[SCA-AE] New A&S Policy at Pennsic

[Eric France]

> My question is this: do we really want to send  teen-agers the message that 
>instead of speaking out against an insulting   tyrannical rule that makes no 
>sense whatsoever and has created far more  problems  (to such an extant that I 
>have heard but have no means to confirm that  the  Pennsic mayor has received 
>threatening emails) than it could possibly  prevent.

"Tyrannical", Mick? Hyperbolic much?

Once again: this rule was not instituted to screw teenagers or their parents. It 
was certainly not instituted to police A&S class content. 


This rule was instituted so that there would be a way for minors to continue to 
attend A&S classes while adhering to the new rules about supervisory 
interactions between staff and  minors at events -- rules that are to be applied 
across the entire Pennsic staff structure.

These new rules are in response to the changing legal climate since the Ben the 
Steward incident. There is more to it than just that, but like many others I'm 
not at liberty to go into gory details (and I'm not the right person to do so). 
But if you think about it for a moment, these rules, if followed by everyone, 
will make such a situation essentially impossible in the future. 


Of *course* its sounds ridiculous if you're talking about a 240 lb 17-year-old 
boy who's authorized for heavy list. Wisdom and responsibility aren't magically 
bestowed on the 18th birthday, but LEGALLY it makes a huge difference. How will 
the kids feel about it? Well if their parents tell them that its a vast BOD 
conspiracy to make their lives suck, they'll probably believe that. Or, if we 
tell them that its to protect them from predators, well they might believe that 
too. I don't know.

There is a really good compromise that has been approved -- any responsible 
adult can accompany a minor to a class. In my view, that makes all the 
self-righteous indignation about what is basically a question of convenience 
look like foolish puffery.


There has been a lot of very harsh criticism of the Pennsic staff on this list 
(and on the Thescorre list), which in my view is totally unwarranted. Pennsic 
staffers, particularly the Mayor and DMs and section heads, VOLUNTEER an 
enormous amount of time and energy trying to make Pennsic a great event for 
everybody. If you don't like how things are being run, maybe you should 
volunteer to work on staff yourself next year -- the change in viewpoint might 
be educational.
 Eric