Governance as a Tool for Advocacy and Protection within Sensitive Groups

[Outis]

Below is a blog post I wrote but never published so might as well post it here.

Governance as a Tool for Advocacy and Protection within Sensitive Groups

Introduction Every social group, irrespective of the controversy or sensitivity surrounding it, has
intrinsic rights that should be protected under the broader umbrella of human rights. In this
discussion, we explore how maps as a group can leverage governance and organization to advocate
for their rights and ensure they are treated fairly and without discrimination.

MAPs as a group It is estimated that maps account for anywhere from 0.1% to 30% of the
population. If we use a conservative central range of 1% to 10% and use a typical country size such
as the UK, this equates to a population of 692,999 to 6.9 million maps. In terms of GDP, assuming
maps hold equivalent shares in businesses, jobs and savings that equates to between £22.74 billion
and £227.4 billion. As a measure of the number of map employees expected within an organisation
such as the NHS, it equates to between 15,000 and 150,000 NHS employees. For a larger country
such as the USA, in terms of GDP maps would equate to $287 billion to $2.878 trillion. 1% to 10%
is sufficiently large a demographic to swing an election or impact an economy.

Historical Context and Lessons Learned Historical movements provide invaluable lessons on
organizing for rights and recognition. Women’s suffrage movements and LGBTQ+ rights
campaigns show a spectrum of organizational structures from grassroots to formal governance.

Women’s Rights Movements:
Local and Grassroots Groups focused on local issues such as working conditions, education and
local elections. Typically, these had democratic governance structures with local leaders and
committees.
Cooperative Guilds such as The Women’s Cooperative Guild established in 1883, focused on
consumer rights, health and education. Governance was typically democratic with elected officers
and an annual congress for voting.
Professional and Education Groups focusing on expanding professional and educational
opportunities for women. Governance was carried out through elected boards linked to established
educational or professional institutions.
Suffrage Organisations such as the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU) founded by
Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughters in 1903. This union operated in a hierarchical and autocratic
structure with centralised decision-making which maintained discipline and high-profile campaigns.
However, this approach often caused splits in the group.
Networking and Federations that combined disparate groups to pool resources, such as the
National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). Governance was highly democratic with
member societies sending delegates to annual council meetings.
Publications and Press groups creating journals, newsletters and books articulating ideas,
strategies and news.

Gay Rights Movements:
Early organisation (post-World War II) during a time when homosexuality was still criminalized in
the UK forced gay people to be highly secretive and careful. Groups such as the Homosexual Law
Reform Society (HLRS) founded in 1958 aimed to decriminalize homosexual acts. Governance was
highly informal and cautious due to legal risks.
In 1964, Campaign for Homosexual Equality (CHE), also known in the North West as the North
Western Homosexual Law Reform Committee (NWHRLC) before merging in 1971 as CHE became
more formally organised with local groups. Local groups were largely autonomous, governed by a
national executive committee elected by members at an annual conference.
The 1970s and 1980s saw the formation of Gay Liberation Front (GLF) which took a more radical
and public approach to activism. Governance was generally flat and open focussing on consensus
building and democratic ideals.
The AIDS crisis in the 1980s saw the creation of new organizations such as the Terrence Higgins
Trust (THT) that had to professionalise quickly to help deal with the serious health crisis.
This shift allowed more mainstream and professional organisations to form resembling professional
NGOs. Governance generally operated like a business with a CEO, trustee boards and departments
focusing on activities such as fundraising and research.
Later, this allowed the LGBTQ+ community to group and justice movements and more recently,
digital and grassroots movements.

Applying Governance to the MAP community The MAP community can learn from these
movements. Today, the MAP community is in a place comparable to the gay movement after World
War II which existed in a largely disjointed set of groups operating in fear of the law and public.
Governance in this context is about establishing structured ethical advocacy platforms that respect
existing laws while striving for societal acceptance and legal protection.

1. Establishing Governance Structures: Create democratic and transparent structures that
allow for discussion, planning, and action. This can include forming committees, electing
representatives, and adopting charters that define the group’s goals and ethical guidelines.
Governance structure creates direction and momentum and helps to channel influence where
it is most impactful.
2. Live Communication and Engagement: Utilizing modern tools like forums and real-time
communication platforms such as Discord or Element can enhance interaction while
protecting anonymity when necessary. These platforms can facilitate the exchange of ideas,
legal advocacy strategies, and support.
3. Funding and Resource Management: Adopt models like Decentralised Autonomous
Organisations (DAOs) for transparent and democratic fund management. This approach not
only helps in resource allocation but also in maintaining accountability and adherence to
group goals and legal standards. Popular DAO platforms such as Aragon make the formation
and operation of DAOs simple, while as opensource projects they can be deployed for more
private DAOs. As DAOs grow, they can be structured into a DAO set like a corporate
structure. Membership of DAOs can be limited to a small group of select voting members or
opened to a wide community. Treasuries within DAOs ensure MAP initiatives and projects
have access to funding with the support of the community.
4. Local and Digital Synergy: Combining digital advocacy with local engagement ensures
that the group’s presence and impact are felt at multiple societal levels. Local groups can
focus on community-specific issues, while digital platforms can address broader, national-
level concerns.

Building Bridges and Ensuring Inclusivity It’s crucial for map groups to engage with broader
movements and organizations. This not only aids in mutual understanding but also helps in fostering
environments of inclusivity.

1. Networking: Collaborate with other human rights and advocacy groups to support common
goals. This aids in building legitimacy and can provide a broader platform for the group's
voice.
2. Public Education and Engagement: Develop educational campaigns that inform the public
about the group's rights and the importance of non-discrimination. Clear, factual
communication can help reduce stigma and build supportive alliances.
3. Support other movements: In the modern online world there are new organisations
constantly forming and having to deal with the same issue of forming ground rules often to
the extent of formal constitutions. By being part of these communities, we can shape
constitutions to be broadly inclusive, creating environments safe for maps.

Conclusion Effective governance within the map community is about ensuring that all activities are
aimed at reducing marginalization and discrimination. By learning from past movements and
adapting to modern technologies and methods, these groups can create sustainable and impactful
advocacy platforms. The focus should always remain on promoting understanding, protecting
rights, and fostering a just society for all.
MAPs as a demographic are significant and with good governance and organizational could be a
powerful lobby group. This can be carried out safely as needed, with care and planning. For
example, if every map made might rights a single issue in an election it would not require individual
maps to be exposed but as a collective it would impact who gets to govern. What we buy, which
services we choose, how we save and invest, collectively the potential for serious impact is
significant.

[PorcelainLark]

Concerning the idea of MAPs as a voting bloc. I think if you had political journalists/a think tank that explained how policies would impact MAPs, you would still need to do more to draw MAPs attention to information you collected. It feels MAP communities should be a lot larger than they currently are, and something should be done to get more MAPs to self-identify as MAPs, if we were going to make use of this idea of MAPs as a voting bloc.

[Fragment]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Society_for_Human_Rights

The Society for Human Rights was an American gay-rights organization established in Chicago in 1924. A few months after being chartered, the group ceased to exist in the wake of the arrest of several of the Society's members.

Gerber set out to expand the Society's membership beyond the original seven but had difficulty interesting anyone other than poorer gays in joining; he was also unable to gain any financial support from the more affluent members of Chicago's gay community. Gerber sought out the support of people in the medical professions and sex education advocates and was frustrated when he was unable to secure it, because of their fear of ruining their reputations through the association with homosexuality.

A lot of these challenges sound familiar, though Mu is already doing better than a membership of seven.

The first pride parade in 1970, meanwhile, had thousands of participants. Out gay politicians weren't really a thing until the late 70s, almost a decade after Stonewall. I think we're still a little off. We haven't reached a critical mass of it being "okay" to be MAP. We're still on the fringes with the vast majority of MAPs not even willing to admit it to other MAPs. I do feel from looking at things like Pedi, though, that we're growing.

Gerber was put through three separate trials, before charges against him were finally dismissed because he was arrested without a warrant.

Gerber's defense cost him his life savings, some of which may have been in the form of bribes paid through his lawyer.

It took until the 1950s for the Mattachine Society to start seeing success on the activism front and even then the 50s was more failure than success.

As Jim mentioned on another site, though, it feels we have pushed past the denial phase and are somewhere between ridicule and fear. Our battle is going to look different to previous battles. We have the myth of "predator-victim" dynamic to overcome. We also have the internet which is both a boon and a bane in how it amplifies messages. Pushing forward is all we can do, though.

[Outis]

I think that's right, the first battle is to just get people to understand the difference between pedophile and abuser. I've found that it can be done.

My line is that when discussing "the pedophile problem" with people who don't know my sexuality is that we have to acknowledge that pedophiles aren't going away and that pedophiles are a part of our communities, the same as gay people, straights and others. I remind people that being a pedophile isn't illegal any more than being an angry person is illegal. But there's a difference between being an angry person and a murderer just as there's a difference between being a pedophile and an abuser.

I find this line often lands fairly well. We all know angry people, we usually know overly horny people. We might be friends with them, we might not, each person is different but we know there's a difference between that person who is always horny and a rapist and that person who's angry a lot and a killer. People can kill for all kinds of reason, it isn't just angry people who kill, and that horny person is horny because of his hormones and he's probably the shyest person and least likely to rape anyone.

I think getting society just to the point of understanding that difference would be game changing. The world has changed a lot, when I was in my 20s I knew someone called Pedo Pete, a mate of ours who was always chasing young girls. It was funny really, he was totally harmless and he was a popular guy. If he'd have gone off and raped someone everyone would have disowned him in an instant, but we'd have done that if anyone had raped someone.

I agree that we should try to get society to understand that difference so we can reintegrate again. Getting to that point, we can then turn to other battles but from a much more integrated and stronger position.