[TriLUG] Palmer for another SC term; proposed amendment to the bylaws

[Chris Knowles]

Alright, I'm concerned now.

Agree or disagree with Mr. Palmer, [1] he at least has stood up to address
what he sees as a problem in the group.

Having several people step up and say "Yeah!  I saw this behaviour years
ago, did nothing, and that's why you all are immature apes compared to
group X!" (paraphrased for effect.) is disturbing.  Not because TriLUG
didn't act that way, totally did.  And I'd wager for the people involved at
the beginning including many of the old guard (myself included) are guilty
of some of the problems being mentioned.  But instead I'm concerned because
those people who saw a problem, were disturbed by it, stood by and did
nothing, rather than trying.  We have a steering committee for a reason.
They're supposed to be the representatives of what we want the group to
be.  And to steer the group in that direction.  If you contacted the
steering committee and they ignored, or reviled you, then well, I'm
ashamed, but from the various threads, I'm guessing you just gave up.  And
if you're not happy with the steering committee, well, I hear there are
elections in a few weeks.

So don't come in *now* and say "I saw that too"  Instead say "Wow, I'm glad
you guys are doing this, I'd be happy to come to a group that espouses
that".  By not standing up, you lose the opportunity to kvetch.

Of course, this leads me in my current direction - Do Linux User groups
still serve a useful purpose?  In the old world, where getting X to run was
a triumph, and rpm dependency hell and compiling from source were *every*
day occurrences, it was *very* useful, but in the modern world where my
eight year old has installed and used linux with no problems, and the googs
have so much information, are they useful?  (When was the last time we did
a *real* installfest?  You know, where people installed new systems?)

So, Cristobal, I'm proud to be in a group associated with you, even though
I may have concerns.  Thank you.  And I want more women to come.  The
comments I've heard from the women I know that work at RedHat are more to
the affect of "There's no other women down there, I'm not going to be the
only one"  - which is an interesting chicken/egg problem that we have to
solve.

CJK

[1] and I agree, though I have concerns about any movement towards
zero-tolerance.  Tolerance is what we want.  Not tolerance for idiot
behaviour, but if all we do is tar-feather and throw out, then how are the
offending individuals ever to learn?  We should include and educate the
people away from idiot behaviour.

<SNIP for length>