There’s a little “Occupy” in all of us just waiting to come out and you don’t have to be on the streets to feel it in your gut. Individuals in all cultures now pause—the Church included—when top-down edicts and closed discussions are passed off as normal. The current demand to stop Episcopal Church Council members from tweeting during meetings is an example. OWS is committed to horizontal and radically open discussion. It is “radical” because allowing more and more persons into the conversation revolutionizes what the democratic experience looks like...and is. Indeed, the EC debate engages the consequences of an Information Age but the scent of unfairness when access is denied comes from a far deeper place. Occupy!From Bishop George Packard on Facebook. A longer version may be found at +George's blog, Occupied Bishop.
What I said on Facebook:
As I see it, transparency is always in order. I don't tweet myself, but I say let them tweet.
"Therefore whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered behind closed doors will be proclaimed from the housetops."
...sooner or later. Why not sooner?
I've been off-put by the string of comments from the anti-tweet lobby: so much abou protecting people from hearing things they might not understand, or that aren't ready for public dissemination. This reads to me like the usual infantilization of the church by its so-called "leaders" who have to package things in byte-sized pre-screened pre-wrapped chunks rather than letting all those tweets say the wrong ("horrors!") thing. It isn't just about transparency, but the desire to be perceived in a certain way -- to control perceptions of others rather than simply being, and then letting the chips fall.
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, you go, girl!
Tobias, thanks. We might not understand, but, at least, give us a chance. If we try hard, we might just tease out meaning from the tweets.
ReplyDelete