Idea of Record Form

The Politics of Peace

Unknown

This is a note of feedback to the conference organizers and facilitation team.

Wow. I Was shocked at how this break-out session went, and wondered seriously:WHO was the bearded grey-haired middle aged white man who dominated the Spirituality of Peace track sub-group with a 15 minute long story? I was upset when he ignored our time-calling and said "we can keep going" so, I called bullshit, walked out of the session, and spoke with the facilitator of the politics of spirituality council, who recommended that I write out my feelings and feedback.

I was absolutely surprised by the difference in this session. It was all about this one man! What about the Open Space that facilitators were trained in and explained to us so well? surely this man wasn't a facilitator. Yet he held the room and ignored or shut down anyone who tried to speak up, stating "I just want to tell this one story, and then I'll open it up" I was puzzled by this statement - was he the leader? Had the entire group agreed to take his leadership and stay silent as he presented to the room (15 or 20 of us)? So, I asked about this, "when will we all speak, and do the work together, and share the power?" and he said again "I just want to tell this one story, and then I'll open it up for discussion, and Then we can break out into subgroups or whatever" I decided to go along with the room and see what would happen. Then he abruptly asked me what part of Boston I was from, what part of town. I stated "Dorchester" and he quipped quickly "Oh well then, we forgive you!" What the heck was that about I thought - and stated back "Oh NO, I'm living in a murder triangle, so I'll forgive You." He started presenting a long story about ghandi. And post ghandi. and a fellow named JR, and all about himself being in india, and the peoples councils, and stratigies of social voting and representation outside the political system of India, etc etc. Pretty good stuff - but I noticed how long he went on, how he shut up anyone who tried to interrupt or speak, and just kept on a rolling with his ego train. Now I began to get frustrated, feeling the session was not at all collaborative, and even feeling that perhaps he didn't understand what this conference was about at all. When the e-mail list page came around, I wrote next to my email "I come from Dorchester MA, the youth murder capitol in Boston, so I don't need your forgiveness "joke", dude."

But I was determined to keep listening and to try to stay with the group - surely he would stop and we could all share power and discuss some of the interesting points that he was making - sometime soon he would stop talking and share the room with everyone.. but this didn't happen. And I began to notice something else not right.

As he spoke he threw in references, examples that seemed strange and inappropriate or weird in a mixed group that you do not know.. He used as one example "Abortion" and mentioned this word several times, looking around the room. He didn't say "womens right to choose" or "right to life" he just said used the term Abortion as something that folks would hypothetically be voting on. It seemed weird. Then, he mentioned a man in India some sort of leader known for drinking his own Urine, and paused, looked around the room and seemed pleased with himself, stating - "he was such a great man, you know.." I was wondering why he was doing this sort of talking.

You need to know something about me: I am very libral and I know about urine drinking for health, and I have seen for many years (I am 39) that abortion is a touchy subject for most women and men. I am not a conservative. I am not a prude. But this guy seemed weirdly self excited with his power to talk, say anything, and just keep going on. He didn't care if anyone in the room didn't know what he was talking about or why, he just went on. It was strange. Finally, when talking about the death of this fellow JR that he admired very very much (he had done a stereotypical "Indian" accent head-wiggling imitation of as he spoke about him!) after telling us al bout this guy and intimating that he was a privleged person for getting access to getting to question this person at a press conference, he told us "…and on his deathbed" - long pause, choked up, looked like going to cry - "oh I don't know why im so choked up about this - he told his mother that… choke choke… he had been wrong to support the party…", blab la bla

I swear - and I am an actress myself - the man faked crying and got silent and was working his audience. But no tears at all in his eyes. Well, This was it. I was really done with this experience.

So now, when people were checking their watches and a black elder woman said "but we only have ten minutes left to talk with each other" he insisted that "WE don't have to stop" and told another middle aged white man "we can work through lunch" - then I lost it. I Called him out, stated "I call Bullshit", that "folks do have to eat and I came to this conference to be empowered and to speak to EVERYONE and listen to EVERYONE not get your personal lecture series - I didn't come to this conference and into this "Open Space" to be dominated by one white man.." (with books to sell and a movement of his own to grow) I stood up and stated that "I came here to talk, listen, share, and be together with each other in developing a new world way, a new politic - not the same old bull". I said "I call BullShit" again, and I walked out.

The saddest thing? His story initially had some great elements! (who doesn't love Ghandi? Especially after having just seen his grandson live in person. We were an opened up audience, prepaired to like what he wanted to say. And he knew it.) Some pearls were buried within it, and if he was more perceptive of respecting others, not jumping to manipulate the group, we would have had a lovely lively discussion. If he had only made it 3-5 minutes long I would have personally been so happy to be part of an Open Space discussion of the main points. But he was a crazy manipulative dude, who started off by insulting myself/my community - I think through ignorance - what could he know about Dorxchester and our pain, the murders, the poverty? He was glib and thoughtless.

My main feedback:

If he was an official "leader" or "facilitator" then you made A MISTAKE. If he was only a fellow attendee seizing power in the room, then I regret seriously not interrupting him earlier, as noone seemed to have the strength to stop this man. He has a lot to learn about sharing power in a group, but seemed to have mastered group dominance, and political speech delivery at a crowd. Choose the group facilitators with care. (I know that you probably already do) Check out their ego issues and background. Be sure that they fully understand and sign on to practice OPEN SPACE TECHNOLOGY or any other agreed-upon format for councils, and hold them to it. This experience was shocking and very upsetting for me. I felt lucky to find two Black women to speak with outside the room, and they understood me and told me to move through it and let it not make me sick. I regret deeply that I let him upset me from the peace path with his inappropriate references and bitchy "joke" about my community/myself when I dared to question the format. I should have been able to stand up and walk out THE MOMENT THAT I SENSED THAT HE WAS IN AWRONG WAY - but I thought I would hang in there, Some of it was so interesting. I thought I could stay polight, that there might be some value there for us all, time to share. I see now that I did wrong, and let myself get upset (probably helping him seem like a victim and getting folks to feel sorry for him - ug!)