National Trust AGM

[PRAMtran]

I’ve received an email from the National Trust inviting me and all other members to vote in their AGM. Does anyone know if there are any things a woman’s rights advocate should vote for or against. Eg TWAW by stealth.

Thanks for posting that, it’s a very informative article.

“As a member, I have just voted. The AGM’s first webpage says voting “will take only five minutes”. This is not true if you wish to know on what and for whom you are voting. To do so, you need to read the short statements made by the council candidates and the wording and explanations of the members’ resolutions.

You should also read the annual report which must be approved by members. On this last point, however, the Trust has saved us time: the annual report is not ready. We can vote for or against it, but we cannot, as I write, read it.
There is only one way to get through everything in five minutes. It is called “Quick Vote”, and you need press only one button. The trouble is you can Quick Vote only one way – to approve the Trust’s choice of candidates, resolutions, auditors and its annual report – everything the Trust wants, and nothing else. If you disagree with the Trust on anything, you must vote slowly.”

That is extremely poor. I can sympathise with the Annual Report emerging fairly late in the day before the AGM, but to open up online the voting without the Annual Report being available is extremely poor governance.

That's a really eye opening article. Whatever side of the debate you're on, the opening paragraph describes a really manipulative organisation

I went to some trouble to find these trip advisor reviews but my post has been overlooked it seems.

The article also includes information on three of the five RT candidates, whom some might regard as ‘establishment figures’, one being a journalist and the other two being a judge and a farmer/landowner with 4,000 acres.

“Lord Sumption. He was until recently a judge of the Supreme Court and is widely seen as our most intellectually distinguished judge living. He is also the monumental historian of the Hundred Years War and has personally restored a major 18th-century house in London and a great chateau in France. What wise charity, especially a conservation one, would not want his help?
^^
Philip Merricks. A life NT member for 30 years, he is the only farmer in the UK accredited by Natural England to manage National Nature Reserves and was chairman of the Council of the Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group. His own National Nature Reserves at Elmley and Swale extend to 4,000 acres. He always promotes the marriage of farming and nature conservation, which should be the way ahead for the Trust.”

@RebelliousCow

’….they are intentionally provocative and with a specific and determined political intent with which I take issue.’

I appreciate your point on the presentation but not yet on the notion of ‘political intent’.

What exactly is the ‘political’ element of the agenda of the NT and other organisations who are on your radar for intentionally and provocatively amplifying historical facts that present Britain in a less favourable light? There most definitely is a political agenda on the other side to prevent it happening.

https://www.thirdsector.co.uk/controversy-culture-secretary-looks-warn-charities-against-rewriting-british-history/governance/article/1707420

I’m a member of the WI so I have first hand experience of queer being introduced on the down low

I've just read a really interesting quote that seems particularly apposite on this thread:

'The simple key to the power of our upper classes is this: that they have always kept carefully on the side of what is called Progress. They have always been up to date, and this comes quite easy to an aristocracy. … it was their business to stand for the new things, for whatever was being most talked about among university dons or fussy financiers. Thus they were on the side of the Reformation against the Church, of the Whigs against the Stuarts, of the Baconian science against the old philosophy, of the manufacturing system against the operatives, and (in 1910) of the increased power of the State against the old-fashioned individualists. In short, the rich are always modern; it is their business'

GK Chesterton

Exactly - they have always had that. The difference then was that it was being force fed according the tenets of a very particular set of theories and ideas - which have very certain political intent. People know when they are being iondoctrinated, rather than being provided with some historical information and context. Plus, contexts are multiple - not singular.

People have provided you with a lot of time and energy on this issue - it s now going round in circles and seems pretty pointless.

Classic!

The reason you don't often post on this board is because you take no issue with postmodernistic theories as they are currently being pushed. Most people who frequent this board do. These theories are all a part of a certain ideological stance that sees itself as inevitably 'progressive' and morally pure ( otherwise known as wokeism) There's the rub.

Perhaps you could address why you said slavery was relevant to everything in all NT houses, and gave tapestries as an example “who picked the cotton”.

several posters have pointed out that slavery is not a factor in the tapestries as they were woven from wool and silk and some made in continental Europe. This is a prime example of shoehorning slavery into the provenance of objects, like the shoehorning of queering of the Mary Rose nit combs.

Someone who, apparently, knows history came out with the gem that tapestries are made of cotton? Unbelievable.

Regarding the shoehorning of previous owners sexuality into the history of the houses - what gives the NT, or anyone else the right to do this based on no evidence whatsoever?

Thinking the risible nonsense of the queering of the Mary Rose artefacts was worthy was another low.

Discussions are not meant to be win - lose situations, the purpose is to enlighten and to understand that there are other perspectives; often those that you don't personally agree with. Life is complex like that. It is not all black and white.

Yes, Sheila Jeffreys is great - and very forthright.

Theer is a whole thread of considered comment. -perhaps you could spend some time going through it? You show no evidence of having read most of the posts.

"Advancing equality" is itself a theoretical construct. Are you aware of that, or do you simply see it as inevitable progress?

I see the cancellations have now started judging by the number of deleted posts.

‘Advancing equality" is itself a theoretical construct. Are you aware of that, or do you simply see it as inevitable progress?

i gave multiple practical examples of advancing equality that were not within the realm of either theory or ideology. I could spend all day giving you more. Feel
free to describe it as a theoretical or ideological construct if it makes you feel better or - more to the point - helps with your generalist dismissal of it.

How very predictable.

Wow paranoid or what?
the deleted posts were burnt toasts repeated, juvenile, personal attacks.

Were the deleted posts already deleted before you reached that point on the thread? In other words, did you have a chance to read what they said or were you already too late for that?

l’ve gone back a couple of pages and quickly scanned for the deleted posts. The posts made since last night which have been deleted are ones which I thought were over stepping the mark (for me personally, anyway). I can see why they were deleted.

Or are there older posts, from earlier in the thread, making serious discussion points which are now being deleted?

Thank you for the thread overall. I'm a national trust life member and usually don't bother voting for the trustees but have done so this time.

It is easy to spot the RT if you wish to avoid but the Trust's recommendations seem to be substantially weaker than a lot of the other candidates so it is worth reading the statements.

Chesterton was good at aphorisms but he is hardly a neutral source. And I know one shouldn't judge an idea by the company it keeps but I really would think twice about quoting Chesterton in this context, if you know anything about his politics that is shooting yourself in the foot. Think "somewhere to the right of Attila the Hun" and that was by the standards of his own times.

I have expressed multiple times my waryness of any of these contemporary slogans and initiatives - and as this thread has progressed my caution has been shown to be accurately intuited.

It is not about " feeling better" - it is about being wary of unquestioningly accepting contested ideas as inevitable necessities.

Perhaps you are unaware of why most women are posting on this particular board? I don't think you are a regular here - I can't recall your username at all in the years I've been posting here? I think If you had sympathy with the issue which motivates most of us here - I think you'd understand perfectly the issues we also have with your campaign.

i'm not sure there is going to be anything else i can add which might aid your understanding. I've already posted at length throughout.

I was too late to see them. But obviously to be deleted they first have to be reported.

This thread is getting better and better! Cotton tapestries, gender neutral toilets in private homes, and anybody who criticises a particular interpretation of history just ‘doesn’t like history’.

On an anonymous board, you never know who you are actually talking to, their background or station in life. It might lead you to feel so smug about your own credentials that you fail to notice when you are making a fool of yourself.

What exactly is the highly contested topic that I am accepting without question ?

I mean feel free to call it quits as you’re right as we aren’t getting anywhere. But I do think attitudes towards NT highlighting slavery are being overwhelmingly clouded by association with the other issue.