Alex Freid is a Junior Political Science and Philosophy Double Major. He grew up locally, in Lee, NH, and attended Oyster River High School here in Durham. His involvement in politics began back in high school, and today he is a political activist, involved in a number of groups on campus. Most recently, he has been particularly involved in the current political movement called Occupy Wall Street. I caught up with him to learn more about his involvement, what he hopes to accomplish, and why this cause is so important to him.
How’d you get involved in Occupy Wall Street?
I have a subscription for Adbusters magazine, which is the magazine that made the official call to occupy Wall Street on September 17th. I received the issue over the summer and my friend and I have both been following the movements progression ever since. He goes to NYU so he was already only a few blocks away so I decided I would go visit him on the weekend of the 17th and attend the protests to see what it was like. We never expected it to be this big or to last this long.
How do you feel about all that is going on?
I’m very excited by what is happening right now. I’ve been an activist for a few years now and this is unlike anything I have ever seen before. What started as a protest has really become a movement and it is very exhilarating to see so many people finally coming out like this. As this movement organically progresses forward, it will be really interesting to see what happens next. How large will it get, how much will it change?
Why is it important to you?
I think that many people have many different reasons for getting involved in the protests and all of them are valid and the overwhelming majority I agree with. Someone once described the overwhelming spectrum of political and economic issues that Americans have as a venn diagram with Liberty Plaza (location of OWS) being the center section, where everyone can come together and voice their united concerns that plague us all.
Personally, I am most interested in removing money from the political system. On all issues which people care about, labor laws, environmental regulations, war, military industrial complex, prison industrial complex, drug legalization or decriminalization, food regulations, pharmaceutical industry regulations, etc… money plays a role in the decisions that affect us all. Democracy is a sham when money has power in politics. How can you say that my vote counts when you have $10,000 dollars to donate against my vote? When corporations have millions to spend on politicians’ campaigns, private donations, and corporate lobbyists, the government is no longer representing the interests of the people, but rather the interests of the corporations.
What have you done involving this particularly?
Besides organizing carpools to Occupy Wall Street and Occupy NH, I haven’t done much on this in particular. I have been to Occupy Wall Street twice, the first weekend and the third weekend. This past weekend I attended Occupy New Hampshire.
However, as I mentioned above I have been an activist for many years now. I started in high school when I created a group of students at my school to focus on ways to make the cafeteria more environmentally friendly.
At UNH I became involved early on in the UNH Peace and Justice League (PJL) and the Student Environmental Action Coalition (SEAC). Last year I was the head organizer of the PJL, and through SEAC I created and organized the brand new UNH Trash 2 Treasure program which was an overwhelming success (www.facebook.com/unhtrash2treasure). Last year PJL won the Phoenix Award (most improved Student Organization over the course of a year) and the Improving Campus and Community Award. Also, for my work in these organizations I won the UNH’s Best award and the Donald F. Harley Scholarship Award.
What do you hope to accomplish?
I just hope to see more people at UNH and around the world becoming active in the political process and working towards taking it back so that it can truly represent them.