Whether you embrace or reject the ongoing Occupy Wall Street movement swarming across the Western world right now, I think all ought to take a gander at this interesting op-ed piece I found on Forbes' website. The author, a clinical psychologist, argues that true democracy and capitalism lays at the heart of the OWS movement. The following is an excerpt in which he explains the difference of motives between OWS and the Tea Party:

From the start the Tea Party was about safety through exclusion, protecting oneself from outside influences—including a President seen as an un-American “other,” perhaps for racial reasons, perhaps other reasons as well. What the Tea Party rejected was anything perceived by them as coming from outside the center of America. It’s not us, it’s never us; it’s them. Bad things were by definition “un-American” or “against the Constitution.”

America, the true America uncontaminated by outside influence, is therefore exceptional by definition. And not just exceptional, but Exceptional. We’re good, they’re bad, regardless of who they are and what we do. No matter that you have no job, no healthcare; you’re an American and your suffering is “their” fault. This Tea Party message soothes through exclusion. What we now need to do is close ranks, reduce outside influence and go back to how wonderful it used to be when we were uncontaminated by outsiders. America, real America, the America envisioned by our Founding Fathers, is where goodness is found. Lock the doors and windows; never explain, never excuse; don’t tread on me. Of course, the price paid for such a pristine American vision of self is always feeling persecuted by neighbors against whom one must remain constantly vigilant.

The start of OWS is radically different. Everyone is included, everyone gets to have a say. Rather than policy they have process. The “we” of OWS is worldwide, a globalized, networked “we” full of good and bad existing simultaneously and everywhere. The messier the better; better to let in those you don’t want then miss out on including those you do. Of course, inclusion can be a big problem because people say and do lots of really stupid things. And all that stupidity is then felt as “us,” not “them.” But that’s the trade-off of inclusion; you have to take the good along with bad.

This path to a better America, a better world, includes living with some fear that getting your needs met might mean hurting someone else about whom you care. Rather than the constant state of hyper-vigilance that comes from the Tea Party’s psychology of exclusion, OWS inclusion carries with it a sadness that no repair is ever perfect, that even the most exceptional America possible will still and always fall short of our aspirational ideals. And beneath the various critiques, like the ratio of CEO to worker compensation almost doubling in the last 10 years, there is a wild optimism at the wooly center of OWS. You see it at the marches, in the music, when you listen to people at Zuccotti Park organizing the clean-up to avoid police action. What becomes clear through a psychological lens is the optimism of cooperation and relationship, of being imperfect together, of searching for repair as community even while knowing no repair is perfect.

You can find the full article here.