon down there, observing, marching a little, mostly observing. And I’m of the opinion that the more specific this movement becomes the more boggled and subject to the powers that be the movement becomes. There are a lot of different walks of life down there and they all have a very general idea of what it is they are fighting against. The more honed and targeted it becomes, paradoxically, the more it becomes divided. So I argue that protesters ignore criticism of there being no mission statement. And I also argue that marches, henceforth, defy city permits and the neat cattle corrals. “Whose streets? Our streets!” Not “Whose partitioned sidewalk?” Protest does not abide by permits or what keeps a city running smoothly. Protest shuts a city down.
How depressing to see Arthur Carter’s old newspaper turn into the NY Post for the carriage trade.
No. Change starts with one person doing one thing. Read your American history.
The New York Observer is written and read by the 1%, they are just feeding their readers what they want.
When you get 99% involved, they need to spend less time per person to disrupt the 1%. With 99% participation you can do all 10 suggestions, multiple times. Those getting time off can surely use these guidelines as hints to create more mischief. NOT VIOLENCE – PRESENCE. “Remember, be nice”
Unemployed reprobates
It would be interesting to see if there is anyone at the Observer who would sign his name to this
mini-minded, snarky drivel. What a waste of space and time.
It is sad to know that one can actually be paid to produce such waste.