[sca, carolingia, anthro] You're Doing it All Wrong
(Hee! I just trolled my LJ ;)
OK, I don't play SCA really any more. But as someone who pretty much knows what's going on and who hacks humans for fun, I wanted to throw this out there in support of youse guys whose agenda I basically approve of and would like to see advanced.
As many of you know, I identify "politically" if you will as a Atmospherist -- a third option, other than "Authenticist" and "Funnist", which has an agenda quite different from either of the other two, but which each of those two mistake for the other one.
As an Atmospherist, my agenda is tele -- that "sensawonda", that sense of transport. I wouldn't go so far as to say "magic moment", because I feel that is often used to refer to something more perfectly Authenticist that I have in mind, but a very similar thing. What I want out of events is immersion. Authenticists of a certain stripe often want immersion too, such as the Poulet Gauche gang, which can make that sort of Authenticist natural allies with Atmospherists.
So the late discussion, started over in new_man's journal, about This Place Going To Hell In A Hand-Basket (my characterization) has provoked (as it is wont to do) a wave of social activism to try and do something about it -- an agenda to which I am deeply sympathetic and which I would be happy to see get some traction. It is to you guys this love note goes out.
I have a hack for you guys. A social engineering hack to address the OOP conversation issue.
However, for it to work -- for you to be able to employ it -- there's some stuff you need to understand. Alas, it's not just a checklist to follow; it's more of a "if you keep checking on the view from this one particular perspective, you'll be able to see clearly what you need to do to react dynamically to the various responses the system throws at you as you do this."
And here we come to the tricky part. I need to step up, here, to a meta-level, because Carolingian conversations always go right off the rails at this point. Repeat after me: She's on our side. Louder, I couldn't hear that. Much better. Now, when I say "Whose side am I on?", you say.... That's right: "She's on our side."
What I am about to explain to you is how, perhaps, you've been mistaken about something, not why your goal is something you shouldn't have. Your goal is my goal. Because Whose Side Am I On? That's right: She's On Our Side.
What I am about to explain to you is some things which contradict and counterindicate ways you may have approached this problem in the past or have been approaching it now. I'm not doing that because I want to shame you or make you feel bad; I'm doing that because I want you to stop doing things which are counter-productive in favor of things which work, so that you will succeed in your goals. Because Whose Side Am I On?
What I am about to explain to you may sound discouraging, as if I'm explaining why you will never, ever get what you want and your agenda is doomed. No, I'm explaining why this problem has proved so intractable in the past, precisely because those "intractabilities" have been a product of how the issue has been viewed, and by seeing the problem differently they may be evaded this time. Because Whose Side Am I On?
We good on that? I'll take that for a yes.
The thing you need to know is no, really, why people talk about OOP stuff at events.
The reason people talk about OOP stuff at events is the fundamental social role of events in the subculture of the SCA, and the fundamental role of the SCA in the lives of people in the SCA.
Every SCA event is a reunion.
The primary reason the vast majority of Scadians attend events is not to do a specific thing, but to be with their tribe and to be human with their fellows.
What do I mean by "be human with their fellows"? To do the things which humans have done since time immemorial to bond with their kith and kin: to say I am I am I am and to witness to others asserting their own I-am-ness. They do this by narrating stories of their deeds and experience -- This week I did; yesterday I was; last night I saw -- and giving accounts of their hopes -- I will; I am trying -- their tastes -- I liked, I am enjoying, I thought sucked -- and their identities -- As I am wont to do; But you know me; You can imagine how I.
We go to events to be with people we like and love, to be ourselves with them and to express our interest in and concern for them. And, of course, to dance with them, and feast with them, and hit them with sticks.
The utterances of such modernity which youse guys wish to supplant are not what people say just because they don't know any better. Perish the thought. They are incredibly important self-articulation and bonding interactions. It is important that people talk about their favorite comic books, their fights with Microsoft, the latest movie they saw, the babysitter, the alternator in their car, etc. with their fellow Scadians, and events are the ceremonial gathering of the tribe at which those sorts of bonding are natural to happen.
It is through these utterances which situate each person in his life to those who have not been in regular contact with him or her, that we re-establish social rapport after absence, i.e. from event to event. This is the fundamental act of relating to one another as real people upon which a sense of community is predicated.
People naturally resist efforts to convince them to stop relating authentically with their tribe's members on the rare occasions of congregation, and to substitute an art form of relating artificially in a way which does not assert the I-am-ness which is a predicate for community. People naturally resist efforts to chop down the unruly forest of their relating as real people to their fellow tribemembers, so that a tourney field can be put there, or a dance floor, or a castle. They may love tourneys and dance floors and castles, but they love their forest of their community, too.
So long as as the people who want to be able to have OOP-conversation-free experiences at events (that would be us, because Whose Side Am I On?) treat talking about comic books at events as second-class communication, communication which is devalued and to be opposed, all those people who most strongly prize that communication and its concomitant bonding will be enormously threatened by your project -- and quite rightly so. That's engaging in culture warfare.
Everytime someone advocates "There should be less OOP conversation" or "There should be more in-persona conversation", even by ostensibly "benign" (i.e. passive) means such as "Here's a class so more people can learn how to", this will be recognized as a negative value judgment of and blanket opposition to something of enormous value to a vast swath of the (local, even) Society.
Sounds dire doesn't it? Looks like a dead end?
(Pirsig fans may want to meditate a moment on Sacred Stuckness.)
The Hack
A key part of this hack, without which it absolutely will not work, and, I dare say, shouldn't work, is that the folks who want a modernities-free immersive event experience need to take all of the above deeply to heart, to appreciate that point of view and grant it complete legitimacy.
No, really. For reasons which will shortly become apparent, this will self-destruct if it is implemented with anything less than an attitude of the OOP conversation at events being enormously valuable...
too.
Because the fundamental assumption I am making about you, Gentle Reader, is that you can grant all of the above and still hold fiercely your valuing of immersive event experiences which are modernity-free. That you can accept and believe that OOP-conversation at events is invaluable, indispensible contribution to one of the most important dimensions of the SCA, without for a moment yielding your conviction that another one of the most important dimensions of the SCA is of being another world, an island in time, a place when/time where we are other than we are, where we say not only I-am, but I-could-be. That you can hold two values even though they may at times be in conflict.
The Hack is this: That those who wish for modernity-free experiences at events work towards there being modernity-OK spaces at events. Spaces which are comfortable. Spaces which are accomodating. Spaces which are adequate to the volume of people who want to use them and the purposes to which they wish to put them. Spaces which demonstrate the deep respect and consideration which you have for the role of OOP-conversation in social bonding and the fostering of the community which is precious to us all.
Do you see it?
It's inverting Enchanted Ground.
Enchanted Ground, marvellous idea though it is, has one big problem. Every time it is used, it further reinforces OOP-conversation-OK as the default norm.
So turn it around.
Are you seeing it now?
By scrupulously marking where OOP-conversation is socially acceptable, it accustoms people to the idea that the default condition is that OOP-conversation is....?
Now are you seeing it?
Wait, that's not all of it.
Good fences, someone recently said, make good neighbors. By marking off an at event territory, and doing so consistently from event to event, by scrupulously ensuring that there's always a place for that OOP-conversation to happen that is a choice place, you make it such that all those people who were on the fence about the choice between immersion and community can choose your side.
I won't kid you: there will always be some people who will object strenuously to efforts to make any more immersion happen. But the vast majority of people in the society came here for wonders -- they stayed for the community, but they came through the door because it was a door to another world. If you can make it so that substantial centrist demographic can have it's cake and eat it, too, they will support your efforts at reform.
Which, bringing us back to the point I keep harping on, is why you have to be so incredibly sincere about supporting OOP-conversation. If it's all just a cynical gambit to make events hostile to OOP-conversation -- to round up the people who have OOP-conversations and put them on a reservation -- you will lose the center; they will see any opposition to OOP-conversation being at events as in conflict with their aims.
You can't work towards eradicating OOP-conversation from events. (Nor, in my considered opinion, should you.) The system will oppose you with approximately as much force as you push on it. But there's a equilibrium point where IP/PN-conversation (In Period/Period-Neutral) is the core and/or greater part of events, normally, by providing for OOP-conversation-acceptible spaces attached. By punching a hole in the opposite side of the can to let the air in, you can pour the contents out much more easily.
Those who prefer exclusively immersive experiences can have what they want, those who prefer non-immersive space or are intimidated by immersion, or need a break from immersion or have business that requires OOP-conversation, can have what they want.
But wait, there's more!
Right now, the paradigm into which OOP-conversation is fit slots people into "OOP-conversation OK" (Funnist) and "OOP-conversation Not OK" (Authenticist) slots. This is terrible. People are put in a position of choosing sides. Exceptional behavior is treated as betrayal. This entire system reinforces both the personalization of conflict and rigidity of positions, two forces which are bad both for individuals and for communities.
By shifting the paradigm of OOP-conversation OK/Not OK to physical spaces, individuals regain the liberty to move fluidly through these political positions, and the values conflict of bonding good vs immersion good can start being de-personalized. Individuals may have preferences, but they become less identified with one position or the other.
By mapping values onto the floors instead of the foreheads, we give all those who wish to support or endorse the immersive project a much less confrontational way of doing so when someone transgresses against the immersion: "Excuse me, I think I forgot something in the lounge -- don't stop talking, I want to hear all about this -- do come with me! [...] Oh, no, it looks like my goblet isn't here; oh, well, I'll look for it later my feet are tired, let's sit here a while." Instead of saying "Don't do that at all" or "Don't do that with me" there's the option of "Let's do this somewhere else."
It also facilitates the reciprocal manoeuver: gently drawing someone new to the immersive game into it, by means of going and hanging out with them in the OOP-conversation-OK area, and then inviting them to join you in the other space. Because the advocate of the joys of immersion is in a OOP-conversation-OK space when they do this, they are in a position to discuss the immersive experience OOPly, and frankly address the intimidated newbie's concerns and reassure them. Instead of advocating immersion being a matter of convincing people to attend (prepare for and pay for) an entire event they're scared they can't handle, you are merely inviting them to step across a threshold for five minutes -- "If you're uncomforable, you can always come back." The barrier to trying out the immersive game is dramatically reduced.
Finally, as an added bonus: It's a place where filk and SCA folklore can be celebrated and transmitted. That has cultural benefits, too, and can help keep that material on the right side of that door.
The Hoary Details
The spaces for OOP-conversation need to be explicitly and expressly marked as such. Printing it in the event program is a good thing, but not even vaguely sufficient.
There needs to be a term for OOP-conversation-permitted spaces, a term which can be used in the rest of the event, and which can go on the signs you might decide to use to mark those spaces. Remember, spaces don't need to be fixed in identity; a space can be used for one purpose for part of the day and another purpose the other part.
The double standard applied to classes must end. If a class is going to be taught with OOP-conversation, it needs to be in an OOP-conversation-OK space. That's going to be a tough sell. Again, remember, you can slap a "This is an OOP-conversation-OK space" sign on a classroom door as needed.
This is mostly a matter of convincing autocrats to go along with it. If you think convincing people is a hard or bad thing, then this is bad news. If you think, "Hey, that's a much smaller number of people to convince than the entire barony," then it's good news. I don't recommend you go about this as a sekret agenda behind anyone's back. Just keep track of whose opinions are critical: autocrats don't just get a vote, they get a veto.
Some autocrats are likely to respond, "Well, I'd be happy to have an Enchanted Ground area for you guys at my event." If you've had any success on this project, decline, decline, decline! Do not reinforce the "OOP-conversation is OK by default" paradigm!! Really, as part of an on-going social change program, it's better to have no OOP-conversation-not-OK area at all than for it to be the Other space.
I have a hunch this will raise astonishing problems for Kingdom level events. A simple solution is to avoid Kingdom level events -- either having them (if it's up to you) -- or scheduling around them.
Scheduling? Yeah: if you manage to get all the local autocrats in an academic year to go along with this, well, that year's burghers will "grow up" thinking this new way of doing things is Sacred Tradition. They will be acculturated to it. That's how you start to change the Barony long-term.
Finally, let me re-emphasize: the OOP-conversation-OK spaces need to be good ones: comfortable, accomodating, adequate to their purposes. It's probably sane to so designate the changing rooms, the restrooms, gate and the kitchen.
Complements
Other pro-immersion efforts can complement this hack, so long as they do not work towards the eradication of OOP-conversation at events. (Advocates of increased immersion should be the first people to stand up and oppose eradication when it rears its head. Seize the middle ground.) Thus tying things like "a class in how to have PN conversation" to "so you don't have to stay to the OOP-conversation-OK-areas of the upcoming event" help make such classes seem far less eradicatory by making their purpose less open-ended. Efforts to promote immersion should be carefully scrutinized for eradicationist rhetoric/aims and cleaned up, if they are not to be counter-productive.
In Conclusion
It's something of an outlier case, but it wouldn't be entirely amiss to describe this whole hack as "paradoxical movement" -- a psychotherapy approach of getting what you want by doing something that looks at first blush to be giving in. It's not exactly: it only looks like giving in because previously black-'n-white, either/or thinking (fun OR authenticity) had obscured a path which goes between two positions.
In essence, the hack I am proposing is a unilateral treaty proposal: it proposes proceeding in a way which attempts to give most (i.e. the big center) of the other side (i.e. the funnists + the big center) all of what they want, in exchange for what we really want. Generally, if you go to the other side and say, "We want to give youse guys everything you want", they'll go, "Uh... gee, uh... OK." In this case "youse guys" is not everybody on the other side, but it's a substantial (and tactically chosen) majority. It drives a wedge between the absolutists (the authenticity-must-die funnists) who will not compromise or treat with you, and the larger sensible majority.
Good luck!
OK, I don't play SCA really any more. But as someone who pretty much knows what's going on and who hacks humans for fun, I wanted to throw this out there in support of youse guys whose agenda I basically approve of and would like to see advanced.
As many of you know, I identify "politically" if you will as a Atmospherist -- a third option, other than "Authenticist" and "Funnist", which has an agenda quite different from either of the other two, but which each of those two mistake for the other one.
As an Atmospherist, my agenda is tele -- that "sensawonda", that sense of transport. I wouldn't go so far as to say "magic moment", because I feel that is often used to refer to something more perfectly Authenticist that I have in mind, but a very similar thing. What I want out of events is immersion. Authenticists of a certain stripe often want immersion too, such as the Poulet Gauche gang, which can make that sort of Authenticist natural allies with Atmospherists.
So the late discussion, started over in new_man's journal, about This Place Going To Hell In A Hand-Basket (my characterization) has provoked (as it is wont to do) a wave of social activism to try and do something about it -- an agenda to which I am deeply sympathetic and which I would be happy to see get some traction. It is to you guys this love note goes out.
I have a hack for you guys. A social engineering hack to address the OOP conversation issue.
However, for it to work -- for you to be able to employ it -- there's some stuff you need to understand. Alas, it's not just a checklist to follow; it's more of a "if you keep checking on the view from this one particular perspective, you'll be able to see clearly what you need to do to react dynamically to the various responses the system throws at you as you do this."
And here we come to the tricky part. I need to step up, here, to a meta-level, because Carolingian conversations always go right off the rails at this point. Repeat after me: She's on our side. Louder, I couldn't hear that. Much better. Now, when I say "Whose side am I on?", you say.... That's right: "She's on our side."
What I am about to explain to you is how, perhaps, you've been mistaken about something, not why your goal is something you shouldn't have. Your goal is my goal. Because Whose Side Am I On? That's right: She's On Our Side.
What I am about to explain to you is some things which contradict and counterindicate ways you may have approached this problem in the past or have been approaching it now. I'm not doing that because I want to shame you or make you feel bad; I'm doing that because I want you to stop doing things which are counter-productive in favor of things which work, so that you will succeed in your goals. Because Whose Side Am I On?
What I am about to explain to you may sound discouraging, as if I'm explaining why you will never, ever get what you want and your agenda is doomed. No, I'm explaining why this problem has proved so intractable in the past, precisely because those "intractabilities" have been a product of how the issue has been viewed, and by seeing the problem differently they may be evaded this time. Because Whose Side Am I On?
We good on that? I'll take that for a yes.
The thing you need to know is no, really, why people talk about OOP stuff at events.
The reason people talk about OOP stuff at events is the fundamental social role of events in the subculture of the SCA, and the fundamental role of the SCA in the lives of people in the SCA.
Every SCA event is a reunion.
The primary reason the vast majority of Scadians attend events is not to do a specific thing, but to be with their tribe and to be human with their fellows.
What do I mean by "be human with their fellows"? To do the things which humans have done since time immemorial to bond with their kith and kin: to say I am I am I am and to witness to others asserting their own I-am-ness. They do this by narrating stories of their deeds and experience -- This week I did; yesterday I was; last night I saw -- and giving accounts of their hopes -- I will; I am trying -- their tastes -- I liked, I am enjoying, I thought sucked -- and their identities -- As I am wont to do; But you know me; You can imagine how I.
We go to events to be with people we like and love, to be ourselves with them and to express our interest in and concern for them. And, of course, to dance with them, and feast with them, and hit them with sticks.
The utterances of such modernity which youse guys wish to supplant are not what people say just because they don't know any better. Perish the thought. They are incredibly important self-articulation and bonding interactions. It is important that people talk about their favorite comic books, their fights with Microsoft, the latest movie they saw, the babysitter, the alternator in their car, etc. with their fellow Scadians, and events are the ceremonial gathering of the tribe at which those sorts of bonding are natural to happen.
It is through these utterances which situate each person in his life to those who have not been in regular contact with him or her, that we re-establish social rapport after absence, i.e. from event to event. This is the fundamental act of relating to one another as real people upon which a sense of community is predicated.
People naturally resist efforts to convince them to stop relating authentically with their tribe's members on the rare occasions of congregation, and to substitute an art form of relating artificially in a way which does not assert the I-am-ness which is a predicate for community. People naturally resist efforts to chop down the unruly forest of their relating as real people to their fellow tribemembers, so that a tourney field can be put there, or a dance floor, or a castle. They may love tourneys and dance floors and castles, but they love their forest of their community, too.
So long as as the people who want to be able to have OOP-conversation-free experiences at events (that would be us, because Whose Side Am I On?) treat talking about comic books at events as second-class communication, communication which is devalued and to be opposed, all those people who most strongly prize that communication and its concomitant bonding will be enormously threatened by your project -- and quite rightly so. That's engaging in culture warfare.
Everytime someone advocates "There should be less OOP conversation" or "There should be more in-persona conversation", even by ostensibly "benign" (i.e. passive) means such as "Here's a class so more people can learn how to", this will be recognized as a negative value judgment of and blanket opposition to something of enormous value to a vast swath of the (local, even) Society.
Sounds dire doesn't it? Looks like a dead end?
(Pirsig fans may want to meditate a moment on Sacred Stuckness.)
The Hack
A key part of this hack, without which it absolutely will not work, and, I dare say, shouldn't work, is that the folks who want a modernities-free immersive event experience need to take all of the above deeply to heart, to appreciate that point of view and grant it complete legitimacy.
No, really. For reasons which will shortly become apparent, this will self-destruct if it is implemented with anything less than an attitude of the OOP conversation at events being enormously valuable...
too.
Because the fundamental assumption I am making about you, Gentle Reader, is that you can grant all of the above and still hold fiercely your valuing of immersive event experiences which are modernity-free. That you can accept and believe that OOP-conversation at events is invaluable, indispensible contribution to one of the most important dimensions of the SCA, without for a moment yielding your conviction that another one of the most important dimensions of the SCA is of being another world, an island in time, a place when/time where we are other than we are, where we say not only I-am, but I-could-be. That you can hold two values even though they may at times be in conflict.
The Hack is this: That those who wish for modernity-free experiences at events work towards there being modernity-OK spaces at events. Spaces which are comfortable. Spaces which are accomodating. Spaces which are adequate to the volume of people who want to use them and the purposes to which they wish to put them. Spaces which demonstrate the deep respect and consideration which you have for the role of OOP-conversation in social bonding and the fostering of the community which is precious to us all.
Do you see it?
It's inverting Enchanted Ground.
Enchanted Ground, marvellous idea though it is, has one big problem. Every time it is used, it further reinforces OOP-conversation-OK as the default norm.
So turn it around.
Are you seeing it now?
By scrupulously marking where OOP-conversation is socially acceptable, it accustoms people to the idea that the default condition is that OOP-conversation is....?
Now are you seeing it?
Wait, that's not all of it.
Good fences, someone recently said, make good neighbors. By marking off an at event territory, and doing so consistently from event to event, by scrupulously ensuring that there's always a place for that OOP-conversation to happen that is a choice place, you make it such that all those people who were on the fence about the choice between immersion and community can choose your side.
I won't kid you: there will always be some people who will object strenuously to efforts to make any more immersion happen. But the vast majority of people in the society came here for wonders -- they stayed for the community, but they came through the door because it was a door to another world. If you can make it so that substantial centrist demographic can have it's cake and eat it, too, they will support your efforts at reform.
Which, bringing us back to the point I keep harping on, is why you have to be so incredibly sincere about supporting OOP-conversation. If it's all just a cynical gambit to make events hostile to OOP-conversation -- to round up the people who have OOP-conversations and put them on a reservation -- you will lose the center; they will see any opposition to OOP-conversation being at events as in conflict with their aims.
You can't work towards eradicating OOP-conversation from events. (Nor, in my considered opinion, should you.) The system will oppose you with approximately as much force as you push on it. But there's a equilibrium point where IP/PN-conversation (In Period/Period-Neutral) is the core and/or greater part of events, normally, by providing for OOP-conversation-acceptible spaces attached. By punching a hole in the opposite side of the can to let the air in, you can pour the contents out much more easily.
Those who prefer exclusively immersive experiences can have what they want, those who prefer non-immersive space or are intimidated by immersion, or need a break from immersion or have business that requires OOP-conversation, can have what they want.
But wait, there's more!
Right now, the paradigm into which OOP-conversation is fit slots people into "OOP-conversation OK" (Funnist) and "OOP-conversation Not OK" (Authenticist) slots. This is terrible. People are put in a position of choosing sides. Exceptional behavior is treated as betrayal. This entire system reinforces both the personalization of conflict and rigidity of positions, two forces which are bad both for individuals and for communities.
By shifting the paradigm of OOP-conversation OK/Not OK to physical spaces, individuals regain the liberty to move fluidly through these political positions, and the values conflict of bonding good vs immersion good can start being de-personalized. Individuals may have preferences, but they become less identified with one position or the other.
By mapping values onto the floors instead of the foreheads, we give all those who wish to support or endorse the immersive project a much less confrontational way of doing so when someone transgresses against the immersion: "Excuse me, I think I forgot something in the lounge -- don't stop talking, I want to hear all about this -- do come with me! [...] Oh, no, it looks like my goblet isn't here; oh, well, I'll look for it later my feet are tired, let's sit here a while." Instead of saying "Don't do that at all" or "Don't do that with me" there's the option of "Let's do this somewhere else."
It also facilitates the reciprocal manoeuver: gently drawing someone new to the immersive game into it, by means of going and hanging out with them in the OOP-conversation-OK area, and then inviting them to join you in the other space. Because the advocate of the joys of immersion is in a OOP-conversation-OK space when they do this, they are in a position to discuss the immersive experience OOPly, and frankly address the intimidated newbie's concerns and reassure them. Instead of advocating immersion being a matter of convincing people to attend (prepare for and pay for) an entire event they're scared they can't handle, you are merely inviting them to step across a threshold for five minutes -- "If you're uncomforable, you can always come back." The barrier to trying out the immersive game is dramatically reduced.
Finally, as an added bonus: It's a place where filk and SCA folklore can be celebrated and transmitted. That has cultural benefits, too, and can help keep that material on the right side of that door.
The Hoary Details
The spaces for OOP-conversation need to be explicitly and expressly marked as such. Printing it in the event program is a good thing, but not even vaguely sufficient.
There needs to be a term for OOP-conversation-permitted spaces, a term which can be used in the rest of the event, and which can go on the signs you might decide to use to mark those spaces. Remember, spaces don't need to be fixed in identity; a space can be used for one purpose for part of the day and another purpose the other part.
The double standard applied to classes must end. If a class is going to be taught with OOP-conversation, it needs to be in an OOP-conversation-OK space. That's going to be a tough sell. Again, remember, you can slap a "This is an OOP-conversation-OK space" sign on a classroom door as needed.
This is mostly a matter of convincing autocrats to go along with it. If you think convincing people is a hard or bad thing, then this is bad news. If you think, "Hey, that's a much smaller number of people to convince than the entire barony," then it's good news. I don't recommend you go about this as a sekret agenda behind anyone's back. Just keep track of whose opinions are critical: autocrats don't just get a vote, they get a veto.
Some autocrats are likely to respond, "Well, I'd be happy to have an Enchanted Ground area for you guys at my event." If you've had any success on this project, decline, decline, decline! Do not reinforce the "OOP-conversation is OK by default" paradigm!! Really, as part of an on-going social change program, it's better to have no OOP-conversation-not-OK area at all than for it to be the Other space.
I have a hunch this will raise astonishing problems for Kingdom level events. A simple solution is to avoid Kingdom level events -- either having them (if it's up to you) -- or scheduling around them.
Scheduling? Yeah: if you manage to get all the local autocrats in an academic year to go along with this, well, that year's burghers will "grow up" thinking this new way of doing things is Sacred Tradition. They will be acculturated to it. That's how you start to change the Barony long-term.
Finally, let me re-emphasize: the OOP-conversation-OK spaces need to be good ones: comfortable, accomodating, adequate to their purposes. It's probably sane to so designate the changing rooms, the restrooms, gate and the kitchen.
Complements
Other pro-immersion efforts can complement this hack, so long as they do not work towards the eradication of OOP-conversation at events. (Advocates of increased immersion should be the first people to stand up and oppose eradication when it rears its head. Seize the middle ground.) Thus tying things like "a class in how to have PN conversation" to "so you don't have to stay to the OOP-conversation-OK-areas of the upcoming event" help make such classes seem far less eradicatory by making their purpose less open-ended. Efforts to promote immersion should be carefully scrutinized for eradicationist rhetoric/aims and cleaned up, if they are not to be counter-productive.
In Conclusion
It's something of an outlier case, but it wouldn't be entirely amiss to describe this whole hack as "paradoxical movement" -- a psychotherapy approach of getting what you want by doing something that looks at first blush to be giving in. It's not exactly: it only looks like giving in because previously black-'n-white, either/or thinking (fun OR authenticity) had obscured a path which goes between two positions.
In essence, the hack I am proposing is a unilateral treaty proposal: it proposes proceeding in a way which attempts to give most (i.e. the big center) of the other side (i.e. the funnists + the big center) all of what they want, in exchange for what we really want. Generally, if you go to the other side and say, "We want to give youse guys everything you want", they'll go, "Uh... gee, uh... OK." In this case "youse guys" is not everybody on the other side, but it's a substantial (and tactically chosen) majority. It drives a wedge between the absolutists (the authenticity-must-die funnists) who will not compromise or treat with you, and the larger sensible majority.
Good luck!