Finally, A Viable Alternative to “Community”

It’s an interesting argument, and much of it’s true. Although once we’re, say, into foot worship, we’re associated with the furries whether we like it or not. The rubric of ‘alternative sexualities’ covers a very broad spectrum.

But ‘networks’ to me doesn’t have the emotional connection of ‘community.’ Network seems much more independent. While a social network can have friendship and interdependency, it doesn’t have the shared emotional connection that ‘community’ implies. Not that I don’t like networks – I’m certainly in several of them – but my connection to leather feels stronger and deeper than that.

Interestingly, the one thing missing is an actual definition of “community.” And what about the different forms of community?

Take Burning Man — and incredibly diverse gathering which happens once a year, and yet persists well after such a gathering. Thus so many people who have attended consider themselves part of a “Burning Man community.”

So once could say that, in a broad sense, there is indeed a community which has come together around alternative expressions of sexuality. What kind of community, and how its diverse elements could work together — that’s the real question.

Hmmm. “Network” describes the structure, but not its functions – political activism, mutual care taking, social involvement and all the rest of it, which “community” implies.

A word I like for talking about poly-style kinship networks is “constellation.” In a constellation, some components are nearer the center and linked more closely, and others more on the edge – perhaps even part of another constellation. That seems to be closer to what we’re talking about here, and it sounds less impersonal than “network.”

I think the word Network works to describe groups of connected individuals fairly well. However, I do not think it addresses the multiple network environment very well. Nor does it do justice to the interconnected support systems that develop between discrete networks.

Now thinking as a tech guy the word ecosystem strikes a much better balance in describing the interrelatedness of the more granular networks and how they create critical mass for support, thought, and comradeship. It is our ecosystem that provides the support necessary to have the multitude of interconnected networks that sometimes only relate to each other through a third network.

The best tech based example that I can think of is the internet. It is not a single organism entity. The internet is enable by all of the networks that are being interconnected by networks. Some networks are higher in the Eco-structure that others, but they all provide the wealth of support and service that we mean when we are talking about the internet.

If we take this approach it becomes a lot easier to see where individual networks are lacking in services or capabilities and address the shortfalls in them or find ways to build connections to networks that already have those services or capabilities available. The stronger and more interconnected the individual networks become the healthier and more robust the ecosystem as a whole.

On the whole I do not see the word ecosystem being adopted easily in place of community, but thought leaders looking at things in this structure and using the related language could ease the transition or redefine the underlying structures of our expectations of community in new ways.

As always interesting thought.

At one time it was a community. We all knew each other, if someone needed money, food, a place to stay , someone was there to help them. We all helped each other and that was the community we had. Today I see no community, people are either to busy or dont care. When once we had a community we have none today.