15-08-2013, 11:59 PM
Duncan Grassie Wrote:Whenever I go back to this noticeboard I keep having to remind myself that all this fervour and debate circles around a pastime involving people moving bits of wood/plastic around the board (and one I still enjoy very much).
It would be great if one year at the AGM we could just get some new faces in who haven't been poisoned by the previous set of protagonists. The only way I can see this happening is by those who have been propagating the nonsense over the past few decades to voluntarily step back and give some space to some fresh new parents/organisers who haven't had these prejudices bedded in. Then maybe people like myself might return to chess.
Since I posted this many of the protagonists I mentioned have piled in on topics that have nothing to do with chess but have much to do with historic point scoring. Do you think that 95% of our membership have a strong opinion on an incident which we were not present to witness or has very little to do with the playing, teaching or organisation of chess? Please take your argument to a darkened room somewhere, sort it out yourselves and let someone else get on with the job of organising chess in Scotland.
I hate to stifle debate on this noticeboard particularly when there is much to be said about the organisation of chess tournaments and actual discussion of chess but it seems like most people just fancy a punch up. Every time these punch ups happen, I consider wading in with a comment like this one and then I realise that I too would become part of the problem.
What needs to happen is that these people need to realise they are propogating the problem, take themselves out of the game voluntarily and give someone else without the baggage a chance to run things. And everytime they feel like opening their mouths to open old wounds they have to catch their own tongues and realise that if they dont, then another generation of juniors, parents, volunteers will have to suffer the same old prejudices. Maybe after a couple of years of dignified debate we may see more people coming forward to become foot soldiers.
If you want to get a quality Sunday morning out in the Pentlands get up to ESOCs long o event in Penicuik which I notice an A McHarg of Interlopers has entered. I would love to spend it one day playing allegro chess again.