Change the description of Indian Pirates loomio group

Fair enough

Promotion of FOSS is the job of something like the FSF.

if you read the description again you can see that it isn't about promoting free software but the philosophies associated with it. that's why it was carefully worded as "Pirate activities are inspired from FOSS philosophy". also notice that it comes only after saying "Pirates stand for human rights and social justice" which indicates they're more important.

another issue is that the words like democracy, freedom, justice, etc. are already widely (mis)used in the current politics and may not convey the true meaning they possess. i hope you got the point. if the word FOSS still doesn't seem apt (or sounds too IT-ish) we can replace it with "voluntary collaboration and free sharing of knowledge as seen in Free Software communities" as @praveenarimbrathod said. @akhileshjamdar is that okay?

PS: even if it isn't stated in the description as such, promoting Free Software is also one of the major Pirate activities! :)

We also need to be clear on the definition of these terms (direct democracy, open/transparent governance, open content (free sharing of knowledge), personal privacy and net neutrality). As you know, in politics, people conveniently change the definition of every word to fit their aims, we need to be clear about our goals in the description. It will be long, but I think the description of a political party should be long.

Lastly, I have seen lot of proposals in this forum on various political issues. I think we are at a very nascent stage and we should discuss (and educate) among ourselves about various philosophies, ideologies and issues before going to a stage where we take a stand about things.

@saipranav i agree with you. it is important to have a clear definition of each of those terms associated with our core philosophies. and thus we should be able to convey why they are important and worth fighting for.

That happens when the group is closed.

I would disagree here. Having been part of social movements and active in politics throughout student days, a group does not have to be closed. Why even go till social movements, just look at some reddit subs like r/india or r/indianews, they are open for namesake, but they are very closed for anyone who is a neutralist.

When a group takes a stand, it becomes a clique, people who don't agree with the stand become outcasts. In r/indianews you'll be branded a liberal and whatnot if you have a view that doesn't align with theirs. In r/india you'll be branded a bhakt and whatnot if you have a view that doesn't align with theirs. This has happened inspite of freedom of speech and encouraging discussion because the majority picks up a 'stand' and treats everyone else with hatred. If the Pirate Party or anyone else starting up is not focusing on building a space a those kind of hate filled groups don't form, what comes out of this party is not going to be productive in any way.

The initial hate filled flame baiters that you said left, have left because Pirate Party is not big enough. Once Pirate Party becomes big enough, those flame baiters will be there to stay and mess up the place.

Looking at whatever little discussion has happened in this forum, it doesn't look like it has the foundation to let any real productive stuff happen.

When a group takes a stand, it becomes a clique, people who don't agree with the stand become outcasts.

We are not just a discussion forum (though that is what we have right now). We have a clear politics (though a work in progress) and we are taking a stand (with our constitution and manifesto). We are looking for people who are aligned with that stand to make those shared dreams a reality.

The initial hate filled flame baiters that you said left, have left because Pirate Party is not big enough. Once Pirate Party becomes big enough, those flame baiters will be there to stay and mess up the place.

No, the flame baiters did not leave, the initial members of the party lost interest.

Looking at whatever little discussion has happened in this forum, it doesn't look like it has the foundation to let any real productive stuff happen.

That is alright, we don't have a blueprint to follow as we are moving through unchartered waters (direct democracy is a new idea, there isn't much movements in the past that we can easily emulate). Thanks for sharing your frank opinion. May be you can check back again later to see if anything changed.

Looking at whatever little discussion has happened in this forum, it doesn't look like it has the foundation to let any real productive stuff happen.

what are your suggestions for building such a foundation? your ideas are more than welcome.

Build a movement that focuses on healthy discussion of any issue that matters to the society.

Stay away from taking official stances from the Party side. When we make an official stand we are essentially sitting on a high horse and telling that we are right and people who don't agree with us are wrong. We will end up accumulating like minded people and attract hatred from people who don't agree with us.

This nation is not anywhere close to perfect. We have a long way to go. But we have been steadily improving. If I look at our past 70 years, we have come a long way in terms of economic parameters and every year is getting better. Politicians will come and go, they aren't as important as the society. At least from my point of view, the society and the quality of politics we indulge in, is degrading since the past few years. And I'm not just talking about the politicians, I'm talking about regular people who talk about politics, we have generally become more hateful of opposing views and theres no space for healthy discussion.

Every party has a stand, we need to have a space where people don't come to take a stand, or to propagate their ideologies. When people identify themselves with ideologies they don't care about what is productive and what isn't all they would want is for their ideology to be propagated. If we don't put the people and healthy politics first, we are not better than any of the existing parties.

Cheers.

We will end up accumulating like minded people and attract hatred from people who don't agree with us.

as you can see here Pirate Parties are formed around some core concepts. it's that very same concepts that bring people together here. actually how did you come to know about indian pirates? what made you join this loomio group?

it may be true that having official stances may prevent people with different opinion from joining the group. but simiarly how people come to join a group, especially a political one, if it stands for nothing in particular? also do you think that not having any official stances will guarantee that the group won't attract any hatred from different parts of the society?

Build a movement that focuses on healthy discussion of any issue that matters to the society.

agreed. but discussions are conducted to arrive at a stand, right? even if we don't declare a stand as official, the community will automatically arrive at some. similarly even if we don't label ourselves as any "ist" or "ian" (eg. socialist) the society will assign us some. for eg. if a specific group of hacktivists call themselves "anonymous" and manages to receive some attention then whenever people hear "anonymous" they may automatically associate it with hacktivistm!

so my point is, not having any stand won't bring much advantages than having a stand does. having a stand helps the community to redirect its energy in order to focus on achieving something meaningful. also as a group open to criticisms, the stances aren't rigid and final. any one can criticize and propose changes and personally i believe that matters most. so along with publishing the official stances we should also state this explicitly, that it is open to criticisms and changes. that's my stand! :)

group description upadted as proposed.