18 November 2011

After the Eviction

Annie Dorsen

On Tuesday morning, just a few hours into the post-eviction era of Occupy Wall Street, Nicholas Kristof of the New York Times tweeted: ‘Could #Bloomberg be a secret Occupy Wall Streeter? He seems to have just revived the movement.’ Official reaction in any form motivates and inspires the protesters. By driving them from Zuccotti Park, the mayor put OWS back into the news cycle, just when major media outlets seemed to be growing bored of the story. The eviction unintentionally pressed a giant ‘reset’ button, solving two intractable problems at once: the growing presence of homeless, mentally ill or unstable people in the park, and the lack of a graceful exit strategy in case the winter weather proved overwhelming. But the first test was clearly going to be the demonstrations on 17 November. If participation was low, it would be spun as proof that the protests were dying out, aimless and unmoored without the home base of Zuccotti Park. In the event, of course, the turnout was massive, the mood buoyant and determined, the atmosphere electric.