If, of course, the expectation is that everybody shows up on Tuesday and Thursday evenings, and the cost of not doing so is not being present in the house, suddenly the situation becomes simple and workable.
Does this means that a person who’s ill and needs to be a week in the hospital will get kicked out? What about a person who’s absent for a funeral of a relative?
Business trips?
The number of excuses for not being present is basically the most restrictive list you’d expect—if you’re literally not in town, if you’re sick, if you’re attending to a personal tragedy. The idea is not to make the house anyone’s first priority, it’s to make it something like everyone’s third priority (but actually above all but a couple of things).
So, no missing exercise because of a party, no missing it because you kinda need to work late, etc. Maybe missing for a once-in-a-year opportunity like a talk or a concert that you’ve been looking forward to for ages, with specific recompense to your housemates for the cost imposed by your absence? But in short, it’s the thing that other stuff has to work around, not vice-versa.
Losing one’s job to avoid missing a house meeting (needed to work late) is the kind of bad priority that should be addressed.
Perhaps some kind of explicit measure where housemates judge and excuse or not each case on a case-by-case basis, including a measure to request leave in advance as well as in arrears?
Sorry, I should’ve been more clear. “Kinda” was the important operational word, there, and you’re correct to point out that the priorities could be easily be construed as clearly bad.
I think your latter norm is basically what’s going to happen. The key thing I want to avoid is the slippery slope whereby there’s no clear line of “this counts as a defection.” I think needing to work late is 100% acceptable. What I was pointing at was something like, “I could wrap this up by coming in early tomorrow, or I could defect on the standing group exercise appointment …”
I want to thank you for the number of concrete, clear criticisms you’re making, and the manner in which you’re making them. I like your style.
A defection would be any case in which a member did not arrive on time or participate fully. Period.
I’m suggesting that there be a formal process by which a member arrives late, performs ten pushups, and joins the event in progress. At the conclusion of the event, he says “My Uber driver was involved in a minor collision on my way here and that delayed me for too long to arrive on time.” and (by secret ballot?) the Army votes and some adequate margin of them excuse the failure.
The other aspect I suggested is that a Dragon might say “[event] is next week and I would like to attend but it conflicts with exercise. May I be excused from exercise for [event]?”. Again, the Army would vote and decide if the absence is excused.
I’m at a loss as to what to do to sanction a member who is not excused. The military has a long list of ‘corrective actions’ and ‘punishments’ that they can apply only because they don’t constitute ‘kidnapping’ or other crimes. I guess you could possibly make those ‘[task] or removal from the Army’, but that runs straight into the eviction problem. I think that it’s absolutely critical that there’s a credible threat underlying the discipline, precisely so that it is less likely to be needed, and the only one I find plausible is ejection, which becomes complicated because of Housing law and morality.
Ok, this sounds quite a bit less authoritarian than I was picturing, and I basically did expect that you were planning to require this to be essentially everyone’s first priority, maybe tied with paid employment at best, but even then requiring that paid employment take specific forms not conflicting with the experiment. (I had definitely framed it this way in my head when I was asking my other question in this thread.) I don’t know if I’m the only one.
This is part of why I’m glad the conversation is unfolding as it is—probably not a lot of people will read literally every comment, but for anyone who’s confused, we have a clear record of where I was wrong and changed my mind, or where I was unclear and people raised confusions.
I think DA should be third or fourth, with obvious things that might come ahead of it being work, family, pre-existing strong friendships, romance, and lifelong core passions.
I’m not personally interested in living in the US, but if I would be interested then the specifics would be important to me.
A lot of personal development seminars in the style of CFAR require a person to be at a specific location from Thursday to Sunday.
Many forms of traveling mean that a person is gone for a week and would be missing. I don’t know about how audience but being strongly location bound can be a problem for some people.
Many house members work for CFAR, and will be gone from Wednesday through Monday as a result. Many other house members travel for business or personal growth. The “I’m literally out of town” excuse is fully valid and supported, and if someone ends up trying to game the system by constantly traveling, I think the requirements of the house are still forcing them to grow in an interesting way. =)
Does this means that a person who’s ill and needs to be a week in the hospital will get kicked out? What about a person who’s absent for a funeral of a relative? Business trips?
The number of excuses for not being present is basically the most restrictive list you’d expect—if you’re literally not in town, if you’re sick, if you’re attending to a personal tragedy. The idea is not to make the house anyone’s first priority, it’s to make it something like everyone’s third priority (but actually above all but a couple of things).
So, no missing exercise because of a party, no missing it because you kinda need to work late, etc. Maybe missing for a once-in-a-year opportunity like a talk or a concert that you’ve been looking forward to for ages, with specific recompense to your housemates for the cost imposed by your absence? But in short, it’s the thing that other stuff has to work around, not vice-versa.
Losing one’s job to avoid missing a house meeting (needed to work late) is the kind of bad priority that should be addressed.
Perhaps some kind of explicit measure where housemates judge and excuse or not each case on a case-by-case basis, including a measure to request leave in advance as well as in arrears?
Sorry, I should’ve been more clear. “Kinda” was the important operational word, there, and you’re correct to point out that the priorities could be easily be construed as clearly bad.
I think your latter norm is basically what’s going to happen. The key thing I want to avoid is the slippery slope whereby there’s no clear line of “this counts as a defection.” I think needing to work late is 100% acceptable. What I was pointing at was something like, “I could wrap this up by coming in early tomorrow, or I could defect on the standing group exercise appointment …”
I want to thank you for the number of concrete, clear criticisms you’re making, and the manner in which you’re making them. I like your style.
A defection would be any case in which a member did not arrive on time or participate fully. Period.
I’m suggesting that there be a formal process by which a member arrives late, performs ten pushups, and joins the event in progress. At the conclusion of the event, he says “My Uber driver was involved in a minor collision on my way here and that delayed me for too long to arrive on time.” and (by secret ballot?) the Army votes and some adequate margin of them excuse the failure.
The other aspect I suggested is that a Dragon might say “[event] is next week and I would like to attend but it conflicts with exercise. May I be excused from exercise for [event]?”. Again, the Army would vote and decide if the absence is excused.
I’m at a loss as to what to do to sanction a member who is not excused. The military has a long list of ‘corrective actions’ and ‘punishments’ that they can apply only because they don’t constitute ‘kidnapping’ or other crimes. I guess you could possibly make those ‘[task] or removal from the Army’, but that runs straight into the eviction problem. I think that it’s absolutely critical that there’s a credible threat underlying the discipline, precisely so that it is less likely to be needed, and the only one I find plausible is ejection, which becomes complicated because of Housing law and morality.
Ok, this sounds quite a bit less authoritarian than I was picturing, and I basically did expect that you were planning to require this to be essentially everyone’s first priority, maybe tied with paid employment at best, but even then requiring that paid employment take specific forms not conflicting with the experiment. (I had definitely framed it this way in my head when I was asking my other question in this thread.) I don’t know if I’m the only one.
This is part of why I’m glad the conversation is unfolding as it is—probably not a lot of people will read literally every comment, but for anyone who’s confused, we have a clear record of where I was wrong and changed my mind, or where I was unclear and people raised confusions.
I think DA should be third or fourth, with obvious things that might come ahead of it being work, family, pre-existing strong friendships, romance, and lifelong core passions.
It’s likely useful to be clear about the process beforehand. Don’t plan for 100% but have a process for what happens when things go sideways.
Yeah, that’s a major section of the post above. Specifics to be hammered out with the actual group, in the first weekend.
I’m not personally interested in living in the US, but if I would be interested then the specifics would be important to me.
A lot of personal development seminars in the style of CFAR require a person to be at a specific location from Thursday to Sunday.
Many forms of traveling mean that a person is gone for a week and would be missing. I don’t know about how audience but being strongly location bound can be a problem for some people.
Many house members work for CFAR, and will be gone from Wednesday through Monday as a result. Many other house members travel for business or personal growth. The “I’m literally out of town” excuse is fully valid and supported, and if someone ends up trying to game the system by constantly traveling, I think the requirements of the house are still forcing them to grow in an interesting way. =)