By Lionel Gayle
Occupy Toronto is the sobriquet for what seems to be a timeless occupation of a private space – a sort of tent-city enclave within Canada’s most bombastic metropolis. It’s from here that a group of belligerent demonstrators have been selecting targets of derision, ever since they kicked off their Toronto campaign on October 15, 2011.
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| An Occupy Toronto protest at Nathan Phillips Square in front of Toronto City Hall, Sat., Oct. 22, 2011. (C) Jackman Chiu. |
While the vigilant police are calling the current encampment of the vociferous activists a peaceful protest, the gathering in St. James Park, on Kings St. East downtown, is a catalyst – knowingly or unknowingly – for fear in the minds of some Torontonians.
Many citizens live close to the well-kept botanical park that is attached to the 158-year-old St. James Cathedral (Anglican). And it’s doubtful that some can tolerate the high-spirited partying such as that which took place October 15: (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gy7kueaSxFE)
But that’s just one inconvenience; call it contrived negativity if you will. If the novelty of communal living is still intact, that’s good, because, based on how long the young adventurers co-habit the park, group dynamics will take its toll. Without a unifying force, the aspirations of a group of happy campers could transform into apathy and confusion.
Toronto occupiers – like New York City’s campers in Zuccotti Park in the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement – have not declared a leader of the demonstrators who have rained down on the Financial District at King and Bay Sts., and gathered in front of Toronto City Hall to condemn the social and economic reality brought on by the vast disparity between the super-rich and the poor.
But it’s a clichéd exercise that is not expected to bring any early change of mind in any government on planet earth. And that’s a very sad state of affair, because in the next 136 days and some hours (as of the publication of this post), the world’s population will reach its Seven Billion mark. More people mean more mouths to be fed, therefore, the wealth concentrated in the hands of a few needs to be spread.
However, I would never advocate a limit to a person’s riches. As long as he/she is not robbing the public purse or acquiring wealth by any other illegal means, you can pile your riches sky-high.
But the message of occupiers seems to be directed at all rich people, regardless of how they have acquired their wealth. Their slogan, “We are the 99%” was borrowed from the OWS campaign, but one protestor, Brigette DePage, explained that in Canada it means that the top “one per cent” controls 13.8 per cent of the wealth.
Even the venerable book of wisdom, the Holy Bible, speaks of the rich getting richer, without any condemnation. Check out this passage from the American King James Version: “For whoever has, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but whoever has not, from him shall be taken away even that he has.” (Matthew 13:12).
In the detail of their message, the Occupy Toronto activists are calling on Canada’s Conservative Party (CP) government to end “corporate greed,” “stop ignoring youth,” “end war, feed the poor” and to “Respect existence or expect resistance.”
The media have reported that there are several similar occupation movements, including Vancouver and Montreal, taking place in Canada.
The Toronto movement is an off-shoot of OWS, initiated by a Canadian group called Adbuster. It has been ongoing since September 17, 2011, when protesters took over the nearby private-owned Zuccotti Park, in the Wall Street financial district in Lower Manhattan.
The movement has been replicated in several other US cities and communities, and the OWS model of the encroaching socio-economic occupation is reportedly copied by more than 900 cities worldwide.
