[amsat-bb] AMSAT-NA, another perspective

[John Brier]

>From what I understand, what started this was just different opinions
about ways of doing things between Patrick and officers/directors, and
in different ways, between Michelle and officers/directors. They each
have very different contributions to AMSAT, and that they ran into
similar issues from those different avenues gives more credence to
their claims.

With Patrick it was mostly about issues with how AO-92 L-band
operations were run. With Michelle there seems to have been tensions
going back further, between her and Jerry most recently it seems. She
has dealt with sexism in this community. I saw it first hand when she
gave the AMSAT/TAPR keynote at Hamvention a few years ago. I talk
about that here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQ9Rch9MjjM

BTW, IMO I felt there was never a threat she would sue AMSAT over
discrimination. From talking to Michelle, she has dealt with sexism a
lot in her career and much worse than what she reported publicly about
AMSAT. I think she is more interested in doing things and the sexism
was just one of the impediments she experienced related to getting
things done. With the money she has raised recently for AMSAT I think
she is trying to show that, and I think she succeeded. She has a lot
of free time and abilities and has and is offering a lot to the
community.

AMSAT didn't have to hire a lawyer to get an anti-discrimination
policy. There are dozens of open source projects, sponsored by large
corporations, that have policies they could have adapted. It is also
interesting that they adopted a policy after the accusations, and then
decided hers didn't meet the definition of discrimination in the
adopted policy. Not that that can't be done ethically, there is just a
huge pitfall in adopting a policy after accusations have been made.

I am not sure about the accusations she made, but does anyone else
remember what I referred to in my video? Could AMSAT publicly
acknowledge that and say it is not acceptable?

With Patrick, the idea that he harassed Drew over issues with AO-92
L-band does not seem like a reasonable description of what I know
about that situation.

As I said in the video above Drew behaved hypocritically and when
Patrick pointed that out I thought it was courageous. There were also
issues with Drew blocking Patrick on Twitter. That info is on
Patrick's website.

IMO the use of words like attack to describe accusations is over the
top. It was criticism. And what threats were levied? That he would run
for a directors seat? Attack and threat are strong words and some
definitions use violence to describe them.

I don't think Drew or others handled valid criticism well. The
blocking of access to the email archives and then the opening due to
the demand letter show to me that their judgement in blocking that was
wrong, and that they actually haven't been welcoming to the new
directors. Clayton also said in his own letter that the only power
they have is to vote during meetings... and they only had one meeting
in a year!

The last thing I will leave you with is a quote from a blogger I
follow that outlines how the ways we evolved make it exceptionally
hard for anyone to deal with situations like this well:

"As some evolutionary psychologists argue, our moral instincts didn’t
evolve to help us to discern right from wrong, but to help us convince
other humans that we’d make good additions to their clan—that we hate
their enemies, share their affinities, and shake our heads at the same
behaviors.

That’s why having your beliefs affirmed by others feels so good, even
when the belief is devoid of moral significance: that the Packers are
better than the Vikings, or that your favorite movie doesn’t deserve
its bad reviews.

Enjoying this feeling doesn’t even require the belief to be true,
which explains why people are generally uninterested in contradictory
evidence, and why solidarity groups form around claims that the earth
is flat, that vaccines cause autism, and that the real Paul McCartney
died in a 1966 car crash.

Because existing beliefs feel so much better than ideas we don’t yet
believe, we all drift naturally toward the comforts of the echo
chamber."

- David Cain

73, John Brier KG4AKV

On Mon, Jul 13, 2020 at 1:06 PM Russ Ramirez via AMSAT-BB
<amsat-bb at amsat.org> wrote:
>
> I have been a member on/off since 2012. I have never been removed from this
> AMSAT mailing list, but have not always been able to log into the AMSAT.org
> web site. In spite of this, I have renewed my membership, typically at
> Hamvention (until this year, but did so online), and made extra purchases
> to support the work of AMSAT.
>
> I definitely echo the message of Hans BX2ABT. Not everyone is bad, but
> unfortunately too many are not good either.
>
> When reading over each point of view of this ongoing dispute, it is not
> very clear what started this dispute. In a statement in response to
> allegations of financial mismanagement, Clayton wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *AMSAT's corporate records give a full accounting of all expendituresand
> are provided to its Directors upon request, in compliance with ourgoverning
> documents and law of the District of Columbia (D.C.) Ouroffice remains
> closed due to COVID-19, where those documents reside.Furthermore, AMSAT
> complies with IRS rules for 501(c)(3) disclosure ofpublic financial
> documents, such as the Form 990 available on theAMSAT website  *
>
> The above statement is either wholly true, or gray, because making a
> statement like this which is completely false would be illegal.
>
> Michelle, you have claimed that you (and Patrick) were denied access to
> financial transaction records upon your written request. Can we simply
> focus on *what* specifically started this whole thing?
>
> Russ Ramirez
> K0WFS
> _______________________________________________
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