Occupy Boston: Looking Back and Moving Forward

For anyone who has said the Occupy Wall Street movement and its Boston affiliate would flicker and die once the winds got strong, perhaps it is time to reevaluate. The Occupy movement, which is now in its fifth week in New York and rounding out a third week in Boston, has gained media attention, popular support and numbers: movements have cropped up all over the nation.

But the Occupy movement has not been without its setbacks, especially here in Boston. A little less than two weeks ago, there was a mass arrest at Dewey Square. The events made a mark on the students of the BU community; there were seven arrests of current students, and former students were involved as well.

Ned Hinman (CAS ’13), who was arrested that night, reported that the  scene was one of “civil disobedience,” but not brutality. “The cops showed up, I was on the opposite side of the side they approached from, so they weren’t particularly forceful with me,” Hinman said. “They had already broken down the line. Like, we were all just sitting down, waiting for them to attend to us. And they said, basically, ‘you can go back to the Dewey Square camp, keep doing what you’re doing, or we’re going to have to arrest you…’ So that was that. I didn’t get thrown to the ground, or anything… I was reasonably, politely held by the arm and led to the wagon.”

The process, afterwards, was arduous, tiring and taxing, and involved being carted from a cell in Jamaica Plain to the courthouse. But most sentences, and all among the BU students, were reduced. Everyone was released by the end of the day.

Boston University alumnus and former Quad staffer Allison Francis (COM ’11) was present that night, as were many BU alumni who chose to remain nameless. “I was present at the night of arrests and I saw huge groups of people get arrested,” Francis said. ” I personally left that night feeling depressed something that started out so peaceful resulted in violence, especially coming from authority figures we are supposed to trust to protect us as citizens.”

In the wake of the arrests, there was an increased interest in the movement on campus. At Boston University, the reaction was strong, as well; the BU Occupies Boston group has sent an open letter to Mayor Menino and continue to plan community action, which is largely organized on their very active on their Facebook page.

Meanwhile, at Dewey Square, the General Assembly the following evening was the biggest of any of their nightly meetings. And when rumors surfaced that Mayor Menino had announced an October 15 move-out deadline, the response was strong and swift.

But even with the small victories in popularity and in press, the Occupy Boston movement has had a difficult week. Yesterday’s wind and heavy rain caused flooding in the tents in the square. There have been conflicts with violence and drug use in the tent city, generating bad press and criticism from former mayor Ray Flynn.

But hopefully, the movement will bounce back from this week and from the mass arrests of the week before that. Francis has hope for the movement. “I think the main thing that would change would be public perception of Occupy. I think if everyone involved continues to participate in constructive activism, people will stop seeing the movement as a hippie, privileged or fringe thing and start seeing it as a diverse group of Americans nationwide working purposefully for structural change.”

The folks at Occupy Boston are focusing on outreach this weekend by spreading their appeal tremendously. This Saturday, famed linguist and local intellectual Noam Chomsky will address the occupiers at Dewey Square at 6pm. The lecture had been set for Wednesday night, but got rained out.

Tomorrow night will also bring the first Occupy the Hood event at 6pm in Dudley Square. It will include a Community Speak-Out, a public forum for issues in various communities, specifically the underserved. Then on Saturday, OB protestors will join forces with Occupy the Hood, in an event they call “A Day of Strength and Solidarity.” It will commemorate a national event, the 16th Annual Day of Protest Against Police Brutality, and will hopefully prove Francis’s point: Occupy Boston is not just for the hippies and the privileged.