Jay-Z is set to release a line of Occupy Wall Street t-shirts for his Rocawear brand and is not planning on sharing any of the money he makes. Although there have been people who have been making and selling t-shirts featuring the protest, this marks the first time they are going to go national and Jay-Z says that he supports the movement, but hey, he still needs to make a buck.
Boo!
ReplyDeleteActually, I'm thinking that the OWS movement might have gone as far as it can with what it's doing. Is it going to go out with a whimper or a bang? I think they ought to do something to go out with a bang. Too many people I know are just tired of hearing about it and our local Occupy crowd is wilting.
WHAT AN ASSHOLE!!!!!!!!!!!! Between him and Beyonce, the could purchase the entire US if they wanted too. Makes me sick. If he goes thru with this I pray that his baby is born with 2 heads.
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ReplyDeleteOf course Jigga would exploit this event. Just the way Kanye did (while wearing a $23,000 Rolex) and those teachers' unions that collect a half-billion a year for doing nothing. And, of course, nothing changes because the protestors haven't figured out how to play the game.
ReplyDeleteProof once again that these suburban white kids in the top 19 percent protesting against the one percent should get on the Jay-Z plan instead of all that protesting. They could also do something like read to kids, become teachers, start community organizations, or make some money and use it to help people. Or do what Wendy Kopp did and start Teach For America. Protesting means nothing if you don't then go and do something to change the world.
Ah, the irony...
ReplyDeleteOf course he will still get cool points for the "support" *barf*
ReplyDeleteWell said Sevenmack. very well said.
Are the protesters stupid enough to buy that shit, I wonder?
ReplyDeleteFrom Jay-Z? you betcha!
ReplyDeleteFrom some random person making tee shirts and selling them? No. That nearly caused a riot.
Anyone who buys one of his shirts is a complete moron and deserves to be openly laughed at and socially shunned.
ReplyDeleteAmen Shiny! Boycott the shirts. Someone at the OWS (oh the irony)should make one of those shirts and sell them, set up a fund and then...what? God, good thing I'm not in charge.
ReplyDeleteOWS needs to pick some real targets and stick to them.
ReplyDeleteA good starting point would be Towers Watson, which is an executive compensation firm that produces comparative salary reports that boards use to justify their massive overpayments to CEOs. There's just no reason anybody needs $80 million a year. You sleep in one bed per night and eat 3 meals each day, for crying out loud.
Or Wal-mart, so consumers could start to face the fact that their own demands for low-low-low prices and constant opening times is rough on employees, the economy and the environment.
Or the offices of the AARP, the power of which is preserving services for the elderly at the cost of schools and children's health and nutrition programs.
There are lots of good targets, but you can only sit in a park for so long.
Good comment Sevenmack....
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ReplyDeleteCan't stand him of his wife.
ReplyDeleteor....I meant or...
ReplyDeleteWell, Nutty Flavor, I have no problem with companies paying high salaries to CEOs. Even when a CEO gets $80 million, he's usually working for a billion-dollar firm, so he's getting far less than the investors (who usually come in long after the seed money for the biz was provided). And if he gets fired, he's now got severance. No unemployment payments and he's not on the dole.
ReplyDeleteAs for the OWS crowd: The real issue is that they're not so much mad about Wall Street getting bailouts, but that they aren't getting bailouts. By the way, these are mostly kids from the top 20 percent of income earners, who collect plenty of welfare in the form of government-run universities and government-backed student loans that carry lower interest rates than that for a mortgage or a private loan. These kids have enough talent and contacts that they can do the Jay-Z plan times two, either as private-sector entrepreneurs or as social entrepreneurs addressing social needs. But they would rather camp out in the park as if they are doing something.
The folks who are really suffering -- the high school dropouts poorly served by schools, out-of-work high school grads who worked in old-school labor jobs and now have to work at WalMart -- are too busy struggling to worry about the sparring match between billion-dollar companies and kids from privilege. And Jay-Z is smart enough to make some bucks off of all of them.
I'd love to hate Jay-Z -- and I definitely think he's behaved in a repugnant manner (think his slap down of women). But on this, all I can say is that he knows the score and is acting accordingly. The OWS crowd needs to smarten up and actually do something instead of rolling in the patchouli doing nothing.
If Jay didn't do it, someone else would have. I'm not saying if it's right or wrong. But he's breaking no laws and is taking his usual businessman approach.
ReplyDeleteHonestly, I would like to take a year to intern for Jay. Love him, hate him, your choice. But the man is smart.
Those t-shirts are probably made in China. :(
ReplyDeleteAs a child of the take-it-to-the-streets '60s, let me say that you can demonstrate and protest all you want to, but if you want to make political changes in this country, the place to do it is not on a street corner, it's at the ballot box.
ReplyDeleteI can't stand him and his wife.
ReplyDeleteSaul Alinsky's Rule for Radicals #7: "A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag."
ReplyDeleteAnd #11: "The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative."
Hahahaha. I like it. Personally, I think the Occupy people are a bunch of idiots.
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ReplyDeleteLet me quantify that, the ones in Toronto are idiots.
ReplyDelete(had to edit because calling someone an idiot and then making a grammatical error doesn't look so hot.)
I don't know about the ones in Toronto, but I don't think they are idiots. Not compared to a lot of other loony political groups in this country.
ReplyDeleteYou guys rock. I love the comments here. I hate JayZ and Beyonce. And I have read that he has made a huge fortune in the stock market. HOW he could do this is just SICK. I HATE RICH PEOPLE.
ReplyDeleteI'll tell you a few tidbits about the ones in Toronto. Last night one of them threw hot soup in the face of another, scalding him. The week before that someone overdosed. And when they're on the news they look like a bunch of fools because they don't really know anything about the issues or how to solve them, they just think the Occupy thing is cool.
ReplyDeleteYeah. That'll get your point across.
Rather ironic.
ReplyDeleteI kind of like the message of the shirt. Jay-Z's job as a pop artist is kind of to capture the zeitgeist...and by the looks of the OWS crowds, he'll be spreading the message to some who aren't necessarily paying attention or participating on the streets. I think it adds something... Sue me!
ReplyDeleteI am torn over OWS - I definitely support the essence of it all and think public protest like this is valuable to put help people in positions of power grow some balls, but of course, the kids out there living it are going to be the typical lot...young, kind of clueless and unencumbered by responsibilities of family and productivity which makes them an easy target for derision. But those are the only people who can really do what they are doing.
I do get annoyed because I work in the nonprofit field and do a lot of volunteer civic work, so I feel like people who bust their asses daily trying to make progress on the problems OWSers whine about don't get much credit, and I also know the OWS kids in my town mostly aren't the ones putting their money where their mouths are when there are ample opportunities to do so in less "glamorous" ways. So I understand why they are valuable, but I'd rather do what I'm doing than what they are...
Also, someone always profits over bad policy, tragedy, etcetera...it's something that happens, I'm sure Jay-Z isn't the only one. People who do this in grossly abusive ways, well, that's on their conscience. I know someone who has been producing an OWS documentary since the very early days, and I am pretty sure he intends to make a profit.
We have to take the good with the bad in a free market, and discourage bad by doing what you can to prevent it from being wildly profitable...I think people forget that we're not powerless in the equation, as consumers.
Long way of saying that, I like the shirt, but I won't be buying it.
All he & Beyawnce do is go for profit. I don't recall ever seeing them do any kind of charity work or helping anyone but themselves. Barf. I hope their kid comes out looking like Wendy Williams.
ReplyDeleteI'm gonna go out on a limb and say that Jay-Z does not really identify himself with the OWS protesters.
ReplyDeleteWell, obviously this is an unpopular opinion here, but I think the OWS movement is wonderful. I am certainly not some young, upper-class student. I am a middle-aged woman who didn't have the money or means to attend college. I have worked since I was 16, except for the past 3 years of unemployment. I have watched job after job being shut down. And I am too old to just have to keep "starting over". I think all they are doing is trying to express a common need for some security. It's the same thing we all want.
ReplyDeleteI know that people say "contact your representative or congressman" about issues, and I have. But my representatives and congressmen don't listen. They have their own agendas, and will listen to no other sides. Vote them out? Sure. I try. But I live in a very party-oriented state, and the majority will vote according to party, rather than issues.
We have been taught for years that you can't fight the government, and that you have to take what you can get. But the government is supposed to be OURS. It's supposed to represent US. The OWS movement is more about showing that the people are TIRED of taking what they can get. They have realized that these people who are SUPPOSED to represent us DON'T. They are demanding to be heard. And I, for one, support them completely.
As for Jay-Z and Beyonce? They can both suck it, as far as I'm concerned. I have zero respect for either of them.
@ThinkABoutIt Love your comment! We can argue all we want that the OWS people are approaching the issue in the wrong way. But at least they are doing something and people are noticing it. And it so true with gerrymandering one's political voice is many time mute.
ReplyDeleteas for jay z. I say take his shirt design and do it yourself and stick it to THE MAN (cause believe you me he may never be the man(issues of race being what they still are in society) but he sure is trying and very close proximity. I don't blame him for trying, but I'm not going to support it.)
Well said @ThinkAboutIt!
ReplyDeleteThanks for posting @ThinkAboutIt!
ReplyDeleteyeah, someone else would have probably come up with this idea before Jay-Z,
ReplyDeletebut he is now a bigger ASSHOLE than I thought of him before.
He is very greedy. When is it enough? Kind of ironic..all those people protesting the disgusting greed prevailing the world and then this ugly douche comes along to prove the point.
yuck yuck yuck. Him and Beyonce should move away..and never come back
Sue Ellen - a city worker was charged with going up a tree to remove a bicycle which was a hazard to people underneath at the Victoria Occupy site. The bike belonged to an "occupier" who had set up a hammock in the tree. As the worker climbed up to get the bike, the occupier dumped a two litre bottle of urine onto his head. At that moment, I lost all fucking respect for these "occupiers". Now anyone doing their job is the enemy?? Fuck off.
ReplyDeleteSomeone I met through volunteering w/ animal rescues (who is also a cop) recently got put on administrative leave from her job for posting some not so positive things about the protesters here on her Facebook page. She was mostly referring to how disgusting they were for pooping in the streets & how it was a shame they were having to spend so much time monitoring the protesters. And while she probably shouldn't have voiced her frustrations on Facebook, I do feel semi-bad she's having to go through all this right now. She's really not a terrible person.
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