Occupy Conversations: What's the next step?

OCCUPYING CONVERSATIONS with new faces and old

The event had been promoted with one of my favorite graphics of the Occupy movement: a cartoon of a tent city against the backdrop of the houses and towers of Toronto, with word balloons springing up everywhere. 

During the occupation, we had implored the city to come and talk to us. Now Faciliation and Outreach had come together with the Design Exchange to create a space where the conversation could continue. And holding this discussion on what used to be a stock trading floor was an irony everyone was enjoying. 

When Mischa took the podium and asked the group to think back to a 24-hour period that seemed like 7 years,  it took a moment before I realized he was talking about our first day in St. James' Park.  In the days since the eviction, every day was starting to seem longer.  The despair that had left me on October 17th was returning. 

And while seeing a lot of familiar Occupiers did raise the mood of the room, the spectre of doom I'd brought with me didn't really disperse until I saw a table full of new faces all making twinkle-fingers at each other. 

The participants at one table were delighted that we had “some kind of leadership structure” (which we did, for the evening) – but more importantly, while the faces were all new, the conversation was familiar.  Sitting in a small group exploring the morality in the design of our economic structures, and debating how much it can or can't allow for human dignity, and then moving on to what we might do about it, I felt more at home than I had since our time at St. James Park. 

Sara Diamond pulled out the areas of intersectionality that we seem to be embracing, and yeah, we matter-of-factly held an urgent GA up the street as our new friends exited out into the financial core... but for me, the room full of people sharing ideas with lists and diagrams and markers and flip-chart paper was the highlight.

Those conversations, and the way we shared them, help me have faith that, while the spectre of doom will likely return, it'll only be in fits and starts, as those word balloons keep popping up across cities and tents and towers. The conversation the Occupy movement has started is only just beginning. I can't wait to see what we do with it.

Visual harvest: http://www.flickr.com/photos/roxycohen/sets/72157628182658873/