Pirate's Blog Has moved
Due to corruption and abuse in the Media Island hierarchy, Pirate's blog has moved to http://news.zinelibrary.info .
It has come to my attention that Media Island doesn't practice social justice, economic democracy, ecological sustainability or peace. Nor do they indicate that they intend to in the future. In reality Media Island practices a top-down decision making structure with rubber stamp meetings. Media Island's director was not elected nor can he be recalled. Media Island's caretaker was not elected nor can he be recalled. Both of these positions are thoroughly corrupted and cannot be reformed. The result of this structure is wasted community resources and a sense of disbelief that the social justice community would tolerate such abuse and corruption in their own institutions.
In light of this, Pirate's blog has moved to continue archiving stories of resistance around the world. The struggle continues... just not at Media Island.
Love, pirate





Media Island has open
Media Island has open spokescouncil meetings every tuesday at 7pm. Decisions are made by those who come to participate about the management of the house at 816 Adams. There has been agreement that "Pirate" presents charges without evidence and denigrates as hierarchy any process where others don't jump when he "proposes" to.
Community involvement is welcomed in trying to manage this all volunteer run resource space. Things will never be perfect for everyone in any organization. Denigrating people who try to keep Media Island together for what good it does for the community as hierarchal is unfair. The charges stem largely from one house resident not immediately getting his wish to drive out the other.
MI and pirate (Joe)
Pirate (Joe) is an elitist tool.Things didn't go his way, so he left. Not only did he leave, but now he is accusing the MI folks of corruption. This is far from the truth. In fact, it was Joe who tried to get KOWA to lose it's FCC license and go pirate (don't we already have a pirate station?). He also has a habit of doing things without anyone's approval or knowledge beforehand. Take the KOWA studio, for example. The KOWA people had a design, but Joe did it his own way. Now the whole purpose of the new studio (space, sound quality, etc) has been lost. We have to tear down and rebuild a whole wall because of his screw up. Also, whenever we had fundraisers, he NEVER participated. He tried to infiltrate and take down people at MI as if he was a spy. He definitely is no anarchist. He is an elitist. Plain and simple.
an exercise in transition
1. Find a couple willing and diplomatic Executive Director candidates
2. write a description of current E.D.'s 10 yr. absence from Olympia and sub-legal participation in the organization
3. present to 'hierarchy'and if the response isn't to make an easy transition then make it into a petition and have the masses of the oly activist community sign it, since it's a known issue that needs to be resolved, and with enough community pressure and planning/organization it could be.
This wouldn't provide some legal tool, but if the MII elders see the wide spread support for a transition and responsible candidates for succession they'd move on. No one ready for the responsibilities of E.D. of MII has ever stepped fwd. So the org has floated without a strong leadership core. In the scheme of things this really would really be a fairly minor coup. People who want to organize for social change should take this on as a mild exercise in transformation.
As for the caretaker position. There were originally guidlines set for the position, if they are not voluntarily followed by the caretaker, nor enforced by the day-to-day involved nor the 'Hierarchy'(E.D. and the one> BOD) then that's a failure of those currently involved.
in cooperation,
Mutual Resource member and desire-ant of active hub of activism in olymia and staunch supporter of not selling 816 adams to re-pay debts taken by unprepared stewards of community resources during WTO
I don't trust anonymous posters
I am happy to publish comments trashing Media Island even when they are anonymous. I don't believe people have good reasons for staying anonymous. If the people were known they would be seen as trashing organizations for the problems they face rather than helping. I know for a fact that anonymous is not speaking for anyone who made soft loans to media island in the late 90's. And the implication we want to sell the house because of unpaid debts is simply promulgating false rumors. Many people admire the work media island was doing at that time.
Our mission has never been to manage a shelter. It is not what we are geared up to do. We do however help tons of folks in marginal situations with no funding or volunteers dedicated to this task. The majority of complaints against media island stem from problems created by folks who land here in need of a place to be.
Tons of activist groups use media island. To make the allegation that we are not an activist hub tells me anonymous is not involved in WIP, OMJP, Common Action, LASO, PMR, Copwatch, SPEECH, Media Island projects, KOWA, Food Not Bombs or any of the 30 or so projects which use media islands fiscal sponsorship services. What other organization attempts to share their space at all?!?
As far as "sub-legal" participation, there is nothing which says a Media Island International director needs to live in Olympia. We talk frquently and make board decisions about fiscal sponsorship requests etc. as needed, which is always more often than quarterly.
The other point which irks me the most is the presumption that Media Island has not been open to offers and nominations of new board members. We don't need or deserve to have board members pushed on us who are hostile or blame us for the very problems we have to confront managing a downtown house.
Who is out there who even wants to hear about all the litany of responsibilities we have been holding down? Without grants we have been paying around $600 of bills every month. We spend immense amounts of time keeping this thing afloat and it sucks getting dissed by anonymous observers. We have been asking for community help and participation to make MII flourish. We meet every tuesday night at 7 to allow a time for new volunteers and proposals to be heard. People are also welcome to help us struggle with decisions on managing the house: How to develop policy, but even more important, how to enforce policy once it is decided upon. Joe was unwilling. He also dissed our meetings and went on doing thing badly because he couldn't handle the restraints of organizational process. His only agenda item ever was Chuks departure. The problem was that Chuks is willing to work as part of an organization and interface with people who come in. Joe was not willing to do this and without it we need to lock the doors.
Political disruption of MI, and Anon comments
I kind of understand why the poster was anon, when it comes down to he says/she says mud throwing, people tend to take sides, and someone usually gets scapegoated....I have no emotional or political investment in MI, in fact today was the first time I connected the house across the street from the library to anything...There is a sign outside of the house, and one time I was waiting in my car for someone, got tired waited outside my car and a guy drove in got out of his car proceeded to go into the house, and glared at me...It was strange and unfriendly, and I still wondered what was in that house...The guy could have smiled and started a conversation with me if he wondered why I dare to stand outside of my car across the street from this house...Talk about negative paranoia....(this was around a year ago) Anyway I have been involved in non profits, though
out the years, and the last involvement was with a grassroots non profit, that I worked very hard for...I ended up being scapegoated, accused of something, gang banged by political correctness, group lynched mentally...That was it for me, my career in any groups what so ever or involvement in anything ended voluntarily with that organization. I won't fight, work for or be affiliated with and for a cause when the people within the org, or who run the show, fight, lie, back stab, steal conceal and scapegoat to keep their little power kingdoms..... After I left, things that I knew about but ignored, things about the group that were not kosher, legal or democratic were brought to the fore by fellow members, who for some time had been questioning the structure and the honesty of the Director...For many reasons, one being that the people who brought the dysfunction, potential embezzlement into the light were lambasted, lied about and scapegoated by the local liberal media and affiliated groups, many felt threatened and harassed and backed down, stepped away, quit the org..Coming out of the closet with issues actually got them bullied by the good open minded liberal community of Olympia, who banded in unity against them without knowing the facts...No one said, hey lets listen to what these people have to say, without attacking or threatening them...I thought about going to some local papers, anonymously talking to someone from WIP, but then I had totally disassociated myself from it, months before this happened, would easily be dismissed as someone who held a grudge, and was getting even, so I decided it was best to let it go...I was in no mood to get victimized scapegoat or hurt over this group, any group ever for that matter, anymore, it's not worth it for me...The truth of the matter, the real issues were never even examined by the local lib community....So please don't tell me that whatever is happening within MI is totally the fault of Pirate, who ever he is....Give me a break, where there is smoke there is fire, and it's pretty obvious that instead of working this out, MI is intent on scapegoating Pirate from the liberal community in general...I don't know any of the players in this typical political drama that plays out in all organizations from girl scouts, churches to our local government...But I see the structure of this is the same as any, us against them mentality...This is a core problem with humanity, the reasons for war greed hate etc...Why don't the parties involved ask the non profit, Dispute Resolution services for some support, and instead of throwing out your opinions, or collective scapegoating opinions, honestly take a look at yourselves, your org, each other and ask honestly as to what really is going on here...Is there any positive thing to learn, can you not scapegoat others to win or to be right?????HuH??????? You (all of you collectively) are speaking so loud, I Can't Hear YOU....Even within progressive liberal groups, there is group think, where the sheep are unwilling to speak out for something they are all secretly thinking about on one level or another...Some don't think, they are there to be cool progressive posers, and will go along with anything, some are getting credits from the college or university they attend on internships...All different agendas, all have a certain self investment in belonging...One observation is that it appears that Pirate was or is a natural organizer, leader type personality, sometimes when two unofficial leaders are in a org, a battle for turf is on, and the wiliest coyote wins...Even without knowing something at all about MI, I smell something fishy, a director who is not in this country, not in WA, no local director, and no board for fear of power struggles? Who is so defensive/paranoid that they consider a board as being destructive to the organization? That sounds a lot like the Bush administration who did not want any outside accountability or checks and balances outside of his political allies...The big Attorney General Scandal is an example of this too....Financial records, transparency???? I don't know really, I am just cynical from my own experiences...Some people use non profits to make a living for themselves, they really don't care about the people they are serving or the message, it's a way to gain community self worth, and make a living too....But it's not a non profit, it's a self serving, for personal profit with little kings, queen, courts rulers in their little kingdom....What makes you any different from Bush or Obama or the spies with agenda's to discredit your organization, really...Be Honest...
Pirate worked really hard for Media Island
In all of this it needs to be said that "Pirate" did a huge amount of work here.
I just want to reiterate that Media Island is blamed for the problems it faces by people not engaged in trying to help us confront them. Our tuesday night meetings are called spokescouncil because we recognize that many groups and individuals share the use of the 816 Adams house and have an interest in how it is managed. It is not the place of the board to decide how toilet paper is bought. The house makes Media Island International visible to the community. We have shared the house actively, proposing at other groups meetings that they feel some ownership and legitimacy in using the house and it's resources and inviting them to make space-use and key-holder proposals on Tuesday nights.
Again, if people are interested in serving on the board of an organization which is not afraid to risk the liability of owning and responsibilities of running a shared resource space for activism in downtown Olympia, please let us know. New board members are appointed by consensus of the existing board as recorded with the Washington secretary of state. I personally salute the existing board for thier willingness to have thier names on such an endeavor and continuing to be consulted on board-level decisions as needed.
I also reject the criticism which is based on the assumption of ubiquitous corruption which implies anyone in responsible positions at MII have anything to personally gain. We have struggled to pay house bills with immense levels of volunteer time for 9 years since Jimmy left to continue offering this space to the community which benefits from it. Of course we've had problems, we are right downtown.