Here’s a excerpt from an interesting analysis looking at the reasons for the failure of Occupy Richmond:
Ultimately Occupy Richmond failed because it was unable to act as quickly as its most paranoid and delusional hangers-on were able to act. What Occupy Richmond needed was to obtain permission to continue to camp in Kanawha Plaza, in spite of a city ordinance that forbade camping in Richmond City parks. Occupy Richmond had a decent chance of obtaining such permission if it had only phrased its request properly and put it to Richmond City Council in a respectful way. But Occupy Richmond seemed unable to reach a decision to act, unable to appoint a spokesperson until it was too late.
Before Occupy Richmond could act, others acted for them. One delusional individual took it upon himself to contact the Richmond Police, including senior police officers, and began to issue “orders” to the police, declaring himself their superior by virtue of his citizenship and generally holding himself out to the police as the group’s spokesperson. On Monday, October 24, 2011, Richmond City Council met and one of the issues they discussed was what the city should do about the Occupy Richmond encampment. I watched that meeting on local access television and I was surprised to see a second person who appeared to be mentally ill denouncing city council on behalf of Occupy Richmond. No other genuine representative of Occupy Richmond attended the meeting, so City Council drew its conclusions about the group largely based on the words and actions of a single individual who was not authorized to speak on their behalf.
Read the whole analysis at The Richmonder.
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