| > Have you ever been sailing on a yacht with friends? Yes. A small group of people, who know each other and want to be together. Sure, works fine. > Generally in my experience it is the person on the tiller who will bark commands as the boat moves across the wind. Yep. I've been that person. I've also been the person who had to get out of the way quickly when I heard "coming about!" so the boom wouldn't clout me on the head. > A hierarchy, temporary, amongst friends. Yes: temporary, for a specific purpose where one person is obviously in a position to give orders that the others should follow. The friends don't have to agree on their entire value system or philosophy of life. They only have to agree on who's in the best position to warn everyone of an impending event that they need to know about. And amongst friends, who aren't going to bicker over all this because they're there to have a good time with each other, and there are no conflicts of interest. What does any of this have to do with the thread topic? |