Over the years, you may have heard well-meaning board members say the equivalent of, "This museum should be run more like a business."
One problem with this idea is that you need to know a little something about a business before you start slashing budgets, firing people, or eliminating long-running programs. Retracing your steps after an ignorant (and hasty) move often costs more time and money than you initially hoped to save.
Unfortunately, right now in the United States, the DOGE-bag Elon Musk and his minions are taking the equivalent of a chainsaw to many museums and cultural organizations across the country.
This is not efficiency; this is stupidity.
Worse yet, these ill-considered actions risk the cultural heritage of EVERYONE in the United States, regardless of their political leanings. The tech bro mantra of "move fast and break things" is especially inappropriate when dealing with museums filled with fragile, priceless objects.
If you are an ExhibiTricks reader in the U.S., I urge you to
contact your representatives in Congress to express your concerns about the risks to museums and cultural organizations that "co-presidents" Trump and Musk pose.
It only takes an instant to damage or destroy something that has taken years to build.
We must resist and protect museums and other cultural institutions from damage (or worse) in the name of "efficiency."
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Paul Orselli writes the posts on ExhibiTricks. Paul likes to combine interesting people, ideas, and materials to make exhibits (and entire museums!) with his company
POW! (Paul Orselli Workshop, Inc.) Let's work on a project together!
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