CSDF Meeting on Sep. 26, 2013, 2 PM SLT

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Gwyneth Llewelyn
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CSDF Meeting on Sep. 26, 2013, 2 PM SLT

Post by Gwyneth Llewelyn »

Dear fellow citizens,

Some 9 months ago, Ranma proposed to do another CSDF meeting. As she pointed out back then, factions do not "run for office" constitutionally, but that doesn't mean that factions are abolished or forbidden — rather the contrary, the CDS still abides by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which gives us the right to associate and to express ourselves freely.

While you all know that I've been away'ish — and will very likely remain like that for another year at least — that doesn't mean that I've been utterly clueless about the CDS (just moderately so :) ). What strikes me is that the CDS, these days, doesn't do any political debates and does not elect the RA, shrugging it off because there never are enough candidates for all seats. Somehow, voting, the cornerstone of democracy, has become "worthless", irrelevant, and low-priority. This is a bit scary!

So, I propose to get the CSDF meet again. We still have a handful of members, and maybe a few others who disagree with the CSDF's views and are happy to come to debate with us. Since the elections are over, this would not even be a "campaign" — but rather an open meeting, to try to discuss some strategies (perhaps for the next term), and give citizens the opportunity to talk about the CDS.

Political debate is not only within the walls of the RA! Rather, in a mature democracy, citizens get together, discuss ideas, formalise them, and then propose them to their representatives for further discussion and proposal. The CDS always was a participative democracy, even though it's true that most of the citizens just want to be kept alone and have some fun building things :) But some others also like to discuss options for their future!

To get the ball rolling, let's meet next Thursday, Sep. 26, at 2 PM SLT. Jon still has the old CSDF HQ rezzed near a ruined church, outside the walls of Neufreistadt. It's easy to find, but you can directly teleport there using this SLURL: http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/N ... 119/63/130

A few topics worth discussing:

- Checks and balances. How can we ensure democratic representativity when the number of citizens willing to serve is tiny, belongs to the same group, and controls all the branches? Formerly, when this happened — and, in the past, the CSDF has been accused of trying to get enough votes for all that! — we knew the names of the political factions who were behind the "groups", and we could out-vote them on the next elections. Now that groups are anonymous, and the elections fail to gather attention (and volunteers willing to serve), how can we protect our community from such maneuvers?

- What's the point of Covenants? Historically, Covenants follow a theme: their purpose was to ensure that the theme is kept up to a certain standard, and redirect citizens who fail to uphold the Covenants to builder groups like the Guild to try to get other citizens — either volunteers or hired hands — to work with them in order to "clean up" the builds.

- Are we financially solid? A question that gets many possible answers, depending on whom we ask. Looking at the numbers it seems that the answer is "no" — we don't have enough citizens right now to pay for all the tier costs. But on the other hand, all parcels (except one) that were put out for sale have been taken. So technically we should be above the red, right? Apparently, no, but it's hard to understand why not.

Feel free to come over and bring your own topics for discussion. Remember, at some point, the whole purpose of these meetings is to gather input, information, and ideas ("The Three Is") so that we might prepare a plan for the next term!

"I'm not building a game. I'm building a new country."
  -- Philip "Linden" Rosedale, interview to Wired, 2004-05-08

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