[statecom-discuss] 2 major problems a the convention-requestforarespectful discussion

[Mike Heichman]

September 2, 2007

Hi Members of the State Comm:

Thanks to Adam, Merelice, Betts, Grace, Bill, Nat, John and Mel, ((I 
hope that I haven’t forgotten anyone.) who have responded to my initial 
message of August 27 requesting a discussion around two issues relating 
to our convention and thanks to those of you who have been reading and 
thinking about our discussion.

I wish to apologize for not noticing Adam you at the convention. While I 
would really appreciate it if you would become more involved in the 
party for many reasons, I now have an additional reason because I want 
to be able to recognize you at future meetings. I also want to apologize 
for all those who were elected on August 25 who are under 50.

My own understanding of the convention and its aftermath has been 
deepened by the discussion that we have had on line and the private 
discussions that I have had with some of you by e-mail and on the phone.

I. Our Discussion

I thank Bill for his following comment: “Mistakes are inevitable, but 
only one is fatal: not learning from mistakes.”

We ended our last state convention meeting by going around the circle 
and briefly reflecting on what had happened at our meeting. Many of us 
expressed unhappiness. My understanding of Dan M’s comment was that one 
of the problems of the meeting was that many of us had arrived with low 
expectations. (Dan, please correct me if I’m wrong.) I think that Dan 
was right. However, how can we come to State Comm. meetings when we have 
a recent history of not managing our meeting well and not using our time 
well to address our major problems?

I am more hopeful when so many of you (this time) have taken the time 
and energy to communicate with each other (Yes-at times our 
communication is messy, but as Grace noted at the convention, it’s 
always going to be messy.).

II. The MA presidential primary decision

1.      I was partially responsible for making a mistake in planning the 
convention. Those of us who met after the last State Comm. meeting did 
an exceptional job of coming up with a preliminary agenda and to 
continue working on a convention which was far more successful than I 
had expected. However, it was an enormous mistake to only plan to have 
15 minutes for the only major discussion that we knew would be addressed 
at the convention. Grace had communicated with me a number of times 
previously that my decision to bring this before the convention would be 
time-consuming and messy. I thought that the choices would be very clear 
and that we could handle it quickly. Grace was right. Mea culpa.

2.     While things certainly got messy, the process was much better 
than I remembered. The major problem, I think, was not the process but 
not providing enough time and problems with group dynamics. As someone 
who often criticizes the process, on reflection, I think that this time 
the process worked very well under difficult circumstances.

3.    The 21-7 vote

a.    I still believe that Grace was right to point out the 7 were 
women. (That was her observation.) Merelice pointed out that one of the 
seven was a male. No one else has said whether or not the actual number 
was 6 or 7. It really doesn’t matter to me whether the number was 6 or 
7; I think that it was a legitimate observation made in our party, which 
embraces the values of social justice and equal opportunity, respect for 
diversity and feminism.
 
b.    The vote did not go down strictly on gender lines. Many women 
voted for the proposal. If there had been more time for the “majority 
viewpoint” to express their reasons, it is highly likely that the result 
would have been greater than 21-7, which by itself is a significant 
majority.

c.    There is a lot of evidence based on what people said in this 
dialogue that the decision was made based on the merits of the arguments 
made. No one yet has made the argument why this was a feminist issue.

d.    Except for the major problem with a lack of sufficient time to 
discuss this important issue, there was nothing in our process which 
distorted the results of the vote. I believe that there was sufficient 
understanding of the two choices before the vote was made.

e.     I agree with those who believe that the correct decision was made 
by the co-facilitators (Gary and Martina) that the convention, the 
highest decision-making body of our party, had made a decision and that 
there was no justification to table this to another body (Adcom or State 
Comm).

 
III. The Election of our Leadership of Our Party

1.    At different points during the convention, we were involved in 
different steps in nominating and electing the leadership of our state 
party. Grace was the only person who pointed out that in the election of 
our leadership, we should pay attention to diversity. While I believe 
that people heard Grace, other people should have made this message at 
different times. There were a number of people who attended the 
convention that were relatively new to the party. Many of them do not 
know much about the history of our merged party. They do not know that 
we always have elected at least one person of color to the position of 
Co-Chair. I know that I felt discomfort about this before the election. 
I did not know how to say something without the appearance that I was 
inappropriately campaigning for some of the candidates. So I said 
nothing. Mea culpa.

2.     I wrote this in my August 27 letter. “Here are the bottom lines:

    a. The only woman officers that we elected (co-chairs and NC) were 
mandated     positions for women.
    b. For our officers: One white woman was elected (Female Co-Chair); 
No person of     color; No low-income person; No “Handicapped” Person; 
No GLBTG; Nobody     under 50 years old.
    c. NO RAINBOW!”

I’m sorry about the under 50 comment. I believe that the rest of my 
statement is accurate.

3.     Response to E-Mail Discussion:

A. In response to Adam, I agree with him when he wrote that it is 
important for us to ask,  “why we aren't attracting the people we say we 
want into the party, …”, but I disagree when he wrote that “we shouldn’t 
focus on any of the discussion and/or election outcomes last Saturday.” 
This is part of what I had written to him, “It is essential that our 
leadership is diverse if our mission includes contesting the system of 
white, male, heterosexual, rich supremacy. One of our problems is that 
our rules. group dynamics and past practice are often barriers to our 
attempts to make our best decisions. We need to create a better way of 
electing our leadership-one of the most important things that happens at 
our annual conventions."

B. While Merelice explained some of the reasons and barriers which led 
to several women, people of color and young people choosing not to run, 
she remains the only officer elected officer who is not a white male. 
Merelice pointed out that what happens at the local level will be more 
important to the future of the party than who was elected to AdCom. 
While agreeing with that sentiment, I disagree that the party only grows 
from one direction (bottom up). If we want our party to grow and become 
more diverse, the leadership of the party must reflect our vision. I 
believe that the current election was a major setback; in the past we 
have always done a much better job of electing a diverse leadership. We 
should acknowledge that this is a problem and constructively deal with it.

(I am thrilled to hear from Merelice that Wanda has agreed to be the 
Assistant Treasurer!)

C. In response to Adam, I made a recommendation to help remedy this 
problem. Maybe electing Gary and Karin, which would add to the diversity 
of our state leadership, is not a good one or the best one.  I am sure 
open to better ideas. However, your response reflects a tendency in our 
party on behalf of some of our members to equate a call for diversity 
with an attack on white males.

I see nothing in our party which necessitates this kind of protection. 
In many ways we do not promote sufficient affirmative action. Instead 
our affirmative action rules often protects the participation of males, 
which I find to be unnecessary and ridiculous. Why do we have to have a 
rule that one of our co-chairs must be a male? Imagine that we had 
elected Wendy and Martina to be our co-chairs!-Our rules would prevent 
that from happening. Imagine that Suffolk County in our next election 
would elect 8 delegates-all of them female including women of color, 
low-income women, lesbian, etc.!—a richly diverse delegation would not 
be seated unless at least 7 males were also elected. How ridiculous!

Affirmative Action is not about including everyone. It is about taking 
positive steps to include those who are historically and currently kept 
behind. I look forward to the day when we discover that our party needs 
to take affirmative action to protect white privileged males. Until that 
day let us focus our efforts and energies on our real problems.

D. Bill (and others) wants us to focus more of our energies in building 
our party at the local level. I’m sure that there are many reasons why 
this is not happening. One of them is NOT that the state party is 
actively standing in the way. While I agree that more of us who are in 
the leadership of the state party could do more local work and chapter 
development, I believe that a stronger state party would better 
facilitate that goal.

It’s true that our party has been in decline despite our statewide 
campaign last year. While I believe that there could have been things 
that the slate could have done better during the campaign and since the 
election to use their efforts to build our strength locally, I also 
believe that the lack of support from the state party was (and 
continues) to be a barrier. Imagine that our party had a membership 
brochure last year and along with the candidates had made a big effort 
to distribute those brochures! If this one thing had happened, I believe 
that we would be a stronger party today.

On a more positive note, the Boston chapter sponsored a workshop on the 
Sudan at the convention. Karin, Joachim and David did a wonderful job of 
organizing the workshop and bringing some new people to the convention. 
At our chapter meeting next Sunday, we are inviting our guests to join 
us for a potluck meeting. We will discuss the workshop, the convention 
and their perceptions of our party. We will invite them to join the 
chapter and the GRP; I will bring voter registration forms. One new 
person  who attended just changed his major to Political Science and is 
interested in joining our National Committee.

E. General Comments based on other communications and reflection:

Having diversity positions on the State Comm. and AdCom are both 
excellent examples of our commitment to affirmative action. However, 
these mechanisms should not be used to deny or cover up our weaknesses. 
It is not OK that we didn’t elect a rainbow leadership because we have 
an Adcom which will add diversity to our leadership.

Our officers are our public face both inside and outside our party. 
Comparatively speaking the all white male MA congressional delegation is 
among the most liberal in the country; that may be acceptable behavior 
for the Democrats, but it should never be acceptable to us.

We have two choices--What we did was acceptable and no change will be 
made or we will come up with some kind of solution.

III. Reflections on Rodney King’s Question: “SO WHY CAN’T WE ALL GET ALONG?”

I was thinking of Dan M’s comment that he made at the last State Comm. 
meeting about our expectations helping to shape our experience. I find 
myself more and more to include the request, “Let’s have a respectful 
discussion.” in my thinking and writing. It’s part of the subject title 
of this discussion. I also confess that it is more of a prayer than a 
request.

I don’t know anybody in the GRP who is not sincerely interested in 
building our party. I don’t know anybody in the GRP who doesn’t have 
some personal issue that they haven’t successfully worked out.

I must admit that there is a member of our party who has my number. This 
wonderful person often pushes my buttons and drives me crazy. There have 
been times when we have been together and I have lost it. So when we are 
together, I try to be better prepared. If my button is pushed, I try to 
be reflective and ask what’s going on inside me. I try to be more 
patient and more forgiving.

I have a new question-“So what can we do, individually and collectively, 
to better get along with each other?”

Love,

Mike