Rationale for a Movement
Audio here!
The “Occupy Wall Street” protests may indicate that after decades of moving ever further to the right, our nation might now be willing to take a more progressive approach to addressing societal problems.
But like its conservative counterpart, to be sustainable, a progressive approach needs to be supported by a socio-political narrative which resonates with the general public.
At its core, the conservative rationale for perpetuating and expanding our top down, authoritarian, and highly stratified system resulting in extreme winners and losers is based on traditional narratives which teach that people are naturally greedy, lazy and antisocial, and because of this, our “big carrot/big stick” system is the only system that can work.
Progressives know this argument is fallacious, but arguing against the default setting of traditional beliefs while managing to keep the audience listening will be a challenge.
So what is the philosophical thinking that informs the OWS organizers? Is there anything that resembles a cogent view that they commonly hold? If so, how can this be conveyed to the general public? And if not, how will this new movement resist the push back from mainstream conservatives who were successfully rolled back the mid 20th century social-economic gains, to a large extent by appealing to people’s underlying conservative mind set.
Join us as we speak with representatives from the Occupy Wall Street movement live in our studio.