Damn (volunteerism)

A couple of very good folks who have been working as key volunteers for one of our BDSM orgs just resigned.

I have no idea what precipitated it. It is none of my business.

But this brings up some stuff that has really been bugging me for awhile.

First of all, I have a case of the guilts that I don't quite know how to resolve. A few years ago I volunteered for an org as the newsletter editor. I edited, printed, folded, stuffed, and drove across town to deliver an 8 page newsletter for 200 people by myself. After a year I was fried. I also *had* to quit too as I was purchasing a condo and quickly found out purchasing real estate is a temporary full time job in itself.

I have not volunteered in a significant, formal way since. I have put together several demos and presented them, so I am still serving the community to some extent. I suppose I underrate that effort--some of these demos require quite a bit of research. But I enjoy doing them so much...

Anyway, I digress. I keep feeling like I *should* hold one of these major positions (like the newsletter editor one). But--I can't bring myself to do it.

While I can chase off predators with no problem I have a *very* tough time drawing boundaries when assigned a volunteer task.

WRT to the newsletter-- it was amazing what people put me through. People who had, I think, graduated from H.S. swore up and down they could not write. Had I waited for someone to write something (I was supposed to be an *editor,* not a writer) I would have never filled up 8 pages. I don't know how many things I wrote for folks. I don't know how many times I had to guess at what a demo was about to do a write up because the instructor could not be reached and would not submit one. I don't know how many times I got called on the carpet for an inaccuracy after I had to beg for the information I got in the first place--and got it 2 days past my deadline. I don't know how many times I edited and put in articles less than one hour before I had to submit the newsletter to the printer to make my print delivery deadline.

The "coop de grass"--the thing that started me thinking about quitting, was when someone told me they wanted me to upgrade the newsletter and showed me glossy ones created by much larger dungeons which have an editing *team*.

So I quit (with three month's notice).

This is not peculiar to that club at all. From what I have heard this is a pretty typical volunteer experience.

The club, the people, the membership, whomever, takes advantage of the volunteers and wrings out their energy until they burn out and quit. Often when they quit they *quit*--as in drop out of the public scene for awhile. I was smart enough to toss in the towel before my resentment became entrenched.

And--the volunteers let it happen. I think it is a self selecting phenomenon. Those who tend to volunteer are those who tend to be the helping sort anyway (minus a person here and there who volunteer for the power and pass the real work onto others)--and often those are the folks who can be taken advantage of in fairly outrageous ways.

There is rarely any questioning of whether or not too much is being asked of the volunteer, whether or not they have a life, or kids, or a *gasp* job.

And the volunteer rarely mentions it.

Which sets up another dynamic--who wants to volunteer when they see the current volunteers living at the place and becoming more burned out? Not a good promotion for volunteering. I don't know about anyone else, but my job takes a lot of tiger out of me already. I don't have the energy to deal with the same crap as a volunteer.

Would it be possible to set up some sort of group ethic for this? I think the first myth that needs to go is the idea of a volunteer as a self sacrificing altruist who has no limits. The volunteer needs to let go of this as much as the organization does. It seems that it would not have been too much to ask that the person who wanted me to upgrade the newsletter would also inquire if I needed help to do that. It seemed he saw me doing a good job and wanted to see how much more he could wring out of me. And, I admit, it would not have been too much to ask that I tell this person that I would be happy to upgrade the newsletter as soon as I have a proper team to support me in creating the sort of publication the BOD wanted.

So what if the only volunteer who can be reached by phone says, "as a matter of fact I *can't* come out to unlock the dungeon right now. I am having dinner with my kids across town 40 miles away and I can't afford the gas to be doing this all the time." A class may be canceled--and a solution may be found to the ongoing access issue, finally.

Under this ethic (something that could be drafted, taught, and institutionalized by the right leaders, I am sure) nastiness and backbiting would not be an acceptable response for someone setting a reasonable limit. Telling a person that they need to host a party every month just because they pulled off one successful one would not happen. If it did the person being told to do this would feel safe to say no.

Seems we need to negotiate our volunteer relationships with the same care that we negotiate our scenes. We all have needs, limits that can be stretched, limits that are hard, and expectations. These scene negotiation skills *are* generalizable!