Another Roots Camp update

Another Roots Camp update

October 16th, 2006

Today I find out if a local chain of community colleges, Ivy Tech, will be able to host our Bloomington Roots Camp sessions on Saturday, November 18. If so, then we’ll have two days, five sessions, and 10 discussions. If not, we’ll go with the 1-day, 3-session, 6-discussion format at the Library and School of Informatics on Friday, November 17.

I had some talks with a local Libertarian, the city, the RootsCamp organizers, and a few others. This week, however, is when the promotion begins in earnest with fliers blanketing as many organizations and outlets as I can contact. I hope there are two days of this, since I have gut-level concerns about getting many people to show up to the 9a Friday session. This whole thing is sort of a prototype for future camps, so it was important to me to try different places and times and see what has more success.

It’s not too late to try to get together a RootsCamp of your own, in your local community. The national level has a definite progressive focus, framed as a post-election debriefing. I am appropriating the idea for a more inclusive conversation about the same. At this point, it all reflects my personal agenda for political dialogue: seeking understanding, rather than persuasion. I hope to have a broad cross-section across ideology, socio-economics and other demographics … enough to force everyone to work past the party labels and talk to each other.

If you are not setting up your own camp but are in the Bloomington, Indiana area on November 17-18, please feel free to stop by and contribute to a session. We’ll also be working hard to get the notes from the discussions published as they happen that weekend, and plenty of post-event processing online.

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