Occupy Dame Street begins

Today a group of protestors and a lot of supporters began to occupy a space outside the Central Bank of Ireland on Dame Street in Dublin city centre. I was there from 2pm, when there were 30-50 people gathering.


Tents have been set up and people are settling in for the long haul, or at least as long as they can without getting evicted. It is still going on now at 11pm. During the afternoon many people spoke spontaneously, using the 'human megaphone' technique to amplify their words - to do this a group of people repeated in chorus the words a speaker said, in small phrases, so that a large crowd could all hear it. The crowd quickly grew to over 100.


In their own words:
"#OccupyDameStreet is one of dozens of sister occupations in the current movement initiated by Occupy Wall Street (occupywallst.org). This is a peoples initiative unaffiliated to any political parties. Like OWS, this is a "leaderless resistance movement" with people of many nationalities, backgrounds, genders and political persuasions. We will utilise tactics of non-violence and civil disobedience, akin to scenes of peaceful resistance in Tahrir Square during the Egyptian Uprising - part of the wider Arab Spring.

Now is the time for the spirit of the revolt in Tahrir Square to spread to other major cities and financial districts around the world. It is the duty of those of us living in western capitalist states to take up the fight against the endlessly greedy bankers and political & financial elites who cause so many problems for not only people at home, but the entire world."

More photos of Occupy Dame Street


http://www.facebook.com/OccupyDameStreet
Indymedia article
Occupy Dame Street Press Release

More to come...