[Businessmtg] Founding Principles, etc.

[Gerald Hunter]

It's a good time to mention that, as an online group, ASP has found through the experience and wisdom of time that operating "exactly" like a face-to-face meeting doesn't always work out well.

The very nature of online formats makes disruption and diversion from our primary spiritual aim not just possible, but from time to time very likely. All it takes is one of two members to get in a snit
for all hell to break loose and the topic meeting is run off the rails. (Snits happen :-)) - and they've happened here, too, though in my experience far less so than in other online groups I once attended.

So in some ways we're much stricter than f2f. On the other hand we're also more lenient than many f2f groups (OT shares as an example). Need I mention the controlling personalities that are not uncommon in f2f? If you've ever run into dominance by an individual in Al-Anon you know the havoc they can cause.

Secondly, as an online meeting we have an elevated responsibility to "run a clean ship". F2f group "errors" affect only the members of that one group and perhaps a small geographic area. These days a high percentage of first contact with Al-Anon is online. That's us and others like us. When we err the effects are sown world-wide. We have a greater ability to affect "Al-Anon or AA as a whole" than do f2f groups.

Consequently ASP has wisely chosen to follow our fellowship's principles with clearly-defined policies which seem to have guided us through the pitfalls inherent to online communications and the Obstacles to Success which have dogged Al-Anon from its earliest days.

So far, so good!

Jerry
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