FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

South Central Farmers Declare Solidarity with Occupy Los Angeles

When causes reach out and band together, true movements for economic and social change begin and coalesce. In standing in support of the South Central Farmers, Occupy Los Angeles stands with our occupation of the South Central Farm five years ago, our struggle for healthy food and community rights, and with Los Angelenos' long history of resistance to our city leaders' oppression of those among our friends and neighbors who are least advantaged.

The South Central Farmers stand in solidarity with your “Counteroffer to the Mayor and LAPD” of November 24, 2011, and we share your grievances. We, too, recognize that the current social system increasingly favors the 1%, and the 99% is paying for that with our health, our education, our civic infrastructure, and our security. This has been the condition of many in that 99% for generations. For more and more of us, our very lives are degraded and even cut short for the benefit of the rich and powerful and those serving them.

As the South Central Farm encampment did half a decade ago, the Occupy Los Angeles encampment has shined a spotlight on the great social and economic divide in our city. The South Central Farmers encourage you to use the upcoming police raid to amplify your message and your demands. We hope you will find opportunities in these events and in the weeks, months, and years ahead to grow and strengthen your commitment to alter fundamentally the system that trades our lives and our humanity on Wall Street for worthless pieces of money.

To help you with that, the South Central Farmers offer our name in support of Occupy Wall Street, and we offer you our experience in negotiating the terrain ahead for growing Occupy Los Angeles through the impending eviction and beyond, as we have grown our movement and our Farm. We encourage you to join with others across Los Angeles who have been moving on parallel courses to yours for years and decades. Let's weld the experience, resources, and community support of established grassroots community organizations to your energy, enthusiasm, and visibility. If we can reach out to each other, we can build, finally, real change that restores the power of governance, of enforcement, and of resources to the people of Los Angeles and the world.

In that spirit, the South Central Farmers stand with Occupy Los Angeles and the Zapatistas in proclaiming, "For Everyone, Everything, For us, Nothing: Para Todos Todo, Para Nosotros Nada."