From: Mike.Freeman@f126.n105.z1.fidonet.org (Mike Freeman)
Newsgroups: misc.handicap
Subject: Re: nfb bbs censorship??
Date: 12 Aug 92 21:20:16 GMT
Reply-To: Mike.Freeman@f126.n105.z1.fidonet.org
Organization: FidoNet node 1:105/126 - Lawson & Reay, Vancouver WA
X-Fidonet: Blink Talk Conference

Index Number: 23852

[This is from the Blink Talk Conference]

In a message to Carla Campbell <23 Jul 92 14:05> Christopher Hill wrote:

 CH> An excellent message.  I agree wholeheartedly!
 CH> Until the petty polotics ends, I've got better things to do
 CH> with my time, like make a living.  If the organization
 CH> can't tolerate differing opinions, why should I join?  I'd
 CH> just get booted out anyway :-)

Hi, Chris.

A lot has been written here about tolerance for various opinions (or the
lack thereof), about petty politics and about the fact that
organizations such as the NFB do not represent the views of so-called
nonalligned blind persons.  I think that the continued discussion shows
that some on this echo harbor some misconceptions about organizations of
the blind, and, in particular, about the NFB.  I also think that Carla's
call for rational thinking should be honored.  Let's do some clear
thinking.

I don't like "petty politics" either.  I doubt that very many other
people, in the NFB, ACB or no organization, like petty politics.  But
what do we mean by the term?  If we mean the dickering over political
offices, the perquisites of power, personalities and the like, we must
ultimately conclude that such dickering is unavoidable.  It is as old as
humanity and occurs in every organization.  Become active in a
neighborhood association, condo association, PTA, church political
hierarchy or secular political party and you will get "petty politics"
in spades.  Unfortunately, it's just part of the human condition.  The
only way to stop it -- and this only temporarily -- is to get the
participants to step outside their small world and take on a common
cause (or, if you will, enemy).  Petty politics ceases only when the
participants feel that there are problems so vast that everything else
becomes unimportant.  This happens in the NFB quite often and is the
underpinning of NFB's practices.

It should also be noted that what is one person's "petty politics"
matters very much to someone else.  What one person considers as
meaningless often turns out to be someone else's basic principle.  Thus,
many ACBers (and nonalligned blind, too) seem to despair when NFB and
ACB tangle on any issue, pining for a day when, as Rodney King said, we
can "all get along".  While this is eminently desirable, what this wish
fails to take into account is the differing style and approach of the
two organizations and, in some cases, the differing goals professed by
both.  For instance, as I understand it (and Durward McDaniel made this
clear in the debate leading up to the vote for expulsion of the fifteen
or so affiliates from NFB in 1961 that led up to the forming of ACB),
ACB is essentially a "states' rights" organization.  People who join ACB
make no demands of their fellow ACBers (and make no agreements)
concerning what anyone in the organization will say and when about any
subject, even if it works to the detriment of the goals of the
organization as a whole or any of its affiliates or special-interest
affiliates.  NFB, on the other hand, asks that a person joining it
pledge not to air disagreements in public.  We can fight like cats and
dogs over policy (and often do) but, once a vote has been taken,
everyone closes ranks behind the policy.  This does not mean that
discussion ends; in fact, policies can be reversed.  It simply means
that the discussions are carried on within the organization.  It is a
voluntary compact among the membership.  But, perhaps, I digress.

As I say, what is considered petty politics depends upon who is doing
the defining.  Let's get down to specific cases and stop the
generalizations.  Only in this way can we get a handle on what is fact,
what is opinion and what we, after careful consideration, think about
the points of view here shared.

As to your getting booted out if you were in the NFB:  you would very
definitely run the risk if you joined, then attacked NFB policy openly
and publicly.  But you could argue within the organization (at chapter
meetings, among NFBers and in correspondence) to your heart's content.
You could bring resolutions to change policy and no one -- be it
President Maurer, Dr. Jernigan, the Board of Directors, the Resolutions
Committee or anyone else, can bottle that resolution up if you wish it
to be considered.  That's not suppression of opinion in my book.

Two last observations:  first, if people do not care to join an
organization and participate in its activities, why should that
organization listen to their (the nonjoiners') opinions?  Second, what
mechanism would you suggest for an organization to get a representative
opinion sample from those who are not members?  Unless people join an
organization and make their opinions felt, that organization has no way
of incorporating the views of those people into its policies.  In other
words, staying uninvolved because no organization represents one's views
perpetuates such lack of representation.  Think about it.

Mike Freeman

P.S.  I work for a living, too!

-MF-
... ** The blind are no longer willing to be second-class citizens. **
___ CRR QWK 1.40

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