We Are the 99%

     From fall of 2011 until early 2012, it was difficult to get away from the Occupy Wall Street movement. From the streets of New York City to the smallest college towns, and on nearly every news source, America saw entitled youth wearing masks and protesting income disparity. Many compared this movement to communism, but if Karl Marx were alive today, it is doubtful he would have supported it.

     The concept of the 99% facing the 1% in a struggle for equality is not unfamiliar to those espousing the views of communism. Marx spends the entirety of the first section of The Communist Manifesto describing the history of class struggles dominating world economic history. In this way, the primary goals of Occupy Wall Street and the communist movement are similar.
     One of the stated goals of Occupy Wall Street was alleviation of student loan debts. Considering that a majority of these protesters were college-educated and in their mid-twenties, this desire is especially telling. They did not represent the working class, the proletariat envisioned by Marx. Over a third of protesters had incomes over $100,000. 76% held bachelor's degrees and 39% had graduate degrees. They much more closely resembled his definition of the bourgeoisie, the elite, educated, and relatively wealthy class. Those who truly desired work and a brighter future were busy at work or job-hunting while these twenty-somethings loitered in parks, demanding legislation to help them.
     Neither communism nor Occupy Wall Street are particularly popular movements. As of January 2012, over half of the country found the protesters to be a public nuisance. Thievery, vandalism, sexual assault, and a host of other serious crimes caused major disruptions, especially in the New York area.While many see communism as government intrusion into citizens' lives, it is based on a principle of cooperative effort. The children of the elite claiming to desire equality for all is both ironic and offensive to those actually in need. To see a perfectly able, educated person complaining about their misfortune while others suffer, without access to food and water, is completely counter to the ideals of communism.