Fwd: Proposal to remove CLP - sudo-discuss

26 Sep 2023

Hey Sudo,

Below is Yar's proposal to eject Community Liberation Programs (CLP) from
Omni. The short version is that the active members of every other
collective have concluded that CLP has left Omni unable to function, and
that our last recourse is to eject them.

If you've followed along, I hope it's been clear that I've tried to mediate
compromise, and that I recognize that the events which have led here are a
damning collective failure. With that said, I think this is the appropriate
action.

Considering the dramatic nature of the proposal, everyone involved would
like to get the strongest, most unambiguous collective agreement on this
possible, both over email and at tomorrow's meeting (*Weds. Sept. 27th @ 8
PM,* in person and at http://meet.waag.org/turtlesturtlesturtles).

If you've heard any of CLP's complaints, understand that supporting this
motion is NOT a dismissal of those criticisms. It isn't even an agreement
with the charges that their leadership has acted with ulterior motivations.
It is simply a recognition that CLP's presence is a barrier to Omni's
ability to address any of its existential problems..

*I hope everyone will join me in looking forward eagerly to actually
addressing the many problems that CLP has cited with Omni* after resolving
the state of ferocious, bitter paralysis we're in.

If you have any questions, I encourage you to call me or talk to me in
person. The email chains are endless, but I'm happy to answer any questions
and make the case for why this is necessary.

If you agree with the proposal to eject CLP, please include in your message *"I
endorse the proposal to eject CLP"* to sign onto it. Like this:

With great disappointment, *I endorse the proposal to eject CLP.*

*Andrew R Gross, (he/him)*
412.657.5332    -   shrad.org <http://www.shrad.org>

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Yardena Cohen &lt;yardenack(a)gmail.com&gt;
Date: Tue, Sep 26, 2023 at 11:01 AM
Subject: Proposal to remove CLP
To: consensus at omni &lt;consensus(a)lists.omnicommons.org&gt;

With a heavy heart, I think CLP and Omni should part ways:

1) CLP act against omni's best interests. They blocked TANC for
months, giving shifting, dubious reasons, moving goalposts, and
outright lies. They sent their own people to TANC to vote against
omni. All this helped to alienate one of omni's last chances to
succeed.

TANC is critical to omni - we are desperate for new people and energy.
They are willing & ready to volunteer, even as the building's future
is so uncertain. Their mostly-BIPOC membership is a promising source
of new faces to carry omni well into the future. All the TANC people
I've met so far who belong to DSA, are part of the anti-zionist
faction within DSA. Their mission of building tenant power is
extremely aligned with all our values.

By sticking it out this long, TANC show more dedication and faith in
omni than probably any applicant ever. They don't want to rent - they
want to join, to share in the burden and the responsibility of
co-ownership, and we've had hardly any new member applications all
year. These opportunities are so rare and special, to work against
them is highly irresponsible, maybe a death blow.

2) CLP make omni less safe. the practice of singling people out for
bitter personal attacks, is adding invective to our meetings and is
actively driving more people away - BIPOC in particular. CLP is not
the only source of this, and other problematic behaviors from other
groups should also be dealt with, but they are a major one. If we
can't retain people, we are doomed.

The way they went after Silver is especially bad. Silver does some of
the most thankless and valuable work here, and got attacked over it.
They stalked Silver's housing, used private info given in confidence
at bogss interviews, combed through 7 years of social media looking
for dirt. What little they found was used in a series of targeted,
wildly disproportionate and unprincipled public call-outs. Silver now
feels unsafe at omni.

3) CLP engage in bad faith. they act as a "vanguard" who think they
know best and push others around. they send authoritative, one-sided
pronouncements which assert lies as facts, with no avenues for
dialogue to arrive at the real truth. their answers to present-day
conditions are to dredge up last year's fights. they reject the most
viable solutions in front of us while offering no realistic
alternatives. When challenged, they make threats, switch to rules
lawyering and change the subject. To function, omni decision making
must move like a ouija board, but CLP treat it like a dart board.

4) CLP sabotaged BOGSS. it should have been created as a vehicle for
all women, nonbinary & BIPOC, to connect and wield power. But it
didn't effectively mobilize anybody outside CLP, and it seems
increasingly likely this was by design. we should keep BOGSS but
seriously rethink the strategy, to increase broad participation.

5) CLP are a liability to getting a loan. their blog posts endorsing
terrorism, dictators and vanguardism - these are things loan officers
will immediately see as red flags. not because it offends bourgeoisie
tastes or the US state dept, but because they see a community that is
unstable, conflict-prone, less likely to be focused on business, and
more likely to drag them into a mess. it's not what we need right now.

6) CLP use people. They claim to care about our marginalized members,
but don't act like it. They abuse identity politics to consolidate
power.

They seem to attract decent well-meaning people with radical book
readings, legit associations and direct service work, but then groom
those members' good intentions to carry water in the vanguard's fights
with other leftists

They manipulate Palestinians, put words in their mouths, and endanger
them by openly celebrating Hamas. They misconstrue boycotts to confuse
people about the actual targets. They purposefully exposed young
people to a traumatizing spectacle to make them feel more isolated
than they are.

They abuse People's Programs' blog as a mouthpiece for the Iranian
regime. They brought conflict to other orgs in the past. It's what
they do. At omni, they gave us a "love bomb" of 6 months of hard work,
and now are doing the same.

7) CLP is toxic to the left. they seem bent to drive wedges between
groups, sow discord where none is warranted, keep people isolated and
scared by spreading rumors, and prevent a movement from coalescing
without them on top. the 9/21 meeting made this crystal clear. all the
groups at that meeting had common cause and shared goals & values, but
CLP used trolling and baiting to create a spectacle in which the
opposite felt true.

8) CLP support the Iranian regime, a position Iranian feminists in our
community so far universally describe as "like being a nazi" or worse.
Listening to them is not islamophobia or harassment based on national
origin, it's not "down with the Iranian" - it's "down with the
enemy
of Iranians", siding with oppressed people against their oppressors.
If we heed the warnings of Iranian feminists about what kind of
character, judgement and worldview it takes to to side with that
regime, we see the through line connecting every other behavior above:
cynical, conniving, cruel.

I can think of only one compelling reason why CLP should not be
removed: they're a BIPOC-led group. This is important, especially for
Omni, and makes their removal a much tougher call. But it's the right
call. I truly believe that a white-dominated org doing the same things
listed above, would have already been removed sooner. The fact we gave
CLP benefit of the doubt for so long, is to Omni's credit, but there
is no more doubt, and it's time to do our duty to our project.

To get through the next few months, omni needs unity and clarity and
positivity. CLP has nothing to offer here. It's time to part ways. I
recommend the delegates:

1) delay the upcoming bogss congress
2) affirm by majority vote, that CLP cannot dominate bogss
3) vote by consensus minus one to remove CLP
4) vote unanimously to accept TANC
5) hold a new bogss congress including TANC members