Report from an occupier who attended one of the "99% Spring" trainings

[JDPriestly]

26. I attended a 99% training this weekend.

Our group was about half men, half women, maybe a little more than half over 50.

Some of the older participants had a long history of political activism and marched, demonstrated and protested before the average member Occupier was born.

Some, like me, worked with political parties, in my case the Democratic Party, or organized in their churches, but were never really active in a movement like Occupy.

The Occupiers who were really active last Fall must understand that a lot of older people went through the economic downturn long before 2008. People in their 50s and 60s lost jobs (sometimes several times) due to downsizing, outsourcing, free trade and discrimination.

The 2008 recession was just a slightly bigger blow than the previous bouts with unemployment and having to go back to school or starting over for many older people.

A lot of older people have lost their homes or are about to be foreclosed. And usually the problem is health care costs.

We are not, for the most part, up to living in tents, sleeping on the ground or sitting outside on a cement ledge in the cold weather for a long GA meeting. Occupying a place for quite some time might be too challenging for some of us in our, 60s or 70s or even, as I think some were, in our 80s.

But we too are the 99%. We want to be part of the movement; we share the same goals as the Occupiers. We want to get the corporations out of government and end the Citizens United decision. We want to return industry and good jobs to the US. We want good, fairly priced, affordable healthcare. The 99% training is not just about older people, but it is really great for integrating us as well as young people who weren't in the Occupy groups into the movement.

At least one active Occupier participated in our training. He told us about a couple of events in our area that we can join in. I discovered that I already have established friendships with some who are very active in the Occupy movement. In addition I visited Occupy LA at LA City Hall last winter.

But the tent-thing? Sleeping on the ground for a number of nights? That's not realistic for me. When I talk about camping out under more comfortable circumstances than the Occupiers did, my children laugh at me. They just can't picture it.

And getting arrested? I doubt the police would really know quite what to do arresting a group of rather delicate women well over 60. It might be an interesting news item, but . . . . . complicated.

So I think that the 99% training could expand the Occupy Movement and bring in some diversity and support.

As for political hijacking? There was at least one strong Obama supporter in our group. Probably most of the group will vote for Obama. But we probably would not have been there if we were just 100% enamored of Obama's policies. Many of us expressed the opinion that the 99%/Occupy movement is a way to move Obama to a better agenda.

If all goes well, I will join in an Occupy event this week.

So I don't think that the 99% training is a threat to Occupiers. It think it will broaden the support base for the Occupy movement. And that is a good thing.