Viewing message <[email protected]>

   From: Tamara L. Siuda ([email protected])
   Subject: Open letter to Joseph (was re: Cat and Tom Show)
   Newsgroups: alt.pagan, alt.magick, soc.culture.haiti
   Date: 2002-05-17 14:10:14 PST

Em hotep (in peace, and I do mean that), Joseph:

[email protected] wrote in message
news:<[email protected]>...

> "[email protected]" (on behalf of Tamara Siuda), ie. Criag Schaefer in all
>  likelihood, wrote the material quoted below. So, let me respond,

Perhaps in your likelihood, but you must not understand much of my
temple's organization.  Rev. Craig is the chief priest of the temple
and is not one of my personal scribes.  I am responsible for the
"material quoted below," which I dictated to one of my personal
scribes.  I'm not going to name that person, because then he or she
will just turn into yet another name on your increasingly long list of
grievances with us -- grievances I have no idea where they came from
or why.


(snipped note to Rev. Craig, since he had nothing to do with this)
> You already know that the House is due for a nasty (and embarassingly
> well-documented) write up on the semi-revived Agora, because I've
> told you this, already. It's just a matter of finding the time
> to put it all together. Say, by June 1.

When did you tell us this?  The last we had heard from you was after
we asked you and another guest to stop arguing on our public boards,
which you took as a personal affront and ran off to post on your own
website about how unfair we were.  I fail to understand how well
documented would be embarrassing. I do not believe anyone under my
direction did anything wrong in that particular instance (and, before
you even start that complaint, "John" was not, and is not, under my
direction -- he like you was a guest at our website, and since we have
public boards, he was welcome there just as you were subject to
certain expectations of civility).


>  Picking a fight in order to cover your (ahem!), politically, is really
>  tacky.

Clarifying an error you posted here (i.e., that I somehow have
something to do with this argument you are having with Cat and Tom) is
hardly "picking a fight to cover my (ahem!)," pardon my French.  It is
simply stating facts. I have no interest in picking a fight with you
or anybody. I DO have interest in not being dragged about Usenet when
I don't even normally read it, and have nothing to do with what is
being discussed.


(snip John rant - again, I am no more responsible for his rantings
than yours or anyone else's, as long as I want our board to be public
and freely discussed)
>  So, you and Stephanie let reality be defined by a paranoid schizophrenic
>  who had a violent reaction to the fact that I wouldn't validate his
>  auditory hallucinations, and denied that King Tut might have had an
>  electric razor. I've seen some whacky stuff out of your old enemies
>  over in the "Reader Circuit" community, but nothing this weird.
>  And the seldom heard Tamara Siuda is presiding over this madhouse,
>  which has to say something.

Yes, it does say something. It says I am a very, very busy person at
the moment, with far better things to do than sit on Usenet all day or
write websites about how people I don't even know slighted me in some
way, when all they did was say "hey, you guys are guests here and we'd
rather you stopped arguing."  Asking people to stop arguing is just
that. It doesn't validate either side of the argument -- it says stop
arguing.



>  You know, Craig, I really wanted to put this gently. I really didn't
>  want to say, "Mambo Racine, given that you are the person who
>  initiated that utter nutcase, Tamara Siuda, I think that alt.pagan
>  would be about 100 times better off without you or your friends
>  trolling their way through it". I even was writing, and rewriting,
>  trying to find a gentle way to retell the bizarre events that I saw.
>  But you just couldn't shut up, and let me be as diplomatic as the
>  circumstances allowed, could you, Schaefer? Fine, that's your choice,
>  and you're entitled to it.

Again, "Schaefer" had nothing to do with this, and he's never done
anything rude to you either.  Nice to know you know me well enough to
call me an "utter nutcase."  Congratulations, you've now stooped to ad
hominem.  Guess it doesn't matter what I have to say in my own
defense.  And I had no interest in trolling usenet in the least --
wouldn't even have known about it had you not decided to name me in
something I have nothing to do with.  You can thank yourself for that.


>  Now, what did you have to say? Oh yes, this ...
> >Dear "Evil Heathen,"
> Oh, call me Joe.


> >Tamara Siuda has never been a student of Cat Yronwode. In fact the two
> >have never even met.
>
> No, but she is a student of Mambo Racine, who I had confused with Cat
> Yronwode.

Okay, then.  I was clarifying facts; I do not even know Cat though I
do not have any problems with her.  I was indeed initiated at a kanzo
by Mambo Racine Sans Bout, last summer.



> I am far from being the first person on Usenet to have ever
> found it difficult to keep the players straight without a scorecard, and I
> don't appreciate the all-too-characteristically hostile tone.

What's hostile about "no, Tamara isn't Cat's student, she doesn't even
know her?"  I think you're reading hostility where none exists.  The
only hostility between us is clearly not emanating from me.



> I even less
> appreciate the effort to make political points off of an irrelevant
> misunderstanding which has since been cleared up, in public. Cat Yronwode
> is one of the combatants, and Mambo Racine is another, both of them
> opposed to Tom. Not that I object to them taking potshots at the man,
> actually I kind of like the idea, but why do it here, in alt.pagan?

Actually, no, it's not political at all. I was told that someone was
claiming I was Cat's student, and I got a copy of the post, and then
told one of my people (most people at my level of work do have
assistants; it's not some evil conspiracy) to send a note correcting
that as well as the statement about Vodou being Pagan.  Simple
statement of facts. I do not read the Usenet, so I apologize if I
didn't know that the confusion had already been cleared up.  This was
the only post I was addressing -- the post that named me when I don't
even read these lists.



> If you decide to be your usual, less-than-straightforward self, and deny
> that Tamara ... no, deny that Tammy Siuda studied under Mambo Racine,
> I'll be delighted to pull up a Dehanews url that shows otherwise.
> Perhaps you've forgotten that Mambo Racine posts announcements regarding
> the progress of her initiates?

Why would anyone lie about that? It's in my official biography -- and
I am proud to have been initiated kanzo with Roots Without End; I
practice Vodou to honor my ancestors, though it is not my primary
religious calling, and the House of Netjer does interfaith work with
the peristyle even now.

Additionally, I would appreciate not being called "Tammy"; it is not,
nor has it ever been, my name, and it suggests a familiarity here that
does not exist. I met you in real life one time, and thought you were
a pleasant and intelligent person -- not the person deliberately
baiting me and being generally rude right now, alas.




> >Additionally, the statement you attribute to our Nisut (AUS) would
> >perhaps better be stated
>
> The statement I gave was a repeat of something that came directly from
> Tamara's lips, and hand in conversations I had with her, and as I am not
> about to start calling her "her holiness", I am not about to seek her
> office's approval before quoting her, or even hers. Comprende, Craig?

Not Craig, and quite comprende.  I wasn't trying to argue. I was
corroborating that I do personally believe that Vodou is not properly
considered "Pagan." That is my belief.  You can believe I'm wrong; I
accept that others have different opinions.



> >given your current argument with the phrase
> >"Neo-Pagan" rather than simply "Pagan," as the latter has different
> >definitions to different people;
> I now need your permission to choose a particular phrasing, Craig ?
> In your dreams, buddy. No, I will not use that phrasing. It would
> change the meaning to something other than what was said, as the
> Western Traditionalist groups that your organization also objected to
> being grouped with, aren't Neopagan, either. In fact, given your church's
> stated position that the netjeru have only a subjective existence,
> theologically the House is a good deal closer to being Neopagan than are,
> say, the Asatruar.

Nope, you don't need my permission (again Craig has nothing to do with
this).  However, given that people seemed to not understand my
original statement, I thought it was appropriate to elaborate on my
reasoning. If that's not necessary, then don't use it. We reserve the
right to define ourselves. If you don't agree with our definition,
that's fine. You don't have to accept it.



> > the Roman Catholic version, i.e.,
> >"anything which is not Jewish, Christian or Muslim," would put Vodou
> >into that category.
> Um - wrong. The Roman Catholic Church has not referred to Buddhism as
> being "Pagan" in living memory.

I will admit to not being up on official Catholic doctrine.



> >You are correct, however, in that our Nisut (AUS) does not consider
> >Vodou to be a pagan religion as it is founded mostly in traditions
> >predating the Classical invention of the word.
>
> Vodou? Uh, huh. Please, Craig. If your group wants to claim to see
> similarities between Egyptian and Yoruba practice, I will have to defer to
> Tammy's greater knowledge in that area, at least until I can find
> a good authority to check these claims with. But the Yoruba don't even
> predate the English, much less the Romans.
>
> That much is high school history. * groan *

It depends on who you talk to; people in modern-day Nigeria go back
quite a bit further than the high-school books.  And this is my
opinion.  Again, you are more than welcome to disagree with it.  I'm
not stating a fact -- I'm stating my opinion.  I don't think Vodou
needs to be considered "Pagan."



(snipped)
> No, Craig, you dropped by to do the one and only thing that you and
> Stephanie ever do - throw your insubstantial weight around. Your nisut
> invited me - practically challenged me - to drop by your group, and make
> up my own mind about it, in an informed fashion, and then write about it.
> That's a reasonable request, one which I couldn't deny, but now I've done
> so, and I don't have to put up with your passive aggressive attitude any
> more. So, get it though your pin-sized head that I'm not one of your
> shemsu, and I don't need your permission to speak about anything.

This letter came from me though it was actually typed and uploaded by
someone else -- so I was throwing my own weight around, if any weight
was being thrown around at all.  However, I think you've really
misread the letter.  Nothing was intended beyond a simple statement of
who I am a student of (or not) and my own position on a statement you
have attributed to me. If someone else showed up on Usenet purporting
to speak for you, I'm sure you would also wish to make your own
statement.  There is no "passive aggressiveness" here, there is no
hostility here.  You don't need permission to speak about anything --
you DO have to realize that other people can and do have the right to
clarify the words you put into their mouths.


Tamara

PS: You'll have to email me privately if you have anything to discuss;
I really do not have time to be around the Usenet.  Anyone else here
who needs anything clarified may also write, though they need to
understand that it could be some time before they get a response
(since I will wish to respond personally given the current suggestion
that I can't answer for myself).


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