Rings of Affinity 2020 | Daniel Trenner

Rings of Affinity

Reimagining Social Life in the Corona Vortex.

By Daniel Trenner, M.Ed.

40 plus years teaching social dance,

Lecturer in Dance at Mt. Holyoke College (2004-Present),

Coach of Hampshire College Salsa and Tango Club (2009-Present),

Lecturer in Dance at Smith College (2007-2018),

and Coach at Amherst College (2004-2019).

Owner of a group house in Florence,

an experiment in “alternative extended family and elder care”.

Prime Mover in the revival of the

International Argentine Tango Community.

www.danieltrenner.com

[email protected]

413-522-2225

Daniel’s Note Spring 2022:

These Protocol Documents were all created uder duress in the face of an ever evolving Pandemic. New Variants of the Virus, new rules from the CDC, and weekly meetings in our household. So now they are like time capsules. Our thinking and behavior keeps changing, and we have yet to update these written rules again. But they do serve as a foundation for our oging decision process. Please keep that in mind.- DT

Dancing in the Corona Vortex

A Suite of Papers by Daniel Trenner authored during the Pandemic of 2020-2022

Contents:

1- Abstract, Biography, and Cover Letter

2-Rings of Affinity- June 2020

3- Casa 62 House Protocols- December 2020

4- Casa 62- Adding Rings Checklist- December 2020

5- Casa 62 Levels of Risk COVID 19 Daniel’s Version

6- The Return of Social Dancing- April 2021

7- Proposal for Social Dance in Academia- June 2021

The following is the first part of what became my Pandemic Suite:

Rings of Affinity:

This is being released on Friday, June 5th, 2020. (So some things may become dated soon.)

The vast majority of us, who have followed the science and played safe, have been locking down for more than two months now, and consciously or not, we have already been training in the art of isolating and distancing.

I live in Massachusetts, where the public has behaved reasonably well so far, especially out west here in Hampshire County, but I am greatly suspicious of the present public plans to reopen our world in Phases, with social opening planned around business, work, and play. This strategy assumes that going back to the world we knew before is the goal, even though we know that that world was destroying itself with abuse of the planet, with institutionalized racism and wealth inequity, and with underfunded education for the masses. We are lacking acceptance of the tapestry of diversity in humans with which we create society. If we don’t find a better, healthier way forward, we won’t be leaving much of a world, or a legacy of social justice, to future generations.

However, within our closing down of society to “flatten the curve” we may have inadvertently also revealed a new possibility for how to move our human society away from the random, the casual, and the hedonistic ways we have been unhealthy. A way forward, beyond our present nightmare of inequities, disease, and environmental destruction.

I suggest an alternative “normal” life modeled on starting with the smaller groupings we have retreated to for safety, and slowly expanding our social contacts through “rings of affinity”, creating safe and slowly expanding social circles, of known and trusted members; teaching ourselves to manage the changes at the microcosmic level.

Such affinity based grouping, and emerging, is NOT the “opening” of random encounters on the street, at places of business, in the government or medical system, or in large public gatherings contemplated in the phased opening of a top down driven society.

Rather, it is based on a grass-roots model of growing consensus about behavior among known groups of trusted members. Our opening must be deliberate and careful, but also ahead of its time and fun. By creating such affinity rings, and then slowly increasing connections with other rings, it is possible to create a safe web of known circles, whilst expanding contacts, but leaving known trails for tracers when the disease inevitably resurfaces. It is a way to reopen our social lives by recognizing the value of trust, and affinity.

We are already getting good at the most important, and perhaps hardest, part of affinity grouping, just by being at home more. We can codify new social structures and rules; ones based on transparency of communication; trust of known groups of affinity; and commitments to safety. We can refine them as we go, by creating lots of feedback. Thus, we begin to model a slow and safe “opening”: One emphasizing the substance and depth of human relationships. It is the random free-for-all of social chaos that we must surrender right now, and not the substance and depth.

This paper is material for the beginning of dialogue. It is not a set of finished ideas; It is a work in progress and I would appreciate your feedback. If you are moved to further develop these ideas I encourage you to add your voice. Yesterday, I read reference to a “double bubble”, one of family units linking up, which makes me glad that there are others out there with similar thoughts. Please feel free to share this work.

Stipulations:

1- In-person, one-to-one relationships are where the building blocks of socializing are created. In-person fulfilling relationships between individuals who havetrust,and shared safety rules, are essential. They should be the first to happen.

2- The Pandemic has created a chain of obstacles to opening social life again,obstacles we have never heretofore known. In the urgency of safety we followed the science and closed down. This was safe.

3- A conservative approach would be to remain under severe restrictions indefinitely.

4- But at what cost? We need human contact. It is “essential”. But it’s much, much more than food service and the capitalist economy.

5- The average person leading an average life of home, work, play, and travel probably encountered hundreds of thousands (100,000s) of vectors of respiratory contacts in any given year. If we could reduce that to the hundreds per person (100s), with all of them traceable, that would make constitute an immense reduction in vectors of contagion, and yet preserve some of the most fundamental benefits of a human social life.

I empathize with the conundrum. We will have to make decisions at the most local and personal of levels, and with incomplete information. We will have to improvise. We may have to take steps backwards after having taken them forwards. But the choice does not have to be one of all or nothing. The choice does not have to involve delegating all of our decisions to a paternal government. Yet the path I am advocating also does not contradict that of governmental mandates. We will follow their “guidelines” for all of our random casual associations outside of our circles of affinity. I speak instead to the personal individual action, where we still must make personal decisions about how we conduct our lives. Grass-roots. The concept of defining our choices from the ground up. By prioritizing the “personal” experience of social life, the living of it well, and then adding more people though overlapping rings, or bubbles, and based on trust.

I see a way forward.

Purpose:

I suggest an approach emphasizing the social capital of small groups of affinity, in the short run, while we remain in danger. We can restructure a return to social chaos, as we once enjoyed it, only after an all-clear is sounded (Sounded by whom? That is a good question.). The approach I suggest for now honors, and tries to reward, the most fulfilling aspects of a social life, while maintaining the protective strategies we have come to recognize as necessities during this vortex.

Goals:

1- In-person building of social and collegial relationships is a building block of a healthy society. It should be preserved.

2- The most successful aspects of such experience are the deep connections made in both work and play, that fulfill the promise of one’s full life. They should also be preserved.

What must be done NOW, in these pandemic and post pandemic times, is to learn how to separate the “substantial and safe” aspects of this moment’s social experience from the more “casual and random” aspects- ones that put large populations in danger of the spread of the disease. The “casual and random” are not inherently “bad”, but they must be saved for later, again, after an (as yet undefined) all-clear has sounded.

Disclaimer:

This proposal is NOT for everyone. It is especially for people who have been paying close attention, educated themselves about the dangers of the pandemic, been consciously adapting their behavior in lockdown, and who can agree on the following:

1- The making and keeping of agreements is crucial. Honesty and transparency are central to the safe implementation of this new orientation of one’s social life. (See Silver Linings below…)

2- Strategies for testing and tracing, drawing back, limiting exposure, quarantine when necessary, and other urgent safety measures must remain in place as we move forward.

The ideas put forth herein are for committed conscious participants! Persons deemed unwilling or unable to participate in such dramatically elevated levels of responsibility, in committed affinity groups, SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO PARTICIPATE in our groups, at least not until much later on. Conscious buy-in from all participants is a necessity. Perhaps there will need to be signed contracts. (Like “Pre-nuptials”) Definitions will have to be tailored to individual groups and chains of groups.

This proposal points to a possible, and challenging way forward. But it is our way forward, underneath the broad concepts of public phases of opening, it is a map for individuals to take charge of their intimate social lives. It is not intended to be complete at this writing, but rather is designed to provoke and engage us in the conversation. A radical forward looking change, dare I say improvement, in the organizing of conscious, grass-roots human social behavior is a benefit to all.

Proposed:

Intentional Creation of a Web or Mesh, of Affinity Rings, Pods, or Bubbles.

During the recent lockdown, people in all walks of our society curtailed their social behavior in the extreme. Some of them were alone, some with a partner, some with a family and children, or some in an extended family. Some of us, as in my household of 10, in Florence MA, were in a committed group of non-related adults.

Here is my main point. This strategy succeeds!!

Bubbles of small groups of people who stay in their bubble, and practice social distancing outside of the bubble are flattening the curve. Within their bubbles, people have not only succeeded in NOT getting sick, but they have, when successful, engaged in a deeper level of emotional support, more complex group negotiations around house rules, and greater transparency and checks on each other’s behavior outside of the bubble. It may not be what we wanted, but it has nurtured improvements in the bonds of understanding and fidelity. I believe this lifestyle can be further nurtured. And I acknowledge this suggestion is not trivial. We will have to face the conflicts of interest, and disagreements inherent in reaching consent around behavior.

Can we return to an up-to-date version of our social lives in this way? Perhaps, we can; and make it one of high quality, but it will require our conscious efforts, ones of every individual involved.

Nuts and Bolts:

1- The affinity groups I am proposing are built by individuals around: living situations: bathroom sharing; food sharing; in workplaces, classrooms and labs; healing and bodywork; and in organized sports and club activities. Then these groups could carefully and respectfully overlap, meaning allowing individuals to move easily between groups, with the pathways being known and traceable. Life will become more fulfilling, and right now, if organized in such a way that within safe known affinity groups physical intimacy would be permitted.

All behavior outside of affinity groups would remain restricted, at least as set forth in CDC guidelines if not more strictly, depending on the level of work we do within our groups.

We need enhanced meeting and negotiation skills to define groups and rules. These exist already, and a growing number of us already have skills. Emerging cultures of “consent”, gender diversity, therapy, counseling, consensus decision making, to name a few. We would now have to apply them in a much more deliberate way, a way which would have to apply to all aspects of our social lives. And, this would give rise to a new class of virtual helpers, consultants, mediators and the like.

2- Safety. In the short term, with no treatment or vaccine yet on the horizon, boundaries around groups would have to be rather strict in order to establish working affinity. (See Safety below)

3- Circles of affinity can be associated with more than your family life. They can be work and hobby related. The essence of this idea is the need to be intentional, responsible, and selective about who is in a group, and and that groups be limited in size. And, no one person can have too many of them. The idea is to emphasize the conditions for meaningful connection for now.

4- Adding people to existing bubbles. We just did at my house, absorbing a graduating senior at Smith, who want to remain in the US seeking work. She isolated strictly for 14 days in an apartment at school, and then moved in to an open room.

Different circles will involve different levels of safety that need unique negotiations about rules. The groups who share bathrooms and food together could also be doing yoga, learning massage, dancing or singing together. These are aspects of a human life that elevate it above the mundane, and give us purpose beyond work and consumerism. Groups may need counselors, and therapists. They will need facilitated decision making or conflict resolution. This will not be trivial. And these are more of the most positive experiences that people can be having, during this new era of affinity, that they would not otherwise receive.

Safety within groups:

1- How groups are selected is important. How does an individual choose the right groups? That is a significant question.

2- Emphasizing the importance of group agreements, of maintaining agreements, of revisiting and renegotiating agreements is essential. Adaptation in the face of threats to safety will also be important, as will be the limits at which individuals are asked to isolate, quarantine, or leave groups.

Once testing becomes reliable and readily available all of the ideas presented here will become easier to implement and safeguard.

3- Efforts toward inclusion, diversity, and against bullying and other anti-social behaviors must be redoubled. This is also not trivial. Forming affinity groups to share safe spaces is an evolved idea. To succeed we will have to be our best selves.

Connecting or Overlapping Rings- The Web or Mesh

1- Chaining together rings or bubbles means greatly expanding the number of contacts, but it does NOT mean a free-for-all. The average person previously maintained tens of thousands (or likely hundreds of thousands) of active vectors of exposure, most of it random and untraceable. By limiting social contact to over lapping rings of 10s of people, the average person can begin “opening” their social sphere while limited to at most a few hundreds of exposures. And, importantly, all of those vectors will be known, and could therefore all be shut down quickly when an outbreak is traced.

2- What is important here is that the QUALITY of social contacts is greater even as there are fewer of them, perhaps even because there are fewer of them. Life can be filled with the kinds of substantial interactions that produce life-long friends and colleagues, without the random masses of contacts we were used to having before.

Dating and Romance:

We have to talk about this too. Intimacy is important to most of us. And if intimacy is repressed, or poorly communicated or negotiated, it will lead to the breaking of affinity and of bubbles. If we are going to ask ourselves to be mature about conducting safe social lives there must be some avenues for meeting and dating new people. As a teacher of social dancing I have specific ideas for dancers, but I think that the affinity for non-work activities, like clubs, is one answer. We will have to create more formal ways of meeting new people who are also living by safe rules. This is not a new thing. Such activities have always been a part of life.

As far as random casual romance goes, it will have to be talked about in an open transparent way. This is another area which will have to be fleshed out. (Pun intended.) In much the way that safe sex has become a mainstream issue, and that transparency about gender identity has become openly discussed, so too will have to be dating in the Corona Vortex. Testing and tracing will have to become part of the protocol before meetings in person, and affinity groups will have to be kept up to date about such “new” contacts of group members. Again, consciousness, honesty, and transparency are the keys. This also means that the most casual of encounters, while not inherently “bad”, would have to wait for the all-clear before they begin again.

Retreat skills and facilities:

We will have to remain vigilant to testing, tracing, isolation, and quarantine. I’m not focused on this aspect too much here because it is already part of the big picture planning, by government, public health, and business.

Built into the regular check-ins and meetings among affinity group members has to be the commitment of participants to honesty reveal when they suspect that they need to retreat. Support for such bravery and authenticity must receive immediate support from everyone involved. This is crucial! People making uncomfortable decisions in favor of transparency, as they happen, must be encouraged, and honored, making the default one of coming forward immediately with the truth about one’s behavior and risk taking.

Silver Linings:

The creation of social circles will have to change. They will of necessity involve fewer people, but this can mean deeper connections and more lasting relationships.

Meeting skills will have to improve, and in the long term this benefits everyone throughout the culture and society.

Affinity groups or rings may survive long term, as lasting ties, and of alternative familial bonding .

The relationships people choose, for work and play, will have to be more selective and committed. Like it or not the age of massive and random social gatherings will have to end for a while.

Some Examples of Affinity and Team Building Activities within groups:

Dancing

Bodywork and Massage

Yoga

Meditation

New Games

Sports

Workouts

Music and Song

Therapy and counseling

Coordinating a safe way for the teacher’s of such activities to safely interact with closed affinity groups will be important, and possible. As a dance teacher I already have ideas. But individual teachers will have to serve multiple groups, and this risk must be mitigated.

Organization:

Grass-roots means from the ground up. The government and larger society will continue to propose rules from above, taking care of more global concerns.

I argue that real social safety begins with us. We must create rules as we are able to, adjust as we progress, and retreat when we must. And that we will be safest by taking control of our health at the microcosmic level, amongst ourselves.

But real social satisfaction, and safety, will really emerge when we have trained ourselves to create our own processes and rules, defined our own destinies.

Conclusion:

In a world that was already suffering the ravages of isolation and separation brought on by mobility, technology, and social media, our social lives were already in turmoil. The change had been accelerating, perhaps at an exponential rate, much like the climate crisis. A culture built on greed, and the accumulation of physical stuff is unsustainable. As is a culture of relationships built on the random and superficial.

The need for safety during this pandemic requires us to reassess our values. Can we create new updated containers for our physical contact and emotional bonding needs? Can we do so in ways more conscious than before? Can we limit the tendency to rely on random large social gatherings to satisfy our needs for human contact? Might there be some new advantages to a lifestyle that forces us to deepen the experience of relationships, but with far fewer people?

This kind of social change, already necessary to limit the wasting of natural resources, could leave a healthier and safer world for future generations. Some one generation is going to have to bear the brunt of the extreme change necessary. I fear that this is it. I have an 18 year old daughter and I feel terribly guilty about the fact that it must be hers. It is not going to be easy. The plunder of the earth over the last few hundred years has created a false sense of “normal” associated with the leading of exploitive lives.

Good luck to this next generation. May they be the weavers of webs of responsibility, of new social “rings of affinity”, and the nurturers of a changed world.

Addendum: On attending protests, and other issues not included herein: June 5, 2020

I’m not sure where this subject belongs in the larger thread of this paper, but it does belong here somewhere. Protocols for leaving, informing your affinity groups, behaving while out, measuring the risk, reporting back, and re-entering the bubble must all be discussed.

Sometimes we must go out into the world. A protest, an accident, for meeting a new love are reasons that come to the top of my mind.

If I take the time to add every deserving addition, I will never get this out, and today is my deadline is today. My hope remains that readers will give me feedback, and add there own thoughts and additions as they spread these ideas around.