by Nathan Anderson

"Tell Me What Democracy Looks Like"

"Show them what democracy looks like!" "This is what democracy looks like!" "Tell me what democracy looks like" Anyone who works near or has to walk past the Chicago Board of Trade, at Jackson Blvd. and LaSalle St., or turned on the nine o'clock news, is by now familiar with this scene: Demonstrators who are a part of the Occupy Chicago movement. They use loudspeakers, beat improvised plastic drums, hold and wave signs that read "We Are The 99%" to voice their grievances at whomever will listen, but mostly toward those on Wall Street — or in this case, the financial institutions that line LaSalle St. — for it was "unethical practices" by Wall Street that caused America's economic downturn. Cleverly borrowing its title from the Occupy Wall Street movement that sprang up in New York last month, the Occupy Chicago offshoot has managed to attract a diverse crowd of people to its cause.

Since demonstrators began protesting on September 17th 2011, in the streets of lower Manhattan, students from Columbia College have been conversing about the Occupy Wall Street movement and the offshoot movements that have been established in some of the nation's largest cities. Columbia's wide-ranging population of students, most who I would consider to be of the "hipster" lot, is eager to participate in what they see as a revolution of sorts against everything that is wrong in this nation. One of the demands the group has adopted is that financial institutions forgive student loans, which totals around $940 billion. The full list of demands can be found here: http://bit.ly/r9lges

The movement — which has also been seen in Los Angeles, Boston, San Francisco and a host of other cities — is not unique to the United States, contrary to what one might think. The call to action was initially proposed this summer by the editors of the Canadian-based Adbusters magazine. Britons, too, have seen the creation of an "Occupy" offshoot. Last week, about 400 people participated in a demonstration near Westminster Palace, in London, according the groups', OccupyLSX, site. People who were sick and tired of the rampant greed and lack of accountability of Wall Street were urged to imitate the demonstrations of the "Arab Spring" that have attracted the attention of a worldwide audience, and have, so far, led to the ouster of two authoritarian regimes, that of Egypt's Hosni Mubarak and Libya's Muammar al-Qaddafi. General Masoud Jazayeri, an Iranian military commander, dubbed this movement the "American Spring."

Yesterday, while reviewing for an economics midterm, a lecture the teacher was giving somehow segued into a discussion about Occupy Chicago. "Is anyone a part of that [expletive]?" he asked. Like most people, including myself, he didn't know what the movements were about and how protesters planned to bring about a change in the system. A student, whose name I cannot remember, raised her hand and started to inform everyone about the movement, speaking in a matter-of-fact kind of way. By the end of her explanation, I was sure that she had no clear reason as to why she traveled to the corner of Jackson Blvd. and LaSalle St. to shout "We Are The 99%!"

As I was waiting for an elevator, I heard someone say that the group had organized a march for tonight that was to end at the Art Institute of Chicago. I had seen a small band of people marching down Van Buren and State Streets once before with a small detail of three policemen on bicycles riding alongside them to keep order. At the time I thought, this movement will never take off, and if it does, it'll be dead by the time Christmas rolls around. But as I approached the museum and saw a crowd that I am sure numbered into the thousands, I was amazed that something with little to no organization and an absence of central leadership could bring together this many people to protest one entity. The small detail of police I saw a week ago had been increased to a few dozen (my estimate); the diversity of the crowd had increased: parents had brought along their children, who also were holding signs that read "We Are The 99%"; older men and women were now part of the crowd.

On Friday, I decided to head to their apparently-but-not-really base of operations to find someone who could accurately answer some questions I had. So around noon, a friend and I made our way to the intersection of Jackson Blvd. and LaSalle St., where across the street from the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago were people with same signs I had seen on Monday. The lunchtime crowd and the placement of the group's makeshift headquarters — a few tents, lawn chairs — made the streets hard to navigate. But we and a number of other people stood with our backs against the wall and documented what could potentially become the left's version of the Tea Party — that is, if President Obama, Harry Reid and other Democratic congressional leaders decide to tap its energy.

About fifteen minutes after we arrived, I stumbled upon Erin "E" Wimberly, a 24-year-old college student who essentially owed over $20,000 to Dominican University, in west-suburban River Forest. As of Friday, Ms. Wimberly had been involved in two other Occupy movements, those in Los Angeles and Long Beach. She characterized the movement as non-violent and nonpartisan: "The people who are here are not in favor or opposed to any one leader." She added, "We all come from different political backgrounds." Although there doesn't seem to be any coordination among the factions that have sprung up across the country, Ms. Wimberly said that there is solidarity among everyone. What she and others most wished for, however, was not for some suit to exit The Fed to tell say that the government has agreed to their demands (although that would be nice) — but for an actual space where members could meet, organize and escape the approaching winter. "It'd be "impractical" to have people sleeping on the streets in near-freezing temperatures", she said. As Ms. Wimberly and I conversed, a man asked us if we'd like some chili. We both declined, but I later regretted my decision, as someone later said, "This chili is damn good!".

Finally, I had found someone who could paint an accurate portrait of the movement's intentions, though I still didn't understand how they supposed to convince government leaders to enact their "demands." To be fair, I had to find someone who didn't share the same views as Ms. Wimberly and her sympathizers. Luckily, finding people who wanted to talk wasn't so hard — even if it was on the condition of anonymity. Two Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) workers, a man and a woman, who happened to be on a smoke break, described them as "idiots" and "disruptive," adding that "they need to find jobs." (The man indicated that the Ceres Cafe, at the base of the Chicago Board of Trade, which usually allows patrons to dine outside, had removed seating because of the demonstrations.) Their assessment was similar to comments made last week by commentators on Sean Hannity's television program, on which they were characterized as "stinky, smelly people" who need to "take a bath."

The movements have captured the attention of a nation that is still in the midst of an economic recovery in which the unemployment rate is a stubbornly high 9.1%. The public and private sector continue to make cuts to employment positions and services to those who need them most. Politicians are unwilling to abandon political ideology to reach a compromise and large corporations that hold too much sway in politics. The movement, I believe, has the potential to encourage elected officials to reach an accord, or vote them out of office, much like the Tea Party did in 2010 if we continue on the same path we're on now. Republicans, Democrats, Liberals, Conservatives, Radicals — we all have been effected by the global financial crisis, and now, because a few thousand people began marching in New York, we have finally found the will to speak out.