We are called losers.
But the true losers are
down there on Wall Street.
They were bailed out
by billions of our money.
We are called socialists.
But here there is already
socialism for the rich.
They say we don't respect 
private property,
but in the 2008 financial crash-down
more hard-earned
private property was destroyed,
than if all of us here were to be
destroying it night and day for weeks.
They tell you we are dreamers.
The true dreamers are those who think
things can go on
indefinitely the way they are.
We are not dreamers.
We are the awakening
from a dream which is
turning into a nightmare.
We are not destroying anything.
We are only witnessing 
how the system is destroying itself.
We all know the classic scene 
from cartoons.
The cat reaches a precipice.
But it goes on walking
ignoring the fact that
there is nothing beneath its ground.
Only when it looks
down and notices it,
it falls down
This is what we are doing here.
We are telling the guys
there on Wall Street,
“Hey, look down!”
In mid-April 2011
the Chinese government prohibited
on TV, in films, and in novels
all stories that contain
alternate reality or time travel.
This is a good sign for China.
It means people still
dream about alternatives,
so you have to
prohibit this dreaming.
Here, we don't need a prohibition.
Because the ruling history[system?]
has even oppressed our capacity to dream.
Look at the movies
that we see all the time.
It's easy to imagine 
the end of the world.
An asteroid destroying
all life and so on.
But you cannot imagine the end of Capitalism.
So what are we doing here?
Let me tell you a wonderful old
joke from Communist times.
A guy was sent from East
Germany to work in Siberia.
He knew his mail would
be read by censors,
so he told his friends:
"Let's establish a code."
"If a letter you get from me
is written in blue ink,"
"it is true what I say."
"If it is written in red ink,"
"it is false."
After a month, his friends
get the first letter.
Everything is issued in blue.
It says, this letter:
"Everything is wonderful here."
"Stores are full of good food."
"Movie theatres show
good films from the west."
"Apartments are large and luxurious."
"The only thing you cannot buy ...
... is red ink."
This is how we live.
We have all
the freedoms we want.
But what we are
missing is red ink:
the language to articulate
our non-freedom.
The way we are taught
to speak about freedom,
"War on Terror" and so on,
falsifies freedom.
And this is what
you are doing here:
You are giving all of us red ink.
There is a danger.
Don't fall in love with yourselves.
We have a nice time here.
But remember.
Carnivals come cheap.
What matters is
the day after,
when we will have
to return to normal lives.
Will there be 
any changes then?
I don't want you 
to remember these days.
You know, like "Oh, we were
young and it was beautiful."
Remember that 
our basic message is:
We are allowed 
to think about alternatives.
The taboo is broken,
we do not live in the best possible world.
But there is a long road ahead.
There are truly difficult
questions that confront us.
We know what we do not want.
But what do we want?
What social organization 
can replace Capitalism?
What type of new leaders 
do we want?
Remember. The problem is
not corruption or greed.
The problem is the system
which pushes you to be corrupt.
Beware not only of the enemies,
but also of false friends
who are already working
to dilute this process.
In the same way
you get coffee without caffeine,
beer without alcohol,
ice cream without fat,
they will try to make this 
into a harmless, moral protest
a decaffienated protest.
But the reason we are here
is that we have 
enough of a world where,
to recycle Coke cans,
to give a couple of dollars for charity,
or to buy a Starbucks cappuccino
where 1% goes to
third world starving children
is enough to make us feel good.
After outsourcing work and torture,
after marriage agencies are
now outsourcing even our love life,
we can see that for a long time
we allowed our political engagement
also to be outsourced.
We want it back.
We are not Communists,
if Communism means a system
which collapsed in 1990.
Remember that today
those Communists
are the most efficient
ruthless Capitalists.
In China today,
we have Capitalism
which is even more dynamic
than your American Capitalism,
but doesn't mean  democracy.
Which means
when you criticize Capitalism,
don't allow yourself
to be blackmailed
that you are against democracy.
The marriage between
democracy and Capitalism is over.
The change is possible
So, what do we consider today possible?
Just follow the media:
On the one hand,
in technology and sexuality
everything seems to be possible.
You can travel to the moon.
You can become immortal
by biogenetics.
You can have sex
with animals or whatever.
But look at the field of
society and economy.
There almost everything is considered impossible.
You want to raise taxes
a little bit for the rich.
They tell you "it's impossible.
We lose competitivity."
You want more money for health care.
They tell you, "Impossible,
this means a totalitarian state."
Isn't it something wrong in the world,
where you are promised to be immortal
but cannot spend
a little bit more for healthcare.
Maybe we need to set
our priorities straight here.
We don't want
higher standard of living.
We want
better standard of living.
The only sense
in which we are Communists
is that we care for the commons.
The commons of nature,
the commons of what is privatized
by intellectual property,
the commons of biogenetics
For this and only for this
we should fight.
Communism failed absolutely.
But the problems of
the commons are here.
They are telling you
we are non-Americans here.
But the conservative fundamentalists
who claim they are really American
have to be reminded of something.
What is Christianity?
It's the Holy Spirit.
What is the Holy Spirit?
It's an egalitarian
community of believers
who are linked
by love for each other.
And who only have their own
freedom and responsibility to do it.
In this sense,
the Holy Spirit is here now.
And down there on Wall Street,
there are pagans who are
worshipping blasphemous idols.
So all we need is patience.
The only thing I'm afraid of
that we will someday just go home
and then we will
meet once a year,
drinking beer,
and nostaligically remembering
"What a nice time we had here."
Promise ourselves that
this will not be the case.
We know
that people often desire something
but do not really want it.
Don't be afraid
to really want what you desire.
Thank you very much!
