Xref: utzoo news.groups:17404 talk.religion.newage:5649 Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!mcgill-vision!bloom-beacon!snorkelwacker!think!samsung!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!walt.cc.utexas.edu!olorin From: olorin@walt.cc.utexas.edu (Dave Weinstein) Newsgroups: news.groups,talk.religion.newage Subject: Re: CALL FOR DISCUSSION: talk.religion.pagan (UNMODERATED) Message-ID: <24170@ut-emx.UUCP> Date: 7 Feb 90 01:18:16 GMT References: <4093@jarthur.Claremont.EDU> <10081@hoptoad.uucp> Sender: news@ut-emx.UUCP Reply-To: olorin@walt.cc.utexas.edu (Dave Weinstein) Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas Lines: 73 (Sigh). I'd hoped this whole barrage from Tim was over but... In article <10081@hoptoad.uucp> tim@hoptoad.UUCP (Tim Maroney) writes: #All I know about him is that he never tried to address the #inclusiveness issues I raised, made a ridiculous claim that ten votes #out of thirty showed a strong consensus for his position, and acted in #an underhanded manner when he posted his call for votes a day or two #before my informal poll ran out. Not exactly the behavior one would #hope for from a would-be moderator. I've already addressed these issues, but the posts long ago scrolled into the dustbin so... 1) I still find it incredibly amusing that you will in the same breath condemn me for actually using a poll which was conducted to resolve the name/moderation issue *and* then condemn me for not following your precious poll. 2) There was nothing sneaky about the call for votes. It was sent out exactly one month after the call for discussion (as the call for discussion had said it would be), there had been no arguments over the proposed name or charter or moderation status in over two weeks, and your bloody poll was still ostensibly about renaming talk.religion.newage. But then, considering your initial flames about the newsgroup, I'm not sure if you ever *read* the initial call for discussion. [Quotes Deleted: Topic is inclusiveness and names] #Sure, but words don't exist in a vacuum. The fact is that, like "New #Age", "pagan" has been co-opted by a particular faction and so in #pragmatic terms isn't considered inclusive; if you say you're a pagan, #people in contact with the traditions will assume you're not a reader #of Ken Wilber, or a Thelemite, or a Theosophist, or a Ramthaist, etc. #If we're going to go strictly on dictionary definitions, then #"Catholic" is the most inclusive term in the world and we should use it #as a synonym for "eclectic". Now, maybe in another three years, the #Church Enlightened and Esoteric will be formed and become tremendously #popular and spoil the term "esoteric" for the rest of us, but for now, #it or something like it would be the best bet. # #Unfortunately, the Neo-Pagans here obviously are never going to address #the inclusiveness issues. They don't want inclusiveness -- they want #exclusivity, which is ever so much more emotionally satisfying to a #certain kind of person -- but they are unwilling to come right out and #say so. Sorry if this seems a little harsh, but over the last three #months I've gotten pretty damn sick and tired of having my points on #inclusiveness completely ignored by that faction. Actually, it still comes across to me as "I led the fight to have talk.religion.newage created and I don't want to let any similar newsgroups get created"... the same theme which has been (at least to my mind) underlying all of your posts on this subject. Inclusiveness is *not* the be all and end all you are making it out to be. The fact that there is a newsgroup with a narrower focus than you'd like does not mean that groups already in existence (like talk.religion.misc and talk.religion.newage) which do have wider scopes will wither away and die. There is room for both, Tim. By your logic, we should only have one newsgroup, stuff.all, because anything else would be factionalism. Your points on inclusiveness haven't been ignored, they've just been irrelevent. But then, you first flamed me for trying to rename talk.religion.newage (something which was never even under consideration), so I don't know why I expect you to actually address the issues of what was *specifically intended* to be a newsgroup with a narrower focus than talk.religion.newage. --Dave --- Dave Weinstein GEnie: OLORIN Internet: olorin@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu Old address: olorin@walt.cc.utexas.edu Disclaimer: My employer has opinions. I have opinions. Let's keep it that way.