We need to not let what happened tonight happen again. Ie. we can't talk about pornography for half of the time.
Projection;
- We will try to get voting for the posts on this blog. Easy to discern quality of the posts.
- Currently setting up a parallel blog which will be a textbook, ideally read by everyone before coming to club.
- More soon. I have homework...
Agreed. New members will need to learn to separate the technicalities of implementation from the overarching structure of the concepts proposed.
ReplyDeleteAlso, there's something I observed at the meeting--the meeting's quality (perceived subjectively by several people) spiked upwards immediately after 6:30. While we eagerly welcome everyone interested to attend, the club is not Harkness. Let me say that again: the club is not Harkness. You are not obliged, in fact you are discouraged, to speak if you are at the meeting but not "certified" (in the Dr. Tisdall sense of the word) for the discussion. In other words, the ones who rambled on but didn't contribute to the discussion, we noticed, also happened to be the ones who left at 6:30. Don't take it personally; the Republican Club has a learning curve. If you think before you speak, and really consider the value of what you have to say, the time to speak and the time to be quiet in club dinners will become eminently apparent. (See message above about reading to begin building your "data dump.") We look forward to seeing you all again next meeting.
It has been my experience that different types of topics have to be applied to different types of participants. Libertarians don't tend to enjoy cultural issues like abortion, marriage etc. Conservatives and Liberals do. Liberals don't tend to enjoy economic topics because of they get wiped on the floor in about two minutes by any experienced club Republican (last night was pretty typical). They then have to either put in some heavy time learning the subject or they don't come back. The latter is the most common. The one advantage of the cultural topics is that you don't have to know much to participate, which is good in preventing the club from becoming a meeting of the von Mises Society. As new co-heads, I appreciate your desire to jump in to your own favorites feet first, but remember, "Officers eat last" (ask me if that's not a clear reference). Getting the rhythm right is not easy and it has to be fun for everyone, at least part of the time.
ReplyDelete"Officers eat last" - Marines, yes? Although I assume this is older than the US marines, so fill me in.
ReplyDeleteI learned this from my second born who was going through his officer's training in the US army, although I assume it is timeless. It means that when you are in charge, with the authority comes responsibility. In this instance to look after your charges before yourself. Doing this translates authority into leadership. The test of leadership comes when you shout, "follow me". Do they?
ReplyDelete