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COMMONWEALTH vs GEORGE HOPKINS 10-23-19


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3 hours ago, garfield said:

I, personally, hold GH PRIMARILY responsible for the slow degradation of the activity

Reminds me of that pivotal time in the late 1990s, when George Hopkins and Scott Stewart presented two very different sets of ideas for the activity.  We have spent the ensuing two decades almost entirely focused on ideas from the Hopkins side of that fork in the road.  What if... 

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10 minutes ago, cixelsyd said:

Reminds me of that pivotal time in the late 1990s, when George Hopkins and Scott Stewart presented two very different sets of ideas for the activity.  We have spent the ensuing two decades almost entirely focused on ideas from the Hopkins side of that fork in the road.  What if... 

We can't remake the past, but we can be #### sure the mistakes aren't repeated.

EDIT:  And the activity isn't under any contract restrictions.  It can change course 180 degrees if it chose to, at any minute, with only majority votes of, roughly, 40 member orgs.

 

 

Edited by garfield
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5 hours ago, keystone3ply said:

His behavior has always fit the clinical definition of Narcissistic Personality Disorder.  It's been said that all leaders have some narcissistic qualities.  
But then some are just way over the top.  What you see in his behavior over the years is a classic example of the latter.   

Alot of that going around lately...lol

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5 hours ago, garfield said:

I hope you meant the "with malice" definition of malignant because, if you meant the "rapidly infectious" version, I'd like to know: 

1. the actual number of posters/followers/Hop-ites who are still drinking his tea, and

2. if any of them are still employed in the activity and, potentially, still zealous about his policies and visions of and for the activity

I’m sure he has some supporters, but I suspect a lot of his followers are just there for the entertainment value.

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11 minutes ago, skevinp said:

I’m sure he has some supporters, but I suspect a lot of his followers are just there for the entertainment value.

Lot of that going around too in social media.... 😈

Edited by JimF-LowBari
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6 hours ago, JimF-LowBari said:

Maybe I’m just hitting YT more with the internet ready TV (love that bigger screen) but that’s getting more out there. I’m a history buff so was checking WWII Victory Thru Air Power movie from that era. One vid had a rebuttal to the “bomb them into submission” idea of VTAP. Started out with ideas that I’ve heard before and calm.... within a few minutes “the Illuminati doesn’t want you to know this”.

With all the corps related vids who knows what might be found....

There's one advertiser who pre-video ads I keep encountering on Youtube, also cultish in its messaging (which is however, more subtle and completely different from the message of the Facebook-dominant group I mentioned) and partly funded, curiously enough, by a heavily promoted traveling theatrical troupe that puts on extravagant spectacles (think Blast! without instruments, or Cirque du soleil) laced with bizarre propaganda.

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5 hours ago, garfield said:

I, personally, hold GH PRIMARILY responsible for the slow degradation of the activity (yes, I've heard all of the "It was voted on! arguments) throughout his long tenure as a "senior experienced" leader of the activity (and I recognize ALL of the other directors who, at the time, agreed to ride in his posse).  Therefore I, again personally, believe that any such zealots should be "kept closer" so to be watchful of any primary motivations of repeating G7-era prognostications about the direction the activity should now go to survive and emerge strong and growing.

A lot of good points to chew on in this fine post. That said, while I'd never wish an alleged sexual predator like Hopkins well, and while long before we knew about that behavior I had made clear my disagreements with his vision of drum corps, I don't think he was operating in a vacuum, nor do I think we can deny that he did some good as well. Bill Cosby's show was beloved family entertainment; Harvey Weinstein produced some films still widely regarded as excellent; Kevin Spacey is universally thought of as a great actor. Maybe some other work by some better people would have risen to the top in their place; maybe the Cadets would have won ten championships under different leadership; maybe the organization would have founded Cadets2, whose existence I considered a boon to DCA (despite some of Hopkins's apparent attempts at meddling in that organization--not that DCA didn't/doesn't need shaking up). And maybe somebody else would have pushed the malignant trends that concern you.

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9 minutes ago, N.E. Brigand said:

A lot of good points to chew on in this fine post. That said, while I'd never wish an alleged sexual predator like Hopkins well, and while long before we knew about that behavior I had made clear my disagreements with his vision of drum corps, I don't think he was operating in a vacuum, nor do I think we can deny that he did some good as well. Bill Cosby's show was beloved family entertainment; Harvey Weinstein produced some films still widely regarded as excellent; Kevin Spacey is universally thought of as a great actor. Maybe some other work by some better people would have risen to the top in their place; maybe the Cadets would have won ten championships under different leadership; maybe the organization would have founded Cadets2, whose existence I considered a boon to DCA (despite some of Hopkins's apparent attempts at meddling in that organization--not that DCA didn't/doesn't need shaking up). And maybe somebody else would have pushed the malignant trends that concern you.

Actually, Cadets did exactly that (10 American Legion national titles before GH was ever involved).

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They could all be Rocket Mortgage ads....

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36 minutes ago, N.E. Brigand said:

They don't relate to Hopkins or drum corps; they relate only as to the ancillary comments that MikeD and others made about the quality of comments on social media. As such, I won't get into the details, other than to say that this cult seizes on what to normal observers would appear to be anodyne news items, and they imbue those stories with magical significance. A Google search (or presumably Facebook itself, for those, unlike myself, who have accounts there), should turn up lists of a given day's top stories, for those who want to dig into such things.

I’ve never gotten any of these. Maybe they have sophisticated algorithms that project our likelihood of believing crazy things based on what we have posted in the past.  😛 

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