[nfb-talk] state con attendance
Chris Jones
chris_l_jones at earthlink.net
Sat Nov 10 17:34:24 CST 2007
Dear Chris and Listers:
This is Chris Jones from Tacoma, Washington. Well, I'm kind of in Mike
Freeman's ball park. I'm almost 55, am totally blind, use a Guide Dog, know
Braille well, get around okay, but am sure I'm not the greatest traveler,
need to lose some weight, but what I know is that I have to keep fighting
for my blind brothers and sisters, no matter what the age or stage, or
everything we've fought for will go down the tubes. I hav wondered what my
work in my little corner of Washington State does, as you might where you
are, but give up one good time, and you'll find people wondering what
happened to you because they care. Oh, yeah, I'm also a preacher, one of
those crazy tongue-talkin, Holy-Ghost folks, and I have gotten tired, too,
sometimes, of feeling that I can't do much, but I've decided that I need to
stay on the barricades for you and anyone else who wants to be treated
fairly. Understand, I grew up in the 60's and 70's. I'm old enough to have
remembered when President Kennedy, Dr. King and Robert Kennedy were
assassinated and when we sent the first man on the Moon. Why do I write?
Because you need to know that, whether I know you or understand your issues
or not, I believe it is my responsibility to do all I can so that your life
is better than mine has been, and mine hasn't been bad, but it would have
been worse if Dr. tenBroek and others hadn't fought for me. I hope you take
this as genuine encouragement. Get to wherever you need to however you need
to. Yeah, independence is important, but my wife, Judy, also blind, is
naturally the consumate geographer at national conventions. We've been
married going on 28 years and I'll never try to compare myself with
her--that's fine, she can be better at navigating than I am, but I have
strengths, too, and so do you, so know that you're vital in this movement,
my friend.
Yours in the NFB,
Chris Jones
----- Original Message -----
From: "Chris Westbrook" <westbc at clw19.com>
To: "NFB Talk Mailing List" <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Saturday, November 10, 2007 2:36 PM
Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] state con attendance
> Mike, you make some good points. Being a young blind person myself, I
> think
> it's sad that many younger blind people view progress as inevitable and
> feel
> no need to join an organization. On the other hand, I'm not really sure
> what NFB is really doing to stop the tide from turning against us The
> biggest issue I see looming ahead is a loss of access to information.
> This
> could be due to inaccessible computer software, inaccessible appliances,
> or
> any number of other things I haven't thought of. On the inaccessible
> appliances front, we had a home showcase at convention, but do you really
> think that will make a difference? I'm sure most manufacturers really
> don't
> care whether their products were coincidentally sort of accessible. I
> hope
> our NFB Jernigan Institute can eventually help with this area. That leads
> me to my next point, which is what mike said about some people believing
> that the national leadership are the experts. I see the NFB as a very top
> down organization with much of it's activity happening at the national
> level. I wonder if in the future the NFB will become more and more
> focused
> on it's Jernigan institute and basically be a clearinghouse for research
> and
> product design, while the ACB does most of the advocacy work? I know for
> myself I really don't see that many ways for a rank and file member to
> influence policy, especially if they can't come to convention but even if
> they can.
>
> Also, I really think people in NFB need to relax and realize that not
> every
> blind person has had great training or has the ability to do everything
> independently. I know ACB has been criticized for having volunteers at
> their convention, and frankly I find that kind of amusing when NFB's
> leadership always has someone going sighted guide with them. IF it's good
> enough for the leadership, why is it not good enough for the general
> membership? If you don't want the help, just refuse it, but don't keep
> someone like me from using help that we may need. On another note, I
> frankly think ACB is better equipped to handle the challenges of the
> future.
> Yes, they can be a bit more demanding than necessary, but I think we as
> blind people are going to have to do more and more of that as time goes
> on.
> NFB's philosophy is too focused on always being independence and this
> whole
> idea of blindness being a nuisance and not that big of a deal. I'm afraid
> the NFB will suddenly wake up one day when all microwaves and other
> appliances are flat paneled with no way to use them effectively, there are
> no usable telephones, all keyboards are completely touch screen and
> wonder,
> gee how did we get here? I think I may be exaggerating slightly, but I
> don't think I'm exaggerating as much as some may think. My only
> consolation
> is that when things start getting worse, we will wake up and disregard
> what
> Kenneth Jernigan said in his speech "the day after civil rights" whenever
> that is, and start fighting again. I just hope it's not too late.
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Mike Freeman" <k7uij at panix.com>
> To: "NFB Talk Mailing List" <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
> Sent: Saturday, November 10, 2007 2:02 PM
> Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] state con attendance
>
>
>> Ray:
>>
>> Welcome to the way the "other half" lives. Here in Washington, we
>> consider we're doing an outstanding job if we get seventy-five to eighty
>> people at our state banquet. Unlike at national conventions, our
>> banquets are more well attended than are our plenary convention sessions
>> as some convention participants bring guests to the banquet who do not
>> attend the rest of the convention.
>>
>> Of course, part of the problem here in Washington is that, whether we
>> admit it or not, we're still suffering from the organizational split
>> that accompanied the whole Robert Acosta business in the late 1970's
>> when the then-affiliate for Washington was expelled (or chose to leave,
>> depending upon one's viewpoint) and was reorganized. The old affiliate
>> eventually joined ACB so that ACB is considerably larger numerically
>> than is NFB in Washington. In the legislature, however, it is we of NFB
>> who are known for getting things done.
>>
>> AFfiliates east of the Mississippi such as Massachusetts are far larger
>> than are our affiliates out here with the exception of California. WE
>> are, in Shakespeare's terms, "we happy few". But NFB is where the action
>> is.
>>
>> On the original subject, what I see in terms of dwindling convention
>> attendance and grousing about the irrelevance of convention material
>> stems, I believe, from a number of trends in society today. First,
>> society is, in general, much more fragmented than was the case thirty or
>> forty years ago. People move around the country much more often than
>> heretofore and, hence, don't put down roots and make as many lasting
>> local friendships. (When was the last time you attended a "block
>> party"?) They are thus less likely to have great circles of friends --
>> arguably a prerequisit for easy growth of organizations.
>>
>> Second, perhaps because society is more fragmented and because there are
>> more venues of entertainment (cable TV, the Internet, video games and
>> the like), I believe that people are far less likely to be "joiners"
>> then was the case even twenty years ago. There are too many other things
>> competing for their time.
>>
>> Third, I believe that it is fair to say that the 1960's and 1970's were
>> decades of activism. Whatever your thoughts are concerning the war in
>> Iraq, note the vast difference between the small anti-war demonstrations
>> of today and the mass protests against the Vietnam war from 1964 to
>> 1975. WE of NFB, like many other activist organizations, are the victims
>> of the paradigm shift from activism to indifference and (see above) from
>> the paradigm of working to make changes to being entertained.
>>
>> Fourth, I believe that, rightly or wrongly, many young blind people
>> today see all the progress that the blind have made over the previous
>> two generations toward a world of equality with the sighted and conclude
>> that continued progress in this arena is inevitable. Obviously, I
>> disagree with this assessment and, in fact, I am worried that we might
>> be on the verge of slipping backward, making NFB even more of a
>> necessity than it may have been twenty years ago. Couple this with laws
>> mandating provision of services such as DSS offices at universities and
>> this is a recipe for organizational lacitude IMO. I opine that many
>> young people do not recognize that provision of some of these services
>> constitutes a wolf in sheep's clothing and, hence, when they hit the
>> "real world" and encounter businesses that don't automatically provide
>> them with all the high-tech gadgetry they think they need, they
>> interpret the problem as one of discrmination rather than one simply of
>> the way the world works. All this is to say that many blind people of
>> all ages today don't see why they need to gain advocacy skills or pay
>> attention to all the "dull" stuf involving politics or their agencies
>> for the blind. Let "the experts" do it. And while many would agree with
>> us that agency moguls may not be the "experts", some are beginning to
>> see *us* as the "experts",where by "us" I mean NFB leadership. In other
>> words, I'm not sure that the rank-and-file always sees that it has a
>> stake in what's happening or that it really has the power to change
>> things.
>>
>> This problem is not unique to NFB: ACB has it also. The "advantage", if
>> one wishes to call it that, that ACB has is that often its affiliates
>> conduct many more social functions than do NFB affiliates -- at least
>> it's like that out here in the Pacific Northwest. When, for example, was
>> the last time you attended a NFB affiliate convention where a comedian
>> was the featured banquet speaker? It has happend in ACB affiliates out
>> here.
>>
>> Now I would hazard that this sort of fluff is not what we in NFB truly
>> want. But to make changes, we must understand why what we're doing may
>> not always appeal to "the masses" and, therefore, must decide whether we
>> can incorporate other items into our conventions that might gain
>> interest and not cause groans of "same ol' same ol'" while at the same
>> time not betraying our NFB heritage and philosophy.
>>
>> I don't have the answer but I value the discussions as we may
>> collectively come up with ideas that might work for all of us.
>>
>> Mike Freeman, President
>> NFB of Washington
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: Ray Foret Jr
>> To: NFB Talk Mailing List
>> Sent: Friday, November 09, 2007 9:37 AM
>> Subject: Re: [nfb-talk] state con attendance
>>
>>
>> Edd, I am floored!!! Are you truly telling us that at your last New
>> Hampshire state NFB convention, y'all only had 30 attendees? Only 30?
>> What
>> is y'all's membership compared to that number? I just cannot get my
>> mind
>> around the idea of y'all putting all that work in to an all day state
>> convention and having only 30 people there. Perhaps you might inquire
>> of
>> your members just what the issues are which cause them not to attend
>> y'all's
>> convention. From what I gather, you say in your message that folks
>> were
>> complaining that the program items were "so so". If I'm not mistaken,
>> we
>> usually have over 100 folks at the Louisiana NFB state convention.
>> How
>> about I forward your message on to Pam Allan and she can maybe suggest
>> what
>> you might want to consider.
>>
>> Sincerely yours,
>> The Constantly Barefooted,
>> Ray
>> Home phone and fax:
>> (985)853-0139
>> E-mail:
>> rforetjratbellsouthdotnet
>> Skype Name:
>> barefootedray
>> Blog:
>> www.raysworld.blogs.com
>> Podcast .rss Feed:
>> http://feeds.feedburner.com/worldofray
>>
>> God bless President George W. Bush!
>> God bless our troops!
>> and God bless America
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Ed Meskys" <edmeskys at localnet.com>
>> To: "nfb-talk" <nfb-talk at nfbnet.org>
>> Sent: Friday, November 09, 2007 10:44 AM
>> Subject: [nfb-talk] state con attendance
>>
>>
>> When I first became NH state president in 1988 the first few state
>> conventions I put on had about 100-120 attendees, up about 20% from
>> the
>> previous president, because I did a lot of outreach to find former and
>> new
>> members, and initiated a state newsletter. We had been drifting down
>> ever
>> since, to under 50. Last year we had our 50th anniversary, and got
>> more
>> attendees, but with people muttering about our programs being the
>> "same old,
>> same old." This year we decided to devote our whole morning to a topic
>> important to blind persons and many others in a rural state, the
>> future of
>> transportation in NH. We made it a one-day con, with a luncheon
>> banquet, and
>> the National report, some technology, mobility, and our business
>> meeting in
>> he afternoon. With the help of Blind Services, the talking book
>> library, the
>> Governor's Commission on Disabilities, and Granite State Independent
>> Living
>> (Foundation) we distributed over 2000 flyers, and aside from program
>> participants we had only 30 attendees. Our officers are very
>> disappointed,
>> and are saying it cost so much money to put on and advertise the con,
>> and
>> put in so much work, that we will pull back and only have a business
>> meeting
>> with lunch in the back room of a restaurant next year. Are other
>> states
>> having the same problem getting attendance at a con?
>>
>> We are using an Imagination Grant to put on a one-day tech expo next
>> April,
>> which is not a convention (cons are normally in October or November).
>> If
>> this flops too, I think the board will be devastated. We lined up an
>> excellent panel of five experts and administrators for the
>> transportation
>> panel, and are working on getting excellent speakers for the tech
>> expo.
>>
>> Incidentally, the results of our state elections were:
>> continuing constitutional officers:
>> Marie Johnson, President
>> Gil Vickery, FVP.
>> Judy Leavitt, SVP
>> Ed Meskys, secretary
>> Lucille Lynch, treasurer
>> and our new slate of untitled board positions is:
>> Julie Clark (new)
>> Wayne Harvey (new)
>> Donald Little (new)
>> John Parker (returning)
>> Stephen Yerardi (returning)
>>
>> Best, Ed Meskys
>>
>>
>> Edmund R. Meskys
>> NIEKAS Publications
>> National Federation of the Blind of N.H.
>> Moultonboro Lions Club
>> edmeskys at localnet.com
>> 322 Whittier Hwy
>> Moultonboro NH 03254-3627
>> my credo:
>> Clinton lied, nothing happened
>> Bush lied, thousands died
>> and over 3,000 permanently brain injured
>>
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