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People asked, well the media asked, what do the Egyptians want, or the Tunisians, when the protests first started there. Of course, we all found out what they w

People asked, well the media asked, what do the Egyptians want, or the Tunisians, when the protests first started there. Of course, we all found out what they wanted.

rimantas 15y ago
Egyptians and Tunisians knew very well what they wanted. What do these people want is indeed unclear to me. Abolish the banks and give all the money to them? Hang all the rich people? Equality of the income? How would that look like? And how many of them are just too lazy to do something and would prefer not to do anything but will still be entitled to some benefits? A lot of those "99%" posters can be summarized by "I took a bunch of dumb decisions, then I took some credit for stuff I did not need, and now I am screwed". Who knew!
- Andrew_Quentin 15y ago
  The protesters know very well what they want also. It is only the media who is unclear for very understandable reasons because this has only started. They are not asking to abolish the banks, but the Glass ceiling to be re-instated, they are asking for more equality of course, the graph for example that was posted here on HN a while ago showed clearly that while the country grew, wages did not, after 1970s, or, after the Regan Thatcer market prevails let the jungle rule. I do not know how many of them are lazy. I would not think many since it takes quite a lot of work to organize what they have and keep pushing forward. Many of them simply can not find a job and find themselves in a spiral without any help because of temporary difficulties. We have had plenty of posts here on HN just how poor people are trapped into poverty. Banks get money, little people get kicked out. Anyway, maybe you should visit their websites and read what they want.
  - rimantas 15y ago
    Thanks for the reply. I must admit, I am not from the USA so I did not follow all this really closely, but if there was a clear representation of the demands, I surely missed it.
  - gwright 15y ago
    I assume you mean the Glass–Steagall Act. I keep seeing this idea of 'asking for more equality' and I have no idea what that means. Equality of what? pay? opportunity? Forced redistribution of money to equalize incomes would be an unmitigated disaster so I can only hope that isn't their actual demand. Anyway, the protesters and their supporters need to refine their message a bit.
    - CWuestefeld 15y ago
      I see those attractive young people protesting, and I can't help but wish for equality of appearance. Why should I be stuck with this body, when all of those people flaunt -- or worse, ignore -- their beauty? Seriously, it's ironic that the same set of people who claim that "material possessions aren't important, it's the people that matter" are the ones who find money so important that they've got to redistribute what others have earned. But they don't give attention to the myriad other ways in which some people are better-advantaged than others.
    - hxa7241 15y ago
      > Forced redistribution of money to equalize incomes would be an unmitigated disaster Not really. A different balance of taxation would be a form of redistribution of income (and indeed would be interpreted as 'forced' by some). Would that be an unmitigated disaster? Well, it needs checking in the detail, but one suspects that such different tax profiles and hence 'redistribution' existed at various times in the USA's past: the 1960s probably, for example. That is unlikely to be called a period of disaster: it was one of growth and creativity, was it not? If all that happened was going to the moon and inventing the internet, you would have to call it pretty good.
      - gwright 15y ago
        Not really. I'm sorry, but I simply can't take you seriously. you don't understand that the very definition of a tax incorporates the idea of 'force' (hint if it is optional, it isn't a tax) you are confusiong redistribution and/or progressive tax structure with 'equal incomes' you claim without any evidence that the 1960s represented a time when this redistribution was implemented My comment was about the ambiguity of 'equality' without any clarification or context and about the dangers of promulgating 'equal incomes' via forced redistribution. I do not want to live in a world where any individual effort made to raise my income above the average results in the government grabbing my wallet and giving it to someone making no effort at all.
  - cube13 15y ago
    >Anyway, maybe you should visit their websites and read what they want. From what I've seen from the posts all over the internet, it runs the entire political spectrum from the very progressive liberal/socialist(tax the rich, end wars, socialized medicine) to the very libertarian(end the federal reserve, go back to the gold standard). There is also a lot of anti-globalization stuff in there, as well. That's on top of the anti-corporate greed goals(which are what I assume the entire thing started about, but quite frankly, I'm not sure anymore). The problem for me, even as a liberal, is that a lot of the demands are either impossible(removing the fed) or so unspecific(there is a lot of talk about "personal liberty") that they could mean anything to everyone that it's hard to state that I support them or am against them.
- jeffool 15y ago
  Well, when you're raised and told you HAVE to go to college, a lot of will she loans for it. Or they'll assume they'll have their job for a long time, and buy a car/house, or have a kid. A bunch of dumb decisions? Not necessarily. Sometimes life just happens. As for what they want, they want to feel like they have opportunities. I genuinely do think it's a discontent that's risen from feeling like their voice carries little/no weight in society, politics included, and that the control is in the hands of those with wealth. It's your garden variety populist uprising, only from the American middle class, so expect to see less blood and more coffee.
  - rimantas 15y ago
    > A bunch of dumb decisions? Not necessarily. > Sometimes life just happens. No doubt about that. However I'd argue, that some of those 99% could have it differently if they wished so.
    - jeffool 15y ago
      Oh absolutely! And I'm sure many are the lazy freeloaders that are easily imagined. But I think honest mistakes count for much of it. Of course, that could well be wishful thinking!
    - ordinary 15y ago
      I think the people now in Wall Street are doing exactly that. :) Not all change for the better comes about by buckling down and getting a second job.
  - uriel 15y ago
    > A bunch of dumb decisions? Not necessarily. Sometimes life just happens. "If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest, or some guy on TV telling you how to do your shit, then YOU DESERVE IT." — Frank Zappa
- nhaehnle 15y ago
  This seems a bit too condescending to me. It's very easy to point to a dictator and lay the blame on him. The violence and injustice perpetrated by a dictator is easy to identify. If you have a complex system where injustice is not generated by a single individual, but rather by the interplay of many different actions, or even generated by the structure of the system itself, this is much harder to identify. You'll note that people in Egypt got rid of Mubarak, but they're not entirely happy about the current state of affairs either. The problem with economic violence is that while the issues are understandable and can be explained, they are hard to boil down to a short slogan.
  - sudonim 15y ago
    The hardest thing with the united states is we've built a system that is complex and there is no one person who screwed everything up. Example: People have high student loans because college is expensive because more people want to go and can get loans from the government so colleges can charge higher prices
    - ctdonath 15y ago
      The greatest thing with the United States is we've built a system that is complex and there is no one way things have to be done. Example: free Ivy-League education available at http://ocw.mit.edu http://ocw.mit.edu for the self-motivated. My wife & I have 5 nontrivial degrees between us, at a cost of under $100k and no debt. A little creativity and flexibility got us a long way. Supply and demand. People are willing to pay high prices for education in exchange for credit-card-easy access, so colleges are willing to charge it. Dig & negotiate a bit, be flexible, and the price comes in a lot lower.
      - wh-uws 15y ago
        Its not about the knowledge. Its about the fact that many decent jobs won't accept any applicants without a degree. Yes you can get all of that knowledge but what proof do you have? By the way im a CS grad with a job Im just saying this as someone who is frustrated with people all ways using the strawmen of free online education which only recently became prevalent and the fact that they fell into circumstances that allowed them to either not need college or go for cheap. The story my generation was sold as kids is that you go to college and then you get a good job. Somewhere along the way that contract was broken... that is part of what this protest is about

People asked, well the media asked, what do the Egyptians want, or the Tunisians, when the protests first started there. Of course, we all found out what they wanted.

rimantas 15y ago

Egyptians and Tunisians knew very well what they wanted. What do these people want is indeed unclear to me. Abolish the banks and give all the money to them? Hang all the rich people? Equality of the income? How would that look like? And how many of them are just too lazy to do something and would prefer not to do anything but will still be entitled to some benefits? A lot of those "99%" posters can be summarized by "I took a bunch of dumb decisions, then I took some credit for stuff I did not need, and now I am screwed". Who knew!

Andrew_Quentin 15y ago
The protesters know very well what they want also. It is only the media who is unclear for very understandable reasons because this has only started. They are not asking to abolish the banks, but the Glass ceiling to be re-instated, they are asking for more equality of course, the graph for example that was posted here on HN a while ago showed clearly that while the country grew, wages did not, after 1970s, or, after the Regan Thatcer market prevails let the jungle rule. I do not know how many of them are lazy. I would not think many since it takes quite a lot of work to organize what they have and keep pushing forward. Many of them simply can not find a job and find themselves in a spiral without any help because of temporary difficulties. We have had plenty of posts here on HN just how poor people are trapped into poverty. Banks get money, little people get kicked out. Anyway, maybe you should visit their websites and read what they want.
- rimantas 15y ago
  Thanks for the reply. I must admit, I am not from the USA so I did not follow all this really closely, but if there was a clear representation of the demands, I surely missed it.
- gwright 15y ago
  I assume you mean the Glass–Steagall Act. I keep seeing this idea of 'asking for more equality' and I have no idea what that means. Equality of what? pay? opportunity? Forced redistribution of money to equalize incomes would be an unmitigated disaster so I can only hope that isn't their actual demand. Anyway, the protesters and their supporters need to refine their message a bit.
  - CWuestefeld 15y ago
    I see those attractive young people protesting, and I can't help but wish for equality of appearance. Why should I be stuck with this body, when all of those people flaunt -- or worse, ignore -- their beauty? Seriously, it's ironic that the same set of people who claim that "material possessions aren't important, it's the people that matter" are the ones who find money so important that they've got to redistribute what others have earned. But they don't give attention to the myriad other ways in which some people are better-advantaged than others.
  - hxa7241 15y ago
    > Forced redistribution of money to equalize incomes would be an unmitigated disaster Not really. A different balance of taxation would be a form of redistribution of income (and indeed would be interpreted as 'forced' by some). Would that be an unmitigated disaster? Well, it needs checking in the detail, but one suspects that such different tax profiles and hence 'redistribution' existed at various times in the USA's past: the 1960s probably, for example. That is unlikely to be called a period of disaster: it was one of growth and creativity, was it not? If all that happened was going to the moon and inventing the internet, you would have to call it pretty good.
    - gwright 15y ago
      Not really. I'm sorry, but I simply can't take you seriously. you don't understand that the very definition of a tax incorporates the idea of 'force' (hint if it is optional, it isn't a tax) you are confusiong redistribution and/or progressive tax structure with 'equal incomes' you claim without any evidence that the 1960s represented a time when this redistribution was implemented My comment was about the ambiguity of 'equality' without any clarification or context and about the dangers of promulgating 'equal incomes' via forced redistribution. I do not want to live in a world where any individual effort made to raise my income above the average results in the government grabbing my wallet and giving it to someone making no effort at all.
- cube13 15y ago
  >Anyway, maybe you should visit their websites and read what they want. From what I've seen from the posts all over the internet, it runs the entire political spectrum from the very progressive liberal/socialist(tax the rich, end wars, socialized medicine) to the very libertarian(end the federal reserve, go back to the gold standard). There is also a lot of anti-globalization stuff in there, as well. That's on top of the anti-corporate greed goals(which are what I assume the entire thing started about, but quite frankly, I'm not sure anymore). The problem for me, even as a liberal, is that a lot of the demands are either impossible(removing the fed) or so unspecific(there is a lot of talk about "personal liberty") that they could mean anything to everyone that it's hard to state that I support them or am against them.
jeffool 15y ago
Well, when you're raised and told you HAVE to go to college, a lot of will she loans for it. Or they'll assume they'll have their job for a long time, and buy a car/house, or have a kid. A bunch of dumb decisions? Not necessarily. Sometimes life just happens. As for what they want, they want to feel like they have opportunities. I genuinely do think it's a discontent that's risen from feeling like their voice carries little/no weight in society, politics included, and that the control is in the hands of those with wealth. It's your garden variety populist uprising, only from the American middle class, so expect to see less blood and more coffee.
- rimantas 15y ago
  > A bunch of dumb decisions? Not necessarily. > Sometimes life just happens. No doubt about that. However I'd argue, that some of those 99% could have it differently if they wished so.
  - jeffool 15y ago
    Oh absolutely! And I'm sure many are the lazy freeloaders that are easily imagined. But I think honest mistakes count for much of it. Of course, that could well be wishful thinking!
  - ordinary 15y ago
    I think the people now in Wall Street are doing exactly that. :) Not all change for the better comes about by buckling down and getting a second job.
- uriel 15y ago
  > A bunch of dumb decisions? Not necessarily. Sometimes life just happens. "If you wind up with a boring, miserable life because you listened to your mom, your dad, your teacher, your priest, or some guy on TV telling you how to do your shit, then YOU DESERVE IT." — Frank Zappa
nhaehnle 15y ago
This seems a bit too condescending to me. It's very easy to point to a dictator and lay the blame on him. The violence and injustice perpetrated by a dictator is easy to identify. If you have a complex system where injustice is not generated by a single individual, but rather by the interplay of many different actions, or even generated by the structure of the system itself, this is much harder to identify. You'll note that people in Egypt got rid of Mubarak, but they're not entirely happy about the current state of affairs either. The problem with economic violence is that while the issues are understandable and can be explained, they are hard to boil down to a short slogan.
- sudonim 15y ago
  The hardest thing with the united states is we've built a system that is complex and there is no one person who screwed everything up. Example: People have high student loans because college is expensive because more people want to go and can get loans from the government so colleges can charge higher prices
  - ctdonath 15y ago
    The greatest thing with the United States is we've built a system that is complex and there is no one way things have to be done. Example: free Ivy-League education available at http://ocw.mit.edu http://ocw.mit.edu for the self-motivated. My wife & I have 5 nontrivial degrees between us, at a cost of under $100k and no debt. A little creativity and flexibility got us a long way. Supply and demand. People are willing to pay high prices for education in exchange for credit-card-easy access, so colleges are willing to charge it. Dig & negotiate a bit, be flexible, and the price comes in a lot lower.
    - wh-uws 15y ago
      Its not about the knowledge. Its about the fact that many decent jobs won't accept any applicants without a degree. Yes you can get all of that knowledge but what proof do you have? By the way im a CS grad with a job Im just saying this as someone who is frustrated with people all ways using the strawmen of free online education which only recently became prevalent and the fact that they fell into circumstances that allowed them to either not need college or go for cheap. The story my generation was sold as kids is that you go to college and then you get a good job. Somewhere along the way that contract was broken... that is part of what this protest is about