[Noisebridge-discuss] Sunlight may disinfect.

[Naomi Most]

Hi world,

Over the course of several mailing list posts, I'm going to expose some
topics here to the mailing list which is read by 1000s of people worldwide,
which is considered the environmental gauge for Noisebridge at large.

It's my hope others will join in -- especially to disagree with what I have
to say, if they feel the need to do so.

Slack has been our catch-all shade structure (in every possible form of the
word "shade") since 2014.  We set up the Slack back in 2014 in an effort to
take our "dirty laundry" off the public internet.

Unfortunately, I see now that we've lost public accountability and a sense
of our own history.  We overprivilege people with short reaction times and
itchy trigger fingers, and underprivilege people who spend longer to
consider what they say.  We've done honest conversation a disservice.

James pointed this out to me a few months ago, and it took me a few months
to really understand.  Sorry for being slow on the uptake, James.

Noisebridge just went through an extremely dark period, during which time
Mitch Altman decided to leave due to repeated bullying.

I just met with Mitch last night.  There is no possible way he will come
back to the space.  The emotional wounds run too deep.  The bullies in
question were able to key into weaknesses and make sure he felt bad about
himself every time he entered the space.  As a result, even if we somehow
*guaranteed* that those people wouldn't come back, he couldn't trust that a
new crop of bullies wouldn't arise and do the same things.

The problem is that Noisebridge's problems aren't unique to Noisebridge.
The Bay Area plays host to a particularly nasty form of social policing in
which an artificial form of social harmony is prized well above Truth and
Authenticity.  This problem runs across the United States and probably
beyond -- and is the source of the alt-right's caricature of the Left as
"snowflakes".

More people than Mitch have left.  Only Mitch has given me permission to
speak his name, but at least one of those people have announced their
leaving here on the nb-discuss Mailing List.

I want to talk about all this in a way that sticks, in a format where
people consider their words and expose them readily to the rest of the
world.  Where people feel they can criticize me and anyone else quite
openly, because they have no stake in the game.

Noisebridge is festering, merely coasting on the hard creative work of more
than a decade past.

Perhaps sunlight will disinfect.

I still believe there is a future for Noisebridge.  I believe Noisebridge
is an important institution in the Bay, and I want to see if there's a way
to learn from our hardships and grow stronger for it -- the way we always
have.

I think that's enough for #1.

Come at me,
Naomi
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