GA Minutes Week 18 - Thur Feb 2
General Assembly
2/2/2012
Occupy UMass has asked that there be no overnight visitors. People are welcome during the daytime
Women’s Caucus holding an open meeting (?)
Bill with occupy Boston TV was interviewed by the Boston Herald and the results were very positive
Occupy Somerville needs people to come to help make signs for the demonstration on their GA next Wed 1st church Somerville 7pm 2/8, for finalization of plans for the ensuing occupy the demonstration on Monday 2/13 5-7pm
Veterans for Peace
St Patrick’s Day parade march 18 from the t stop at Broadway
The Police Department thinks that Occupy Boston is going downhill. They expect 250 for the next march and expect 250 but we hope for 1000
This is a public relations move not a demonstration and the objective is to draw in people and to have fun
We ask that everyone stays in their group, there will be the raging grannies and the unions are coming in. If everyone stays in their group they are asking for solidarity and that everyone stays in their group
This is a family occasion and we ask that people do not wear face masks. Please wear your bandana around your neck
Wee have no problem with the mask if there is a taear gas situation
We ask that no one in this parade and since kids are there that no one uses profanity or uses any obscene gestures
The more people we draw in the more power we
Last year there was a haveproblem with Veterans for Peace so there is a call for more groups to participate
Keep re3aching o0ut to the people they know and the groups they know, we can draw more people into the movement and have a lot of fun
That is on March 18 at 2pm at the Broadway stop of the T% Redline, l;ook for the white veteran’s for peace flags
Health and Justice
Deborah Rochelle health justice boston
We are trying to think of various actions we can ge4t involve3d in in the upcoming months
We are thinking about running in the boston marathon
Are there any other people who would hold up the banners in the Boston marathon
We need people to hold up the banners for a few miles
dbershel@gmail.com
We are also going to have some street theater on Sat morning at 8-9am at Harvard business school/ health care business conference/ we think there should not be any business in health care/ if anyone is interested, please let me know what is going on.
There is a group of people already running the marathon you might want to get in touch with them
Everyone has a general idea about spokes
Their initial meeting has been cancelled
You may want to continue to keep posted on what is going on out there
Anna
There is a group of people working on safety e 5 Saturday at 1pm
Good for those thinking about social justice and safety issues
safety@occupyboston.org
Martin
Just got back from a trip to New York, Philly and dc
There are some interesting things going on in Occupy-philly
They are having some of the same issues as we do
They say hello
There is a second Occupy Boston media summit being planned, we will have an announcement with the date and time in an upcoming ga
Zoey
There are no updates in regard to the Thompson island working group
April around the same time as the ga
FAWG
In case anyone has receipts and needs reimbursement from FAWG
We are meeting Sat 3:30-4:45at community church, action assembly on Sunday at community church at 5 pm for more overarching
Community game on feb 6
Other info
monday feb 15
sustainable economy
Mon 2/20
Mon 2/27
Decolonize to liberate
Sunday 2-5 (city place)
Tuesday (5:30-6:45)
Women’s caucus presentation at e5 will be
After women’s caucus on
20th anti oppression
Saturday park st 1pm at park street
No war protest
Dan Cheeno
On behalf of media
If you have something to add to the calendar please use the calendar media form for your event
Click the top right contact us and tell us about your event and it will get added to the calendar
Bobbi has a concern that so many things are happening and they are not always on the calendar
The media cannot always chase people to see that things are on the calendar
Is there a working group that deals with the inconsistency on the calendar?
Terra point of information
Transparency and accountability group starting with Jimi and Terra
This is about sharing things openly about how things are done and decided at OB
The problem is that without everyone being on the calendar things are missed and overlooked
We need to have a conversation about why things were put on the calendar, and why not
Signs
Announcement about meeting sat 11, 3 to 5 (location to be determined)
Four longtime Boston activist about contacts and affinity groups
Jaykelly26@yahoo.com
And there is a doodle page
Is there anyone in the room who is interested in talking about what they are thankful for
I will start with b and then Alex, than John and martin
B
I am thankful that people are not here, they are at the barstool Boston protest
I think it has taken a while for women to understand how important women’s issues are for Occupy Boston, thank you people for being here and not being here
Alex
I am thankful for after a long time of dealing with my family and going to a billion occupies to being back and being welcome back with open arms and dealing with my opinionated self
Craig Griffin and Paul (?)both made the all star team
So on a side note occupy basketball I am trying to work that out
Ethan
I am happy that I have had and I have a lot of energy
I am thankful for finding a way to liberate some assets that I have
I am thankful for the library and I can go there and get on line and get some, some might say that’s socialism because we are getting some things passed
Thirsty Thursday are a fun thing
Harbor island is something to be talked about
I am thankful for knockout Barstoolz
I am thankful for the people who are protesting such a ridiculous thing. It is happening in front of the house of blues
Jason
I am thankful that Fox 25 had us in the studio talking about OB for two days in a row
Martin
I am thankful for the Occupy Philly people. They go through a lot. I was floored by their dedication
Many are unemployed and while trying to find a job give a lot to occupy and take in those who are worse off than they are
I am thankful for those who invest in this movement without the selfish what am I going to get mentality
Our first thankful Thursday has payed off awfully well
The church has asked us to stay away from the piano, it has been prepared for tomorrow’s concert
Sorry Cheri wasn’t here to see the first thankful Thursday
We are passing the box to raise fund for the ga, we raised 59 dollars on Tuesday which was more than half we needed to pay for the space that night
We have two proposals tonight
Eli
I have an announcement. Tomorrow we’re having a spaces meeting, it was blasted out over email today
There are pockets of people working really hard on a permanent indoor space and we have some incredible ideas about how this space could serve as an indoor Dewey and be a launching space for this movement
Meeting tomorrow are 6:30 at e 5 and wanted to make sure people knew about this
We have two proposals and two rollovers
Shouldn’t we check who is here first and then check on the rollovers?
There is one proposal
Is Deborah butler here?
No
We have two proposals
At the request of John Murphy we are checking for quorum
The way we use quorum for OB is we as GA if we are representative enough to make decisions
Before quorum we want to put people on stack
That is a reasonable request and a point of information/
Quorum is when we ask the audience if we feel that we can speak for OB, you have to make that decision personally and we take a count to see if we have quorum and if we say yes we take the proposals and we move
If you know that someone will be pissed that they are not here for quorum we shouldn’t take and pass proposals
Let’s hear what the proposals are first before we make the decision if we have quorum
We have one rollover proposal and one new proposal
I will read the rollover and then the new proposal
The spaces proposal
Matt and Anna
We want 90 minutes from the Saturday ga to talk about a safer spaces proposal sometime in the indefinite future
We will now check for quorum
Do we the members feel we can make decisions period for OB?
It is decisions in general.
There has been some confusion that quorum is proposal specific.
If we do not have quorum for one proposal we do not have quorum for any proposals
That is why we says decisions and not to specify around one.
Do we have quorum
It does not matter what proposals we have
It matters. I was requested to read the proposals.
Once quorum is deemed with us not having once we do not have it for the evening.
Quorum is deemed as saying do we have the prerogative to say we are making decisions for OB
Citizen’s United has a resolution
We stand in solidarity with OWS that money does not have speech and the the rights of human being s will not be granted to fictitious entities
If we do not have quorum it is not dead yet. You can raise it on Saturday. We sould like to make this decision before then
Any more questions about quorum?
Is this a particularly small ga meeting?
It is not
This is not the smallest group that we have approved a decision with
As we tried to note the other day there is not definite number for quorum
We make that decision at each ga and we are adults who can handle it
Do we need anything else to make this decision?
Do the members of tonights’ ga feel that we have enough people to constitute quorum?
We do not have 75% PEOPLE WHO AGREE SO WE DO NOT BELEIVE WE HAVE ENOUGH PEOPLE HERE TO MAKE DECISIONS AT OB tonight
We can discuss the meetings but we cannot make decisions about the proposals
We can take ideas from the general assembly on the space, we have it until
Martin this weekend as part of my job I was in a 48 hour hackathon and we should do something similar here
Safer spaces would you like to discuss your proposal with the GA. No
Citizen’s United are you interested in discussing the proposal?
Any questions about the motivations and goals?
Occupy Wall street passed this
2 page document. It is here
Not to confuse what we are trying to propose
We will have our own draft
This is a constitutional amendment for solidarity with OWS and a call for an amendment
We had a 2 page document and a 6 point plan with things that seemed obvious
This sums up the point of the document and has some other things we are talking about
There were things that are straight forward that we can get behind
Is this the language that other amendments being circulated about?
Basically yes
This basically says that money is not speech and corporations are not people
Are all of the groups on board? Groups working on this legislature throughout the country.
In the country who agree with this idea coming together to agree with the process
This is the language of OWS
Do the other national organization use the same language? Thye are using different approaches.
We believe that money is not free speech.
We do not want to discourage anyone from a particular amendment or to have people fighting amongst themselves
This is a concept
We are coming back in a couple of weeks with a more comprehensive document with more specific language.
All of these movements to amend the constitution are eventually going to stick
We have to get people talking about this at home
It’s what OWS came up with and we do not see fit to make a place about this.
There is a meeting about getting the groups together on campaign finance and teaching people about the issues
Volunteer at OB.org
Martin made a suggestion about talking about a hackathon
Someone suggested that terra talk about transparency
Alex suggested we a talk about the group discussion
We need to start individual stack
If anyone would like to be on stack we are taking that
Matt Carroll wants to talk about consensus
We are sitting together and it is a worthwhile discussion
Do you want to come down here?
Just an announcement on Tuesday about consensus
I want to make an announcement making consensus a discussion topic
Anyone else?
Alex
Just in general I keep talking a about depression/ the weather is cold and people are more depressed and medications are taken
I want to tell people to say hello and give people flowers, call people, and be nice to each other
We can all use the pick up
Why don’t we stop and talk to people when they are in the same spot, do the best you can and stay around, that might keep people moving forward
Janus Jackson
Doing homeless ministries since 1999, Dewey was my location, when the tents went up I called it gentrification
This is a tough time of the year, I hope you keep up the fight, this is the beginning of a second American revolution
I told Mel king if this revolution continues they may assassinate Obama which is why the NDAA passed this year
Bobbi
I want to say something. I feel we are a definite threat to the powers that be. While we have no leaders I think we can be picked off. I’m sorry if that sounded stupid but I have been at this for many years
I would like to amplify what Bobbi and Janua said
I do not want to go on live strem
Two weeks ago we celebrated the birth of MLK day in the course of which was made many reference to his assassination
I am well informed that MLK was picked off, with reference to the vulnerability that each of us has in the months to come
MLK was executed not assassinated
The fashion designer Versace was stalked by Cunanin abnd assassinated and since he was famous this applied
MLK and JFK were executed by agents and agencies by the US government
The fbi, cia the us army and the sharpshooter from the Memphis police department fired the fatal shot
I propose that we have and educational seminar on the weekend preceding the assignation of April 4 that we invite as a major speaker the attorney that litigated the case in 1999 after the murder in Memphis, William pepper about the execution of the agents who picked off MLK because he was organizing the poor people’s campaign in Washington. In the course of ensuing weeks I’d like to further this discussion
Matt wanted to make a response
We are more like a hybrid than a zombie in a leaderless movement
Ever thing we are doing is creating resilient
It is incapable of stopping us
Terra
I am a system engineer and I am not afraid if they come and try to get me
It is better to have people who are sensitive and knowledgeable. I am not going anywhere
People should be more afraid of doing nothing
Sarah Owacki
Keep in your thoughts and pray for the 77 people who died following a soccer match in Egypt, it should be friendly sport and turned out not being
I hear about the comparisons and it is very complicated to compare what is going on in those countries is not al fun and games and in this case a game went really bad, please keep them in your thoughts and prayers
Martin
Going off of what Terra and Matt are talking about
I know that you heard about Susuan Komen defunding Planned Parenthood
The backlash has resulted in the donation s and the money that the Susan Komen foundation pulled from planned parenthood has been donated in the last couple of days
because of the internet and the hyper kinetic world that is the power we have to raise 500K in two days
Quickly
A few weeks ago the Madison protest started, let’s not forget about what happened in Wisconsin, they went after the collective bargaining of the people. The four state senators left to prevent a quorum
When I left on that Saturday there was the tsunami in Japan. Blocked out the news
Anyone else want to share or talk about another topic
Sustainable economy group
Matt Carroll, not to gut next Tuesdays assembly there is an anarchists potluck, anti-authoritarian and anti corporate (2/7/12) 7pm lucy parsons by the Jackson sq t stop in Jamaica plain
we are free flowing tonight
Jorge
Don’t gut the ga
I am thankful for the fact that there are so few of us and most are out on a n action standing up against misogyny
I usually don’t like to see ga’s losing quorum
I think the safer space3s statement is important
I see Keegan and I know that proposal was very important
As many of us that can be at the ga Saturday I hope you will be there and engaged in the decision making process.
I read a great deal during mid-January when I saw the numbers dwindle during the night
I had nowhere to go to leave ga and no longer had a 70 hour week and I felt displaced and dislocated
When I was spreading what was going on, we are in hibernation like acrocus waiting to pop out in spring and waiting to see the action and intensity that we saw in late summer and fall
We had nearly 100 at the last ga
150 at the citizen’s united event
We had a good turnout at the solidarity with Oakland
We are still her and strong, we are just morphing back into the monster we were in the fall
Hang tough Patty
BC this is not a ga I am not facilitating, I want to get on stack’
I wanted to say that going to the T meeting and getting angry and yelling at the manager, it felt good to march and yeall and scream and get angry again.
You could pick up a sign and march and chant and do anything
We cannot get angry and yell and scream when we are in churches and basement
I look forward to marching with veterans for peace and for whatever we decide to do on April first which might be a new encampment, maybe not at Dewey square
If we hadn’t been watching the news and hadn’t happened to stand up and go that night we would not even be here, because the news covered it and we were thinking about going to wall street so we didn’t have to go.
Anyone else?
The concept of prioritizing our main OB events
We have 89 work groups,
There are little groups and large groups
With the direct actions every group of four cannot call a march
As we prioritize we will come back together for larger events
Glenn
The live stream just went out-
Do you want to go out and have a beer or call it a day?
Is this one of the places where we pay by the hour? No we pay 80 whether five minutes or four hours
We are trying to raise the funds every night for the space
The question is up to the group
If the working group wants to
Transparency
We are about
I am not the best to talk about how lack of transparency leads to oppression
It is really important and I am a transparency activist
Little people are outside of public meetings discussion governance then they come back to the meeting public and decide what we are going to do
We then have open meeting laws to make sure that this doesn’t happen
It requires posting 487 hours in advance with an agenda to discuss what is going on
If it is not on the agenda they cannot talk about it so you cannot get caught off guard
We are not adhering too it here at OB
We have to discuss if we are going to do stuff like that
Not having any standards allows us to have sparks of creativity
So they get together and come to the meeting after they a have already voted on something
I would like to get some feedback on what you think about that
Are open meeting laws important?
Madison , Wisconsin a meeting of four to five met and convened and person shouted them all down saying they could not do this. In a short period they passed a quorum with four or five people in the room.
Sometimes we have quorum, other times we do not.
How the rigidity of having this gets into flux
It is a valid one of the basis for oppression is that you trust everybody
I can get you to do what I want if I can get you to trust me
Then we share information there is no reason not t , we tweet all over the place
It takes very little time
What happens is we find out that a meeting is happening, and decisions are being made because people are excluded and not invited, these practices are what got us to the system that we are fighting now
That is exactly what we are running up against.
We don’t want to recreate the same system that we are fighting against
By being transparent we are fair to one another
All eyes should be there
Amongst some other things a lot of things are in people’s homes and we ask people to rsvp and that this is transparent enough there was a talk today in facilitation
You are not here to represent yourself, people should attempt to make these meeting.
Some announcements are made and some only show up to those that they think matter
With so many meeting s you cannot be at all of them, this weekend there is another summit and you cannot go to all of them. People have to work and it is a privilege to be able to have time to come here.
The calendar problems are often laziness
We need to have a standard
These are not fault of the human data, but is sounds like things take the place of a proposal and we want to pursue standards so that oppression through non transparency does not happen,
The contact information should always be available to check on upcoming events
There should be goodwill that people are not acting in a nefarious way, there should be standards for the calendar updates including contact information
When do you list it on the calendar and when do when post it
We might be hanging out at a certain place and since we are part of this group ideas are sparked that way
Gender, spokes or an anti-oppression idea is talked about in a social way and one night after a ga at what point do call it a real meeting
At a point is common sense that it looks good for the wiki
Martin
I think some of it is acknowledging that for years back
One example the night of the notorious proposal that resulted in all types of drama the following morning , not because anyone planned it, our email software decide that we would not be on the media listing anymore which was really bad timing so Sarah got really upset
Having some kind of common ground and things like this
Things do happen organically, there may be better ways to communicate
The FB happenings on FB have problems when people delete things and we don’t know who deleted,
We have good reason
My point is if you weren’t there to establish more trust and communication, we don’t want this written , but mutual understanding where we are coming from
We are asking people to make things more public more early one
The thing about the spokes council in the next week and a half we will have more frequent and regular security culture trainings
We need to understand these things much better
Terra
We lose strength as a community if we are hiding things from each other
Alex
I think when people talk about transparency I have to stop from removing myself from the conversation and one night three working groups started in my tent
I should have taken notes that whole time
I cannot help it that that happened and that it evolved that way
It would have started that thing that I was an evil dictator trying to run occupy boston, there are times when people need to have transparency
How many working groups post their notes in a major different way.
Carol It think we can use common sense and people do not. There is common sense to go beyond we had a great idea to we are going to have meeting ans plan things that are of great significance to OB
That is the point that we make things transparent
Terra
I was going through the experience that we have had problems there with transparency
The POC group does not feel comfortable and do not come to the meeting
We have to make the groups easier and inviting
There is stuff to make the OB overall structure more inviting
What has been mentioned is at what point does it have to be transparent
I want to cede time for a moment to ask how it went at knock out barstoolz
It was really great a ton of northeastern school, a march to house of blues
People were spitting on us as we walked by, that was a small group
There a was a big line of people and there was a big rally, there was an alternative dance party
The creator of barstoolz showed up for the speak out and demanded to talk and it was like, no
They are still at the house of blues
Did you talk to people in line and ask them shy they were ther
Some got it others didn’t
Some people got their tickets taken away
Most people were pretty drunk
Other than barstools was there a corporate sponser
They used Northeastern’s name in thehe promotional materials, but I don’t know if there is a sponsor
Back to transparency
My question was, at what point, is it fair, If I have an idea I put things up on and email / if it is significant enough and you are going to meet with a bunch of people it is significant
Several people have had issues with the way that the spokes persons group developed, it was obvious that it grew organically
Should there initially be an email exchange?
We need a less theoretical discussion
This is sort of getting a little, it seems unrealistic and onerous to ask someone to announce everything
It should feel like a task to put on wiki that we had a conversation about citizen’s united
When I told jimi two feathers that the response about what had happened in spokes it was ok.
People might be offended later
I can go to any of these spaces
The point is that other people don’t know
The spokes group was broadcast widely at GA
There are no longer insiders
The spark that is the micro thing, what are the standards that we are struggling for?
If the couple of people had and idea driving in their tent or in a car
To go from that to saying that we should get a group of people to talk that has real significance for occupy boston that has significance you should have open meetings as soon as you decide that
Once you get beyond that you can talk about what are the structures of OB
Before things are further developed
We should have these conversations more in person and less in email
There are conversations good and bad that go along in email
Martin and then Richard
Martin
For established groups one thing that has hurt me and I am trying to deal with is that the group I am most involved with is media and lot of things happen behind closed doors
Facebook outreach was secret because we don’t want people to know who what is to influence in the ga
This may not be valid, and emergency broadcast system has a media tem member rot message to it. Ten people are on it to get a text message saying media should do this
I liked Daniel’s proposal that we are all leaders and when you call people out on this we are on the curtain of what not all the time and often is not an intentional it starts this thing
It is something about he over regulation and I do not want to read notes from biddy’s
When people wake up in the morning and remember there might be something there
You can have lots of good ideas, but if you are going to act on it within th the working group let people know, in the larger group let people know, later if it is a great idea you want to bring common sense that it is an organizational and not an interpersonal discussion, or isf you only discuss with certain people it is deliberately exclusive+
Alex
My hesitance comes from watching my community act in poor fashion with OB
I talked to John Ford every night what we thought about people etc,
Many things we talked about never had an impact on any decisions and many had a lot of impact on the notes about what happened in these meetings
If we do things that results in major progress things start to happen and things pick up
Dan Chavez
I think that there is not only one official body called the GA that are inclusive and running that way
We have many working groups that are formed that way
We can encourage it by making the groups work, we cannot regulate working groups
I think
People feel things are going on behind their backs and that there have been factions formed
There should be an open community. everyone should be allowed to weigh in
I go to meetings all the time and I demand that we know what is going to be discussed
The lack of transparency going on now, the original intentions show bad formed in having many things solidified in a narrow scope and then wait until late rto bring it to the wider group
Terra
The WC and POc are closed meetings
Ther was a famous case where the boston school district wanted to have a decision made ahead of the vote, they got three hotels room and had people come through and established the position before the meeting.
They called friends and developed a position outside of quorum, so quorum of people have offended the intent of the open meeting guidelines
I want specific standards
I tend to want to be inclusive and have everyone involved
No have everyone invited not just those who care about a certain issues
It was a surprise to me when my information was not posted, my information
I understand the human impulse to go against the types of cliques that are forming
I don’t want to pile on the same groups
Once a miscommunication is cleared up, two meetings before going fully public is not an awful thing
A fairly major group that sparked an idea that brought people in
Finally there was a formal announcement of the SAA group for Sundays
They announced that they were working on it for a while
It was a group of people who had and idea and then they brought it to the GA
I know these individuals very well the idea was brought to me many time, two and a half weeks it was brought before it was brought to the GA
Ethan
This is good to talk about
A few things, not to say that this should be talked about, we do understand that what two talk about in the privacy of their own home will be between those tow people and unless they are going to act later it is still private
If three people decide to commit grand larceny in the name of OB it is grand larceny
If three facilitators get together and call together a facilitation meeting to invert the process of the general assembly, it is a large thing that the general assembly needs to talk about
We have little things and big decisions that need to be talked about going forward and thaqt there needs to be a middle area of more than two or four or five to move forward in liiatiaon of something we want to know where the line of disclosure comes
Practical too, is where the point of contact puts it (the meeting or event) on the calendar
I love the SAA, I do not think using positives are a reason for advocacy
We did this and this and it turned out to be positive
SAA’s ar going well, but maybe we failed in it’s formation. where we have our own problems absolved we are included in groups we were previously excluded from our social circles We should not have to think of everything, but think of the future and not as individuals who have excluded people
We need more middle ground
Carolyn
People are not taliking about their personal needs being met, but what is in the best interest of the group
Maritn
I like what Ethan said,
I think I would implore us not to do what the rest of society does, we need to take a scaple or a sledge hammer to it
I think for the most part people can talk about what they want to talk about
I don’t want to hear the side conversations and about what Patty and Jorge talk about every night
For the most part 99% OF THESE conversations are non malicious and they just happen and organically pop up
Some are drunk, I don’t want to read it
There are some that are trickier
I can speak of two working groups that I am a part of and how they dealt with it
That might shed some light into a solution into how to deal with it
Way back in November ot October there was an individual in a tent in a working group who wanted to change how our website traffic was handled, so late at night he sent a couple of texts that said I want to change our traffic to this. They were avoiding people who they knew had a problem with this, in the next text meeting the way they solved it was a good solution
They changed the traffic, if you want to do that you have to do it in an 8 person meeting
If you do something medium not huge meeting you can attach it to an email
Then they voted that if you agree you can do that
Tech did a good job there
The other working group there were a couple times when out of the 28 fb admins, four met and voted that they could vote the others off
One individual alone met at two in the morning about only given these four people access
There are instances when this happens and there has to be some kind of structure to prevent the misuse and we need better principles
Daniel
One solution I agree with is if that any working group in occupy boston be inclusive and post all minutes of the meeting
Anything more than that is what I would want to do
Post meeting minutes and a post contact information
One public meeting every two weeks
Terra
This needs to be discussed more widely
We said we were going to have an open discussion and we are having an open discussion
The FB was an interesting situation and it was created by an individual
The adding of admins was something that got out of hand with 28 admins
The group does not know whose responsibility
The admin was started by and individual for Ob
He invited three or so to join in and it was was four
Random people started inviting random people
What happened was a lack of responsibility and people who were offended by the lack of responsibility and this added to the lack of transparency
In that same vein we need to know more about working groups in general
The core of ga talks about things than cannot fit into occupy boston as anything further to make a blanket statement about transparency
How the working groups functions is about how things are or are not making sense
A couple of things I am looking at is not about discussion but decision making
We are making a conversation about transparency that should not stop because we are not making a decision making body
We can be a collection of individuals
Time and access resources to come to a consensus
Nothing is inherently wrong
I think this is a complicated issue
When we started the arts group we had an affinity group and then had an open meeting
there was no problem with that
I do feel differently about groups who come together to present major policy proposals about how occupy boston is run
How we set the terms of the discussion and how we propose the questions and have the discussion has a lot to do with how the proposals evolve.
Putting it out is advance becomes problematic
Once it is presented in a certain way, these decision should be open early on other wise things harden without the best way to think about the problem
To make a claim malleable again make it easier to tighten up
Temp check on continuing the conversation
Can we post these minutes?
The topic needs to be discussed amongst a wider group of people over a wider group of people.
The occupy boston fb page there was group that had a separate admin