What better place to protest wealth distribution inequity than at a boat show featuring the likes of super-yachts and personal submarines weighing in at a cool $2.9 million? At least that’s how participants in the Occupy Ft. Lauderdale movement feel. Occupiers will join roughly 100,000 international boating enthusiasts at the 52nd Fort Lauderdale International Boat Show (FLIBS), which launches on Thursday, October 27 and runs for five days.
The largest in-water boat show in the world will feature 1,800 boats along with a variety of fishing, diving and boating seminars. Coincidentally, the 2011 FLIBS will also present the brand new, 16,000-square-foot SYBAss (Super Yacht Builders Association) Pavilion—a custom-built, air-conditioned barge that will give mega-yacht builders a place to display new designs and upcoming models.
With over $3 billion of boats, yachts, engines, gear and accessories, one can only assume that protestors are directly attacking boaters. Yet Christine Weinbrecht, media liaison for the group formed in the wake of the Occupy Wall Street movement, disagrees, saying “We’re not protesting the show itself, but the boat show is a symbol of the divide between the 99 percent and the one percent. It’s a place to get the word out that we exist.”
Around 200 occupiers are expected to attend an Occupy Ft. Lauderdale demonstration outside the FLIBS on Saturday, 29 October.
For more information on Occupy Ft. Lauderdale, click here.
