Occupy Underground

OWS was organizing and studying other movements, including Stonewall, for months before they hit the streets on Sept 17th. The organizers included many seasoned activists and there was much literature about the history of previous movements, tactics, strategies for dealing with the police, etc. That is why when they did end up on the streets, they were prepared for arrests, had lawyers and legal observers on the scene, were instructed to film everything from every angle, anticipating, as we have now seen, police making false arrests, lying under oath etc.

They also studied the Indignados in Spain, who in turn based their movement on previous movements.

The notion that OWS came out of the blue and did not connect with other movements, other organizations such as Community Service orgs and Unions and Student movements, Gay Rights organizations, mostly came from the MSM.

But I had been reading their website before the first day. In fact they had a dry run weeks before to practice for the real thing and to test their organization.

Stonewall was certainly discussed among other successful Social Movements.

This movement is in its infancy right now, so it's a bit premature to say 'it got it wrong'. Seems to me to be the most successful beginning of a movement over the past several years. But no one expected it to achieve all of its goals in a matter of months. It will most likely, like all other social justice movements, take decades to undo the harm done by decades of wrong policies.