Brian Anderson The Western Front www.sunlive.co.nz

Today Tauranga Chamber of Commerce is hosting a meeting on the shape of future local government in the Bay of Plenty.

It is just an information session but it is the start of what should be a very strong debate in the Western Bay if the same upheaval which hit Greater Auckland is to be repeated. Aucklanders have opinions now. It remains to be seen if the laidback Bay is going to claim a voice in its future.

We have had ample warning. It is pleasing that the Chamber of Commerce has taken this initiative but the Western Bay needs people to stand up in the next few months and make themselves heard.

You must have your say. Give them a piece of your mind. Let them know who's boss. Give them both barrels. Stand up, speak up or shut up. Your opinion is as important as anyone else's.

It is strange that in this communication age individual voices are being lost. Civilisation developed around our ability as individuals and groups to communicate. John Donne recognised that no man is an island and to be no part of any body is to be nothing. If we lose our right to speak up effectively in our society, we are nothing and our whole society will suffer.

There are so many ways to speak out now but so few ways where anyone is listening. Voicing an opinion is absolutely bad form if you are challenging your network of friends and might make them uncomfortable with ideas for which they have absolutely no interest. If your friends don't care, they are not much use anyway. You have to have a public voice.

We need strident calls for change from soap boxes in the park. We need them now. We need loud arguments in the pub over which politician is telling lies. We need face-to-face debates on television. The guts have been taken out of dissent and individuals are wrapping blankets around themselves and hiding. Facebook is a wimpy form of communication. It is a little like leaving the blinds to your front room open for all the world to see and leaving the door to the bathroom open for your special friends. Twitter of course is just an equivalent to signed graffiti and is definitely not a complete communication system. Make a stand now. Bring on the bumper stickers.

Of course you will have to know what you are talking about and there is a challenge to the media to keep the public up-to-date but the responsibility is still on the individuals to monitor and control change in our society. There is going to be plenty of political fluff this year with it being an election year but this cannot be allowed to be divert us from addressing the more important changes on how we will be governed that have started already.