State of Siciety: preview and suggestions

RantWoman is NOT writing this year’s State of the Meeting Report. RantWoman found the initial draft well-crafted. Humbly, as usual, RantWoman found herself wanting to upset the careful crafting; RantWoman is also cross about things that seem otherwise to RantWoman than they are presented in the State of Society report. RantWoman reminds herself that she gets to suggest corrections. Others get to suggest corrections, and the practice is on the second monthly reading to accept the efforts of the drafters with gratitude.

 

Here were RantWoman’s suggestions, a couple notes added after the initial email, with particular emphasis in a second email on the joy of the FLGBTQC gathering including many steps inviting Friends to make access needs known and a clear point of contact before the event for accessibility requests. RantWoman is perfectly fine with the thought that she may be telling too much of the truth about a number of hard realities and hard realities that others want to lay at RantWoman’s feet. Suffice it to say, RantWoman has the sort of versatile God that gets things done lots of different ways but many many things need to be held in the Light.

 

Suggestions for the State of the Meeting Report.

RantWoman will keep to her practice of not posting the entire draft State of Society report until it actually passes through Business Meeting a second time. However, RantWoman is called to share a number of suggested additions to her blog and the known universe. (RantWoman will also check to see whether she has posted last year’s report. RantWoman remembers something like “learning about ableism” in last year’s report; RantWoman remembers thinking “Ableism? News to RantWoman?” But back to crafting this year’s report, acknowledging no word limit on suggestions even though good sense dictates that the State of Society Report should under NO circumstances be longer than two sides of a page in a reasonably readable font.

 

The minimalist approach: Add the italicized changes below to the draft:

● Volunteers modernized, organized, and decluttered our library, clearing away older volumes and making room for new light, including the cataloging of a large-print Bible for low-vision Friends who want actually to hold a book instead of interacting with an electronic device. A new project is underway now to create an electronic catalog of all library materials,

● Under new editors our monthly newsletter, Gleamings, underwent a cosmetic redesign including addition of headings to make it more readable for screen reader users. Submissions have increased.

 

The minimalist approach as above plus one addition, with disability content in italics:

·         In February our Meeting hosted a mini Midwinter Gathering for FLGBTQC with the theme Have FUN. Friends came from 3 yearly Meetings and several Monthly Meetings for a day of worship, crafts, food, fun and variety show. An invitation at Opening Worship to share access needs made it safe for Friends to speak of things others might not even have thought about.

 

Look, RantWoman knows there needs to be a word limit if only for the sake of readability. But RantWoman thinks it is never terrible to name some of the things our worship is a bulwark against, kind of like this:

We strive to remain faithful to Light among us in the face of many challenges:

·         Seattle is growing and its transportation infrastructure badly needs to evolve to keep up with this growth. A region-wide housing affordability crisis makes it difficult for many among us to find stable housing and also makes for many heated public meetings and creates many pressures for displacement.

·         We have been firmly reminded of ecological crises: last summer brought several weeks of wildfire haze, with many days so severe that people were advised to limit time outdoors. Images of an undernourished mother orca carrying around her dead calf haunted us for many days until the grieving whale was able to release her baby. This winter, we lived through a once in about 10 years two-week long snow emergency.

·         As if we did not have enough challenges evoking each other’s best selves, our national political mood assaults our souls, conscience, and sometimes physical beings.

 

Cut straight to the chase. Add as SECOND paragraph

Version 1

A long ago moment when Nominating Committee declared everything to do with disability off-topic for a Friend experiencing midlife vision loss continues to haunt our community, most recently with an appointed Care and Accountability committee for the same Friend that also thought its charge did not include figuring out what does or does not work about matters of disability. Currently a clearness committee is at work on a minute to create an Ad-Hoc committee on Disability at UFM to hear Friends’ stories and cultivate better mutual understanding.

 

Version 2

A long ago moment when Nominating Committee declared everything to do with disability off-topic for a Friend experiencing midlife vision loss continues to haunt our community, most recently with an appointed Care and Accountability Committee for the same Friend that also thought its charge did not include figuring out what does or does not work for that Friend about matters of disability. Considering the number of former clerks of Quaker everything flummoxed as we struggle to talk of these challenges, it has to be okay that lots of other Friends are struggling too. We are gratified though when people able to do many simple things turn out to be extremely helpful. Currently a clearness committee is at work on an effort to create an Ad-Hoc committee on Disability at UFM to hear Friends’ stories and cultivate better mutual understanding.

 

Version 3, the fractal version in danger of having as many characters as the entire rest of this post.

A long ago moment when Nominating Committee declared everything to do with disability off-topic for a Friend experiencing midlife vision loss continues to haunt our community, most recently with an appointed Care and Accountability Committee for the same Friend that also thought its charge did not include figuring out what does or does not work for that Friend about matters of disability.

RantWoman notes and greatly appreciates many step s our clerk took to try to recognize challenges of blindness in Business Meeting. However, efforts actually to discuss a number of different disability issues in Business meeting led to very colorful disruptions. There was no space for a perfectly legitimate at least to RantWoman question about wheelchair access to homelessness services provided by a new tenant. Another tangled discussion of minutes degenerated with occurrence of the word “idiot.” See multiple references on this blog. “Idiot” is certainly ableist language, and RantWoman is having the same problem about that term as many disability justice advocates have about words which may be used to characterize the current occupant of the White House. A matter of physical safety also entered the picture and the result was yet more distress, as well as lively ongoing dialogue involving “safety,” eldering, and a number of other challenging concepts.

Considering the number of former clerks of Quaker everything flummoxed as we struggle to talk of these challenges, it has to be okay that lots of other Friends are struggling too. We are gratified though when people able to do many simple things turn out to be extremely helpful. Currently a clearness committee is at work on an effort to create an Ad-Hoc committee on Disability at UFM to hear Friends’ stories and cultivate better mutual understanding and better centered processes in Meeting for Business.

 

Change the paragraph here as suggested by the italics

This year, our meeting considered several issues related to changes in our local community,  including a letter to the mayor and city council in opposition to the building of a new youth jail in  Seattle. This proposal led to dialog within the meeting, but no action was taken. Friends approved a minute making the connection between transportation changes in our area and the struggle to address climate change as the U district Mobility Plan (related to a new Light Rail station set to open in 2021) evolves.