allenindenver's blog

I read Kassia’s and Sky's great website about their European community-hopping and would like to comment about a few things mentioned in the text which accompanies their photos.

See: http://sites.google.com/site/eurocommune/

Kassia and Sky write that, “Twin Oaks blurs the line between community (in the contemporary understanding) and society. Usually, it seems, communities have a sense of purpose. Twin Oaks has some of this, but mostly its purpose is to perpetuate itself.”

See: http://sites.google.com/site/eurocommune/christiania
Jan 22, 2009 12:48 PM by Sky Blue

One might call that a cynical comment about Twin Oaks (TO), suggesting that many communities (especially European communities, in the context of Kassia’s and Sky’s website) are values-based while TO exhibits a self-serving purpose. My suggestion is to respond to this cynicism by attempting to identify what specifically it is that TO may be perpetuating. Answering that is a bit complex, yet it can be simplified, in my view, to the idea that what TO is perpetuating is primarily what I call the "sharing lifestyle." It can be stated that simply, yet there is also a lot behind that statement, especially with regard to TO’s feminist, egalitarian orientation and to the community referring to itself as an “ecovillage.”

Cynicism on the part of both current members and ex-members is an important thought to consider, because of course it leads to current members becoming ex-members. I see many connections and aspects of this issue and I'd like to lay some of them out and ask for comments.

I'm going to relate this issue to the whole history of TO. It has to do with the change over time in the general concept of the reasons for TO's existence. Several important things have changed with time, and some things have remained essentially the same despite those changes, and I want to touch on all that. Here's the summary:

A Sense of Purpose in the Communal Organism
A. Allen Butcher

I read Kassia and Sky's great website about their European community-hopping and would like to comment about a few things mentioned in the text which accompanies their photos.

See: http://sites.google.com/site/eurocommune/

Kassia and Sky write that, “Twin Oaks blurs the line between community (in the contemporary understanding) and society. Usually, it seems, communities have a sense of purpose. Twin Oaks has some of this, but mostly its purpose is to perpetuate itself.”

See: http://sites.google.com/site/eurocommune/christiania
Jan 22, 2009 12:48 PM by Sky Blue

One might call that a cynical comment about Twin Oaks (TO), suggesting that many communities (especially European communities, in the context of Kassia’s and Sky’s website) are values-based while TO exhibits a self-serving purpose. My suggestion is to respond to this cynicism by attempting to identify what specifically it is that TO may be perpetuating. Answering that is a bit complex, yet it can be simplified, in my view, to the idea that what TO is perpetuating is primarily what I call the "sharing lifestyle." It can be stated that simply, yet there is also a lot behind that statement, especially with regard to TO’s feminist, egalitarian orientation and to the community referring to itself as an “ecovillage.”

Cynicism on the part of both current members and ex-members is an important thought to consider, because of course it leads to current members becoming ex-members. I see many connections and aspects of this issue and I'd like to lay some of them out and ask for comments.

In February of every year is a holiday that most of the country observes called "Valentine's Day." At East Wind Community in the late 1970s an adaptation of this holiday was begun by Steve (Che'), later taken to Twin Oaks Community by Christy when he moved there in the early 1980s. Steve's original inspiration may have come from the practice of re-evaluation co-counseling which was being practiced at East Wind at the time, which among other things encourages the validation by others (specifically the co-counselor) of an individual's feelings. The Validation Day tradition may have since spread to other intentional communities. If any readers are aware of other communities adopting this tradition I invite them to share the story.

Validation Day involves a small group of people creating a holiday card for each member of the community. To the cover of the card may be affixed or drawn or painted anything that is suggestive of the person for whom the card is made, including their name. Cards are made for children as well as adults. All of the Validation Day cards are then kept in a box in a primary public space and all members are encouraged to write something validating of as many other members as they can, while refraining from looking at their own card. The cards must therefore be fairly large, and the process is best started more than one week before the Validation Day holiday.

On Validation Day each member retrive's their respective Validation Day card, and typically the entire day is oriented as a holiday, with reduced work expectations, attractive festooning of the dining hall, grand supper, and a dance party in the evening. This holiday is especially appreciated due to its timing during the coldest part of the winter.

The first paragraphs in this writing reference the article found here:
"The Democratic Dimension of Anarchism" by Murray Bookchin
http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/anarchist_archives/bookchin/cmmnl2.mcw.html
http://communalism.net/

"Communalism" as an Economic rather than Political Term

I continually deal with the question of defining "communalism" as I lived for 12 years in rural communal communities of up to 100 people, and my intent has been to bring aspects of that culture to the city. Murray Bookchin's article "The Democratic Dimension of Anarchism" equates "communalism" with "libertarian municipalism," and he states in one of his notes that, "9 History provides no "model" for libertarian municipalism, be it Periclean Athens, or a tribe, village, town, or city--or a hippie commune or Buddhist ashram." In contrast, I shall state, as I once tried to tell Murray in person at the Institute for Social Ecology, that the closest "model" to his ideal are indeed the communal societies comprising the Federation of Egalitarian Communities (FEC) in which I've lived. Murray didn't respond to me, and certainly we both could find ways that Federation communities don't perfectly meet his ideal, yet some of them are very close, and provide excellent examples, or at least the best we've got, of communal libertarian municipalism.

The ways that even the largest Federation communities do not meet Murray's "model" could be said to be size of population, and also the question of economic issues, yet still I maintain that they are the closest examples available.

Murray focuses the definition of "communalism" in his article upon political process or governance. He quotes a dictionary definition which I found in my dictionary as well. Murray writes, "Communalism is defined as 'a theory or system of government [sic!] in which virtually autonomous [sic!] local communities are loosely in a federation.' 8 No English dictionary is very sophisticated politically."

A. Allen Butcher, Denver, August 2008

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You Share What?!

What is the most shocking thing about communal society? Different people may answer that question in different ways. For some it may be income-sharing and the resulting freedom from dependence upon any one person or upon the nuclear family for one’s economic well-being, as is the norm in the dominant culture. For others it may be the social acceptance of having multiple or other non-traditional sexual partners, yet for most people, however, it could be something much more basic to human nature.

This paper is a follow-up to two others I’ve written recently, the first being about the change in the ideology that Kat Kinkade espoused as the reason-for-being of the member communities of the Federation of Egalitarian Communities, Twin Oaks, East Wind and Acorn, which she co-founded. (See: http://www.thefec.org for: “Kat Kinkade and the Communal Theories of Equality and of Sharing.”) Over the decades Kat realized that striving for equality was problematic, even though it was she who invented the most effective form of communal economic system, the vacation-credit system. Over time she realized that the tendency toward leveling everyone to the same amount of economic consumption was not conducive to social harmony. Kat wrote, “Secular communal economies must, to be successful, be full of holes. I think that if they are too tight, too ‘equal,’ they will fail, because people would not be able to stand the constraints. ... Most people value small liberties more than they value small equalities, and therefore society works better if the rules aren't too rigid. Equality is a means, not an end.” (Kinkade, "Is It Utopia Yet?" 1994, p. 47, 50)

Allen Butcher, Denver, August 2008

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From the track record of failed court cases that Federation communities have attempted, it appears that either Federation communities need to learn how to defend themselves against those who would distort and disparage their alternative lifestyle, or else think very carefully about taking future issues to court. Following is a survey of court cases involving member communities of the Federation of Egalitarian Communities, and some suggestions on how to be better prepared for legal challenges.

Not every legal case has been lost. There is one very notable court case that a Federation community won. This was in 1986 when the IRS attempted to interpret the tax status of 501(d) as requiring a vow-of-poverty. Twin Oaks successfully argued that the original legislation created by Congress did not intend to require that members donate all of their personal assets to the communal society upon joining. Since then, many new communities, most of them Christian, have incorporated as 501(d) associations. Twin Oaks paid a Washington law firm $60,000 to win this case, saving them from having to pay the quarter-million dollar bill the IRS had given them for back taxes. (See: Kat Kinkade, "Is It Utopia Yet?," page 282)

I think there is grounds for appealing this case to a higher court.

It's a travesty of justice that a culture was tried and not the crime.

I think that the prosecutor's office, and perhaps the judge, was negligent in their duty to have let the defense make those arguments against Ganas, as though they justified the assailant's shooting someone.

Also, if the judge insisted upon making Ganas' culture or alternative culture material to the case then the prosecuting attorney could have and should have defended Ganas' culture.

People know that communal societies are different from the dominant culture, that's why they're called "Alternative Lifestyles" and "Countercultures." Just like Korean subcultures, and Hispanic subcultures and African subcultures, there are different values and behavior codes than in the dominant culture in America. Yet it can be shown that in Ganas' culture assault with a deadly weapon with the intent to kill is not sanctioned.

This point should be easy enough to establish.

If help is needed from the stand point of the alternative culture itself, then I would think that the Federation of Egalitarian Communities, Delegate Assembly can file a "friend of the court" brief stating that Ganas would never have been admitted to the Federation if it had been determined that any of the distortions of truth that the defense alleged about Ganas were true. It is not true that the community sanctions rape, nor that members with American citizenship are forced to marry aliens, nor that the community brainwashes members. If any of that were true the Federation would have denied or revoked Ganas' membership.

Yes, it's true that in alternative cultures people sometimes have extra-marital relationships, that Americans marry aliens, and that people are changed by their experience of living in alternative cultures, yet none of that is a sanction for assault of any kind, much less with a gun.

Allen Butcher, July 2008 (EW ’75-’83, TO ’85-’89)

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***

This paper presents in Kat Kinkade’s own words her invention of the vacation-credit communal economic system, and her later abandonment of the ideals of equality and communalism due to her concerns about envy and the lack of personal incentive. This paper only addresses Kat’s comments on economic issues of labor and money, while her views on politics and decision-making require a separate paper.

Kat co-founded three communal societies, Twin Oaks (TO), East Wind (EW) and Acorn, and named its networking association the “Federation of Egalitarian Communities.” In Kat’s later disillusionment with communal society may be found inspiration for changing the emphasis in communal theory from equality to sharing, and for developing new experiments in communitarian design.

***

Kat in “Journal of a Walden Two Commune,” from “Walden House Newsletter,” Aug, 1966, p. 8

The holding of property in common at Walden House is not an article of dogma. We don’t do it because it was recommended by Jesus or Marx. We do it because it saves money and makes sense. Where it ceases to have these functions, we cease to practice it.

Kat in “Journal of a Walden Two Commune,” from “Walden House Newsletter,” Aug, 1966, p. 14

Equality in a community is a relationship so structured that no member envies another. Simple.