Politically Correct and more

[Raffi Aftandelian]

Jack, thanks much for:


>With regard to your earlier email, I agree that PC is rife in the Open Space
community, and that it is not safe to raise certain issues - not only in
these posts, but beyond OSList.

>Two years ago, Paul Levy and I announced a discussion session, Open Space
2.0: Beyond the Dogma. The announcement triggered some hostility and a heap
of defensive responses. Paul received an item of what can only be called
hate mail from a prominent member of the so-called OS community (perhaps
more like what Scott Peck would call 'pseudo-community').


> Pseudo-community: Where participants are "nice with each other",
> playing-safe, and presenting what they feel is the most favourable sides of
> their personalities.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community


>I've had similar responses to other posts, which is why I rarely post to
this list these days.

>25 years down the track, if they survive that long, most organisational
concepts and tools have splintered and evolved. Open Space hasn't, and I'm
not sure this is a good thing. It seems to reflect a degree of orthodoxy.

>I await howls of protest.


and Michael thanks for giving a picture onto what happened at the one OT
conference you attended.

You make OT sound more like a Rainbow Gathering or a Burning Man event than...

In any case, Jack, I'd like to express a howl of appreciation for saying
that there are things you'd like to bring up on the list but don't feel safe
doing so. 

What would it take for you to bring things up on the list?

As for the evolution of OST, hasn't it evolved?? Aren't Art of Hosting,
Barcamps, unconferences, the Genuine Contact Program examples of the
evolution of the technology? Now, we may quibble about the usefulness of
these different paths of evolution, but...

And at the same time, when it comes to gathering together to get work done
around something with great complexity, i haven't come across a better way. 

i'm afraid for now we're stuck with the Man in the Hat and the
re-re-re-re-re-re-retelling of the Two Martini story...

if something could be different in the os community, jack, what would it be?
and what would you need to make that happen?

i'll be the first to admit there are things about the os community that i
find maddening at times. but when i ask myself how important it is to really
address them- does it really matter- i find, well, no!

i think we are at a point where if we were to stop having stammtisches,
wosonoses, osonoses, os "trainings," etc. ost would still get out
there...we've reached a tipping point. 

if anything, i wonder if the history of our community in terms of how the
technology has gotten into the world is a case worthy of study in and of
itself (an example of how a good technology can get out there with minimal
use of resources). ost got out there without a marketing plan, without
research demonstrating its efficacy, heck without a - from what i can see- a
central organization coordinating efforts and with rather limited rolling 
out of an increasingly senile (his word, not mine) guru  for marketing
efforts... 

yes, it was and is self-organizing at work...and at the same time, i wonder
if it is worth looking more deeply at the question birgitt has posed--
"what's the larger container in which self-organizing takes place?"

warmly,
raffi

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