When Occupy Wall Street started on Sept. 17, 2011, it seemed like just another left-wing protest in New York against the bailouts, but it quickly ballooned into a movement which still has a social and political impact today.
Currently, only the core activists of OWS are still meeting to try to build a movement to push for radical social and political change. Today, there will be a General Assembly in New York for the second anniversary.
I never thought I would see a social movement that isn’t just fighting the traditional populist battles, but actually questioning the system. For many years there were protests against the Iraq War, tuition hikes, budget cuts and gay oppression, but I never thought a single movement would try to encompass them all.
As a student, OWS seemed so far away and insignificant, but watching how quickly the movement spread to more than 50 cities and dozens of countries, it became clear that this was no ordinary protest. Its goals were ambitious, to say the least. Its website, occupywallst.org, has a bold slogan: “the only solution is a world revolution.”
For a society that advocates conformity, it was a breath of fresh air to see and be part of a movement that challenged the social and political status quos. Yet when it started, the goals were not well defined.
The movement’s goals centered around two key issues: wealth inequality and corporate influence over government. “We are the 99 percent!” was a common slogan, signifying the top 1 percent owning 40 percent of the wealth.
OWS also brought up issues that before weren’t discussed in political discourse, such as the growing student debt crisis.
Currently the total student debt is more than $1 trillion, which is more than total credit card debt. All of this debt on students is due to state budget cuts on public universities.
For many years, it seemed the nation was condoning the neoliberalism of Bush and the Tea Party. The conversations were only about government spending and how bad it was, which led Republican states to cut funding for state universities. This put a heavier burden on students.
With all of this talk of cut backs and deficits, there was a growing movement that felt Obama wasn’t doing enough to address the plight of the poor, students, minorities and middle class.
The movement dwindled significantly due to elections sucking up political activism. Many moderates who supported OWS weren’t long-time activists and chose to support Obama instead of change.
Even though the movement lost most of its momentum, it still had a lasting political impact on the country and now especially with students.
One student movement called Strike Debt radically pushes for debt forgiveness and a public overhaul of the education system. Although these radical changes were not likely, one newly elected Democratic senator was listening.
After Elizabeth Warren was elected senator of Massachusetts in 2012, she proposed a bill to have student loan rates temporarily lowered from the current rate — 3.4 to 6.8 percent — to the interest rates that banks pay — 0.75 percent. Currently, students are paying nine times the interest per dollar we borrow than Wall Street bankers.
With Warren’s proposal and Obama’s re-election, clearly revolution was a far cry from success, but seeds were planted and conversations were changed.
Although the world revolution didn’t happen, OWS was a way for students, workers and activists to be heard.
There was also a more subtle success of the movement, which I believe was more significant than marches. Although most didn’t participate in the OWS protests, there was a level of silent support for the protesters.
OWS showed that there were many people who were ignored by politicians and the media, and that there is still a lot of discontentment in this country and the direction we are heading.
Joshua Hajiakbarifini is a 24-year-old political science and economics senior from Baton Rouge.