Re: Quorum (Re: [ga] CORRECTION!!!)

[Kent Crispin <kent@songbird.com>]

On Mon, Mar 26, 2001 at 09:43:44PM +0200, Roberto Gaetano wrote:
> Kent,
[...]
> 
> What Harald pointed out is that, useful or useless, we *do* have rules, 
> that  are known by everybody, or at least they should.

The discussion, recall, started from someone's mistaken claim that 
three votes passed a historic law in the US.  It was pointed out that 
the USG procedures define a quorum which make it impossible for such a 
thing to happen.  I said that the GA does not have such a rule, but I 
did not express it clearly.  We have rules, indeed, but we don't have a 
rule like that (with exception to the case when it is the voting rules 
themselves which are being voted on).

> What happened looks like "déjà vu". The GA takes a vote (or a poll, or 
> debates an issue), reaches rough consensus of the people that did vote (or 
> expressed an opinion), and the "losing" part complains about the small 
> number of voters. I've seen this before, I will see this again.

And the "winning side" always tries to claim that the result is
legitimate and authoritative, regardless of how ludicrous that might 
be.  You have seen that before, and you will see that again, as well.  
Personally, I have come to the conclusion that the emphasis on voting 
is fundamentally destructive, and that it only serves to further 
polarize things.

> 
> Folks, you all know the reality.
> You all know that this list is just a subset of the Internet community (less 
> than 300 people over a population of millions), and that just a small 
> minority votes.
> We have two possibilities:
> 1. to say that altogether this GA has no sense, and save our time for 
> something else (or go play in another sandbox), or
> 2. try to get the best out of it, try to make the more out of the small 
> resources and participation, try to have a meaningful debate.
> 
> Option number 2., IMHO, means also to accept the results of the (limited) 
> participation, and not to cry foul if we don't like them.

1) Reminding people of limited participation is not crying "foul".  
Limited participation is a fact that everyone needs to keep in mind, 
not just the "losers".  (Love those polarizing terms, don't you?)

2) It is completely unrealistic to expect people to say "Oh, the GA
decided such and so, so I'm going to shut up and accept the decision of
the GA as the final word".  What comes out of the GA is just what comes
out of the GA.  Itis not binding on anyone, and every single participant
will pursue whatever other avenues are available to try to influence
events in their favor.

The GA has no mandate to be a decision-making body, and it is not
structured to be one.  It was intended to be forum, and a source of
people to do work. 

> >Therefore, one still must go back and analyze any vote to determine the
> >level of support it had, to decide if the result should be given any
> >weight.  Hence the "rule" has no significance.
> 
> Of course one must analyse the numbers.

That is all I reall said, you know...

-- 
Kent Crispin                               "Be good, and you will be
kent@songbird.com                           lonesome." -- Mark Twain
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