Occupy Melbourne: Where you stand determines what you see

Here is a very revealing run down of some of the events at Occupy Melbourne

I am a Baptist minister and trainer in nonviolent conflict transformation who attended the Occupy Melbourne demonstration on Friday.

We have a saying in nonviolence practice: "Where you stand determines what you see." Here's what I saw.

On Friday morning I was one of the last into the area before it was completely fenced off. I spent the next two hours moving between the lines of police and occupiers, asking them to remain human to one another, eventually kneeling in the space between them to pray for same. It's only when we dehumanise one another that we are capable of violence. People become "problems" to be solved instead of brothers and sisters to reason with and convince.

I read Melbourne Lord Mayor Robert Doyle's op-ed in the Herald Sun. I don't fit Mr Doyle's stereotype of "rabble". Neither did more than half the crowd there on Friday. I saw professionals, students, mothers, and tradies. In fact, the more violent the police response, the more diverse the crowd became as bystanders flocked to join the occupiers. I saw elderly shoppers in tears, clearly shocked by the brutality. Where you stand determines what you see. What they saw clearly helped them choose a side.

Mr Doyle asked of the Occupy Melbourne group, "What were those knives, hammers, bottles, bricks and fuel for?" Simple: they were used in the camp kitchen, Mr Doyle, to feed anyone who wanted food, including the homeless. The knives were used to butter bread, the bottles for drinking from, the fuel for cooking, the bricks and hammers to set up the camp. If any of those items were intended to be used as weapons, as you so obviously imply, why were they not used or even brandished as such? The occupiers had ample time and opportunity to do so. They didn't.

In fact, I ask Mr Doyle to show the public one instance of documented violence by the occupiers. If there was any such instance, you can be certain it would be all over the news - yet it is not. In fact, despite almost 100 arrests, not a single person has been charged with anything. On the other hand, YouTube (and even the Herald Sun website) is awash with examples of excessive police violence.

Continued HERE

The Cops in Melbourne have sure messed up here.

This agressive action on the part the Mayor and the Police has made far more people sympathetic to the cause and has revealed a lot about where they stand with this issue, and this issue is NOT having tents set up and denying other Melbournians access to the square, because it as all fenced up now and no one can access it.

Just to be clear we are referring to corporate greed, that is what the protests are about and lets say that just once again, corporate greed...

Have a read of the entire article, it is very revealing and accurate in my opinion.

For those that would like to see what kind of unprofessional half-wit is in charge in Melbourne, here is his opinion piece in a newpaper

www.heraldsun.com.au...

Oh the irony. You can do your communist thuggery in the third world but in America we do not do business with thieves.

They are a tiny number who held the centre of the city to ransom; disrupting businesses and community events; denying use of popular and busy public space to anyone except themselves; shutting down public transport and city streets one week after their initial protest; vandalising cars, trees, benches and businesses down Swanston St.

reply to post by thehoneycomb


Rubbish.

What a complete load of crap.

Talk about a bloody smear campaign. I read the one in the Herald Sun yesterday, it was outrageous.

Thanks for bringing that up. Not.