Re: Seniority-Much Ado About Nothing
From: Kay Argyle (argylemines.utah.edu)
Date: Tue, 31 Oct 2000 17:51:01 -0700 (MST)
In defense of making much ado about "nothing," nothingness is in the eye of
the beholder.

You don't know whether you have consensus before you discuss something, and
sometimes discussion modifies the consensus.  Sometimes you have consensus
and shouldn't have, because your consensus is ignorant (the world is flat)
or even immoral (skin color measures something -- anything -- besides the
presence of melanin).  Discussion is the only hope of evaluating that.

The frightening thing about questioning the rules is that it dawns on you
that if one "rule" was wrong, maybe others are ... maybe lots ... maybe
all.  The walls around your mind come tumbling down, and the world is a
cold and drafty place.  You have to test each step, picking your way
through the rubble.

Having started questioning everything, you're going to find that some
things are true, after all.  Does that mean it was a waste of time to
question them?  No.

The debate about senority established that most people contributing to the
discussion, having considered the matter, feel it is a legitimate,
reasonably fair method, applicable to this particular case.  It also
brought out a couple of suggestions about other approaches -- like, do you
need a priority system at all?

> There are so many issues that get brought up that nobody ever replies to.

Examples, please?  It seems to me there is considerable discussion of the
nuts and bolts of achieving affordability, diversity, simplicity,
community, environmentally sound practices ... and patience.

When I'm making baby steps towards some distant goal, and somebody who is
further along the road gets impatient and disdainful of my efforts, I
question whether that road is one I want to be on.  That's true whether the
goal is moral, physical, educational or anything else.  I have a right to
be a beginner, even if it means I make mistakes, that I'm unoriginal,
clumsy, or insufficiently devoted.  If the "enlightened ones" are
intolerant of my not having achieved perfection yet, I'm going to stay
imperfect, by choice.

Kay Argyle
Wasatch Commons

P.S.  One of the reasons I joined cohousing was I was tired of everyone
thinking I was crazy.  Here were a bunch of people who were crazy just like
me!  You may be tired of people agreeing with you; I'm not.  ;)

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