June 23, 2024
Letter from the CTCW Board regarding the removal of Tchipakkan from organization activities;
To the Changing Times Changing Worlds community,
On 06/20/2024 the Changing Times Changing Worlds Board, at an emergency board meeting, voted to remove Tchipakkan, Virginia Fair Richards-Taylor, from her positions on the Board, any committees, and from all volunteer or paid positions related to the organization. This decision was reached due to an overall pattern of resistance to and failure to follow actions decided by the board and specific factors including;
- Not providing a letter of resignation in a timely manner as agreed at the CTCW board meeting of 06/13/2024
- Racially insensitive language used in official CTCW communications, specifically the CTCW Website Blog and the Otherworldly events
- Continued resistance to feedback from the board regarding guests of the Otherworldly events who publicly promote views which conflict with the organization’s Statement of Values
- Disregarding the directives of the Conference Planning Committee by communicating in an ex-parte manner with potential speakers
- Communicating directly with concerned external parties without involving the board, leading to an escalation of the situation and harm to the external party
- Apparent mis-representation of the events of the 06/13/2024 board meeting to longstanding members of the CTCW community
May 16, 2024
The Board of Directors of Changing Times, Changing Worlds issues a heartfelt apology for comments made by a volunteer in unofficial discussion after the formal, recorded presentation of last night’s Otherworldly interview program, and also for inappropriate language used by the host during the formal presentation. This language was not in keeping with the principles of the organization, and we take this lapse very seriously.
Words without actions are empty, so we are following this apology with these actions:
- We recognize that our immediate response to this during the incident was inadequate. We are working to identify suitable training in this area, which will be required for all current Board members, and for volunteers going forward.
- We recognize that our oversight on the space where the incident occurred, the weekly Otherwordly video interview, was inadequate. We are suspending the program for review, and will not resume until such time as we can ensure that our code of conduct will be followed within that space.
- The volunteer who related the story containing the offensive language has been removed from all duties with the organization.