[News] Occupying Wall Street 1492 – 2011

[Anti-Imperialist News]

<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/10/10/occupying-wall-street-1492-2011/>Occupying 
Wall Street 1492 
<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/10/10/occupying-wall-street-1492-2011/>– 
2011

http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/

Posted on 
<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/10/10/occupying-wall-street-1492-2011/>October 
10, 2011

“These people are very unskilled in arms
 with 50 
men they could all be subjected and made to do all that one wished.”

“Gold is a treasure, and he who possesses it does 
all he wishes to in this world, and succeeds in helping souls into paradise.”

“I should be judged as a captain who went from 
Spain to the Indies to conquer a people numerous 
and warlike, whose manners and religion are very 
different from ours, who live in sierras and 
mountains, without fixed settlements, and where 
by divine will I have placed under the 
sovereignty of the King and Queen our Lords, an 
Other World, whereby Spain, which was reckoned 
poor, is become the richest of countries.” – Christopher Columbus

If there was one thing, that one had to choose to 
lay bare the inhumanity of this United States Of 
America one would not have to go any farther than 
the celebration of Columbus Day. The genocide 
that Columbus thinking set in place is 
unparalleled in the world. A genocide of 
wholesale slaughter that has never really ended. 
It’s never really ended because the pathology 
that Columbus used, continues today in 
Afghanistan and in Iraq and in Palestine and in 
Northern Ireland and especially in 
<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/07/04/what-is-the-4th-of-july-to-a-puerto-rican/>Puerto 
Rico
 the oldest colony in the western 
hemisphere, a colonization that began under 
Columbus and continues today under the US.

Racism is a relatively young concept within world 
history. It’s only a little bit over 500 years 
old. Before Columbus there was no racism. It was 
the writings of Columbus that set in motion the 
idea that some were superior and others were 
inferior and that the criteria for that 
superiority and inferiority was in the color of a 
man or a woman’s skin. The ideology of racism 
opened the door to mass murders, torture, rape, 
disease and enslavement. What makes racism even 
more particularly odious is that it’s rooted 
firmly in the soil of capitalism. Racism was and 
is, simply a means to an end. It was a means to 
impoverish the many to enrich a few and it all began with Columbus.

 From the enslavement and genocide of indigenous 
populations in North, Central and South America 
and in the Caribbean, to the trans-atlantic 
African slave trade to the subsequent 
colonization of Africa and parts of Asia. The 
common means in all this is racism and the common 
end is capitalism. It’s built a foundation and a 
template for 
<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/08/05/capitalism-the-theft-of-human-potential/>capitalism 
that is used to plunder and exploit to this day.

Some 500 years later people have taken to the 
streets to connect the dots. It began in the 
Spring in North Africa with Algeria, Tunisia, 
Egypt, Morocco, Western Sahara, Mauritania, and 
Sudan in the African Spring. It spread to the 
Middle East in Iraq, Syria, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, 
Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, and Yemen in the Arab 
Spring. In the summer it spread across Europe in 
the European Summer in Greece, Spain, Italy and 
England and now it’s finally reached the 
modern-day epicenter of capitalism with the 
occupation of Wall Street and the American Fall.

The uprisings that began in North Africa and 
spread to the Middle East were clear about the 
racist implications of capitalism and how it 
affected their lives with the way that European 
and American powers back dictatorial regimes in 
their respective countries in order to rape and 
plunder the natural wealth and resources of their 
countries. The difficulty connecting the dots 
between the 500 years of racism in service to 
capitalism however is not something that is as 
prevalent in the European Summer. The uprisings 
in Europe were an indication to the end results 
of capitalism’s austerity measures on the 
populace. However the link between capitalism and 
racism cannot be broken so easily. What may have 
begun as racism towards others in service to 
capitalism is now being applied to the European 
population. Although there was no connecting of 
the dots between racism and capitalism among 
native Europeans the effects of austerity 
measures against them and the resistance 
movements built up to them are the same as in the African and Arab Spring.

As an aside – the reference to the African Spring 
as being a part of the Arab Spring is something 
that is a blatant example of racism. The very 
negation that these uprisings began on the 
continent of Africa and then spread to the Middle 
East is something that is done by design to 
further remove the issue of racism in the global question of capitalism.

Now it’s America’s turn to turn up the heat on 
capitalism. 
<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/10/07/to-occupy-and-unoccupy/>The 
Occupation of Wall Street that was inspired by 
the African and Arab Spring in a tactical sense 
is a good start but the American Fall hasn’t 
connected the dots to capitalism’s handmaiden 
racism, in much the same way that the European 
Summer didn’t. This could be the fatal flaw in 
the Occupation of Wall Street. The financial 
collapse for white Americans and Europeans may 
have started in 2008 but for non-whites it 
started with Columbus in 1492 and has continued since then.

This issue of recognizing the 500 year history of 
racism within the machinations of capitalism has 
a huge impact on the Occupation of Wall Street. 
Wall Street is the epicenter of the financial 
world. If the dots between racism and capitalism 
can be connected here then they can be connected 
around the world. If something can be done about 
racism and capitalism here in America with the 
Occupation of Wall Street and the other 
Occupations that are spreading around the country 
that are quickly making up the American Fall then 
maybe, just maybe, a paradigm shift of the last 
500 years can be made. A paradigm shift that can 
re-shape the world and turn it back to right side up.

This federal holiday of Christopher Columbus is a 
perfect example of the disconnect between racism 
and capitalism in America. There are a lot of 
bright, young, intelligent, college educated 
people downtown on Wall Street struggling 
physically, spiritually and mentally to come up 
with solutions to the wholesale greed of 
capitalism. Yet the annual parade for Columbus 
that marches up 5th Avenue in New York City on 
this federal holiday seems to have gone off 
smoothly. You would be hard pressed to find a 
wider chasm between racism and capitalism than 
with the Occupation of Wall Street downtown and 
the Columbus Day Parade uptown. You would be hard 
pressed to find a greater disconnect between what 
Columbus began with the genocide of indigenous 
people’s in the Americas and the subsequent 
trans-atlantic African slave trade and what the 
banks did and continue to do to the global population.

If after the American Fall the United States of 
America is still celebrating Christopher Columbus 
who is the embodiment of the genesis of the 
Native American holocaust and the birth of the 
trans-atlantic African slave trade, and the 
harbinger of what the world is suffering under 
now, then it would be better if those who were 
Occupying Wall Street just went back home. It’s 
not too late to make the paradigm shift that will 
not just free the us from the corporate 
exploitation we ALL suffer under
 black, white, 
red yellow and brown. It’s not too late to 
shackle the means that capitalism uses divide us 
to make that exploitation possible. It’s not to 
late to understand that racism is a tool of capitalism


Occupying Wall Street 1492 – 1898 
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<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/10/10/occupying-wall-street-1492-2011/>nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/10/10/occ

<http://twitter.com/#%21/vgbnd/status/123514077678014464>October 
10, 2011 5:43 pm via 
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Some notes on the art. The first piece DISCOVERED 
is of course a Christopher Columbus credit card. 
The two sets of four numbers on the card are 
11/19/1493 which was the day that Columbus landed 
o the island of Boriken, now known as Puerto 
Rico. The second two sets of four numbers are the 
date 12/10/1898 is the day that the Spanish gave 
the possession of Puerto Rico to the United 
States after losing the 
<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/06/07/a-record-of-empire/>Spanish 
American War. The flag in the right hand bottom 
corner is the first flag of Puerto Rico known as 
the Lares flag. It was named after the mountain 
town of 
<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/08/09/the-birth-and-attempted-assassination-of-a-nation/>Lares 
where it was used in an uprising Spain against 
Spanish colonial rule that took place in 1868 and 
is known in Puerto Rico as 
<http://nothingtobegainedhere.wordpress.com/2011/09/22/the-rebel-history-kept-hidden-from-you/>El 
Grito de Lares, the Cry of Lares.

The second piece is Enjoy Colonialism Since 1493. 
It’s a design i did for 
<http://ricanstructed.spreadshirt.com/>RICANSTRUCTED 
a design company dedicated to the liberation of 
Puerto Rico from US colonialism. You can get that 
design on a T-shirt or Hoodie. It’s 1493 because 
that was the year that Columbus landed in Puerto Rico.

The third piece is an AMERICAN EXPROPRIATION 
credit card for Uncle Sam. The first two set of 
numbers on the card are 07/25/1898 which is the 
day that the US invaded Puerto Rico during the 
Spanish American War. The second two sets of 
numbers are 03/02/1917 (on the card, the year is 
first followed by the month and day – for 
aesthetic design reason) that was the day that 
Puerto Ricans were made US citizens by the US 
congress (without their consent) so that they 
could be drafted to fight in World War I. The 
1952 under the small Puerto Rican flag is the 
year that Puerto Rico became a Commonwealth of 
the US in order to have Puerto Rico avoid being 
listed on the United Nations list of colonized nations.




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