I hate the word "Community"

[Thogey]

If you have a minute, I mean a free minute where you have absolutely done everything else you can think of, licking the bottom shelf of your refrigerator, knitted a belly button lint sweater etc. Read this communist dribble that was posted in our local paper.

http://dcourier.com/main.asp?SectionID= ... eID=152882

It would be interesting to rewrite it and say what it really means. I think I counted "community" or variations there of 18 times .

I may expunge this word from my lexicon, unless I'm talking about ants or bees or something.

[johnbrickner]

Ok, so how do I respond to this without saying the word community and not add to your . . . umm, concern? Not sure it is possible. Luv you Thogey, keep posting. You in addition to Ray, tend to bring out the best in me.

Anyway, here goes. The concern is Prescott is going to shat. Looks as though there are many problems needing to be addressed and people are noticing. So you have to ask who do you want to address these problems? Not wanting to use a libertarian cliché, but generally everything the government does turns to shat. So that leaves you and me and the every day people in the trenches living the life and doing the work to do what needs be done.

Now, DR. Barnes appears to be more of a lets get concerned and cause a commotion and then get government to take care of it kind of person to me (apologies, Oh Brother Where Art Thou influence). Problem here is government's answer to our problems is to create more government to fix the problem. More government is one of the problems.

So now were are back to us. Bottom line here is there are no hordes of volunteers waiting behind the curtain to forward a good cause. Until a number (could be small if dedicated and in for the long haul) of people get together, sit down, determine the problems, and start forwarding, inviting, persuading, and organizing a critical mass of other concerned Citizens to continue the cause to coming up with answers, Jack Shat is going to happen. Except that if it isn't an organized group of Citizens as described above you can be assured if it is a big enough concern then it will be a department of the government or corporations that will.

One need not look any further into our past and see this was done to the Organic movement. Which (to toot my own horn,) I called at the Jan. NOFA Winter Conference in 1996 in a public forum speech at Barre, MA. As you can see, the forces of evil are much greater than my persuasive speeches.

Fixing Prescott must come from the bottom up and both leadership and actions protected from being taken over by corporatism. They must also be done not with the attitude of "who's permission do we need to do this?" but with the attitude of "by the grace of Almighty God, we already are". In addition actions and decisions must be transparent, inclusive, etc. . . .

Prescott can be seen as a microcosm for all the United States. At some point, such a movement must catch (apologies Hunger Games influences) fire or we will continue to get what we've always gotten.

[theo]

"In addition, to foster the adoption of best practices, the Prescott area communities would dedicate themselves to upgrading the abilities of all its citizens to understand and employ best practices. The goal would be for Prescott-or the greater Prescott area-to become a true learning community."

Sounds like coerced indoctrination. I'm sure the "best practices" are whatever benefits those in power.

[Verbane]

...Eventually you end up with a Community Organizer for Mayor President

[spacecase0]

Community seems to me right up there with public relations,
just another thing you have to figure out how to spin the the direction that does not hurt anyone
and "public relations" was a better phrase for propaganda (sometimes history is pretty funny)
groups seem to have some real power, just make sure that it is not used to hurt you and you have no worries

[Recyclersteve]

I mentioned on another thread that I consider the RC site to be a community, even though we live far apart from each other. The RC community is one that I like being a part of.