|
Theater of the Absurd
Unregulated freedom means anarchy and absolute order means despotism. A free society seeks to achieve a compromise between these two extremes. Then a substantial amount of individual liberty may simultaneously subsist with public order. [01] Denying a few anarchistic residents their power and consistently challenging an oligarchic administration will eventually destroy absolutism. Apparently, the spirit and drive of the original gray panthers died. Perhaps the Council House panthers should stop surrendering to an oligarchy and sharpen their claws. They can then democratically reassert their civil rights. The spirit of the original panthers may then return to haunt a new generation of aggressors.
|
|
|
 |
Council House policies effectively deprive residents of their right to a quiet and peaceful environment and access to grievance procedures. The board of directors ignores appeals for change while Mitchell (the mullenium clone) neglects to enforce existing rules and laws. For example, Harry C. B-sh, formerly board chairman, notorious in the Washington area for his procrastination, does not respond to correspondence from residents. A source who has known him personally for many years described him as "dropping problems like he would drop hot potatoes." Generally, the directors have become part of the problem and not part of the solution. Board policy smacks of absolutism and racism unacceptable in a building financially-assisted by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), or anywhere else for that matter. These people consistently deprive residents of due process of law and by extension their civil rights.
Eventually, when the potatoes get too hot the directors pass them to Robert R. B-r-sf-rd, [02] a Seattle attorney who does not know the difference between satire and legal prose. This completes the asylum that Swift would have called the improvement of madness. Administrators consistently kill the messenger instead of dealing with issues. This prevents an otherwise competent staff from performing efficiently. The silent, law-abiding segment of the community feels frustrated while the loud segment has established anarchistic special interest groups, some ethnically and religiously motivated. An inefficient and politically motivated agent, accountable to HUD, has turned this residence into a theater of the absurd with an unemployed actor choreographing it.
Both the directors and the administrators follow an unequivocal policy for doing nothing. They believe that if they do nothing then problems will vanish naturally. Like bureaucrats and lawyers without an argument they use structured procrastination techniques that employ appeasement to gain personal power over those whom they consider powerless. For them life becomes one long postponement: they fail to recognize that delay in confronting a problem always worsens it. Evidently, they have not learned that Adolf Hitler's greatest allies were silence, indifference, and inaction. [03] He would have immediately coopted the equivocating Council House board of directors.
Invariably, the directors try to keep up with yesterday by delaying problem-solving until tomorrow and believe that they will eventually solve all problems through appeasement. Sir Winston Churchill described an appeaser as a person who feeds crocodiles hoping that they will eat him last. [04] The management hacks at Council House not only feed them but turn them into pets. They even give them pet names like Dunbar, Stahl, and Cowdin.
Mullen and his clone invariably use precedents when forced to decide an issue. They say: "we have done it this way for years so why change it now" when backed into a corner for a decision. Intelligent people change their theories to support changed circumstances and make intelligent decisions based upon current implications. They do not accept outmoded practices based entirely upon precedent or expediency.
Procrastination allows individuals to evade issues that they find politically distasteful. By using a combination of laissez faire, appeasement, and "kill-the-messenger" techniques they cause a greater disconnection between residents and the staff than would naturally exist. Then more residents adopt anarchistic attitudes. They generate casual observations by anonymous people that have no value whatever to delay then deny justice. They obscure issues by using asserted constructs too abstract to test that define as vague theory or untestable hypotheses not open to investigation. Competent judges deny this type of argument immediately. However, Council House administrators, directors, and their attorneys, continue to play this political game.
That game includes constantly moving the personal effects belonging to very old people. This creates an inestimable emotional trauma or exacerbates an existing condition. It probably applies more to senior citizens living in subsidized housing. They have very little left to treasure apart from their furniture and mementos. However, the administrator preemptively moves them from one apartment to another without notice. That coercion also violates their leases and HUD regulations.
Preemptive action usually suggests that a cover-up of unlawful activity has taken place. In a legal sense, this type of administrative action obstructs justice by preventing due process. To support him, B-r-sford has made a personal attack on a complainant (a practice frowned upon by judges) and created a quagmire. Moreover, the directors have delegated their own responsibility to a smart-mouthed lawyer and an incompetent administrator instead of facing issues themselves. This has extended administrative incompetence to board level and turned a simple complaint into a three-ring circus with a lawyer as ringmaster.
Mullen and Mitchell have perfected the kill-the-messenger technique. To evade facing issues they discredit the messenger using whatever devious ploy they can muster. They coercively persuade anyone associated with the issue to act against their conscience. In the fable, the king angrily killed the messenger then later realized that he had killed his own daughter. The directors will eventually kill their own credibility then destroy the facility that they pretend to protect.
Unfortunately, truth sometimes has the capacity to provoke a negative and hostile response. Insecure people who have a modicum of authority over the comfort of other people feel superior and often become hostile when confronted with the truth. They then make irrational and illogical decisions that damage those for whom they hold a responsibility. They then retire into a cocoon to publicize their "good works" before real disaster strikes. They cannot face the truth.
Messengers get no pleasure in speaking truths to those who have no wish to hear them. They feel affronted by the reaction and ostracism. They also resent the manipulation that accompanies kill-the-messenger paranoia. The infection spreads. The public then contracts the kill-the-messenger disease. They find a way to evade their issues and behave like the worshipers in the temple who wanted to kill Jeremiah because they did not like his message. They silently suffer the rage and fearfully deny the obvious truths. In public they withhold their views and behave like the biblical prophets who withheld their prophecies. The religious zealots among them condemn sin until they find that the condemnation applies to them.
Council House board of directors continues to sing in barbershop style. They harmonize like politically correct song birds then decide to do nothing. Then, conducted by their attorney, they produce incredibly dissonant music. This disharmony results in qualitative control by those making judgment. Moreover, it supports a cultic instinct toward conformity that eliminates any inconvenient nonconformity (also honest dissent). [05] The conformity destroys any vestige of individuality. The exclusivity forces everyone to become like someone else. It enables the bureaucrats to deny freedom of expression to dissenters and allows them to harass nonconformists. It also outlaws any behavior that they find "inappropriate." The war cries "censor it" and "politically correct" then define synonymously.
Nmesis.
Since publication of Life in a Seattle Squirrel Cage, Nmesis has received notes and documents from a variety of sources. They reveal other violations of law by Council House administrators and directors. He can verify and validate copies of genuine documents when received anonymously but must disregard unsigned notes
If Council House residents and others wish to use Disconnected to air complaints then they must sign their names to them. If authors wish to remain anonymous then they should say so. Nmesis, a professional journalist, will honor the request and will not disclose his sources. He knows about the retaliation and ostracism that Mullen and Mitchell consistently use to silence people who file legitimate complaints. However, Nmesis prefers openness and the publication of correspondents' names.
|
