Campbell River, BC

You know me…Open Space and all…

A big part of my life’s work is about making meetings, events and gatherings productive engaging and effective learning environments. After facilitating more than 100 Open Space events and countless other World Cafes, Appreciative Summits and other events, traditional conferences leave me more than a little cold.

So when Johnnie Moore invited me and Rob Paterson to talk a little about unconferencing I jumped at the chance to spend a little quality Skype time with these two engaging friends. The result is a podcast of our conversation complete with notes at Johnnie’s blog.

Port Hardy, BC

I completed an umdergraduate degree in 1991, including an 80 page thesis on organizational culture in Aboriginal organizations. Today a friend and I were talking about graduate school.

I feel no urge to do an MA or an MBA. My life is course work and this blog is my thesis. It’s vast, vast learning.

Today is Canada Day. I’ll be playing music at our little festival here on Bowen Island along with friends Julie Vik, Moritz Behm, Corbin Keep, Jessie Pinner and others. We have an all-Canadian set of tunes, from traditional east coast fiddle and flute tunes to Bachman Turner Overdrive with a bit of Spirit of the West, Bruce Cockburn, Stan Rogers and the McGarriagle Sisters thrown in for good measure. Bunch of original songs as well.

It aims to be fun. If you’re on or near our little island come on over for the day. If not, visit Webjay and stream my playlist of beautiful Canadian songs from little known artists.

Thank God.

After a year of fractious Parliamentary behaviour, scandal and something like ten non-confidence motions, Parliament finally passed Bill C-38 and gay marriage is finally legal nationwide in Canada.

Of course it has been legal for two years now in what has become seven provinces and one territory. That inevitability however did not seem to dissuade the opposition. The opponents of gay marriage continually made the point that legalizing the same would result in a denial of rights for straight marriages. No one, not my MP John Reynolds nor anyone I ever asked about this could point out how this works. Nor could they suggest why continuing to deny equal rights to gay and lesbian Canadians on these grounds was somehow a principled defense of equality for those who already had those rights.

And then, as the above linked NY Times article notes, Stephen Harper, the opposition leader made the argument that legislation supported by the Bloc Quebecois was somehow illegitimate less than two months after he did a deal with the Bloc to try to defeat the government on a confidence motion, a motion which lost by one vote. Harper has promised to revisit the legislation if he ever becomes prime minister. Knowing that he would do that, try to overturn a law that affirms a constitutional right, is reason enough to ensure that he never forms a government.

I find politics to be a field scarce in constructive ideas and collaboration, which is why I so rarely comment on politics in this weblog. However, in the face of the partisan screaming and moaning of the past year, it is heartening to see this Parliament finally pass a motion on something positive and forward looking. I congratulate all who voted for the bill, and the rest of you who, like me, tried to convince your MP to do the same.