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| The WE CARE FOR CHENNAI Network is not currently active and cannot accept new posts | re: re: How To Start A Revolution | Views: 120 | Sep 28, 2004 4:43 am | | re: re: How To Start A Revolution | # | Govind Srinivasan | | Hello Bala,
Thanks for your participation in WE CARE FOR CHENNAI.
I believe that you should be aware that there are plenty of young people, imbued with extraordinary vision, courage and conviction everywhere in the world today. They are well-read, articulate and more than everything else, sincere and dedicated to the cause they have chosen to serve.
The internet is a beehive of a lot of self-help guides and there is no dearth for advice. I also find that many people are tired of being told what to read, how to understand and how to act.
I am trying to pull in as many people as possible in WE CARE FOR CHENNAI. Nobody is important over somebody else.
As regards your observations on Chandra Gupta, I think that his views are not very different from the mass-opinion. He has expressed his understanding and he should be allowed to express his opinions in his own way.
Action is one thing and exhorting people to act is another thing. In a public activity, we require to give margin for criticism, pessimism, expression of frustration, excitement, quick-movers who also flag-off quickly, ideators who will stop with giving ideas and can't be seen in any other activity, less-speaking and more action type, no ideas but always actions, etc., besides people who have remarkable balance of all the attributes of leadership by example.
WE CARE FOR CHENNAI cannot be hustled through. I am not conjuring visions of making it a big flagship vehicle of public participation convoy. The problems of any big city are not the ones which developed all of a sudden.
Many issues requiring attention have become even part of the city's traditional mindframe to tolerate. Can we stop making people urinating in public overnight? Can we stop people parking their vehicles in a disorderly manner? Can we stop people violating traffic signals by issuing diktats?
Better to encourage people to speak out whatever they feel like. Internet is probably the most deadly weapon to protect democracy, all the negative fall-out notwithstanding. Let us allow people to speak out their mind.
Last but not the least, I am a Business Person and not a full time social worker. I have my limitations, but I have ensured that my social commitments don't spoil my business either.
I require people of all shades and views to pour out their mind here and don't want to censor them. May be, even a few negative or pessimistic views are required to make the fence-sitters jump into the fray and take positions in the mission of WE CARE FOR CHENNAI.
I would love to hear from you more, but let us ensure that we don't cut people to size. Mahatma Gandhiji was a very shy person in his adolescence. But we all know the kind of social leadership he had given in his later life that has no parallels anywhere in the world. Who knows? A Gandhiji may come out of the work we may do in WE CARE FOR CHENNAI too.
Govind Srinivasan
> Bala Pillai wrote: > Govind and all, > >As a first objective, I'd suggest you identify a tight group of people that we form a self-starters team with -- connectors, mavens and sales-people. For example, it can be a group of 3 committed people. The more people, the faster you achieve your mission, the less the slower -- that's all. > >It is quality not quantity. It is character we seek, not skills. For example, and at the risk of being politically incorrect, at this stage, I would not waste time with the likes of Chandra Gupta. The likes of Chandra are best engaged with at later phases. > >I would try to find one or two Landmark Forum graduates or those with analogous psychometric profiles. See http://www.ilovepossibility.info/landmark_forum_india_bangalore.htm > >cheers../bala Private Reply to Govind Srinivasan | Sep 28, 2004 5:25 am | | re: re: re: How To Start A Revolution | # | Bala Pillai | | Govind,
I'd suggest you decide -- for the near term -- which of below is a higher priority.
1) create the nucleus of a working group OR 2) raise awareness of the problem
I took it that it is (1). Your response suggests that it is (2).
If it is (1), to maintain the action and pre-action tone for it, I suggest:-
"Never allow a person to tell you 'no' who doesn't have the power to say 'yes'."
- Eleanor Roosevelt, American First Lady, 1884-1962
If it is (2), your response is apt -- my passion is for (1).
cheers../bala
Private Reply to Bala Pillai | Sep 28, 2004 5:53 am | | re: re: re: re: How To Start A Revolution | # | Govind Srinivasan | | Hello Bala,
Personally I feel that we require to make a lot of people converge into this platform, - people of all hues and colours.
I am not going to don the cap of a strategist or a kind of numero uno for this group. I am seriously searching for socially-minded and capable youngsters, who have that zest and drive to accomplish.
If the issues I have recounted are genuine and are able to touch the chords of hundreds of people, WE CARE FOR CHENNAI will move ahead.
Do you really think that people are very much interested in class-room way of being taught things like social psychology, management techniques, organization development, etc., in Internet Group Discussion Fora? Doing work is different from reading how to do, while I don't undermine the need to read.
Cheers! Let us move ahead to organize people and usher them into this network. Let the imagination of thousands of people work to the advantage of WE CARE FOR CHENNAI.
If we fail, let us take it in our stride. After all, failures in public mobilization don't have any meaning for individuals who work for it, but only reflects on the pubic apathy. Then, is it not also true that a society or community gets what it aspires for? WE CARE FOR CHENNAI can become a failure too. But it would have aroused the imagination of a good number of people. Well, in that case, I think we should be happy that we could contribute for that imagination to trigger.
Don't you find that there is no response to all that you write and I do in this Group Discussion? What does it show? Simple. There is no point in raising a big level of expectation. Abstractions don't work in mobilizing people for common cause. Small and concerted actions which have the power of triggering the imagination of a big number of people is the need of the hour in WE CARE FOR CHENNAI.
Rgds,
Govind Srinivasan
> Bala Pillai wrote: > Govind, > >I'd suggest you decide -- for the near term -- which of below is a higher priority. > >1) create the nucleus of a working group OR >2) raise awareness of the problem > >I took it that it is (1). Your response suggests that it is (2). > >If it is (1), to maintain the action and pre-action tone for it, I suggest:- > >"Never allow a person to tell you 'no' who doesn't have the power to say 'yes'." > >- Eleanor Roosevelt, American First Lady, 1884-1962 > >If it is (2), your response is apt -- my passion is for (1). > >cheers../bala > > >Private Reply to Govind Srinivasan | |
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