Occupy Wall Street claims no hierarchy and is, obviously, completely non-profit. Keeping this in mind, the cause relies heavily on social networking sites such as Twitter and Facebook to promote awareness of the cause and gain support around the globe. Since the commencement of Occupy Wall Street, the idea has spread to many other cities around the world such as Occupy Tokyo and Occupy Rome. This is all thanks to the speed of communication of the internet.
Alice Rawsthorn, author of “Elements of Style as Occupy Movement Evolves,” praises the movement for exhibiting smart marketing tactics by naming the movement “Occupy…” not only because it is easily translatable, but also because it is simple and customizable and for this reason, has become almost an icon. She also explains how the visual symbolism of Occupy Wall Street differs from other political and economic movements in that it incorporates historical and modern motifs. The most common icon is the raised, black fist along with #OccupyWallStreet. The clenched fist is reminiscent of black power movements in Assyria and the Russian Revolution while the hashtag promotes the cause through Twitter.
Ironically, as Occupy Wall Street is trying to fight the overbearing influence of corporations and lobbyists, they are using the same tactics as their business rivals to gain support. The occupiers want to stop the chokehold that large businesses have over the economy and politics, but I believe that a great part of that chokehold is due to the power of media advertising and marketing. Sadly, money does make the world go ’round and this is the perfect example that capitalism is so deeply ingrained into our minds. Big corporations and Occupy Wall Street are both acknowledging the power of advertising in our capitalist society and maybe this is a sign that we won’t be able to shake our capitalist ways. Maybe our country isn’t ready for revolution.
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I think the Occupy Wall Street movement proves exactly how powerful a tool Twitter can be. You can follow the movement step-by-step simply by tracking the #OWS tag! You don’t NEED to watch the news every morning or every evening (though, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend stopping altogether (unless you watch Fox News, in which case, I want you to stop right now!)). All you need to do is sign into your Twitter account and scroll through your timeline for a few minutes and BAM! You know everything you need to know, often from the primary source (the OWS protestors themselves) and with less bias than would probably be apparent if you did choose to watch the news instead (because you can get your information from multiple varied sources at once, and therefore get both sides of the argument). The movement also shows that–as you mentioned–money does indeed make the world go ’round, and this makes the “Does money ruin art?” debate an important one because the world includes the art world… The jury is still out on a definite answer to the debate, though.