Date: Thu, 11 May 2000 12:26:52 -0500 (CDT)
From: Antistoicus
To: Sally
Subject: Re: Proposed Newsletter Sponsorship


Before we proceed, I have to insist on one simple rule. Once a question has been answered, it has been answered. Otherwise, this list is going to rapidly become unreadably dull. Sally's questions were not only answered (repeatedly), with the answers easily found, simply by re-reading old mail to the list, but they were answered at such length, that I was afraid that I might be testing the patience of the list.

May I hope that everyone will respect this rule? Or at least know that if you must ask someone to repeat himself, the request should be made in private e-mail, and not sent to the entire list?

Counterarguments, or alternative proposals are welcome. Tests of will are not. Life is too short for those. So, let's move on.


On Thu, 11 May 2000 Sally wrote:

> ... there are many solitaries in the Chicagoland
> ... Pagan Community who would like to do something
> ... for the Community but don't care to join a particular
> ... group/temple/coven to do it.

As I've already said, my position would be that they would be perfectly free to submit articles for approval. Whether that position is the one a future editorial staff would adopt, would be up to the staff, not me.

As for taking part in the putting together of the newsletter in a more involved fashion - the newsletter staff would, itself, be an organization. So, if someone's complaint is "I'd like to take part in putting this thing together, but I don't want to belong to a group", then he is asking to have his cake and eat it, too. One need never be apologetic about one's refusal to do the impossible. He either is on the staff, or he isn't.

Would I suggest that someone have to join the Council to be on the staff for the newsletter (as opposed to just writing for it)? You bet, and why not? The Council isn't a coven, it's a loose association of people bound together by little more than a commitment to work together in a civilized fashion. To respect a request on someone's part, to join the staff of the newsletter, without joining the Council first, would be to agree to an arrangement where we give him authority over one of our projects without getting to know him first. That, to me, would seem foolhardy, not to mention, irresponsible.

Besides which, do we really need a few thousand people on the editorial staff? For that matter, do we even need two dozen? Yes, we'll be losing the applications of a few of the more radically isolationist candidates, but, why is this a bad thing? Is it a good idea, to be inviting people who are radically anti-community, to take leadership positions in a project that will have so much of an impact on the health of the community? So, we lose a few candidates. There will be plenty left.

Now, to be serious - have I asked anyone here to pop for dues, yet? Swear allegiance to anything, or anyone? So, really, what is the issue?


..................... ..................... Yours in respectful confusion,

..................... ..................... ..................... ..................... Antistoicus


PS. The newsletter would be put out by a group of people from the Council. Whether or not they would also happen to be Shrine members, would be immaterial, though, at this point, there is a heavy amount of overlap between the two. (Hence, the joint list, and joint meetings).

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