A Digital Occupation

At the time of our most in-depth interview, she was deeply involved with Occupy Wall Street.

We met for an interview at a café on the corner of Tompkins Square Park in the East Village.

As we talked about Occupy, she was quick to interrogate the benefits of Internet organizing as a sustainable forum for activism:

EB: What about – you talked about the Internet organizing of Occupy. I was talking to one of my advisors about, when I talk about this project and all of you participants being separate and acknowledging that you all know each other in different ways, he said that there was something disembodied about doing it all on the Internet. So, what do you think – if the organizing is happening online, does that mean that it loses something?

GS: It definitely loses a lot I think. You can’t create a revolution with – the Internet is just a start-up. It should not be where you are going full time. First off, anyone can put anything on the Internet. Sometimes, with what you hear, you can’t even be sure. So you

need to know people who are already connected to that thing and be like – yo, is this really what is going on? So it really comes back down to knowing someone, right? I definitely feel like it’s more important to have, if not a one-on-one, a collective. Post that there is going to be a meeting, this time, this place. Don’t start a meeting online, that makes no sense to me. I don’t know how one can get much done that way. It’s also, I also feel like it takes away humanity. It’s very dehumanizing. And if we are going to try to get of a place of true equality, we are going to need to get to a more human place, right? Which is one thing that I feel like is – I wish people recognized more and that they realized what the Internet is really doing to us and how maybe we shouldn’t be so dependent on it for everything. And the other thing is, right – you put anything on the Internet and the cops will fucking find out, right? You tell another person, in code, the cops are probably not going to find out. That’s the other thing I feel like people are probably not getting.

EB: Yeah. It’s really interesting to look at the laws that are coming down on the Internet and Internet freedom. And as a tool of organizing and social movements using digital tools, it’s kind of terrifying but it’s also – you don’t want to be intimidated enough not to use them. It’s a strange space to negotiate.

There is a sense of personal indignation in Green Strawberries as she argues against dehumanization. Although she doesn’t go into detail about the limits of organizing online, she questions its practice even as she acknowledges the Internet as a revolutionary space for communication and information freedom.

EB: So do you see pockets that are really successful – like, is a lot happening at Zucotti Park or – where is it happening?

GS: From my perspective, everything is happening on the Internet. Mostly. A lot of it is happening on the Internet. And then I feel like - because Occupy Wall Street is very interesting. I think it is definitely different from other forms of movements. Because of that, it’s not this one unified movement – right? It’s literally, like, here’s Occupy Wall Street, here’s one branch, there’s another, sometimes they intertwine but not really…

EB: Do you think that is a deficit to it? Or do you think that it is a good thing?

GS: I think that it’s not such a good thing. But I feel like that is just how it is going to be for a while. If Occupy Wall Street does go further…

EB: Right. Because I wonder a lot if it isn’t necessary that it branches in a million directions. Like if you wouldn’t just have to ignore issues, you know, in order to have it be unified in any way.

GS: Well, the issue with the stemming of branches and what not is, um – the fact that there are all these different views how to go about creating a revolution. Anyone you talk to in Occupy Wall Street – they’re always talking about “when we get to the revolution” this is what is going to happen. But the problem is that we all want to get to a revolution in a different way, and so we are all kind of being like – you know you don’t really agree with me, I’m going to go over here. So, is Occupy Wall Street ever going to go anywhere with that kind of mindset?

Green Strawberries offered some pointed critiques here, of the multiple views on revolution and the Left as caught up in a hyper-intellectual paralysis. It was interesting talking to her about the importance of multiple perspectives and the danger of information overload. The shared discourse space of the Internet created a platform for us to use our language to discuss the messages behind the media we consumed online. Throughout our conversation, Green

Strawberries explored subtle messages in blunt ways. She simultaneously criticized the white Occupiers for their “G20 Chic,” questioned the virtues of organizing online and romanticized the internationality so immediately accessible through online media.