The #occupywallstreet movement gathers force with an inspiring campaign that encourages people to upload a photo of themselves holding a text message expressing their financial predicament.
Each face is a person. Each person is a story. Most of the stories make you feel thankful your situation isn’t as bad. It’s amazing how many people turn to prostitution to pay the mortgage. Or work 16 hours a day.
Why it’s great: It’s an artistic game. And it’s a social game. There are rules. “Take a picture of yourself holding a sign that describes your situation in one sentence – for example, “I am a student with $25,000 in debt.” Below that, write “I am the 99 percent.”
People get to represent themselves. They tell their own stories. Most ignore the instructions to write a sentence. But when you read the stories, it’s often obvious that people’s situations can’t be reduced to a sentence.
Remarkably, people’s personal financial problems are being expressed as political problems. As the gallery grows, it becomes increasingly political, by mass corroberation. Our representational democracies normally run on the premise that it’s impossible to draw links between personal welfare and politics. This helps to change that.
We are the 99%” gallery. I look forward to watching it grow.
UPDATE:
Have a look at this fascinating statistical and political analysis of the We are the 99% tumblr project.
Parsing the Data and Ideology of the We Are 99% Tumblr
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