[HSU-CoordBoardInternal] Letter of Hiatus from Governance/Organizing

[Jesse Ide]

To Josiah Litant, the Committee of Ten/Accountability Board, and the
remaining members of the current body calling itself the Coordinating
Board: 

I'm writing to announce a hiatus from organizing work that I am taking
for my health and moral integrity. It is not just CoordBoard that has
brought me to this conclusion, however it has been a big influencing
factor. I haven't quit until now because I made promises to other people
that I wouldn't quit and leave them, however both of those people have
now quit themselves, thus negating a lot of my grounding for persevering
in what has been not just a very stressful and time-consuming role, but
one that has made me feel very ethically and morally gross and has often
triggered my PTSD at many times. The amount of time I've been dedicating
to organizing work for large bodies of people has eclipsed my social
life, academic work, ability to take care of my body, and necessary
feeling of control over my own life that I need to handle anxieties from
my PTSD. I have not been able to spend time on things that I enjoy, or
even been able to enjoy things I make time to do. 

Today, all of my classes were suddenly cancelled and I expected a day
off, instead, after I got off from my 9am-12pm work-study job (one of
two jobs I work to support myself financially at this college, in
addition to work I did at the beginning of the semester and odd-jobs I
work irregularly such as cleaning mods and participating in experiments)
I was caught in non-stop organizing work/activism from 12pm through
10pm. My entire day was stolen and I had no time to work on academic
projects that I've been unable to work on because of organizing work,
let alone get much needed relaxation. I was also triggered by
conversations at/after Pizza With The President, and then had more work
dumped on me by a co-organizer for a student group I sign for, without
my consent, which I had explicitly told her earlier that I did not think
I would be able to do. Then, as I checked my phone to ponder if I even
had the mental capacity to work on homework, I saw Nicole's letter of
resignation. 

I simply cannot handle all of this. I am a survivor, working through
gender dysphoria, working multiple jobs to afford college, and taking
classes on top of it. That's amazing enough. I saw great potential in
the structure we had outlined last semester, and giving back to the
community is something I value strongly and almost feel bad not doing.
However, my feelings of obligation to continue to do governance work has
outweighed my feelings like I can actually have control over my life and
be listened to. I outwardly voiced strong concerns about the "retreat"
on Saturday and was told that "consensus" was that we were having it at
a certain time. I'm sorry, but I attended the group dynamics and
organizing workshop at Signer Seminar and the consensus flowchart said
that if there were any reservations or concerns about something that
that is not consensus. 

I would be happy to organize Town Meetings in a small committee that
just does work focusing on that. The kind of work I imagined CoordBoard
would do is more like how FiCom or FundCom meetings are than how our
current meetings are. I did not want to be on Community Council, I
wanted to organize Town Meetings and help participatory democracy get a
grounding at Hampshire. My hiatus does not mean I'm quitting governance
or community organizing forever or anything like that. It means that I
will not be attending CoordBoard meetings or participating as an active
member for an unknown length of time, probably a month or until the end
of the semester. If you need someone to take notes at Town Meeting,
promote things on facebook, or do any small task related directly to
organizing Town Meeting, I would be happy to have it delegated to me.
Similarly, if you bring a form that needs to be signed to me, because
I'm one of the signers, then I would still be happy to sign it. I can
tell you where I'll be in advance and you can bring the form to me. 

I don't expect you to save my seat for me or allow me back onto the
board without being elected. I'm just not going to completely make
things difficult by becoming uncooperative and disappearing before you
can cover the work I was doing with someone else. I still like Town
Meetings, and want to make them happen, I just can't handle CoordBoard
meetings and do not agree ethically with how they function. Talk of
"pushing things through town meeting" and "people won't talk about
things the way we want" makes me feel gross. That we didn't even get a
voting system up that prevents non-Hampshire _community members_ from
voting, when the only reason we weren't using intranet forms is because
we wanted to prevent staff and faculty from voting, shows how
misalligned the priorities of the board are from my own motivations for
being on CoordBoard. 

I am also taking a break from all my other organizing positions, so it's
really not just CoordBoard on its own that is so difficult. I'm going to
either do this until I feel like I've regained control over my life, or
until the end of the semester; whichever is sooner. In this time, I'm
going to focus on making personal life improvements that will make life
easier for me even when back in an organizing role: such as alleviating
gender dysphoria by focusing more on furthering my transitioning,
rebuilding a healthy social life that I've lost because of organizing
work, getting back in the habit of cooking my own meals so I can get off
of the "event food diet" that is clearly making me feel awful from day
to day, and restarting regular hygiene maintenance habits that I fell
out of because of a lack of time and energy after doing so much
organizing work. 

After I finish my hiatus, I will carefully observe what organizing roles
I might want to take up again based on how I've developed as a person
and how those roles have changed since I've left. I do not intend to
have this hiatus for too long, really, just a month is the more likely
plan. I simply can't be spending 9am through 10pm Monday through
Thursday every day with non-stop work that isn't even academic. 

I hope that this doesn't cause too many problems for any of you, and I'd
be happy to lend any of you my Big Red Binder full of my notes on the
work that was down leading up until this semester. 

Good Luck and Best Wishes, 

Jesse Ide F12 

On hiatus from signing for one of the largest student groups on campus
and its weekly extravagent 80-person workshops 

On hiatus from signing for the student government or any other
governance work 

On hiatus from conducting the EMMA experiment for the Mad Science Club 

On hiatus from advocating for mental health and wellness resources
through the Wellness Center and SHAC 

On hiatus from involved Social Justice activism 

CSI Office Worker 

MDB Night Monitor 

Singer in Two Choirs 

Linguistics, Cognitive Science & Conflict Mediation Student 

 
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