The Whole World is Watching

While I found the earlier confrontations on Occupy action day a bit disturbing, the march across the Brooklyn Bridge last evening was perfect. Peacefully conducted and incredibly heartening. I'm sorry I can't find any captures of the aerial livestream done by the local Fox affiliate last night. The endless line of 99%ers with flickering votive candles was simply breathtaking. Sadly, if Fox archived it, I can't find it. Their permanent coverage seems to be all about the "stand offs" with the police earlier in the day.

But the iconic moment of the march is surely what is being widely being called the "bat signal."

Or we should say bat signals since there was a long set of projections. The back story on how they pulled the bat signals off attests to the growing strength of the movement. Every day they build solidarity as evidenced by the woman, a poor single mother of three, who let these strangers into her apartment and refused to take money she most probably needs because "this is for the people." [If you don't have time to watch the video, some stills of the projections are here.]

And by people, I don't mean just the "angry" and "ragged" protesters our US media carefully targets in their coverage. The foreign press manages to interview well dressed, working New Yorkers who braved the dark and the cold to march across the bridge. In fact, the crowd that swelled across Foley Square prior to the march appear to be largely populated by well dressed people who support the movement but aren't in the park every day because they have jobs they can't afford to lose.

May the "bat signal" be prophetic. "This is the beginning of the beginning."

[More coverage at Gothamist and photo credit.]