I'm a member of a group called Society of Friends International (SOFI) which has been set up by 1st generation immigrants from the subcontinent. It’s become very successful with members from all over the world. When it was set up having "International" in the name must have seemed ambitious but it's worked out well. In fact it's so popular that there is a freeze on new members. The idea is simple:
It brings people together for cultural events containing music and poetry and of course food but there has been stand up comedy and dance. Its greatest success are the well-organised and varied group holidays that have attracted many new members and have bonded people together through shared experience. The context of being somewhere new has made it easier for SOFI members unfamiliar to each other to approach one another and chat.
Most attractive to me and many others is the deliberate spirit in which things are done. Life is busy, so it's a vehicle in which valuable things often pushed in the background can be expressed: religious tolerance, the encouragement of inter-generational mixing and the collective exploration of things that are new. The new things tried means there is a strong possibility of failure and discomfort. The stand up comedy that was booked was awkward because it there was almost no respite from taboo-busting material that was often just plain vulgar. However it was tried, something that was totally alien to many members in terms of form and definitely content was experienced, now it is no longer so strange.
The SOFI newsletter is open for anyone to contribute to. It is an outlet for talent, views and humour which the older generation with their history of hard work and struggle are not credited with. Equally valuable is the news of members it carries. Through it joy can be shared and support networks for difficulties friends many be experiencing can quickly develop. This accepting notion of friendship is so simple but so necessary today. Strangely, I can imagine people thinking it is radical, particularly in London which can be very lonely for the young and the old.
The current trend of individualistic pleasure seeking has its place but things have been skewed a little too much towards it. The clearest example of this is the ever-growing festival going crowd, who despite gathering in their thousands to enjoy themselves, do not enjoy themselves together, it is the individual experiences they seek. The drugs allow them to escape from themselves and their rigid perception of things; the people around them are the backdrop- there to enhance the experience rather than to be part of it. It's perverse to me that an opportunity to meet so many different people is passed over and in favour of a very private drug-induced experience. People are so much more interesting. My experience of festivals left me perplexed at how opportunities to have far more potentially rewarding experiences are wasted. People are to be taken sparingly, but binging on alcohol and drugs is far less daunting. The perversity of this seems inescapable.
However, SOFI and I have to be humble as the most radical experiment in friendship are also called the Society of Friends but are probably better known by their alias which is the Quakers. They have been around a bit longer- since the 1650s and now have a quarter of a million members spread thinly across the globe (their presence is most common in Bolivia, USA, Kenya and Britain). They are committed to the principle that individuals must make up their own minds. Though it sounds simple, the seriousness with which they have pursued this ideal meant they have always been an incredibly radical group. It was a bold experiment.
The combination of practising friendship and making space for individuals who do not agree with prevailing orthodoxy or with views of people within the society itself has led to interesting results. It’s a wonder to me that the society has survived. I’d expect the value the group places on respect for individual views to put too much strain on friendship between members; and friendship after all is the central point of the group. Their bravery in questioning things leads them to participate in or support civil disobedience which must take its toll, but they have survived and are still going strong. Another aspect of the group is that it is run on democratic lines and no decision is made until everyone agrees but this has not led to inaction, in fact they have initiated a huge number and variety of ventures. They ignore rank and status, in the past members were called “thou” regardless of titles any friend possessed. Their way of dealing with persecutors was to meet them face to face, surprisingly this sometimes worked, even with fierce opponents who were challenging the very foundations of society.
A clue to their survival apart from their mutual respect is the fact they update their outlook from time to time in response to changes in the world around them. Here’s how they describe the process: “Pressure for revision has always come from the generality of Friends, but each revision has met with resistance from some who had lived with the old words and had found them entirely satisfying. Nevertheless, it has been the experience of Britain Yearly Meeting that necessary change has, despite occasions of great tension, been effected in love and unity.” Their shared faith is also a balm that soothes fractious differences: “Friends find unity in the depth of the silence, when the worshippers are truly gathered and deeply centred on the things of the spirit. We struggle with differences in our meetings for church affairs and here, too, as we consider what action we are called to take over issues that confront us, we know the experience of unity in conviction and purpose. It is a unity which is not to be found in optional attitudes but in discovering the place in which we can stand together.”
The Quakers seem optimistic to the point of naivety in their faith in human decency. It can be seen in their hope that things would change as a result of a few people practising friendship, which was and still is assumed to be a private matter of minor consequence in public affairs. However, it has effected real change and must have lent some flair for enterprise and organisation, some of their achievements are listed below:
- Set up the first anti-slavery society
- First people to plead for the abolition of the death penalty
- First group to propose a free national health service
- Initiated prison reform leading to recognition and treatment of mental illness
- Went to jail to establish the right of conscientious objectors
- First group to invent the idea of offering humanitarian aid to civilians devastated by war (in 1870-1 they brought food and clothing to both sides in the Franco Prussian War)
- Collectively awarded the Nobel Peace prize in 1947
- Currently fighting for everyone to have the option to divert the portion of tax currently going towards funding war to peace building initiatives
- Set up Amnesty International
- Greenpeace
- Cadbury Plc
- Clarks, shoe manufacturer
- Barclay’s Bank
- Friends Provident
- Lloyds Bank
- Oxfam
- Rowntree’s
- Sony (formerly Tokyo Tsushin Kogyo); TTK's founding board chair was Tamon Maeda, a Japanese Quaker.
A company with no Quaker links:
- Quaker Oats! (despite having a Quaker in it’s logo)
A pattern of their history is that they never sought control of the organisations they created. This was because they discovered friendship, equality and giving orders were incompatible. This was especially true as organisations grew beyond a certain size. Businesses they formed and controlled were initially very successful partly because they benefitted from the goodwill and trust their integrity engendered- they did as they promised. However this same integrity meant the quality of relationships with employees and customers they sought were incompatible with expansion at all costs or with maximising profit. Most Quakers have now moved into the service and caring professions. Similarly, Pennsylvania founded as a Quaker colony, remarkable for its unusual peaceable attitude towards Native Americans and for its exceptionally democratic government is no longer a Quaker Colony. They lost control of it because their approach meant they were unable to play politics.
The experience of Quakers, whose tolerance of internal disagreement is outstanding, suggests there is no need for friends to think alike, if that is, friendship is seen as an exploration rather than a search for security and if each partner is recognised as having equal dignity. While making their minds up for themselves, they made the listening to the opinions of their friends an essential part of their method, and the ‘Quaker Faith & Practice’- a core publication of the society emphasises that they be of both sexes. This was a radical outlook when Quakers were first formed, unsurprisingly by a man and a woman.
Unfortunately I have no record of them organising package holidays, a strange oversight in such an admirable society..
