[New-imc] (1) hurt feelings (2) fast website vs people process

[boud]

hi blue pi, petros, everyone,
   Rule (1) Make love, not war.
   Rule (2) When all else fails, go to Rule (1).
   Rule (3) If really desperate, say sorry, and then try Rule (1) anyway.

petros, blue pi: i am personally convinced that both of you
have the best intentions. IMHO the conflict is a mix of hurt 
feelings, miscommunications, and maybe some confusion about
substantive issues. These are not good reasons for us to
be angry with one another, IMHO.

petros wrote:
http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/public/new-imc/2003-February/003510.html
> I just wanted you to know that for reasons unknown to
> me, people in imc-beirut and in the new-imc working
> group, are being told by Hannah (blue pi), that I am
> accusing her (of what?) and making things difficult for
> her. 
> 
> You should be aware that none of this is true. You
> might want to search if that is the case, before
> assuming that I am guilty of this accusation. 

petros, in the following email:
http://lists.indymedia.org/mailman/public/new-imc/2003-February/003402.html
you clearly make some criticisms of blue pi's "approach".

Whether or not these are "accusations" or "constructive criticism",
and whether or not they are true, IMHO, your intentions are to make
criticisms which need to be made (in your judgment), and you try to
make them sensitively.

But i don't think you can deny that in some sense it is an "accusation",
and that blue pi is understandably upset. People have feelings!
Sometimes criticisms need to be made between friends which risk
hurting feelings - but in that case you should be aware of the risk,
and if people's feelings are hurt, then you can maybe apologise,
give everyone time to cool off and maybe later talk about the 
substantive issue when people are ready to treat it calmly.


> It makes me sad that this campaign of lies has

This is from 003510.html - IMHO, this sort of language constitutes a
personal attack. blue pi may have been upset, some of her online
judgment may be incorrect or confused, but that's not the same as a
"campaign of lies". IMHO this deserves a straight out apology to blue
pi.

On Mon, 3 Mar 2003, blue.pi wrote:

> >It is *our* responsibility that our colleagues
> >in Beirut are still being told by imc sources,
> >erroneously, that having an imc group and having a 
> >website is the same thing. We need to give relief to
> >our Beirut colleagues from this terrible dilemma which
> >has been placed on them. 
> 
> I guess Petros could claim that he is not talking about me, when he writes 
> “imc sources”. But who else could he be talking about? Himself? Concerning 

blue pi: i agree that some of petros' statements, especially the ones
you quoted earlier risk hurting your feelings. Whether or not the
claim of "interfering westerners" is valid or not, i think that petros
has the right to make the comment, but that of course it would be
better if it can be stated in a less accusatory style.

But here, i don't think you should infer that you are being personally
attacked when petros talks about "imc sources". In this case, petros
is clearly trying to depersonalise the issue.

> the content of the accusation: I ve already stated before: The people here 
> wanted a website badly when I arrived here and they were quite disappointed 
> when I told them that it would take a while to go through the process. 

Here i'm confused, sorry. i think both petros and i argued in favour
of process, but i don't think anyone tried to *block* IMC Beirut starting
a website quickly. As for people being disappointed, if they were already
well organised, in the sense of having non-hierarchical decision-making,
doing outreach to various grassroots groups, etc etc, then the process
could have been quicker. It just happens to be the reality that most
groups, even if they're already organised as some sort of activist group,
have not yet been through this sort of opening up and dehierarchisation.
Anyway, we're getting off the point...
 
> This was the first attack in November: 
> 
> >I see that as group, you may think that if you make a
> >website ready, that your application to new-imc might
> >go through more easily. Itís true that unfortunately
> >this happens with some imc groups,  because some of our
> >colleagues are not clear in what they do.
> >Irresponsibly, they encourage imc groups to form
> >quickly and to develop technically (create a website
> >and apply for membership), without any attention to
> >group process, or with only a shallow attention to
> >politics. We keep having disasters when we follow that
> >policy. For that reason, I assure you that wherever my
> >opinion has any weight, I will continue to oppose that
> >policy - it is nothing more than a leftist/ progressive
> >version of missionaries ("soft crucades" to
> >proselytize), married to techno- philanthropy (instead
> >of money, donating access to the net for selected
> >allies and colonised communties), both of which have
> >done humanity a *lot* of damage, especially to us who
> >live in the global colonies. 
> 
> >And for those of us who live in the Middle East, we
> >know directly that if we ignore political realities,
> >and just allow the missionaries, crucaders, and
> >philanthropists to shape the forms of our struggle for
> >liberation, our communities suffer death and
> >destruction.
> 
> Like the “imc sources”, I wouldn’t know who else could be addressed here as 
> “missionaries, crusaders and philanthropists”. I also assume that if he 
> didn’t mean me, he would have clearified that after I protested. 

blue pi: relax! You're not alone amongst the accused ;), and you're
probably not even among them at all! IMHO, this is a valid comment. At
least in the part you quoted, there is nothing trying to attack any
individual. Inferring that you're included is not going to help in
constructive communication.
 
> I do find these terms highly offensive and anyone living here would. Of 
> course, I don’t know if people who are not that familiar with the Middle 
> East (and after all Cyprus does seem today much more part of Europe than 
> part of this region) can understand what a great insult they are. 

IMHO the whole idea of Indymedia is to help local groups speak for
themselves - so opposing the dominance of missionaries, crusaders and
philanthropists seems to me an extremely valid comment, in general. In
a particular context, it could hurt someone's feelings - such as
yours, because you feel it devalues all the work you've contributed to
IMC Beirut. i agree that petros should be more careful in his 
criticisms, but i don't think you can complain about his comment
as a general comment.

> I acctually think, this needs to be discussed, because I don’t think it is 
> right to artificially slow people down in this region when they want to set 
> up a website, especially not when we think it is completely normal that 
> imc’s in Europe and Northamerica have their website immidiatly. 

blue pi: i think you are upset now, but please don't be upset by 
my saying i think you're confused here. Maybe this is the *substantive*
part of disagreement between petros and you.

* petros favours the people approach, process as priority.
* i personally also favour this approach.
* Some people feel that starting a website quickly should not be
opposed.
* As you say above, Beirut people hoped to get a web site up
quickly and were disappointed that it required more organising work.

* i thought there was something like consensus that a group should
feel OK to start a website quickly if it wishes, but that it should
also understand why we, as a network, think that the people side,
the political side, the process, whatever you want to call it,
is really important, and that the website risks being a ghost site,
or collapsing, or becoming sectarian, or whatever, if there is no
people process. So AFAIR we've never said to a new group: we oppose
you starting a website until you've gone through the process.

* Even if someone from new-imc working group tried to tell a new group
that they should not create a web site immediately, i don't see how we
could stop them. There are many different groups offering to host
Indymedia sites, and of course there are web sites outside of
Indymedia, and even if someone from new-imc said to, say, scott from
bandwithcoop "please don't create a startup site for this new group
because they're still new", i think scott (or whoever) would quite
rightly ignore this as unacceptable controlling behaviour.  Indymedia
is decentralised. We try to coordinate and communicate, but different
global groups don't control each other.

> up a website, especially not when we think it is completely normal that 
> imc’s in Europe and Northamerica have their website immidiatly. 

i'm confused.

The same new-imc approach to people self-organising as a priority
applies in Europe and N.America just as much as in colonised countries. 
In fact, now that many group in the USA are applying, it remains perfectly
clear (IMHO) that people networking, outreach and real participation
by diverse local groups, etc etc are more than ever necessary for US
IMCs.  

Can you name any N.American/European recent new IMC where a new-imc
volunteer recommended they start a website immediately and didn't
insist they go through the organising process?

 
> I have said before, that the group here was really eager to get a website 
> already when I arrived and I really don’t see why they shouldn’t have one. 

Is this a language problem with tenses (past vs present)???

past: They could have started a website anytime, even before approval.
Some of us advised prioritising the process rather than the website,
but noone (even petros, AFAIK) tried to *block* them starting a website 
early on.

now: IMC Beirut has been approved. i haven't followed the IMC Beirut
tech discussions, but i thought the web site was already on the
way. It's up to you (IMC Beirut) to contact (dns at
lists.indymedia.org) and to update

http://www.indymedia.org/contact

using your password (the "contact" should have the password; if not,
try emailing mark at indymedia.org) once your website is ready. In fact,
you can update your entry to "approved" without waiting for the website.

> bye you all - hope to see you on some other list under better circumstances, 

OK, here's my summary:

= petros - maybe should accept that a criticism may be perceived as
an accusation or as a personal attack, and maybe should remember that
even when a criticism is valid, it can be done in a way that 
minimises people's feelings being hurt 

= blue pi - understandably upset, but maybe should accept that a
criticism may be made without intending to hurt people's feelings, and
maybe not take a general comment on "missionaryism" too personally.
And this applies both ways: when criticising petros' comments, it
would be best to try doing this in a way which avoids hurting *his*
feelings. (Yes, men have feelings too...)


= substantive issues (apart from diplomacy, people's feelings, etc.) - 

Does anybody oppose the following (seems an old consensus IMHO)? :
- that any new group should be encouraged to focus on people process etc
(http://docs.indymedia.org/view/Global/NewImcHowTo) 
rather than immediately starting a web site
- that, however, any new group should feel OK to start a web site
running an Indymedia engine immediately if they wish to, and that
new-imc working group not only does not *want* to but also *cannot* stop 
them starting a website. All the same, we would hope the group understands
why we think Indymedia is much more than an open publishing website.

blue pi, petros: Maybe if we could consense on the above substantive
issue, we could put the misunderstandings and hurt feelings into 
"the past is the past" and get back to making love, not war.

solidarity
boud