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Freepers Beware of the Non-Meeting Meeting (Vanity)
www.rileysfarm.com ^ | 02-15-2004 | Self

Posted on 02/15/2004 3:52:23 PM PST by farmer18th

Perhaps some of you who are veterans at planning issues have seen this, but the other night I witnessed my first community plan meeting that was moderated in the "Assets, Issues, and Solutions" format.

Here's how it works. Community members don't get three minutes to address the meeting. A moderator stands in front of the room and asks questions such as "What do we like about our community?" (The assets column) Another question is "What problems do we have in our community?" (The issues column) and "How can we solve our problems?" (The solutions column).

Community members raise their hands and the moderator has complete control over who is called upon. The moderator's side-kick gets to summarize complex issues into two word descriptions that are written with magic marker on butcher paper in front of the room. No vote is taken. No discussion ensues except between the moderator and the member of the audience. If one person rises to say "parking" is an issue, there is no chance for that observation to be moderated by a vote on the matter, or even a show of hands. In our case, I noticed that the person wielding the magic marker was writing down whatever tickled her fancy, whether it had anything to do with an audience members observation.

A member of our extended family observed that "Living History" was a community asset, since we perform American Revolution and Civil War Reenactments. The Magic Marker person translated this to "country living." An apple farmer said the expense of agriculture was a community problem and the magic marker person scribbled down "organic farming" in the solutions column, even though it had never been mentioned.

At one point, my brother stood up and said, "is this an Oprah Winfrey show or a community meeting?"

When I spoke with the moderator afterwards, a retired planner, he defended the process on the grounds that community members won't be interested in the details of the planning process. He said he had a pretty good idea about what the community was interested in. I asked him how he would quantify that, since he never took a vote.

"I have a pretty good feel for it," he said.


TOPICS: Government; Your Opinion/Questions
KEYWORDS: communityplans; delphi; facilitator
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To: mabelkitty
smart growth

I'm not sure what that term has come to mean around the country, but around here I'd settle for any growth, since we seem to be living in an area that is filled with "conservative no-growthers." ("I've got my 3 acres in paradise, so close the gates and let's start protecting the environment now.")
21 posted on 02/15/2004 4:21:32 PM PST by farmer18th
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To: Little Bill
This thread might be helpful.
22 posted on 02/15/2004 4:23:24 PM PST by spunkets
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To: SauronOfMordor
Volunteer or consultant?

Volunteer in the sense that no one is paying him to be involved in the process around here. (He lives here). Consultant in the sense that he now represents clients to community planning commissions, after serving as a planner himself.
23 posted on 02/15/2004 4:24:01 PM PST by farmer18th
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To: farmer18th
If you use Yahoo! or Google! to search "Delphi Method" you'll get a few sites that are very good, I saved them to hard drive. Beware facilitated meetings like that. In a nutshell, the whole meeting is rigged for a preordained outcome. The only defense is organization and requiring that meetings be held in accordance with traditional methods like "Roberts Rules of Order" and such.
24 posted on 02/15/2004 4:27:42 PM PST by Freedom4US
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To: big ern
Oh, I got it. I was just going along with it. I felt like using lines like that the other night.
25 posted on 02/15/2004 4:28:04 PM PST by farmer18th
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To: Pukin Dog
There are two things being labeled "delphi". One is the technique you describe, an above-board technique for arriving at truth. The other is what I have in #17, a covert technique for manipulating group opinion and intimidating group members towards a pre-determined conclusion, under the pretense that the session is above-board
26 posted on 02/15/2004 4:28:05 PM PST by SauronOfMordor (No anchovies!)
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To: farmer18th

Hegelian Dialectic & the New World Order

For the benefit of those who have not yet heard of the Hegelian Dialectic, let me briefly run through it as taught by Authority Research Center president, Dean Gotcher. The Hegelian Dialectic or "Consensus Process" is a 200 year-old, three-step process of "thesis, antithesis and synthesis", developed in the late 1700's by a German named Georg William Friedreich Hegel that results in what we now know as "group-think". It is a system Dean calls "Praxis" that Socialists have used for centuries to seduce, seize and control mass populations without warfare. It is also in full operation here in the United States under such names as: "Outcome Based Education", "Goals 2000", "Sustainable Development", "School To Work", "DARE" and many more. It's all about embracing "tolerance, diversity and unity" for The New World Order. To put it in layman's terms, it's brainwashing.

Here's how it works: A group gathers, and has agreed beforehand that each in attendance will ultimately surrender his or her own personal position on any given issue to the will or "consensus" of the group after *processing to consensus* through dialog. In a Christian setting, the presupposition is that the group's will determines "the will of God". The group's "facilitator", whoever that may be, mediates between sides, be they "good and evil", "for and against", "republican and democrat", "liberal and conservative", etc., whatever the case may be, often instigating heated confrontations between the opposing sides for the purpose of suggesting compromise as the perfect solution to restore and maintain the peace and the relationships of everyone involved.

The resulting outcome or *consensus* is then re-introduced if necessary, at the next meeting for more "Praxis", more dialog and more compromise until another "consensus" is reached. Then the "process" repeats all over again...and again...and again until the facilitator's desired outcome is achieved. Over time, the convictions and concerns anyone may have had originally are processed away beyond recognition or relevance leaving one and all to accept the facilitator's pre-determined outcome as the consensus of the group. It's no longer a question of what is right or wrong, good or bad, lawful or unlawful, but rather HOW WE ALL FEEL ABOUT IT...no absolutes, no conscience, no convictions, no laws, no Constitution, no Bible and NO GOD!!!...only consensus....and a contrived consensus at that. That's the Hegelian Dialectic.

That's exactly what "facilitator" Bill Hybels accomplished the other day between church leaders attending the Willow Creek Conference and his friend Bill Clinton on ABC's Nightline. Protesting evangelicals (thesis), demanded socialist Bill Clinton (antitheses), answer for his lies and sexual indiscretions at the meeting. Hybels, as the "facilitator" voices their protests and then injects that Clinton HAD confessed to them by saying he publicly admitted: "I have sinned". Yeah, well...we ALL have sinned Bill. The Bible says it in Romans 3:23. That's not news. That's not a confession either. Nor is a politically expedient appearance in front of a church full of evangelical Christians before the Democratic Convention a demonstration of repentance.

The good reverend just wants us to forgive his pal Clinton so we can all be one big happy family. Thesis + Antitheses = Synthesis...the Hegelian Dialectic. Sounds like the perfect formula for an Apostate Church to me. I wonder if Hybels has sent everyone personal invitations to "The Millennium World Peace Summit of Religious and Spiritual Leaders", meeting at the United Nations later this month as well? I hear they're all getting together to create a great big One World Religion for us here on planet Earth. ...A WORLD CHURCH!

27 posted on 02/15/2004 4:32:25 PM PST by handk (The moon belongs to America, and anxiously awaits our Astro-Men. Will you be among them?)
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To: SauronOfMordor
under the pretense that the session is above board

It's all getting much more clear now. Last summer, when we started out with conventional committees and sub-committees, taking minutes, writing proposals, discussing them, we were told at the outset that a county consultant could help us arrive at a consensus. I asked the proponent of that idea, "how? How can a civil engineering firm help us reach a consensus in a meeting or two?"

She nodded her head vigorously. "They can! They can!"

I thought at the time she didn't understand me, but it turns out she was talking about Delphing the community into their pre-determined plan for our little valley.

The same retired planner who moderated the meeting argued that we really shouldn't have too many people in on these things.
28 posted on 02/15/2004 4:33:07 PM PST by farmer18th
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To: SauronOfMordor
I dont think what I described is "above board" at all. I think it is an insidious mind-control technique which has been mastered by Liberal government to keep us under their thumb.

One thing I learned in the Navy, was that ANY planning meeting that attempted consensus without open debate and open notation of final opinion is phony. Moderators start by telling you what you will be allowed to discuss, when you will be allowed questions, and state that the consensus opinion will be reported "later"; is an invitation to walk out, or even better expose them for what they are doing in a calm voice.

29 posted on 02/15/2004 4:37:04 PM PST by Pukin Dog (Sans Reproache)
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To: farmer18th
bump
30 posted on 02/15/2004 4:37:09 PM PST by RippleFire
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To: farmer18th
It's important to realize that the term "Delphi" is applied to two totally different procedures.

In the early 1960s the Rand Corporation developed a procedure the called "Delphi." It was to be used with groups of experts who NEVER MET TOGETHER. The idea was to extract expert opinion from the group in an efficient mananer.

Delphi as developed at Rand had three characteristics:

(1)anonymity: the participants do not know who else is in the group;

(2) iteration with controlled feedback: the process consists of several "rounds" of questionnaires with written responses; on each round the participants are given a summary of the responses on the previous round, such as written reasons for or against something, with duplicate or irrelevant responses omitted;

(3) statistical feedback: the questions are always phrased such that the respondent gives a number -- a date, an amount, a percent, etc.; the feedback consists of a statistical summary of these numbers, usually the median and the two quartiles. This is in addition to the summaries of written responses.

Several experiments at Rand showed that this form of Delphi was often more accurate than conventional meetings. This form of Delphi is still widely used in technological forecasting, and has a long history of testing and improvement. There are frequent articles on it in the professional literature.

When you are in a meeting such as the original poster described, and are told that what you're seeing is Delphi as developed at Rand, you're being lied to. The manipulators have hijacked the term and used it for what amounts to a brainwashing scheme. As a long-time practitioner of genuine Rand-style Delphi, I object to this hijacking, but there's nothing I can do about it except try to inform people.

31 posted on 02/15/2004 4:40:09 PM PST by JoeFromSidney (All political power grows from the barrel of a gun. -- Mao Zedong. That's why the 2nd Amendment.)
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To: farmer18th
I just assume most freepers have read stuff like Huxely's basic stuff. Personally I fall in with the Savage Beasts. Although when I was 20 the whole sex for fun with anyone would have gone over reall well with me.LOL

My wife is out of town this week and the kids are at Grandmas and my idea of a fun day of freedom was stacking 2 cord of wood and window shopping at the gun show.

I even have a beer in the fridge I may drink later.

32 posted on 02/15/2004 4:45:04 PM PST by TheErnFormerlyKnownAsBig ( I went to the gun show today and saw an Sharpton for President sticker on a truck. Seriously dude.)
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To: farmer18th
There was a fascinating article written here on FR over 5 years ago you should take a look at called Public Opinion or Pluralistic Ignorance: The Theory Behind the Spin. B.K. Sulanowski, wherever you are, I never forgot this post you wrote.
33 posted on 02/15/2004 5:01:29 PM PST by Ziva
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To: farmer18th
Sounds like a communist meeting where everyone is exepcted to agree with the leaders.
34 posted on 02/15/2004 5:43:00 PM PST by GeronL (www.ArmorforCongress.com ............... Support a FReeper for Congress)
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To: Pukin Dog
I dont think what I described is "above board" at all. I think it is an insidious mind-control technique which has been mastered by Liberal government to keep us under their thumb.

OK, then let me re-phrase: it has the capability of being an "above board" technique for examining positions and arriving at the good position PROVIDED that the facilitator/coordinator/whatever-to-call-him is HIMSELF above board. It's weakness is the ease with which the facilitator can rig the results. As Stalin noted: "Who votes doesn't count, it's who gets to count the votes".

In the Leftist Delphi Technique, essentially the facilitator is trying to give the impression that the participants are engaging in a fair and unbiased process, while the process itself is as rigged as a Chicago election. This leads the participants to accept the results, or at least not fight the results. The technique is as old as politics: isolate the opponents and make each think he's in a minority

35 posted on 02/15/2004 6:26:43 PM PST by SauronOfMordor (No anchovies!)
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To: farmfriend
Maggie =

You and your pingees need to read through this thread and be aware of the methods being used. Until I read them, I did not realise just how some of the Agenda21 actions had been implemented -- now I know.

Cheers,
Mike.
36 posted on 02/15/2004 9:01:07 PM PST by brityank (The more I learn about the Constitution, the more I realise this Government is UNconstitutional.)
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To: farmer18th; abbi_normal_2; Ace2U; Alamo-Girl; Alas; alfons; alphadog; amom; AndreaZingg; ...
Rights, farms, environment ping.
Let me know if you wish to be added or removed from this list.
I don't get offended if you want to be removed.
37 posted on 02/15/2004 10:12:00 PM PST by farmfriend ( Isaiah 55:10,11)
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To: brityank
Agenda21

I thought I was the only 'nutcase' to mention Agenda21 on FR?

Do any others believe it is actually happening? WOW!

38 posted on 02/15/2004 11:38:19 PM PST by B4Ranch ( Dear Mr. President, Sir, Are you listening to the voters?)
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To: Ziva
Thanks for the link. That's exactly the pattern of public dialogue these days. If there's one nuance to add to that commentary it would be that our own descent into a dumbed-down television culture makes the whole business of manipulating acceptible speech easier. I went to one meeting a year ago, (a meeting that actually allowed 3 minutes of public commentary for members of the audience), and one man actually decried developers because builders never seemed to deliver cable TV as promised.

The more we become peasants, the more we will deserve ruling nobles.
39 posted on 02/16/2004 12:10:01 AM PST by farmer18th
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To: farmer18th
For the benefit of anyone who actually wants to see the aftermath of one of these Crayola democracy confabs, visit:

http://www.sbcountygeneralplan.net/media/Redlands.pdf

Notice that they didn't even have the courtesy to transcribe their conclusions and set them in text. You have to download and use your PDF magnifying glass to glean anything from the site.
40 posted on 02/16/2004 12:33:09 AM PST by farmer18th
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