I had a rare lunch date today. Not only was the meeting itself an infrequent occurrence, but the group meeting also displayed a rare trait: the folks within it are wholly honest with each other about pretty much anything. If someone thinks it, he can say it. No one feels threatened or gets bent out of shape; it doesn’t matter how crazy, inappropriate, or otherwise counter-culture the remark may be. This includes saying that you think someone in the group is dead wrong, but that doesn’t happen very often because everyone is genuinely invested in trying to see the other person’s point of view. What does happen fairly often is the occurrence of the phrase, “I can’t say this to most people, but…” and out comes a thoroughly refined and balanced thought. But it’s a revolutionary thought. Too revolutionary for ‘polite’ (read: safe) discussion. Yet this IS safe discussion. And what’s more, it’s *real* discussion.
Still, that thought – borne of personal sweat, genuine passion, and sincere application of intellect – will either not be shared at all (outside of our infrequent meetings), or else it will be instantly disregarded when it first sees the light of day in a public group. Why? Because in the public group all the acceptable answers have already been identified by those who hold power. All that remains is for enough discussion time to elapse in order for the public group to claim that genuine deliberation did, in fact, occur, and therefore the decisions made are valid “group” decisions.
Whether it brings wonderful new things, or terrible problems, revolution always brings change. If change is inevitable, is it be better to RISK it on revolutionary, yet principled ideas – or just RESIST it and wait for time to force it upon you?
