Quaker presence at financial protests

Quakers participate in the London protests

Quakers held a Meeting for Worship near the London Stock Exchange on Saturday as nonviolent protests began at financial centres around the world. The police refused to allow demonstrators to approach the exchange, confining thousands of them outside St Paul’s Cathedral.  Several other Friends turned up on Sunday or later in the week to join in the ongoing protests. Hundreds of people are now camped in the area. The demonstrators are protesting with the slogan ‘We are the ninety-nine percent’, a reference to the power and wealth of the richest one percent of the population.

Larissa Hanford, who attends Westminster Meeting, said the protests were about the struggle for ‘global democracy that works for everyone.’ She said there was ‘a strong pacifist strain throughout’ as people participated with an ‘equal voice.’ She compared this with the current political system, which ‘doesn’t really give people the chance to get their voice heard.’

Ben Jarman, also of Westminster Meeting, said he witnessed aggressive police behaviour on Saturday night as campaigners were forcibly removed from the cathedral steps. He said the atmosphere improved on Sunday, after Giles Fraser, canon chancellor of the cathedral, asked the police to leave and invited protestors into services.

‘There is a very strong emphasis on consensus decision making,’ said Ben. One police officer told him that he wished every demonstration he had policed had been this well-organised.

Hundreds of people are now camped outside the cathedral, while similar protests continue globally. Alia Gee, a Friend living in New York, told the Friend that she has been taking food and supplies to protestors camped in the Wall Street area since the day the occupation began. Anna Sharman of Wandsworth Meeting has begun to do the same in London.

Larissa rejected the allegation that the protestors do not share common aims and will be ignored. She pointed out that the campaigners had agreed on nine key points by Sunday, despite the large numbers and differences of opinion. ‘Direct action is a really powerful way for people to get their voice heard,’ she said, ‘Don’t underestimate it.’

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Comments

The Society of Friends has a strong history of fighting for civil rights and justice for all. Now is a good time for us to stand together with this movement, as we did did at our beginnings in the Civil War. Have we become too comfortably middle class and entrenched to assert collectively our support for such an admirable movement?

By stellaninini on 23rd October 2011 - 10:50

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Sorry, just wanted to clarify—I’ve been bringing food to the OWS protestors since the first *week*... They started Occupying Zuccotti/Liberty Park on Saturday September 17th, and I started bringing supplies on Wednesday, September 21st. Cheers! alia http://alia-gee.blogspot.com/

By alia on 3rd November 2011 - 13:26

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