Self-Nominated

RantWoman needs to nominate herself to a number of new roles at the Association of Bad Friends. However, RantWoman is called to have a tirade first.

RantWoman HATES Facebook. RantWoman is grateful to get emanations via Facebook indicating that Youngest Cousin is alive and well and surviving a job RantWoman thinks must involve dispensing explosive material in war zones; RantWoman makes special dispensation for Youngest Cousin's endless invitations to join Farmville because of the war zones issue. Still

RantWoman generally finds Facebook overwhelming, does not WANT the opportunity to read a gazillion comments about every blessed thing ever written. BUT when she find something she LIKES and wants to refer to again, RantWoman gosh dang it would like to be able to find things again. Hence borrowing the following item from the Association of Bad Friends.


A brief History of the Association of Bad Friends by Rufus Bones

It was a dark and stormy winter night in northern California. Jacob Stone and Brent Bill were amusing themselves with libations and deep discussions on various topics. Included in them was the possibility of borrowing from ancient Popes and instituting indulgences for Quakers. For an appropriate donation amount (set by Bill and Stone), a Friend could purchase an indulgence from a testimony and be free from it for a time. This could include buying an indulgence from the peace testimony so a Quaker could go slap another person who needed slapping.

They agreed that this was probably not a GOOD idea, even though it was a good idea.

Which led them onto a discussion of what was GOOD and what was BAD for a Friend. The stories which they had been hearing about actions in certain Midwest Yearly Meetings (primarily), that goodness or badness rested in being in theological and political agreement with the actions of certain Yearly Meeting staff people. If a person failed in either one (or both) of these agreements and that person would be named a BAD Friend and actions to dispose of her or his standing as a Friend would be undertaken.

Bill admitted to Stone that he was a bad Friend, though so far had not been publicly called out as such. He said that when he travelled schlepping his books, readers always seemed a bit intrigued by Bill being a Quaker -- as if surprised any of them still existed. When queried on his Quaker-ness, he usually answered, "Yes, a bad Quaker." The questioner’s eyebrows generally raised at that response. Bill told stone that he would go on to explain that, though he had been a member of the Religious Society of Friends all his life, he was just not very good at being a Quaker. He found that he frequently failed to live up to the ideals of the Religious Society of Friends – he was not always peaceable, humble, truthful, and so forth. Stone admitted that he was a Bad Friend, as well. As a sweet union of Badness bound them together, they rejoiced that these two lost sheep remained … well… lost, but that they were together in their lostness.

At about that time, the libations ended as did the chance for further face-to-face discussion.

Over the next few months, Stone and Bill carried on an erratic e-mail series of missives of deep-thinking such as had occurred when together. The decisive moment came when Stone sent Bill an email that asked, "Should we form the Association of Bad Friends??? Or Rogue Quakers of America???"

Whilst RQA had a certain ring to it (and slightly parallels the RSF), Bill said he leaned toward the Association of Bad Friends (ABF). He admitted to Stone, that while bad, he’d never thought of himself as a rogue. As he said, “I do like to heckle the herd from within, not lead it off into a new direction.” After further thought, they also agreed that "of America" was a little too parochial. They were certain that there had to be bad Quakers across the globe.

On Thirdmonth 8, 2008, Bill announced, via his blog, (
http://holyordinary.blogspot.com/2009/03/association-of-bad-friends.html ), the formation of the Association of Bad Friends. Membership cards were hastily designed (this haste being a further confirmation that Bill, at last, was a bad Quaker) and distributed upon request.

The only principle of the group was that no Yearly Meeting officials or anybody else could nominate anyone else for membership in the Association of Bad Friends. Self-nomination was the only acceptable way to become known as a member of the Association of Bad Friends.

Requests for membership flooded in and Bill spent the next 40 days and 40 nights doing nothing but printing and mailing out membership cards.Then he sent out a dove to test the waters. The dove returned with an email mail in its mouth. Unrolling it, Bill found this message, “Thee shouldst start an Association of Bad Friends group on Facebook.”

Unsure if this was a Word from Above or if it just meant that Stone’s computer was down and he had found another form of communicating, Bill went and did as the email said.

The group was formed with a brief explanation of its purpose and a restatement of its guiding principle – “A group for folks who are just not very good at being Quaker -- who aren't always peaceable, humble, kind, loving, truthful, ... and know it. It's a place to poke fun at ourselves (as bad Friends) and not at anybody else we might consider bad (or "good") Friends. The emphasis of the Association of Bad Friends is "good" fun. Members must self-nominate. Yearly Meetings and their officials are not allowed to name prospective members.”

The addition of the line, “It's a place to poke fun at ourselves (as bad Friends) and not at anybody else we might consider bad (or "good") Friends” was acknowledged as being awfully GOOD for a bunch of BAD Friends, but was considered necessarily (sic, RantWoman). Many self-proclaimed good Friends were having no compunctions against calling bad Friends bad and worse. Some of the bad Friends were smarting, rightfully, from hurt feelings. So no name-calling or meanness was to be allowed. "No Wounding Allowed." Such behavior is just too bad, even for BAD Friends.



With the latest revision forced by Facebook in the ABF organizational structure, RantWoman was called to lay down her clerkship of the Committee on Doing Sudoku in Meeting for Worship Committee. Instead RantWoman has been called to clerk the "Still Didn't get the memo Committee on Email Immoderation."

RantWoman alas has such amazing Bad Friend prowess that she is also seasoning calls to

Wing Commander, 907th Psalm Airborne Paper Ministry Squadron

The Thank you Ever So much for volunteering to do my discernment for me Committee on Organizational Development

the "Would you please start that sentence with 'I feel' school of tact, Diplomacy, and Conflict Excavation,"

the "No one has the right letters behind their name even to START to count the social worker-worthy issues in RantWoman's checkin at the beginning of committee meetings" Committee.

The "Never Mind that the Social Worker Worthy Issues are currently comparatively well-controlled Right now; they are still WAY too much for one's committeemates" committee.

The "Ah just shut up and let's have some silence" committee.

The "Edit the content of what one remembers saying when typing up the minutes" Friends Committee on elocution, rhetoric, and Oral presentation

The "Long Periods of Unformatted Worship Make Me Really just want some liturgy" committee

The "My civic activism projects are doing a better job about both inclusive process and racial justice than my Meeting" committee.


RantWoman thinks she had better STOP and go off to be a face in the crowd at an event about fiscal brokenness. Lord Have mercy on us all.