Sound Off: Occupy Wall Street? Occupy All Streets

I forget sometimes that I am part of the wealthy minority.

For whatever reason, the world has always been unbalanced. I sit at my ridiculously overpriced computer in my warm clothes and my warm, comfortable house and I check the time on my ridiculously overpriced iPod. These things are ridiculous - almost tactless - because not so far away, the rest of the world (roughly 80 per cent) lives on less than $10 a day. Nearly a billion people entered the 21th century unable to read or write, there are 2.2 billion children in this world, and one billion of those children are in poverty. 22,000 children "die quietly" due to that poverty. (*UNICEF)

I forget sometimes that I am part of the wealthy minority. I feel indescribably, incredibly lucky (what else would you call it?) but I forget. The voices of the 80 per cent are too faint, too numerous and ordinary for me to be shocked into action.

But I was shocked into action after seeing Occupy Wall Street.

Occupy Wall Street is an ongoing movement by the "99 per cent" - the average middle class - asking for equality from the "one per cent" that seem to have it all. Sound familiar? Think of the French Revolution; think of the American Revolution.

In an Adbusters ad for Occupy Wall Street, it is asked to bring tents. And that is what the people have done. Tents, blankets, friends. People hold up cardboard signs to protest against the inequality of having only few things while somebody else has too much. The people are angry.

Some people (like my father) are working too much for too little, towards nothing - no pension, no promise of a retirement, nothing. Those same people are supporting families, while the "one per cent" are ridiculously wealthy and dodge fees people with less money than them have to pay.

Occupy Wall Street is spreading! There is inequality almost everywhere. But it is silent where the idea of Occupy Wall Street is needed most.

As part of the 99 per cent asking for equality, and the 80 per cent that has the power to make the change happen, we have the duty to shift the giant teeter-totter of the world into balance. In the end, there is no they, no far away faceless beings suffering quietly and dying quickly, but us, united because we are human, and because it is in our nature to care.

So what do we do? Do we sell our belongings to donate everything we have? Do we take up arms to make a change? Not necessarily. There are things we can do that are in our power to do.

We could start thinking about this need of equality in the world, and we could tell others about it. We could donate a little at a time, from what we can. We could aspire to become someone powerful to make a big change happen.

For now though, I wrote this. This is my tent on the sidewalk, my crudely painted sign.