Accusations of financial malfeasance–including that money donated to Occupy Wall Street is being given to people with the suggestion that they “buy drugs with it if they want–are just the latest sign of deep internal problems within the #Occupy movement, according to internal emails and online messages.
One such message comes from Jacki Di Salvo, PhD, an organizer for Occupy who is also a teacher at Baruch College and CUNY. Di Salvo seems to be locked in a struggle with 18-year-old Nan Terrie, who has a group called Strong Women Rule. In an email from New Year’s Eve, Ms. Di Salvo refers to Ms. Terrie as “the disrupter” for suggesting that the finances of Occupy be audited.
Ms. Terrie has actually been mentioned on Big Government before. She was one of the people calling for a safe house at Zuccotti Park after all the crime that was occurring at Occupy Wall Street. Terrie also was a victim of theft in the Occupy movement, something she also spoke out about publicly. Exposing what’s really going on at Occupy Wall Street in regards to sexual assaults and violence doesn’t seemed to have endeared her to Ms. Di Salvo, as it contradicts the picture painted by the mainstream media and Occupy boosters like Nancy Pelosi and President Barack Obama.
Here’s the email from Ms. Di Salvo:
Nan, the disrupter, tried to get a proposal passed tonight for auditing Accounting (Finances). She wanted the Audit to be done by her dubious group Strong Women Rule, which only has 4 members & which she uses to be a spoke at SpokesCouncil. This is very suspect. A Times reporter recently was told I knew something about OWS finances and wanted to talk to me. I declined because I am afraid the press is fishing around for something for which they can criticize OWS. My sense is That Accounting has been hard working, transparent and characterized by integrity. The questions I raised about Finances was about GA approval of so many budget requests that we could soon go broke, although I notice that in recent days people at the GA have become much more cautious and prudent.
There are reports that Ms. Terrie was ejected from a “SpokesCouncil” meeting and that Occupy organizers were attempting to find a private location, so as to exclude her and her disruptive questions. The next SpokesCouncil meeting was assigned a ‘To Be Determined’ location, as this post went to press.
There is clearly some dissent in the ranks of Occupy on management issues. Someone using the name They Use Fake Names posted this last night:
It doesn’t take a family of ten working 60 hours a week to provide for their family.
It doesn’t take 100 people working themselves to death to provide for a community.
We’re producing nothing. We get nothing. We’re getting a shitty quality of life for more work.
These complaints of a “shitty quality of life for more work” shouldn’t come as a shock to anyone who’s studied the history of collectivist movements. Last week the same They Use Fake Names account posted the following:
This is what’s really going on:
The people with access to the office get the $100 daily allotment of money. They use it on whatever they want. I heard one member of finance state, “Buy drugs if you want, just make a receipt for something…”
The OWS COMHUB Group recently ratified the NYCGA so that many groups will be pushed out. In this way the pool of money will have less hands to go for. And the people in the office with direct access to the finance working group will have money longer. Meanwhile, they encourage you to go out and get arrested and stand up for the cause and raise donations! Any and all donations must be taken by the Finance Working Group because your autonomous beautiful self is too stupid to handle the money! The finance group should handle it for you We’re all brother’s and sister’s in one occupation though, so don’t worry! We will take care of you!
Ya, right! After the raid, the finance working group completely disappeared. And time and again they are no where to be found when shit hits the fan and people need resources. However, large sums of money have routinely gone missing! And there is no effort made to be transparent or show who the people controlling the money really are…
Reports of people getting $100 a day, for any purpose, being told to fake receipts; complaints about “shitty quality of life for more work”; and a vanishing finance committee–these don’t appear to be a concern for some Occupiers like Ms. Di Salvo, who apparently ducks interviews if she thinks the press may possibly report something negative.
She has “a sense” that everything is fine, though, so the people who gave money to #Occupy should be relieved.
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