The main thing that concerns me about changing our procedure is actually that we have a strong consensus among those who have spoken up. It has been such a strong consensus that I can well imagine that anyone who disagrees might be hesitant to speak up. And while we are a group that tends to love writers, I could well understand that some might not think that supporting this one group is the best way to show it.
I'm glad the proposal was brought and I think it will pass handily, but changing procedures in this case seems like beyond slippery slope to me, more like a greased pole.
Personally, I would hate to be excluded from the process even if I agreed with the outcome.
but changing procedures in this case seems like beyond slippery slope to me, more like a greased pole.
I'd have to agree. The likelyhood of a similar situation to this happening is pretty small, and I can't see how there would be any concensus on a quick fix voting procedure. You could argue there should be a way for a stompy to be able to make layout changes and have it voted on later, I suppose.
Personally, I would hate to be excluded from the process even if I agreed with the outcome.
This, and feelings like it, are why we have the voting process in the first place.
In the ancient past, there was the Bullshit Consensus, and lo, when we wanted something to happen, we talked it to death and in the end the decisions that were made were made mostly based on who had the stamina to keep making their points after everyone else had given up and gone home. And we called it "consensus" and it mostly worked out.
Until, of course, some decisions were made that were less popular than the consensus-builders had been assuming, and people began to speak up about it, and words like "bullshit", "disenfranchised", and "cabal" were thrown around, and there was much unpleasantness and many hurt feelings and eventually we realized that we needed a system where everyone could have a voice and thus was born the Cheesebutt and its associated practices.
That.
And we are doing something immediately what with the collecting of funds and such.
I don't need a vote to ask Buffistas for donations for random acts of paypal. We don't put board fixes to a vote if things go wonky, we don't vote on thread titles (that's an example of bullshit consensus).
And in this situation, there's nothing stopping anyone from saying, "I'm a Buffista, and I support this strike," or whatever. As individuals, we can still make a group statement. That's different from officially making a statement on behalf of the organization. Not that we're organized.
I mean, it adds up to a group statement. Not a Group Statement.
I'm resigned to the necessity of this vote, if only because it makes most of y'all more comfortable with the statement.
I'd still like for there to be a procedure to truncate voting, but I'm not sure I'd be able to make the case for a hypothetical that would meet some urgency standard. The odd thing is, every entity I've ever been involved with or help set up, including a non-profit board on which I sit, contain provisions to shorten time for urgent matters. And every court system I practice in contains rules for emergency motions and shortening time. So to me, it's almost a defect in our current voting system that we don't have any such provisions.
