Can the Eastern Star spam!

I got added to a new email directory as part of my statewide appointment this year. Sure enough, it didn't take but a few weeks for the junk mail to start trickling (not, I will grant, flooding) in. Jokes, "inspirational" poems, bogus health and safety warnings, and general glurge, often with some politically- or ideologically-motivated "moral".

Before I even consented to publish my email in the new directory, I asked our group's leader to impress upon all of our co-appointees that the list was to be used for official and informative messages only, not junk. It isn't a moderated list, just a directory, so once the email addresses are out there, we don't have any enforcement mechanism or anything. And so, over time, voluntary compliance breaks down. Let's just say glurge practitioners aren't known for their thoughtful construction of opt-in (or opt-out) programs, or even any brain engagement whatsoever between themselves and their "Fwd:" buttons and the entire contents of their personal address books.

It's disheartening. It's embarrassing! We're ruining email as a means of communication within our Order, and that isn't good.

As a Chapter Secretary, I now have several members who won't consent to publish their email addresses in our Roster for this exact reason. I'm walking a fine line trying to keep said emails for my personal and official use... it only takes one slip with "Cc:" instead of "Bcc:" to release them into the wild.

How can we solve this problem?

If you have suggestions for aliasing my Chapter's outgoing email in a way that doesn't expose member addresses and can be 100% set up and moderated at my end without my members' involvement, please comment. I haven't figured it out yet.

Most of the groups I receive messages from aren't (and aren't gonna be) operated with the level of technical sophistication necessary to keep my address safe from glurgers, unfortunately.

I'm also working on a "Think Before You Fwd:" program: a delicately worded, intentionally friendly, personal appeal from me to cease and desist. I make it as clear as possible that I want to receive messages the senders have personally composed, but that I am not interested in anything forwarded. This seems to be helping! But only in a Wac-a-Mole sort of way. It usually works if I send it directly to an individual, but is almost never heeded when I broadcast it to a list. I also encourage everyone to get permission from their intended recipients before they open the Fwd:gates. That hasn't worked yet, and I'm not holding my breath.

Since our members do surely love being ordered around by Grand Authority Figures, I'm debating whether I should approach some of our Grand Chapter leadership, but since many of them are offenders themselves, I can't say I'm optimistic.

Is there any way to take back email and make it useful for communication within OES? Or is it a lost cause?

(Lest ye snark, Brethren, about the credulous old ladies, I must point out that my first offender of the year on my latest list was one of you. I would hazard a guess that this is yet another problem we all share.)

If we can get a handle on responsible use of email, maybe that'll help with membership....

GC of Washington, OES, Google map

I feel pretty confident that this is the first and only Order of the Eastern Star mashup in existence.

I've got a Grand Lodge of Washington version, too, but you Masons are clever and I wouldn't be surprised if someone else beat me to the world's first Masonic mashup.

Maybe this'll help with membership....

A caveat about mergers

If we meet less often, that'll help with membership.

If we shorten Introductions, that'll help with membership.

If we shorten Responses, that'll help with membership.

If we "lighten up" about the quality of our Ritualistic work, that'll help with membership.

If we rededicate ourselves to the quality of our Ritualistic work, that'll help with membership.

If we grant all dues-paying members voting credentials at the Grand Chapter session, that'll help with membership.

If we extend fraternal recognition to the Prince Hall Grand Chapter of Washington and Its Jurisdiction OES, that'll help with membership.

If we simplify the language in our Ritual, that'll help with membership.

If we relax our dress code, that'll help with membership.

If we support our youth groups, that'll help with membership.

If we build a big float and enter it into all of our community parades, that'll help with membership.

If we advertise on radio and with billboards, that'll help with membership.

If we put fraternal decals and license plates and frames on our cars, and wear fraternal pins and T-shirts, that'll help with membership.

If we do more "fun activities", that'll help with membership.

If we raise more funds for charity, that'll help with membership.

If we're visibly active in our local communities, that'll help with membership.

If we reach out to different ethnic and religious groups, that'll help with membership.

If we get rid of the meaningless "traditions" that are holding us back, and embrace change, that'll help with membership.

If we brew beer, or visit casinos, that'll help with membership.

If we lower our standards and make joining easier, that'll help with membership.

If we raise our standards and make joining more meaningful, that'll help with membership.

If we tell everyone we know how much we enjoy Eastern Star, that'll help with membership.

If we merge our diaspora of struggling Chapters into fewer, stronger Chapters, that'll help with membership.

Some of these are good ideas. Some are terrible ideas. All of them have been tried. Including, to varying degrees, mergers.

On the subject of membership, we're still tempted by the quick-fixes and cure-alls. We're plagued by an absence of logic and common sense. (Do any Chapters have prospectives beating down their doors with Petitions in hand if only Introductions could be three minutes shorter?)

On the subject of mergers, "membership" must not be the goal. Mergers and membership are almost oppositional. The reason mergers are still so taboo is that they require an acknowledgement that we cannot and will not increase membership enough or in time to save all our Chapters.

I don't believe anything in the above list has the slightest chance of increasing membership. I don't believe increasing membership is a realistic goal for the forseeable future. I don't believe this is entirely our fault, and I don't believe it is at all within our control. Not only that, but I think most of what we flail around with, in the name of membership, has been harmful to the members and the Chapters we already have. I still get tempted, but I'm learning to resist the siren song of membership.

The goal of mergers is not to grow the Order. It is to save the Order long enough to have any hope of growing some time in the future. It's important to acknowledge this, because it will shape our approach to mergers, and our approach is critical. We must conduct our mergers thoughtfully, because a bad merger can be even more destructive than none at all.

A brief history of mergers

First, some background. Our Worthy Grand Matron this year, a wonderful person who has honored me with a (minor) statewide appointment, is opposed to Chapter mergers and often makes this a theme of her public remarks. This has prompted me to examine my feelings about mergers, both for Chapters and Lodges, and it has sparked some discussion on the subject among my friends and traveling partners.

Since I've posted a few times already about too many buildings, it isn't a surprise that I favor mergers as one means of addressing our membership and participation crisis. But my thoughts on this subject are also evolving, in ways I'll discuss in this and future posts.

I watched one of our own neighbor Chapters struggle for years and suffer two failed merger attempts. Stubborn inactive members showed up to vote "no" and then disappeared. Stubborn active members allowed themselves to be churned through the line again and again instead of walking away. The Chapter continued on life support until last year, when they couldn't regularly get a quorum of seven. Their Charter was suspended mid-year and permanently seized at Grand Chapter. Those who sacrificed themselves all those years were rewarded with Demits. Now they're bitter and disillusioned enough that they're in no hurry to come back to Eastern Star, and although I think their ire is misdirected, it's hardly surprising.

This is my Alamo. I invoke our late, scarcely-lamented Chapter and its self-sacrificing Sisters as evidence of where our collective opposition to mergers gets us.

Our current WGM says it had always been her intent to refuse to grant any mergers during her year in the Grand East. She goes on to report, sadly, that three mergers were already under way when she was installed which she feels she has no choice but to allow, though she doesn't approve of them. Another one of the WGM's appointees this year has expressed a wish that an in-progress merger in my county might fall through. "Wouldn't that be great?"

Count me as one who is extremely grateful that our kindly WGM isn't pigheaded enough to obstruct the mergers she's inherited. Remember the Alamo! I don't know whether she's suppressing new mergers, as it's rumored was done by some of her predecessors, but she's certainly making a point of announcing at every Chapter this year that she "hopes" there won't be any more. And it's bad enough that she's disparaging the difficult and painful choices being made by our own Sisters and Brothers in their decision to merge. It's not as though they take it lightly.

My statewide appointment affords me the opportunity (indeed, the obligation) to visit other Chapters regularly, something I haven't done since I was Associate Matron, several years ago. I have to say I'm shocked by what I find. Chapters that seemed healthy 4-5 years ago are now struggling. Chapters that were struggling now have the pall of death over them.

We've gone from losing our sideliners, to losing our line officers, to losing our installed appointed officers, to losing our "permanent pro-tems", and now we've reached the point where most Chapters, including mine, can't even be certain they'll have enough temporary pro-tems to fill their chairs for Opening.

Now I'm seeing the spread from stated meetings to even our "special" events. Turnout at Official Visits has dropped off sharply. Turnout at Receptions is half of what it used to be. Our 61 Grand Representatives, whose only duty is visitation, are lucky to see ten of their number in the same room this year. Even our own Grand Officers barely manage appearances at events outside of their local areas.

Here's a photo from our Grand Chapter Installation this year. Look at the sidelines!!!! I had more people at my Chapter Installation than are in this picture!

This is not new. I'm beginning to understand what my Chapter's 50-year members are so upset about.

Based on what I'm seeing, which is a disaster, and what I'm hearing, which is the same old desperate denial, I'm officially making the switch from "supporting mergers" to encouraging downsizing in many forms, including mergers.

I'll continue these thoughts in upcoming posts.