<html><div>At 01:03 PM 4/21/00 -0500, you wrote:</div>
<br>
<div>>And just because Open Space came from Africa doesn't mean that
it is honoring</div>
<div>>that culture. Historically, white europeans have made a
practice of</div>
<div>>"borrowing" things from other cultures, claiming it
and benefitting from it</div>
<div>>without giving anything back to that culture. I'm not
saying that's what's</div>
<div>>happening here. I don't know... I'm just putting it out
there.</div>
<div>**************************************</div>
<div>Some thoughts. I believe it important to make a distinction between
Open Space and Racism in the US (and elsewhere). I have always thought of
Open Space (one way at least) as a sort of a Rorschach (sp?) Test. You
know, the funny thing with ink blots to see if you are crazy. The blots
themselves are purely random, and therefore meaning is totally in the eye
of the beholder. What you see is what is welling up in your consciousness
-- for better or worse. In an Open Space, I think pretty much the same
thing happens. There is no content -- except as supplied. Folks come as
they are -- and fortunately in most cases, they leave changed, sometimes
profoundly, and for the better.</div>
<br>
<div>So Open Space, I think, is pretty much color neutral, race neutral
-- just about anything neutral -- except it is death on control
freaks!</div>
<br>
<div>As this discussion proceeds, it may be well to remember the 1000's
of folks in India, Asia, Africa, and South America who have all been
"in" Open Space to say nothing of the First nation Folks in the
US and Canada. As near as I can tell (either as participant or
facilitator) there is virtually no difference in response or behavior
anywhere in the world. It always seems to work.</div>
<br>
<div>For me, Open Space breaks barriers so that we can be fully human
with each other. It is not magic, but it gets the job done. OS creates
the conditions of Peace (with a capital "P") -- not a dreamy
sort of indolence, but genuine conversation and encounter. So it can be,
and has been, enormously helpful in overcoming the agony of division --
whether that be race, tribal, class -- or professional. </div>
<br>
<div>Does racism, tribalism, sectarianism, nationalism -- appear in Open
Space? For sure, because they all come with our common human experience.
But of greater import is that when you open the windows and doors of our
lives something deeper than all of the divisions comes through. Call it
what you will -- I would call it the common Spirit of our Humanity.
</div>
<br>
<div>So where do we go from here? My guess is that we offer Space to
anybody who cares. And move on when the doors are shut. Who knows, they
may open tomorrow.</div>
<br>
Harrison
<br>
<div align="center">
Harrison Owen<br>
7808 River Falls Drive<br>
Potomac, MD 20854<br>
USA<br>
phone 301-469-9269<br>
fax 301-983-9314<br>
website <br>
<a href="http://www.mindspring.com/~owenhh" eudora="autourl">www.mindspring.com/~owenhh</a><br>
Open Space Institute websites<br>
<a href="http://www.openspaceworld.org/" eudora="autourl">www.openspaceworld.org</a><br>
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