[pp.int.general] My perspective on the events

[Pat Mächler]

Dear pirates,

I really feel the urge to write something here; even if it is just for
the archive and will probably not change the course of things to come.
I expect that Samir will likely not be reelected within the next years
and I'm not certain if he will stay in the pirate movement. No matter
what I'm as grateful to him as to any pirate who dedicates hir time
for the pirate movement.

I don't want to categorize anyone (especially not Samir) here, as I
hate social categories that ultimately often help a lot to diminish
the freedom of individuals in societies. However I think it would
probably be helpful for everyone to show my perspective; partially out
of an inner feeling, partially as I think "objectivity" can never be
"the look from nowhere", but solely achieved by incorporating as many
perspectives as possible and by reflecting upon your own perspective;
and partially because I think the perspective might even contribute
against a single-minded categorization of Samir.

I feel myself personally always to be between a pragmatic and an
idealist. Now when it comes to finding solutions I am usually the one
that tries to come up with a consensus. On the pragmatic and
leadership level I'm peace-driven. I'm the one that always plays the
"good cop" rule. Authoritarian leadership is not my expertise, neither
is playing advocatus diaboli for hardly-achievable consensus solutions
that I often tried to push for. However these skills are the expertise
of Samir and I am grateful for that. I think it's even vital to have
such elements in a team to a certain extent. Just as it is the case
when the political left and the political right agree to a certain
consensus after a long debate, it's not as if such a "solution" should
not be questionned and attacked by the pirate parties. Neither is it
the case that an extreme of anti-authoritarian leading would always
lead to good solutions. Vice-versa the other extreme is neither a
solution (it's a nice ideal, but will likely never work out in the
extreme form). I was always aware of these "weaknesses" on my side.
When we started to coreteam we did agree that we will play "the good
cop-bad cop game" and I was happy with that as I knew that it worked
out for my in my scout troop as well. Certainly there will be hardly
anyone that will accuse me of beiing guilty for driving Samir in a
position where he had to act like this. But I'm quite certain that
this first arrangement I had with Samir was a factor, which was also
contributing and it's not crystal clear whether the term "guilt" could
not be used. I'm not going into a discussion on the possibly atomic
structures of the "guilt" term, as I had already previously written
about that on this list and I would advise you not to do so either; I
would rather advise you to take that time to think on schemes and
write on proposals that can be put forward for the upcoming GA in
order to have means to avoid such situations in the future.

As said I expect that this message will not lead to change the course
of things I assume to come. Probably that's for the better, probably
not. No one can say for certain. I'm not going to defend Samir for
discussing a relationship in the way he did publicly or certain other
actions which I personally do not approve of. But I think however
things will go on from now...it's vital for the pirate movement not to
become close-minded and I hope I helped to contribute to that. I'm
positive we will find a way to do the HQ incorporation before the next
GA; I would prefer to have Samir aboard for the PPI HQ incorporation
as he is just as crazy as most pirates in the movement that believe in
a common international organization; for that I think he deserves to
be mentionned within the PPI HQ documents.

note: likely there will be a certain amount of critical response to
this mail, either to my perspective, PPI as such or me as a person. Be
assured that I will consume and reflect upon this criticism, but I'm
likely not to respond to them at the moment. I decided that I
currently have to dedicate my time to other areas, than trying to
dispute other views. This was also not the intention of this mail.

BTW: I consider myself 31377 to send this somewhat pathetic message at
13:37 CET ;-P

regards
-pat maechler
 treasurer of PPI