Eric Cantona's call for bank protest sparks online campaign

[Ghost Dog]

Source: The Guardian

"We don't pick up weapons to kill people to start the revolution. The revolution is really easy to do these days. What's the system? The system is built on the power of the banks. So it must be destroyed through the banks.

"This means that the three million people with their placards on the streets, they go to the bank and they withdraw their money and the banks collapse. Three million, 10 million people, and the banks collapse and there is no real threat. A real revolution.

"We must go to the bank. In this case there would be a real revolution. It's not complicated; instead of going on the streets and driving kilometres by car you simply go to the bank in your country and withdraw your money, and if there are a lot of people withdrawing their money the system collapses. No weapons, no blood, or anything like that."

He concludes: "It's not complicated and in this case they will listen to us in a different way. Trade unions? Sometimes we should propose ideas to them."

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/20/eric-cantona-bank-protest-campaign

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Video here. Became a youtube hit. Now this message is spreading online, according to the Guardian, and beyond:

It's a waste of time demonstrating in the streets. Violence is not a good idea. Just remove your money from the banks and they will crash. Then we the people can attempt to make a new start.

[Blue_Tires]

1. he could be on to something...

[ClassWarrior]

2. Go Eric! He was awesome in "Looking for Eric."

NGU.

[defendandprotect]

3. Really want to comment on the wisdom of your final cautioning re violence .....

It's a waste of time demonstrating in the streets. Violence is not a good idea. Just remove your money from the banks and they will crash. Then we the people can attempt to make a new start.

More than anything we have to be cautious about this --

Violence only will work for the right wing and against the rest of us!!

The only way the right wing can rise is by violence, stolen elections -- lies.

Also think going to DC when no one is there is kind of a wash out these days - -

I haven't been in quite some time because of that -- though I feel guilty -- and

wonder if I should go next time.

What we are fighting is corporatism -- and capitalism -- a suicidal concept of exploitation

of nature and humans.

Money is the core of it -- We have many means -- like this one -- of fighting back if we

unite.


We responded to the FIRST calls to move $$ to the credit unions .....

presume that's still part of the plan -- haven't watched the video yet --




PS: Btw, Sen. Bernie Sanders relates that when the bail out money was given -- and FED

never did say what if any interest was charged but Sanders says probably 0% to .05% --

and that they turned about and used the money to buy Treasury securities at .035% and

.04% interest!! That's one of the reasons why no money was being lent out after the

bailouts!!

[dixiegrrrrl]

4. I wonder how many DU members still have accounts at the 4 Big Banks?

Last time I did a poll on the question ( August, maybe?)
there were quite a few.

conversely, there have been calls for each American family to buy ONE ounce of silver.
Apparently that should bankrupt JP Morgan, which is currently being sued for fraud in the silver market.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCM7rMIqxmk

[jwirr]

9. Not I!

[elzenmahn]

10. Credit Unions are the way to go...

I've done my banking with them for years...better rates, money stays local, no money going to a corporate overlord. No Brainer.

[JDPriestly]

12. We are in a credit union.

[jtuck004]

5. Not likely. After the banks borrowed perhaps $140 trillion on top of the $9 trillion

dollar housing market, and then the values of homes across the country declined a bit, (despite Bernanke's assuranace in 2005 that such a thing was very unlikely), and the government proceeded to bail them out with what eventually became $23 trillion in loans...

what makes ANYONE think the government would let them fail now? Especially over a bunch of puny savings accounts?

For cryin out loud, they even changed the rules promulgated by the FASB to allow the banks to keep homes on their books at the old inflated prices, instead of the current market price - that one change will keep them solvent for at least as long as it takes them to foreclose on the project 9 million more homeowners who are going to lose their homes.

That sounds like the solution of a person who has no clue about our current banking system, or how many friends they have in our government.

On top of that, since many people are raiding their retirement just to live, where is there enough money in the banks to make a difference?

The problem is debt owed by homeowners, pension funds, governments at all levels - and you can't just take that out of the bank.

[Matariki]

6. As if people have money banked away anymore.

Default on loans en mass - now that's another story.

[bergie321]

7. How does he know

There will be no blood? Don't forget that corporations run shadow armies like blackwater now.

[denbot]

8. We have not used a "bank" for several years

Credit unions are the way to go.

[bertman]

11. I was thinking "Great Idea!" then I remembered that I don't have any money

in the banks to withdraw.

:-(


Maybe some person with money in the bank will take my place in line.

[Blue State Bandit]

13. We need to organize a "Safe List" of banking service entities to entrust...

...to be effective in this endeavor. Our targets "DO NOT PROVIDE BANKING SERVICES" when they use more than their clients' interest service duties (AKA your common bank fees) to turn a profit. Banks should be non-profit, or moderate profit. These guys bet your house, or your job, or your life line from a concerned "government of The People". These are not bankers, they are Privateers, properly known as PIRATES!

For now, I would settle for a moderate profit organization. I like TD Bank. I like Credit Unions. Lets not forget about the Community Banks either.

I'm just sayin', what's the American worker, feeling lucky that he still has a job, going to do if this happens w/o a plan on the next payday to follow? Is he going to cancel his direct deposit in protest, and then try to cash his check?

This needs to get done.

[Johnny Harpo]

14. InTheory...Not A Bad Idea...In Practice However....

If a large number of bank customers suddenly showed up and strated withdrawing their funds, this probably would (as is has in the past) be considered a "run on the bank".

The answer to which would be the temporary closing of the bank until the customers regained their self control.

One has to consider how much this would really "hurt" the bank.

Of the 'Big 4' how much of their total assets are really made up of the monies in savings or checking acounts?

i would guess we would all be surprised at how little that really amounts to.

[sabrina 1]

19. If they didn't need our money, puny though it may be, they

wouldn't be begging us to use them and offering all kinds of incentives to attract customers. So, I will go with not giving them our puny amounts of money.

I like this idea but I think people should not do it all at once, or they will close the banks down.

I disagree that if everyone took their money out it would not affect them, it would.

[Ghost Dog]

20. Yes. I don't hear Cantona suggesting we should all do it on the same day.

That's someone else's 'campaign'.

Just, use your head, is what I say.

[billlll]

15. "DO NOTHING" "ITS FUTILE" hearing a lot of this on this thread

One hears that every move the LW makes

"Strikes are futile
Taxes are futile
Boycotts are futile
S. African White Rule will never end" etc etc etc on and on into the dark long night of New Feudalism.

Credit Unions are fantastic. Use them.

[Proletariatprincess]

16. Banks were invented to keep money safe from thieves.

Now the banks are the thieves....and have been so for a long long time.
Support your local Credit Union.

[billlll]

17. if we dont use banks for loans (use Credit Unions) or deposits

Or for their many "junk fees"

Then how can they exist?

Can't CUs also do mortgages?

PS Biggest donors to GOP - banks
Biggest to Dem - Labor Unions

[Ghost Dog]

18. "One of the main roles of a bank is to keep money safe."

"One of the main roles of a bank is to keep money safe. This appeal will give great pleasure to thieves, I would have thought." First reaction from Valérie Ohannesian, of the French Banking Federation, quoted by the Guardian at the end of the article.

As a comment there puts it:

"Hmmm.........I guess she has no sense of irony then!"