From britdisc-owner@csv.warwick.ac.uk Thu Oct 31 15:22:30 1996 Received: from thistle.csv.warwick.ac.uk by clover.csv.warwick.ac.uk with ESMTP id IAA02419; Thu, 31 Oct 1996 08:55:46 GMT Received: by thistle.csv.warwick.ac.uk id QAA15338; Wed, 30 Oct 1996 16:23:35 GMT Received: from arl-img-2.compuserve.com by thistle.csv.warwick.ac.uk with SMTP id QAA15149; Wed, 30 Oct 1996 16:20:05 GMT Received: by arl-img-2.compuserve.com (8.6.10/5.950515) id LAA10538; Wed, 30 Oct 1996 11:19:26 -0500 Date: 30 Oct 96 11:12:25 EST From: Stuart Clark <101336.3664@compuserve.com> To: Britdisc <britdisc@csv.warwick.ac.uk> Subject: Dangerous ground..... Message-ID: <961030161224_101336.3664_GHW119-1@CompuServe.COM> Sender: owner-britdisc@csv.warwick.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Status: RO Rob, (and whoever else is interested) > Andy C may well have spoken out of turn and with what now reads as an > excess of vitriol when criticising what were, in the main, niggly > details from last weekend. However, in the course of the sound kicking > you all gave him, someone or other suggested that rather than blurt > his bile all over britdisc he should have a quiet word with the > venerable Simon Hill, i.e. keep his mouth shut. Well, yes but then no, I don't think that was what (Becca Humphries) was suggesting at all. Where did the idea come from that not putting your views on BD but speaking directly to a TD or Si Hill was the same as keeping your mouth shut? Yes, BD is a good forum for having an audience and promoting discussion - but whining is not discourse - it's all one way traffic (except of course for the flames of wrath such complaints provoke). Correct me if I'm wrong, but very little positive has come out of the cost/breakfast argument - lots of people jumped to the organisers defence, lots of nodding henchman are probably sitting at PC's agreeing with Andy Cotgreave's gripes. What was being suggested was that Andy could equally as well have communicated those gripes to Chris or Simon after the tournament and they would have certainly received an equal amount of attention as they are now but probably without such the knee jerk reaction involved in having to justify the running of the tournament to the whole British Ultimate community - I know Chris and Wayne are very open to constructive criticism of the tournaments they run and any comments are always appreciated - all that's being questioned here is the method in how those complaints were communicated. >It's interesting that for offering what he thought were genuine criticisms which >could well have struck chords with others he was pounced upon when another >person who shall remain nameless, primarily because I'm just not sufficiently >interested to go back and check, got away with some direct, personal and >ostensibly groundless abuse at the expense of Rob the Jester. Surely britdisc is >exactly the place where people should be able to moan about any detail of british >ultimate even if only so that the rest of us can carefully correct their misguided >attitudes. I don't think that's the reason he was pounced on at all. I think the reason he was pounced on was because of his, as you so rightly put it, misguided attitude. You will notice that all of the people jumping to Chris' defence are all people who have been tournament hosts, are players on teams who have been tournment hosts or are BUF officers. Believe it or not, this is not a coincidence. All of these people appreciate that a tournament is something that comes together over a period of months - not days. If you spend so much time organising something, trying your best to cover every detail, hearing someone complain about the quality of your jam is not very gratifying. I think you're right in that BD is the venue for "questioning" details of British Ultimate, not necessarily moaning about them, but my personal view is that the questions we should be asking are about organisation of the BUF/coaching/regionals/nationals/tournament formats/what the BUF can do for players and vice versa etc., peppered with tournament reports and seasoned in Dave Murray style humour!! We should be talking about the larger machinations of the BUF. If you get to the point where you're moaning about breakfast then you're back on the dangerous ground of the heated, now infamous Bog Roll debate after Ross a couple of years ago. Yes, these are complaints that may be worthy of attention and can be addressed, but you can rest assured that the quality of strawberry jam at next years Nationals is not high on the priority list of the BUF. It's been said before but I'll say it again - if people think they can do better then they should give it a shot. When they've hosted a cheap, PERFECT tournament with all the trimmings i.e. party, breakfast, quality hot showers and excellent changing facilities, no wind, blazing sunshine (no excuses for not booking the weather), then, and only then can they take the moral high ground and start criticising other tournament hosts. This is not another flaming of Andy Cotgreave, I know in the past that he and I have shared very similar views on a number of things and I do think that there were points he raised that do require looking at (breakfast not being one of them!! ;-)), but having been a tournament host myself once I couldn't rally to his cause on this occassion (Sorry mate!). No tournament is going to be perfect, maybe it's time we started to accept that and didn't expect too much from people. Minor gripes we can grin and bear (can't we?) BUT, If you do have a complaint - don't shut up, do talk to TD's and the BUF about it, just do it in the way that causes least offence to all the people who put all the work in. Potential whingers take note - if you talk to people at the event you're unhappy about, you may find that you will get satisfactory answers to your questions AND you won't get flamed from lots of disgruntled people on BD. That's got to be more agreeable to both parties hasn't it? Stu. SE RC Village - and he knows he is.