2-7-08

Yesterday I picked up the seal and papers for our corporation, which was drawn in the name Men’s Action, Inc. on January 28, 20008.

This incorporation will lead to a more viable organization with accepted methods of accounting and fiscal conduct. A bank account will be opened in the corporate name this month after which sales and donations will be made and received in the corporate name. These activities are part of our efforts to create a solid foundation upon which to build our membership.

On another matter, I heard from Marc Roemer yesterday who has become comfortable with his adventurous journey to Costa Rica. Below is a copy of his letter in which he describes his first hand observations of a patriarchal way of life and the dangers to it of economic progress.

Hi EG.

Everything’s going great here. I did 2 weeks of Spanish classesand I’ve made some trips to the beach, getting plans in place todayfor another few days of surfing.I’m staying with a traditional CR family in a small village. It’s anextended family of 5 houses all right next to each other. I think it’sgreat for the kids to have other adults in their lives who love them.I wish I had had other options besides my parents when I didn’tunderstand them. I don’t think this lifestyle is going to last muchlonger though, because the next generation will go to college andprobably move to the city where the high paying jobs are. Of course alot of gringoes are helping this process along because by doing thingslike tutoring English to school kids (like I did), required foreducation credentials here. Ironically one English teaching volunteerstaying with the grandmother of the family told me how much she lovesthe family. Failing English is a problem for us to solve, and morefamilies falling apart will be the result, and another problem, whichthe elite don’t know how to solve if they even consider it a problem.Of course people want more stuff, they are as materialistic here as inthe US, but this family has everything it needs, including a womanthey pay to do the ironing, so by my way of thinking I don’t see agreat need for more money. I suppose that’s easy for me to say whileI’m traveling around to places they can’t afford to go to. At the sametime I’m not sure they recognize and appreciate all they’ve got.I spoke to the dad of the family a little about patriarchy, motivatedby my observation that his kids never cry or shout, and they all seemso happy. He doesn’t think that he’s the boss. He actually insistedthat he shares all decisions with his wife (she’s a homemaker andpart-time travel agent). We agreed that feminism and machismo go tofar.I hope you are well. I sort of changed my plans in that I don’t reallywant to work right now. At some point I may look for students to teachprivately but for now I’m simply enjoying myself.

Marc

Let’s all wish Marc well on his adventures. I’m sure what he experiences will become ammunition for the propagation of our message.

E.G.

INCORPORATING AND OTHER ACTIVITY

INCORPORATING AND OTHER ACTIVITY

Much has transpired since my last communication and I take this opportunity to bring you abreast of developments.

You see that we now have nine streaming videos. Another 24 are in the hands of our Chief of Internet Operations and are in the process of being converted to digital. We will have three categories of streaming videos. One will be from my public access TV program that ran from 1993 to 2002. The second will be material that has been made since then and the third will be interviews that I participated in. We are looking into the practicality and advantage of getting a webcam .

I have started to podcast again, an activity that I held off on because it takes a fair amount of preparation, and I questioned if anyone listened to it, inasmuch as I received no feed back. Your comments on the podcasting will be appreciated.

In any event, we have an advanced website, which I feel is second to none for its various offerings and I ask that you ask your sphere of influence to visit our website. I will write more on personal contact in A Message from elder George.

We incorporated on January 24, 2008 and had to drop off the Rebuild Society from our name in order to avoid having to register as a non-profit. We can still use our name as before, but the corporation is Men’s Action, Inc.

My thanks to those of you who were able to make a financial contribution to help the business aspect of our organization get started. To those who plan to do so but haven’t done it yet, I ask that you move on it. The above activities take money.

Another area of activity that helps our coffers and our outreach at the same is the distribution of books and booklets. I noticed that the number of hits our website receives is in large measure affected by the number of books and booklets ordered. Written material has a multiple effect because it gets passed on to others. All of our material contains our website and whenever material is distributed website activity increases.

I offer a 5% discount on book purchases of five and a 10% discount on book purchases of 10. The booklets are already discounted 25% to members; that is, they can be obtained for $15/set of five and are subject to the same quantity discounts as the book. These prices include freight and handling. If you can’t make a $100 donation, order five books for $95, or five sets of booklets, or five of each. We do not have dues, so donations and the purchase of materials is our only source of income.

I held a lecture in Harlem last week and after distributing 1500 fliers not one person showed up as a result of those fliers. Everyone who came to the meeting came as a result of personal contact. Again I will go into details of personal contact in a separate message.
While the attendance was poor, one of the attendees invited me to a meeting last night at which I made for more contacts and sold another book. This is an example of personal contact and the networking it produces.

The local colleges have started the spring semester and I plan to find a way to address the students; however, the planet Mercury is retrograde until the 18th of February and I have already seen the effects of the confusion in communications. This is a good time to plan but not to initiate. I’m curious to see if there will be any communications snafus in the primary results on February 5th.

As you can see there has been a lot of activity here at headquarters all of which is aimed at our goal for 2008 of increasing membership. I thank you all for your participation and look forward to your continued efforts to spread our message.

Please log on to www.mensaction.net and read today’s Message from Elder George in which I describe the effectiveness of personal contact.

E.G.