The Way I See It

The way I see it, I believe that in public forums, certain protocol should be followed when persons want to address the individual chairing the session-whatever it is.
You see, I am from the ‘old school,’ but I find that sometimes the old school’s policies do not work, because what I find is that in many cases, the persons chairing the session, generally ignore the persons who are putting up their hands for acknowledgement and accept the contributions of those who just talk when they feel like.
I remember some time last year, I was invited to a particular meeting and the person chairing and the featured speaker, eventually accepted input from the attendees at the meeting.
For an extended period, I put up my hand to make an input and was ignored.
Meanwhile, other persons who just started talking and making their contributions, mostly sarcastic and abusive, were taken and debated in some instances.
The chairperson looked in my general direction a few times and even accepted a contribution from someone sitting next to me and passed me by.
I eventually gave up and refused to just start talking as the others were doing.
Earlier this week, I was invited to another forum and after some wonderful presentations by the featured speakers, they allowed for some limited time for input by the persons at the workshop.
The same thing happened. I put up my hand to make what I considered would be a valuable input and was overlooked for persons who just ‘cut in’ when they felt like.
One of them was so verbose that he spoke at will on almost every single topic and was never ignored nor asked to be brief.
On the other hand, I with my hand up, was overlooked.
Finally, the featured speaker acknowledged me and I got up to speak and immediately one of the facilitators of the workshop, stood up to say that we should allow the presenter to complete his presentation and then we could ask questions.
So I sat down.
Yet still, I watched in dismay as the speaker was interrupted time after time by other persons, especially my verbose friend and ‘not a word in English.’ They were not stopped.
When the presenter was finished, before we could ask any more questions, it was pointed out that due to limited time, they would move on to the next speaker.
Well I newa!
The same thing happened with the next speaker, again as I was told that as soon as I was acknowledged by the speaker that I should wait until the presentation was finished and then I watched again as other persons spoke at will thereafter.
I eventually gave up and wondered if the ‘old school’ theory really works.
However, on giving due consideration, after the fact, I am thinking that I will stick to the ‘old school.’
So maybe, kisses really go by favour and depending on who you are, you are given more privileges to talk in such fora, or maybe they are saying that you simply have to be boisterous and aggressive in order to be acknowledged.
Guess what? My mother and father did not bring me up that way, so I am too old to change now.
I guess I will be continuously silenced because I won’t be saying too much until my hand is acknowledged.
That’s the way I see it. How do you see it?