“There is a conventional “narrative” that the Occupy movement is the product of social media. I hold the contrarian view that the Occupy movement actually results from the shortcomings of and dissatisfaction with digital culture. Occupy participants are proving that only by exiting a screen-centric digital cocoon back into the physical world can their discontent with political reality attain the critical mass necessary to achieve change. […]
I don’t want to diminish the role of digital media as an organizing tool. Blogging and tweeting are okay, but for protest it is ineffectual. It can be ignored. It can be switched off. And as satisfying as it is to vent, it is only a proxy for doing something in the physical world. At a certain point in political life — as in sexual life — it’s better not to be doing it alone in your room.”
