Earlier today I was talking with someone today who exclaimed, "Occupy Wall Street, that's so stupid!". I then proceeded to explain to them that OWS is trying to say "hey, this capitalism thing isn't really working right now". It's not to say that capitalism never worked, it's just pointing out that there are some significant holes in it right now.
I believe that by now, most people (except some in Boulder) realize that communism has also failed. Now, communism didn't fail because God hates communists. It failed because it wasn't maximizing the total economic prosperity of all people. The people behind OWS have also realized [, I naively assume,] that capitalism in America is also no longer maximizing the total economic prosperity.
In America today you see thousands of families that incurred large amounts of debt to a disgustingly rich minority. This rich minority (an oligarchy) forced these families out of their homes and into slavery. You might recognize that this looks a lot like the economic system that capitalism replaced - feudalism.
OWS protesters are also crying out about the death grip that rich and powerful businesses have on our federal government. Some even claim that presidential elections are completely rigged (I probably wouldn't go that far). Either way, the government that our American forefathers created is completely absent and void from our current government. We've become so obsessed with being the most powerful country that we sacrificed the values and virtues that made us who we are.
The Occupy Wall Street movement is right, our system is broken. Yes, there are many broken systems out there, but that's not a reason to not change them. Protest is an important political mechanism that has been proven to work in the past. We need it to work now. The only problem I have with OWS is that it seems to be an incohesive jumble of complaints with no real answers. But I suppose that's where real change begins.
