In the public eye

​Yesterday one of the Bucks Federation board of trustees held a shop and coffee morning at her house in Padbury. I imagine the attendance might turn out to be lower than hoped because overnight rain had caused extensive flooding on local roads. It is appreciated when the WI shop contents are brought out to the areas at a distance from our HQ in High Wycombe.
The local WI discussion group met this week after a sort of summer recess. The topic was “fake news” which is not a new problem but one that has grown in importance with the advent of social media. We thought there were two kinds; first the deliberate information planted to reach a targeted audience in order to achieve a specific aim and secondly, information started with a nugget of truth which then suffers manipulation in the manner of Chinese whispers. Fake news has been about since it was exchanged by word of mouth among the courtiers, crusaders and peasants of the medieval world. It was used in scare stories in wartime and in espionage to bamboozle the enemy. Chequebook journalism thrives on it and of course it is so fast along social media outlets.
Our WI Annual Meeting is in November and this year it was very well attended. We completed all the required reports and were pleased to be reminded of a successful year with interesting speakers enjoyed and a healthy bank balance to see us through the next. We have a committee and our president is game to continue in post for another year. The members were asked to sign up to receive the Bucks Newsletter on line rather than as hard copy. Several of us refused even though we had e-mail addresses because we didn’t like reading newsletters off the screen and personally, I don’t believe that the members will take up as many bookings for BFWI events if they haven’t got the information in writing in front of them. It’s bad enough as it is with the system of not receiving paper tickets for events: one has to go back to the original announcement in the newsletter to be reminded of time and place. OK you can prove me wrong! The tickets for the barn dance are selling well. The social time at the meeting was taken up by “swishing” our unwanted clothes or bad buys amongst each other. This proved popular and no money changed hands.
The local WI held a promotional stall at the November Farmers’ Market when we ran a tombola and drew attention to our WI. This attracted a few enquiries into what the WI was all about and we hope these will bear fruit in January.