The day had a second big bright spot for me: the Minnestar team had nice surprise for me at the opening ceremony. This meant a lot to me.

I’m a little sheepish about posting about it, but I think we’re supposed to share our wins on social media? And this is a great chance to return the thanks to Minnestar’s leadership and volunteers, who all work so hard to make this event happen. Keeping such a good thing thriving and •sustainable• for all these years is a small miracle!

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After each scenario, I revealed the actual historical story — surprise, the scenarios weren’t hypothetical at all! — and said what the person in that situation did in real life.

It seems like the thought exercises and the historical stories hit home. I heard a lot of positive things from people after the session and throughout the day.

I mention all this because (1) maybe it’s a thought exercise you can try for yourself, and (2) it might be a tool you can adapt to spur discussion in your own circles. Again, people are hungry to talk about this.

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Note: the instruction was to imagine multiple ways they •could• respond. Not “would,” not “should,” but •could.•

The prompt was “Right AND wrong answers!“ That’s a technique I love in the classroom: students are so afraid of being wrong, some are reluctant to speak up at all — even when they have good ideas. “Think of •all• the possibilities, including ones that are clearly wrong” creates space for them to speak up without embarrassment. And it builds the capacity to •imagine• — a capacity which authoritarian movements always seek to dull.

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For those who weren’t there, the session description is attached. The format was as follows:

I gave the participants a series of hypothetical scenarios involving technology and authoritarianism, and asked them to imagine with the folks next to them several different ways they could respond in that situation, using the following prompts:

- embrace
- ignore
- rationalize
- adjust
- refuse
- expose
- sabotage
- document

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