I belong to what I believe can be considered an average Mensa local group, Channel Islands Mensa (CIM); our 250-some members live all over three counties along the Central Coast of California, although the true national average among local groups appears to be 380. A recent local calendar shows 13 events; though the driving distance is such that members from one end of the group rarely attend events held on the other end of our area, all of our events get a remarkably good turnout — sometimes as high as 20% of our membership. Now let us bring a microscope to bear on the officers who steer our small ship. It'll be easy, since most of them haven't changed in years.
Our LocSec is finally hanging up his hat after several terms. I know how he feels; I served a couple of terms myself, and only by volunteering to be editor instead did I escape being LocSec again. Our treasurer is running once more for his position of "Treasurer for Life"; our editors will likely stay in their positions, which they have held on and off forever; and we will probably be able to twist the arms of a few other regulars to be Vice LocSec and recorder. We have no ombudsman at the moment, so another arm is at risk; but all our other positions (circulation manager, scholarship chair, proctor coordinator) are essentially lifetime offices as well. We currently have no gifted children coordinator (GCC) or SIGHT coordinator, and some people hold two or more positions. Yet,like many local groups, ours is quite content with the status quo; we assume that whoever holds a particular position will continue to do so for the rest of his or her life. As I said, the only way I wriggled out of LocSec was to become editor, and the only way out of that was to become RVC. Generally, we tend to recycle officers and appointees because no one else wants the jobs. If memory serves, two of our six elected local officers were officers when I first got heavily involved in local Mensa in 1980, as were two of our four appointed officers. We have accumulated inertial service (and officers) like an old ship's bottom accumulates barnacles and we can no longer easily make way.
What if, because of distance problems, our group's San Luis Obispo County (SLO) members (or others in a similar position) broke away and became an independent local group, rather than simply the Northern Area with a coordinator? All we would need to do is turn the coordinator into a LocSec, make the proctor the proctor coordinator, and get a Vice LocSec, recorder, treasurer and editor, right? Well, no. We would also need to scrounge up a GCC, a scholarship chair, a SIGHT coordinator and an ombudsman in case things got ugly. Our working sails are furled tightly and stowed in the lifeboat of bureaucracy, which is now too full to be useful in an emergency. Still, assuming that everyone held only one position and everybody was happy to hold one of those needed positions, we'd need only 10 people. (Coincidentally, that number is exactly 20% of the membership in the potential group, and exactly the number that participates in the first place.) Could this possibly work? Of course not. Within a year people would be fighting with each other; within four years people would feel like they were stuck with their positions for life. Nothing burns volunteers out faster than being chained to an oar, tied to the crow's nest, or doomed to permanent galley duty.
In spite of holding elections every two years (every year for some local groups), Mensa is really a volunteer organization. I do not recall ever having to fill out a ballot in Channel Islands Mensa during my years in the group — because no one was opposed. Sometimes one or two positions are filled by appointment after the election because no one volunteered to run for them in the first place, but we somehow manage to muddle along. The problem is that new or different people are reluctant to volunteer to run for or be appointed to office. They can see that the position's holders don't change — and they realize that it's not because these people love what they are doing. Once people get elected/appointed, a strong rip tide sets in. They simply can't (or, in some cases, won't) get back to shore.
And so I look up at the national and international elections. I see quite a bit of progress at the international level, where three slates ran for office. There may be more to this than meets the eye, but it does look like healthy behavior. At the national level I found myself voting for exactly two officers. Four of the five top AMC officers were elected by default. Two very good candidates ran for RVC, Region 9, and it was a close race. (I'm just glad it wasn't decided by one vote, like it was once before when amazingly few members voted.) With respect to the automatically elected candidates, their situation eerily and too well reflects my own local group's: Mensa seems to have officers for life. I don't care how qualified they are, or that they have promoted themselves up through the ranks: This bothers me.
Money will not solve this problem; e.g., in a recent treasurer's report, Channel Islands Mensa showed around $9,000 in savings, in addition to the normal checking account. We have had that forever.
Awards will not solve this problem. Our local group has never won any awards that I am aware of; that does not surprise me, nor am I ashamed of it. I sat as a judge for the Newsletter Awards one year and enjoyed that duty; it really showed me how widely newsletters differ and that quality has nothing to do with group size. More to the point, since the group newsletter is the primary contact most members have with Mensa, this has always seemed like a worthwhile contest. However, when the Group-of-the-Year contests came up, I saw that as a very bad idea. I still do. Consider the problem of recycled local officers and then you will understand why our group and other groups like it are not going to get a lot of points toward any award. The RVC cannot fix that, the AMC can't fix that, the National Office can't fix that — and Leadership Development Work- shops merely create better "officers for life" at the local level.
Mensa now has a giant bureaucracy; we've become a ship of state whose officers are completely out of touch with the "passengers and crew" — the average member and the average local group. It would be another example of "The Emperor's New Clothes," except that in our case the citizens of Mensa are saying nothing because they simply aren't looking at the Emperor. In fact, it wouldn't surprise me to learn that most members don't even know who the Chairman is and even more don't care. I am happy that a number of new faces ran for RVC positions (along with a few old ones); I only hope that their rise to the top will be quick, because we simply can't wait for them to advance through the ranks. Some patience will be necessary, for election, though slow, is the only non-mutinous means we have to "relieve" the tired dynasty on the bridge. It would take only one election if all hands snapped smartly to reality and formed a slate to oppose the top half of the AMC — those elected by the full national membership — but most of us couldn't care less about elections.
The dock has rotted from neglect. The harbor is stagnant. The U.S.S. Mensa is adrift; its sails are shipshape, but its compass is locked and its rudder is rusted in place. Godspeed to those aboard who chose or will choose to stay, start at the bottom, scrape the barnacles, overhaul the gear and work their way to the upper deck. May they reach the helm and set us back on course before they lose their innocence and we lose their momentum.
Mark Hutchenreuther, better known throughout Mensa as "Hutch," is the founder of the Creative Mischief SIG; it amused and engaged Mensans in memorable ways, including the now infamous "duck walk" at the Peabody Hotel, during the 1993 Magic AG in Orlando, Florida. Hutch also served as RVC 9 after being elected in 1997.