15 July

Council meeting again tonight. Another great example of the terrible mistake we’ve made with the idea of ‘the people’, and ‘community consultation’. Now it just means asking anybody who wants to offer an opinion, to come forward and share it. That *always*, in every case, leads to a conga line of whining complaint. Like any social media post with comments, the dominant contribution will be a pile-on, with every possible grievance trotted out. Consultation used to mean the skilled assessment of community need, by skilled assessors. Not just the performance of grievance by self-selected members of the community. Nearly always the same tiny minority, who use their obstruction to every activity in the community as a platform to generate attention and status for themselves. Unless we control status games in societies, that is ALL people will do. Hijack every social process, in the battle for attention/status.