[ELECTRON] Is the Electron Club Becoming Too Political?

[James Beeley]

I think Ross has made a very good point about security and random people
interrupting activities. As I understand Ross is teaching an Amateur
Radio Foundation Licence course. When you are teaching a group of people
it can be very distracting to have others wandering in and out, an it is
to say the least inconsiderate of the people in question to do so. I'd
suggest a sign on the door indicating that a class is in progress, and
asking those who are not participating to respect their need to not be
disrupted.

There is also the issue of security. If, as Nina is suggesting, the EC
is to go down the Fablabs route and be kitted out with equipment such as
a milling machine, rapid prototyping machine and laser cutter, it is
essential for safety and to prevent damage to the equipment that access
to them is properly controlled and supervised. This will mean a more
formalised management system with specific people responsible for
overseeing access to these machines and training and supervising users.
If an accident occurred due to improper supervision or safety
procedures, the EC (and possibly individual members) could be open to
being sued or even to prosecution by the Health & Safety Executive. 

Contrary to Andrew's comments, I don't believe Gordon's comments
regading "teenage Red Clydesiders" were at all unreasonable. Political
activists taking over and wrecking otherwise useful organisations is a
serious problem. To take one example, the University and College Union,
to which I belonged when I worked at Glasgow University, has sadly been
taken over by leftist agitators. They waste a great deal of the union's
precious time and resources over completely irrelevant issues such as
abortion, Iraq and the entirely useless "boycott" of Israeli academic
institutions. The net result is that while comparable public sector
professionals such as senior local government officials, civil servants
and doctors, who have effective unions focussed on their members' needs,
have gained generous pay rises, university lecturers' pay has fallen
behind badly due to the ineffectiveness of the UCU. I'm concerned to see
the same thing happening to the EC.

With the current level of concern over grossly excessive levels of
government debt and rampant abuse of taxpayers' money, I doubt if
taxpayers would react well if they found out that their hard-earned
taxes were effectively subsidising political protest groups, some of
which are involved in planned and organised criminal activity. If this
got into the media it would do the EC no good at all.

To be honest I'm disappointed in the EC, I was hoping to see a well-run
electronic/radio/computing/open-source hobby club /hacker space along
the lines of the Chaos Computer Club or NYC resistor. It seems to me
there is a risk that the most technically capable people, who are
essential to achieving this goal, will be driven out by the activists
who have little real interest in technology. The question really is
which direction the membership wish to go in?

That's all I've got to say on the matter for now. 


Jim