Comments on: Universal House of Justice Letter on Baha’i Elections

By: Baquia

Baquia — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 20:08:42 +0000

I think that H means that we shouldn’t blame the current implementation of Baha’i elections if they are not proving to be effective. Rather we should look to ourselves. I could be wrong but this is what I ‘get’ from H’s message.

Although there is a grain of truth to this, there really is a more complex dynamic at work because the individual and the community as a whole shape the community as well as being in turn shaped by the specific administrative processes.

To go back to H’s analogy, while taking driving lessons would no doubt help, upgrading from the Model T to say, the Prius would also yield better driving since it has been engineered for much better user interaction with the driver.

By: Craig Parke

Craig Parke — Mon, 21 Apr 2008 03:20:36 +0000

If we can not drive, let’s not blame the car. Take a driving class or two. Changing the car color won’t make us drive better.

Hi H,

Welcome. Please explain what you are saying here.

Thanks!

By: H

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 23:14:39 +0000

If we can not drive, let’s not blame the car. Take a driving class or two. Changing the car color won’t make us drive better.

By: Bahai Elections - How To Improve Them? - part I

Bahai Elections - How To Improve Them? - part I — Sun, 15 Apr 2007 21:02:35 +0000

[…] everyone is poring over the recent Universal House of Justice (UHJ) message of March 25 2007 on Baha’i elections. You should read the UHJ’s letter for yourself but if you’re feeling lazy, I’ll […]

By: Craig Parke

Craig Parke — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 12:45:52 +0000

I voted in 32 straight annual Baha’i elections in person to elect a delegate to the U.S. National Convention. I voted with absolute prayerful diligence after serving in many capacities in the Faith to be aware of the best candidates to vote for as Shoghi Effendi advised. I now vote only by mail because I cannot emotionally sit in the same room with the current insipid automaton electorate that has allowed the Baha’i Faith to be destroyed like this. The only thing that can save the Baha’i Faith now is strictly enforced term limits at every level and the shredding of all top down imposed agendas at every electoral convention henceforth forever. Let the grass roots decide the fully local agenda. Any topic is open for discussion including all currently imposed top down plans, concepts, and mindsets. People should be permitted to come to their District Conventions armed!

In the past two years I personally know of at least 7 people totaling over 210 years of Baha’i service on LSA’s, DTC’s, foreign NSA’s, and pioneering posts who have left the Faith in total anguish and disgust. The Faith is in free fall and the lifetime incumbent class currently at the top cannot deal with anything. The U.S. National Fund is currently experiencing a 50% shortfall yet none at the people at the top can discern what is wrong. They can’t because they live in an air tight tiny world of their own making. Baha’i World Club not Baha’i World Faith.

I know people who have written to the Universal House of Justice and never received a reply of any kind ever! Or people that wrote to their NSA and got a form letter reply over two and a half years later! It is embarrassing and disgraceful.

So Divine Judgment is coming on the current Institutions of the Baha’i Faith. Terrible, terrible, terrible furious Divine Judgment upon the people in these positions and their families. I pray for them.

Immediately instituting term limits is the solution (I suggest 10 years lifetime service on the Universal House of Justice, 8 years lifetime combined service on any National Spiritual Assembly, and 5 years lifetime service on any one Local Spiritual Assembly). No person should ever serve in any Institutional appointed position more than 5 years total combined lifetime service. After these terms of service people will then be required to go out and get a real job where you are held fully accountable for your decisions and your performance. If your business doesn’t make a profit, or your computer programs don’t work, or your books don’t balance, or your students flunk every test, or your patients all die you are out of a job and you are out on the street to die in the gutter.

Otherwise completely deranged and self-deluded people will just serve forever as lifetime incumbents in endless on-going total disgrace of themselves and their family names.

The present system of elected service must now be corrected if the Faith is to survive.

By: White Hanky

White Hanky — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 07:16:11 +0000

Baquia This section of the letter caught my eye:
…”Contributing to the widening distrust of so vital a process are the influence on the outcome from vested interests having access to lavish funds, the restrictions on freedom of choice inherent in the party system, and the distortion in public perception of the candidates by the bias expressed in the media. Apathy, alienation, and disillusionment are a consequence, too, as is a growing sense of despair of the unlikelihood that the most capable citizens will emerge to deal with the manifold problems of a defective social order. Evident everywhere is a yearning for institutions which will dispense justice, dispel oppression, and foster an enduring unity between the disparate elements of society…”
Gee..do you think they could have been talking about ohh..I don’t know..random guess here, THEMSELVES? or the Italian NSA Finance scandal, the ‘term limits’ proposal and perhaps your own observation of the ‘closed loop between the ITC and the UHJ when they have to replace a member of either institution?
Just a thought or two as I print this off to feed the worms. WH aka the Worm Composter grin