Inspect our roots with us! – Join the talk about CORE VALUES

September 13, 2013
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We are approaching an exciting theme in our General Assemblies, one that is central for our survival and solidarity as a local movement. That is the idea of CORE VALUES – creating a solid set of ideals and principles that will guide and unite us.

Born from the activities in our Summer Capacity-Building Conference last August, we see Core Values to be essential in our survival, power and vision as a social force. (Even the forces ripping our earth and society apart find rest in their core values of greed and corruption!) In impact and sustainability, time and history proved more favorable to the side of Occupy’s bringing consensus on grounded core values and Mission Statements than those who did not bring consensus on any principles – across region and process. As them and many of our satellite groups have shown, it’s time to inspect our roots.

On Thursday, September 12, the body of General Assembly began piecing together our core values during intense dialogue. In it, we talked about:

 

  • RELATIONSHIPS - seeing all organizers and contributors first as the individual; fostering and honoring relationships of trust and mutual aid
  • EMPOWERMENT - speaking power to the truth of the 99%
  • NON-VIOLENCE - resisting forms of violence and oppression within ourselves and our community
  • SYSTEMIC CHANGE - addressing the source of the problem as opposed to the symptoms
  • DEMOCRACY – building a consensual, collaborative body of decision-makers and doers
  • EVOLUTION - learning through our mistakes and exerting effort to fix them
  • CRITICAL ANALYSIS - being self-aware to find problems when they’re small
  • RESPECT - using our core values to bring civility and common ground to all who will Occupy, regardless of ideology or perspective

 

And this is only the beginning! Until the time for democracy is right, we will continue to reach out to our broader community, find more core values and critically analyze them both during our Assembly times – Thursdays, 7 pm. @ OPDX Office – and out in cyberspace. As we approach our 2nd Year Anniversary on October 6, join in the assessment and move your opinions forward.

This entry was posted on September 13, 2013 at 7:54 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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