(Images: CHS)
A group of 15 #MicCheckWallSt participants formed a line and stood in silent protest in front of the oft-targeted Broadway Chase bank Saturday afternoon. Earlier in the day, the protestors walked Broadway, handing out flyers and garnering double takes from passersby who noticed the dollar bills covering their mouths. The money displayed messages like “DEFINE NECESSITY” and “YOU ARE WORTH MORE THAN $$.” We told you about the planned protest and provided some details about the Occupy Seattle offshoot here Friday. On Saturday, the group encountered mostly curiosity though two SPD cruisers did arrive to observe the situation during their vigil outside Chase. Meanwhile, the bank pulled down its automatic window shades to block the view of the protest from customers and staff inside. The #MicCheck line couldn’t help themselves as the shades came down — the muffled giggles were pretty much the only time the group broke its silence.
Showing your message about “money doesn’t talk” on a laptop produced by the company with the highest market cap in the entire world that uses factories in China where the workers are committing suicide by the day.
Ok then.
Jo, you’re the first person EVER to suggest the “irony” in Occupy protesters using Apple products! Brilliant.
Now that was some irony for ya.
But the Occupy movement seeks to build a world where people come before profit, and that includes the people laboring in Foxconn sweatshops.
Try again, jo jo.
In other words, etaoin, “We in the Occupy movement are holier than thou. Do as we say and not as we do by putting your money where our mouths are.”
Thanks for the feedback.
Are Chinese labor laws crappy? Of course. But too big to fail banks are a more personal topic for most Americans given that we personally have been the victims of their actions, and we have a relatively easy alternative to using them: credit unions and local banks.
We don’t need the too big to fail banks for our economy to work. A relatively small credit union is just as efficient as a huge bank, and unlike Chase and Bank of America they’re actually more willing to give out loans to small businesses in the communities they are a part of.
Although it’s true that our economic choices currently give our voices to those we do business with, one of the reasons why I go out to #michcheck events is because I don’t want this to be the case. You shouldn’t surrender your ability to contribute to the debate because you need a car to drive, a computer to work or some medicine to live.
We as citizens should not be the agents of our disempowerment. Large corporations should not be able to use the vast power they have to tilt policies and elections in their favor.
Changing the constitution so that money isn’t speech is a long term goal. Regulating banks is a more medium term goal. In the meantime we can encourage people to take steps they personally can do to take their money out of the hands of people that nearly wrecked the economy. Money that was used to influence lawmakers so that they weren’t held accountable for their actions and regulated again.
If you want to watch the stream I recorded you can find it in two parts at:
http://www.livestream.com/owsoccupyseattle/video?clipId=pla_
http://www.livestream.com/owsoccupyseattle/video?clipId=pla_
The last time I checked there are at least two branches of Chase bank on Broadway. It would be nice if you indicated which one you’re referring to.
“Are Chinese labor laws crappy? Of course. But too big to fail banks are a more personal topic for most Americans given that we personally have been the victims of their actions”
So I guess it should matter more to me because I might have to pay a $2 fee per month on my checking account rather than people actually putting their life to an end.
I want my two dollars!
The “oft-targeted” one, wee
Yes jo, we can imagine how much sleep you must lose anguishing over the human cost of your consumer electronics purchases. Ha!
Occupy is putting their laptops to good use fighting for a democratic society, one where the richest few no longer dictate government policy, rigging the system to protect and enlarge their wealth at the expense of the many.
As Lenin put it, “When it comes time to hang the capitalists, they will sell us the rope.” And the laptops we’ll be live streaming it on.
Saw these guys as I was driving down broadway and just had to roll down the window and yell “Enough already!” I felt a bit old and cranky doing so, but man, this is just so stale!! And the people who have to deal with their protests aren’t the Jamie Daimon’s and titans of Wall Streets – it’s the folks who probably make just enough to afford a studio on Cap Hill. They lose so much credibility with this childish garbage
How you know they didn’t buy the macbook used?
Amen. Talk about beating a dead horse…
Seriously kids, it’s time to pack up your toys and move on. Capitol Hill has really has heard your tired message enough.
“Occupy is putting their laptops to good use fighting for a democratic society…”
I think you misspelt “communistic” there.
Hey ERF, no need to worry about a resurgent Communism, what with global Capitalism being such a huge triumphal success and all. *cough*
I don’t understand why they’re holding their protests here instead of downtown where the big chain-stores are located.
Seriously, tco, umvue, and the other Capitol Hillbillies, it’s time to put a sock in it. Nobody cares what you think.
Yes, a brilliant idea! We’ll tape socks to our faces! Hmmm…now what shall we write on them?
ows super genius, on the sock over your mouth you should write, “This is for _your_ protection, not mine.”
Your statement is misleading and unfortunately become common as well as unquestioned. The communist and socialist have been working to undermine our country and society from within for about a hundred years now. It’s like a little kid that brakes a gift they didn’t want and then turns around and says, “See! I told you it didn’t work!”
Oh, I see, it was the work of “the” communist and socialist — not endemic Wall Street fraud — that brought down the investment banking industry, which required a multi-trillion dollar bailout from the American taxpayer. Riiiiiiight.
On the contrary: If it weren’t for the $1,148,300,000 in Treasury bond purchases from the socialists running the People’s Republic of China, that shining star of Capitalism, America, would be in even deeper shit than it already is.
Btw, a little kid brakes a bike and breaks an unwanted gift.
How about in DC instead of Downtown Seattle then?
I think the point is to be in different neighborhoods, and be able to get the word out to different groups of people. Makes sense to me!
God, yeah, trying to make people think twice about their consumerism. How booooring. I wish they would leave me alone so I could just spend my money and not have to think about anything and could just be with Urban Outfitters in peace.
Uhhh, and I don’t know the last time you looked for apartments on Cap Hill, but uhhh, the demographic of folks who live here is changing. There are LOTS of people with LOTS of disposable income on the hill, and I think that makes it a reasonable neighborhood for this sort of action.
I am so sick of this stale, dismissive line of criticism. Guess what? We live in a society run by corporations. No one is off the grid! Protesters are not claiming to be so! If they weren’t using a Mac, they would just be using another device that was produced in horrible conditions. That is PART of what is being protested! The fact that everything we buy, no matter how conscientious we try to be, is produced by a corporation with TERRIBLE labor practices. This is not the way the world should work. A lot of protesters aren’t even necessarily against corporations, they would just like to see them run fairly and humanely. No irony here!
By and far most of MicCheckWallSt’s actions have been downtown. It’s nice to come up to the hill once in a while. I live here, this is my neighborhood.
I’m pretty sure this was the same group!!