Night 8 - Occupy Montreal

Occupy Montreal Night 8

Well I have to say I was really impressed with Occupy Montreal when I went by tonight. I didn't spend very much time there, but the little bit I saw was vastly improved, I really am very impressed. First off, it's much tidier from an outside view, they have more recycling, & garbage bins with better distribution on site. Everything is better organized on all accounts. The candles I was really worried about I didn't see. On my way past, I saw a group of adults who appeared to be in their thirties and forties who clearly had jobs (they had just finished parking a car that looked like it couldn't be more then a few years old), mentioning that they wanted to see what could be done to get heat & showers down there.

The energy is also better at night, but I don't know if that is a result of today's events (they had alot of organized events such as educational films being shown, circus performance and other entertainments). There are more tents then there were before, in fact, I think they have reached capacity for the space they are using. My fiancee did some research and he says there is 185 tents right now, not sure what the total occupation population is. People seemed to be very harmonious with each other, alot of positivity down there right now.

I haven't been back to the GA (general assembly), so I cannot comment on how the general assembly is progressing but I do plan to go back out. Tomorrow they are holding a fundraiser so I was thinking to go down and check out what they are doing. According to the official blog, they now have 6 lawyers who have joined in and are showing support.

I have spent the past two days with a different side of the Occupy movement by attending the Council of Canadians conference which gets into the educational details of the issues the movement is addressing (except that the Council of Canadians is a very old organization who has been working on these issues for decades). The Council of Canadians is in full support of the Occupy movement in terms of Canadian context and through their local support of each occupation location, they are providing a connection. In Vancouver they are providing both infrastructure and other forms of support such as tools. It was interesting at the dinner tonight hearing the president mention that they never knew last year that this year they would need to budget for the revolution.

You know, if Occupy Montreal banded with the other Occupy's, to truly form "Occupy Canada" alot of good would come from that. But what if they were to consider becoming a political party, and if they were to seriously consider something like that, I believe they hold the potential of being able to shake up Canadian politics in a way that even the NDP have not yet achieved. Think about it. These are very intelligent minds coming together, with the right support, they could start working on reworking & fixing the system from within. The NDP started off as a grassroots movement, look where they are now! Alot of NDP values are shared by Occupy Montrealers, so if there were two like minded political parties in government, alot of positive change could come from that. Of course I am sure this idea would not fly with the Occupy Montrealers, I don't think they want to become politicians, but I can't speak for them in any context.