After 5 months of meetings we know what we look like to each other (and names are beginning stick too) but how do we want to look to outsiders?

I raise the following questions as thought provokers for discussion at the next meeting.

As a group are we passive; soaking up the information provided by guest speakers once a month and happy to continue to be that way?
OR
Are we wanting to mobilize, get out there, be active to educate and assist others?

If as a group we are the second, are we ready to pick a "pet hate" (or three) and begin working on ways to get the word out?


Susan...

Personally, I’m in two minds about passive verse active. I really think Skeptical and critical thinking should be the norm, but as along as news papers keep printing horoscopes and people are selling ghosts on trademe, skeptical activism does have its place.

The problem (as I see it) with getting out there and kicking the crap out of some pseudoscientific non-sense, is we run the risk of labeling ourselves as naysayers, and becoming outcasts from the pov of the public eye.

I would much rather promote critical and scientific thinking, plant the skeptical seed per se, and get people thinking and evaluating for themselves.

I think we (as skeptics) have some great useful material out there, i.e. Podcasts, Youtube channels such Captain D, Thunderf00t to name some, P&T Bullshit, South Park, Mythbusters. I have (quite passively) passed some of this material onto my peers and had great results.

I am all for getting more active and mobile, promoting critical thinking. I just think we need to do it right in order to be successful.

Agree with Alex.

If we were to get active I'd like to see it as something separate/additional to the Thursday meet up. It would be great to have a "report back" during the Thurs session to hear what the Active Group were doing and achieving, but even though I've only attended once, I enjoyed simply mixing and mingling with rational people. It was very refreshing to be in a room where I knew that if I mentioned I was coming down with a cold nobody was going to suggest crystal healing or prayer.

Passive skepticism does little to counter the irrational. Just look at the prevalence of psychic TV programs like Sensing Murder. There are people who actually believe that sort of nonsense. That cr*p gets air time because there is insufficient resistance from folk like us.

That question's a bit of a False Dichotomy...

Why can't we be both?

The present format seems to be working fairly well... And, as has been suggested, there's nothing stopping smaller groups of people from going off and doing some activism as well...

I suggest we put it on the agenda for next month's meeting, and each month anyone with any good ideas can call for volunteers to organise and initiate something.

Idea: Bill Subritzky healing meeting on the 16th march. I was going to go, but it clashes with something.

I'm hoping to get someone to make notes / interview people for The Cusp podcast.