Why I/O OccupyNatGat2014 Transparency Such A HUGE Issue Here

Hi ~ I started the group to try it out for organizing NatGat. Changing anything or deleting anything caused confusion so we kept everything up without editing. Now Sea has flooded all the threads with Marxist mathematics.

All these sites and platforms are Tools - what a group does with the tools is something for the group to clarify. It would be interesting to ask Loomio what they had in mind with that setting.

We (NGWG) used Loomio mostly as a discussion platform. (imo - very few decisions that impacted the actual organizing were made.). My guess would be that function would be used correctly in a discussion that was actually doing cumulative work - there is some value in updating the work, adding new links, new media, new "where we are now" updates - so folks wouldn't have to scroll forever to find needed info. I'm guessing that is the intent.

Thinking, for example, of the Online Component discussion. "We want to have an online component" and here's some ideas and links and stuff to get us started.
Discussion begins; folks are adding all sorts of stuff.
2 months down the line, the admin(s) cull through that and change the Discussion context to "here's where we are now - we've made a lot of headway - here's all the latest links - the blah blah group is doing this and the abc group is doing that. What's next?
and around it goes, keeping all info on the topic in one easy to find thread, and keeping the main description updated.

I agree that no one should ever change or censor what individual members are saying. Not sure that I agree that it is the admin's place to announce every setting possibility to the group. (if they even notice them - a lot of times with new platforms, folks will set up as is in default mode.) Some would see that as hierarchical and condescending. Though this particular default setting would be something the group would like to know, I think.

Having the ability and acting on it are two different things. This is why we come together from a position of "trusted networks" before a group like natgat or s17 organizing even begins. and also why groups - any group - need to define their purpose and operating procedures in the beginning, or like with loomio, when it is first introduced.

Questions should always be asked. The whole group learns. Nefarious intent should not be our default position, though. I think that's what was so hard this year. people working their asses off and having their motives for working 15 hr days for the project, questioned. (Rather than how does this work? what can this do? How can I learn to do that?)

just some thoughts from the lonely admin peanut gallery.

Agreed. Our last minister at CUC was on a very different wavelength from mine in many ways, but one thing that stayed with me when he left was “assume good intentions”. That is something I have almost always felt in Occupy, but was missing from a lot of the NatGat planning, especially in regard to Maestro and IO.

Hi Trisha!! =) I'm bet you were soooo happy to post the results of your thing and don't ever have to go back there again! the best thing about timing things, sometimes they just have to have an arbitrary ending even if there's not an ending ending. BTW, thank you so much for doing that and so many of those things you do so well.

Now, if someone over heard that conversation, they would assume that we have been working together for years, and yet, we met in Sacramento for the first time, and on the phone before that never knowing one another in any other kind of way. We have, and probably by all appearances on the ground, a "Climate of Hierarchy" because you and I are "working together" and we are not the "newbie" except we are, just in a difference context. Its what happens when the show must go on, the players are ready. Its not good, not bad, not patriarchal or matriarchal, just hierarchical. 3D climate = recognize the conversations u are having.

Right now, however, imho, the patriarchal men need to man-up, imho. The problem is, i think they are confused by what "Man-Up" means anymore. sigh.

And, as I think Sally, L.R. and Trisha got to witness my arse first hand at least once or twice, i often lose myself in the collective voice when I'm super open, and I just go until someone says 'stop' or something like that and i always intend to pounce in my landings so as to never hurt anyone, including myself ... so if I'm not hearing you, call me "Elaine" and I will listen with different ears altogether, but sometimes it takes a minute for Niki to simmer down! Hopefully, and I'm working on it day-by-day -- by the time you HAVE to call me Elaine, I've left that reality and gone off to find myself first, before coming back into the mess that was.

Transparency or the lack of transparency, comes with personal trust issues, we are all transparent and we are all not, depending on what we think is important in the moment, and then we develop a collection of moments and you begin to get a feel for people. blah, blah, blah -- how we can avoid it here, is a FAQ ... set it up and let people start asking and answering questions, put it wherever people work -- titan pads, the website itself, loomio, facebook, tumblr, twitter, wherevers .... eventually the questions will form themselves into the FAQ. The questions Donna has been asking are basic, and should be straightforward and answered matter of factly without defensiveness (a hard habit 2 break for us all!). any way, cheers, ladies. I am honored to