The Park Slope Food Coop in Brooklyn has been a focus of boycott activism targeting Israeli goods since 2011. Those efforts have so far failed to convince that progressive community, now 43 years old, to boycott Israeli products, but tonight there’s another vote on the question aimed at defusing boycott activism.
A Coop board member has put forward a motion to require a 75 percent vote in favor of boycott measures. This motion does not mention Israel, but it is clearly aimed at preempting a proposal first put forward last spring that the Coop boycott Sodastream products because they are made in part in facilities in the occupied West Bank. Traditionally, the Coop has voted on political questions such as boycott with an up-and-down vote.
The Coop has never voted on that Sodastream proposal of eight months’ standing. I’m told that the leadership has begged off, saying that it can’t find a space to house such a discussion. But they did find a space big enough to house tonight’s meeting.
Only Coop members are allowed in to tonight’s meeting. The sponsor of the rule, Jesse Rosenfeld, the secretary of the Coop, says that the 75 percent threshhold would end “division and hostility.” As if such a bureaucratic dodge is going to allow a forward-thinking community to avoid the Israeli occupation.
Here’s the latest issue of the Linewaiters’ Gazette, which includes a lot of debate over Israel boycott initiatives.
Our thoughts and prayers are with the staunch supporters of human rights and the enemies of collective punishment. The Park Slope BDS just like the rocket threat, will be defeated.
And this was the winning speech. The proposal to change the Rules of the General Meeting, as so noted by the Chair Committee in an open vote, was approved at 294-YES, and 192-NO.
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My name is Jesse Rosenfeld. Secretary of the Coop and Member of the Board of Directors.
I joined the Coop because I liked the word. Cooperative. It just rang true with me. I liked the idea of pitching in while meeting my neighbors. We all hope for an end one day to long lines and the incomprehensible two-step checkout process. Still most people say, “I love the coop. I love it here.” I shop several times a week, I’ve become a pretty good cook and I’ve made friends with people I wouldn’t normally meet discussing subjects I wouldn’t normally encounter. Everyday I see someone on the street from the PSFC so the community I find here is not an abstract. People, I am making an effort tonight because we all love this place. We all work together and we want to see it thrive.
Which brings us to tonight’s proposal. Our boycott policy isn’t about what we boycott anymore. It’s about how we’ll use it going forward to demonstrate unmistakable cooperation. Right now, the guidelines are too vague, as in: not actually spelled out in a hard number. It’s only implied, and until now unquestioned, that enacting a boycott needs 51% of all the votes to pass. This has bred an unintentional split-down-the-middle mindset when discussing contentious boycotts. Which is not good for the Coop. Going forward we want unity in addressing injustice, we want harmonious General Meetings surrounding boycotts, and to heal feelings of persecution in the hearts of our members. We want to drain the strength from poison-pen dueling so that Gazette editors will be released from working far in excess of their standard 2 and ¾ hour shifts. We want to give staff and the General Coordinators breathing room again to focus on operational improvements instead of dealing with the ramifications of boycott discussions and proposals. We musn’t let this vague, unwritten policy continue to overshadow the cooperative principles that are central to our operations.
For example:
ONE: Our Mission Statement says: as members, we contribute our labor: working together builds trust through cooperation and teamwork…We are committed to diversity and equality. We oppose discrimination in any form. We strive to make the Coop welcoming and accessible to all and to respect the opinions, needs and concerns of every member.
TWO: The First International Principle of Cooperation reads: Cooperatives are voluntary organizations open to all persons able to use their services and willing to accept the responsibility of membership without gender, social, racial, political, or religious discrimination.
What all this means is that no political litmus test should exist in any cooperative other than whether they are cooperating by fulfilling membership responsibilities. But this raises a few sticky questions: How can we fulfill the part of our mission where we welcome all of our members regardless of political opinion? How can we maintain diversity? And how has the Coop taken positions on boycotts without alienating the members who disagree with the boycott? The answer is that all of our present boycotts have been uncontroversial. Chilean Grapes, Coca-Cola, Nestle, all have passed with an overwhelming majority, and no one was offended or made to feel discriminated against along the way. 11 out of 13 boycotts in the last 25 years have been at 90% and the other two were at 80%. We found the sweet spot. 80 and 90 percent! That shows solidarity, not a virtual 50-50 split. Tonight, we can join together and fix this oversight in our Boycott Policy.
Codifying the number at 75% to pass the vote, up from the unwritten 51%, further girds our foundation of cooperation. 51% is not solidarity! 75% is, or at least a lot closer to true solidarity. Our organization is open to anyone regardless of their political affiliations, but 51% leaves it wide open to anyone who will say anything to get the ball over the 50-yard line. To avoid that going forward we must strengthen the most precious bond we have: Trust. A cooperative such as ours requires almost blind trust in each other because we accept anyone willing to pull their own weight. With 75% we embrace alternative viewpoints and we encourage movement towards cooperation across political lines. It breaks my heart to witness the divisiveness surrounding boycotts month after month, year after year, and it should stop now.
With all of our boycotts passing so far at 80 or 90 percent, and the unwritten boycott policy at present at 51%, a good compromise is 75%. The Coop presents many vibrant platforms for new ideas. All that’s expected in return is overwhelming agreement for a boycott. It should take a quite a lot of effort to speak in everyone’s name. It should be as close to mathematical everyone as possible because solidarity demands real understanding of what membership thinks . 1% past 50 doesn’t do that. 75% is both majority rule and cooperative, making sure we don’t boycott something in a way that could wind up offending a huge section of membership. Boycotts with overwhelming support will counter the distaste people have expressed for reading the Gazette, our public unifying resource. A supermajority will encourage people to return to attending GM’s on a regular basis. Our true solidarity will attract the 2500 more members per year we need to replace the ones that leave. And we’ll avoid potential erosion of 49% of our membership who wouldn’t want to be seen by an onlooker as supporting any future highly controversial boycott.
Our operations and stability are more important than any boycott. There is much more that unites us than divides us. Whether you see us as your community, your business, or your family, if we want the coop to thrive, the cooperative comes first. The boycott policy must be codified at 75%. Otherwise, we will look at each other one day and realize that something quite precious has been lost.
My name is Jesse Rosenfeld. I stand as pro-Coop. Vote Yes for 75%, yes for solidarity, yes for cooperation.
are they a bunch of Birkenstock wearing Klinton supporters? Good grief, out here in Lexington we’d be speaking English if they had been in charge. New York City progressives, who cares actually, they don’t live in the real world anyways. They should eat pesticide. their food coop isn’t doing them much good anyways. That’s for people who like overpriced organic food…They are called Yuppies. maybe they will live fifteen minutes longer by not buying food at Stop and Shop. Who drinks Soda anyways, what is this, 8th grade? The food they buy in NYC can be had in Maine for 50% the price. Escape from NY time for them. They are not progressive. In what way are they, do they eat tofu and do Yoga. Do they snort wheat grass? Seriously, a modern normal group of people wouldn’t be censoring themselves. These people take the cake for self importance. Food coop, that’s something only in NY would people be pro Israel and pro obfuscation and act like were all in this together so we should just be quiet. They are stooges of a foreign land, not progressives. Its a meaningless word. They progressively steal land. . Get your own food, you “Progressives” ! and legalize it already. Progresso soup is too salty. When the electric grid goes down, we’ll see who is progressive and who is a violent psychopath.
The “divisive and hostile” objection to Palestinian solidarity efforts like BDS have become the hoariest trope of desperate Zionist apologetics.
A friend of mine belongs to a Reconstructionist congregation whose members observe a polite silence amongst themselves re Palestine /Israel lest the sweet bonds of brotherhood they enjoy be riven by…different opinions. Some fellowship, that can’t endure dissent. I mean, guys, you’re not some starched WASP family whose scary fissures are just barely held in check by denial and alcohol, right?
If you want to savor a good, self-righteous fit of nausea, search for a Stand With Us video called something like “Why BDS Scars Don’t Heal”, a smarmy little slice of agitprop detailing the woes that befell the pro-injustice community when the satanically devious agents of BDS descended upon Olympia, Washington’s Food Co-op to sow their seeds of discord among the happily Edenic folks. Much sighing and weeping about long-term friendships dashed on the shoals of those pesky demands for decency towards an occupied people. How perfectly awful! Cynical BDSers, looking for a happy pack of friends to tear apart and then moving on, atop their camels with scimitars held high, once their damage was done.
Grow up. You can’t handle some of your friends thinking differently from you? Threatened in the absence of unanimity?
Go be Amish, then, and stop whining.
There were tons of egregious ways that the chair of the General Meeting conducted the supermajority vote. Even she voiced her opinion that the changes that Rosenfeld proposed were changes to the bylaws, which if they are require a 2/3 vote to be passed and must be publicized to the members. She only heard one motion to table the vote and refused to listen to any others. She also refused to allow any amendments to the proposal. One member complained that when she tried to pre-register to attend the GM for work credit, she was told that they stopped taking any more work credits but that she could still attend. I’m sure that turned away many members who wanted to vote but were given the mixed message that they would not be able to attend the GM. One of the chair members also challenged the undemocratic nature of this vote and was shut down while Gen’l Coordinator Joe Holtz had far too much time to express his position in advocating for this supermajority vote–he’s abused his position as a co-founder many times and has gone out of his way to block a democratic process for voting on BDS or any Israeli boycotts. We have most definitely entered an era of McCarthyism at the Food Coop and beyond and the people on the hit list are pro-BDS supporters.