The trouble is that you keep telling me about my angry scoldings, my
so-called tone and angry scoldings from you over and over. I do my best
to hold back the irritation you keep causing me with these never ending
put downs. But eventually I reach a breaking point and you really are
getting an angry scolding now. First, I clearly remember your asking me
to ban Mustafa. That was well after the debate about religion had
stopped. There could be no debate or argument when he would do nothing
but post insults. You asked me to ban him and instead I reluctantly took
the mildest action against him that I had I muted him. So now you are
revising your memory. Okay remember it differently if you want, but I
still remember what happened anyway. Next, everything I say is not
Marxist theory and when I do express Marxist theory you should be taking
it seriously by showing me what is wrong with it if you think something
is wrong with it. Instead, you decide that if you label something
Marxist theory you can then just dismiss it without even considering it.
Now I suppose you will have something to say about my tone again. Okay,
if you don't like my tone then tough shit. My tone is my tone and I
don't know how to change it or insert some other kind of tone. I say
what I mean and mean what I say and you refuse to accept that. You just
keep up the put downs. You have to expect that I will get a bit angry
after so much of that. So, yes, this is an angry scolding. I have
restrained myself for a long time, but you just keep pushing it and
pushing it and it really gets hard to keep restraining myself. So,
again, if you don't like me or if you don't like this list, which I make
no effort to control, then you can just leave.
Carl Sagan “Why do we put up with it? Do we like to be criticized? No,
no scientist enjoys it. Every scientist feels a proprietary affection
for his or her ideas and findings. Even so, you don’t reply to critics,
Wait a minute; this is a really good idea; I’m very fond of it; it’s
done you no harm; please leave it alone. Instead, the hard but just rule
is that if the ideas don’t work, you must throw them away.” ― Carl
Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
On 12/10/2020 9:47 AM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Roger,
I did not suggest that you ban Mustafa from the list. I suggested that you stop
arguing with him about his religion.
I have not meant to denigrate you in any way. I have criticized the manner in
which you argue with people with whom you disagree.
I have always expressed a lot of respect for your technical abilities,
abilities that I, and many of us, particularly older people, don't have. And I
have expressed appreciation for your willingness to keep the group alive.
I have been insulted and my feelings have been hurt when you have chosen labels
to describe what you believe my political orientation to be, which sound like
epithets when you use them, rather than labels.
Every political opinion that you have expressed, almost every article that you have
posted, have been from a Marxist orientation. I have no quarrel with that. My discomfort
is with what you call, "explanation" of your points which sound like angry
scoldings,, as this email of yours does.
I have no intention of leaving this list, not until it dies or I do, or I
become too disabled or ill to continue to participate.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On
Behalf Of Roger Loran Bailey (Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Wednesday, December 9, 2020 10:30 PM
To: blind-democracy <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: FW: blind democracy list direction
Frankly, it has always struck me as self ghettoization to have lists especially
for blind people when the list has nothing to do with blindness. Good grief, I
happen to subscribe to a science fiction list where everyone is blind. It is a
list formed from the accessible world audio discussion list, but beyond that
what does that have to do with blindness. There are scads of lists out there on
most any topic you can imagine that have nothing to do with blindness. Yet,
blind people seem to think they have to gather into their own lists anyway. In
most of those lists the participants will not even know that you are blind
unless you mention it and if it is irrelevant there is no need to mention it.
As for this list, it was founded as a list that was relevant to blind people,
but it turned into a list where that was largely irrelevant. Since most of the
subscribers are blind then discussion that is related to blindness does come
up, but that is only a small part of it and if you want to discuss blindness
issues there are a lot of lists out there dedicated to that too. I was not the
founder of this list and I only took on the job of list owner because all the
rest of you seemed to think you were incapable of setting yup the list. I made
no effort to change it when I did set it up. I stated in the description that
it was a reestablishment of the list that had come before and that anyone could
join. I pointed out that it was founded by blind people, but that it was not
necessary to be blind to join. I said that most of the discussion was about
politics, but that you could talk about anything you want to talk about. That
was how I found the list and I left it that way. Now, on any email list people
come and go. I don't give much thought to why they come and go. They could be
getting too much email. They could have other priorities. It doesn't matter.
Here they have the freedom to come and go as they feel like it and I don't
usually know why that is. In one case I was told. Joe left because Mustafa
joined and in keeping with my policy of noninterference I declined his request
to ban him. I finally gave into your demand to at least restrict his
participation in the list, but I never did feel comfortable in doing that. I
did debate with him, but despite your claims that I keep debating I generally
do not do that. I simply offer my opinions just like you do and just like
everyone else does. When people do not understand what I am trying to say I try
to explain it. When they decide that they know more about the subject that I
happen to have studied than I do while making claims about it that are complete
nonsense I explain where they are misunderstanding.
This is teaching, not debating. They may think they are debating, but I am
trying to teach. Now, I do have a Marxist point of view and I do post articles
that come from publications that consider themselves to be Marxist. So what?
You post articles from the liberal press. By the way, I don't even necessarily
agree with the articles I post. I read articles on line and post some that I
think might be of interest to this list.
The large majority of articles that I read I do not post. But somehow when I do
basically the same thing you do you style it as somehow nefarious. Now, you say
that you assumed the discussion list I belonged to was socialist. Frankly,
Miriam, your assumption went beyond that. I did not say that I belonged to any
discussion group on Facebook. As a matter of fact, I do, but I am generally a
lurker on most of them. I have subscribed to a lot of them and I don't have
time to pay a lot of attention to any one of them. I just go to Facebook and
skim through what is currently on the first page of my timeline. Occasionally I
make a comment, but not usually. The groups I am subscribed to are science
groups philosophy groups and some political groups. But when I mentioned
inviting people to subscribe to this one I was not even thinking of those
groups. There are people who have sent me friend requests and I tend to accept
all friend requests. I hesitate to use the word friend myself because I think
of the word friend as referring to people one hangs around with in person. I do
not even know these people. So I call them followers because they get my posts
when I make them and so they follow what I have to say. That's not much. I
generally post the same articles there as I post here. I follow them too
because I get their posts and for the most part those posts are posts
expressing a liberal political point of view. I invited them to this group to
grow this list.
It did not occur to me to seek out blind people because so little on this list
has anything to do with blindness. I invited them simply by posting an
invitation on my own timeline and they may or may not have seen it depending on
how much traffic they get on their own timelines.
But something has become very clear. No matter what I do, no matter what I have
to say, no matter what I post, you think you have to somehow denigrate it. You
denigrate it by completely making up things and this claim that I was trying to
turn this list into some kind of Marxist discussion list by inviting people
from a Marxist discussion group on Facebook is an example of completely making
up something to denigrate me with. This is McCarthyism. Now, I would really
like to tell you that if you don't like how I run this list then you can just
leave, but the trouble with that is that I don't run this list. Again, I
moderate by not moderating. I did not want the job of list owner or moderator
in the first place, but I took it on because you and the others were not doing
a thing to save the list. That is, you were again giving up without even
trying. I assure you that it does not take a technical genius to set up an
email list. All you have to do is to go to the hosting web site and find a link
or a button that says something like create a group. You click through that and
follow the prompts. I will admit that when going through the settings there
were a lot of settings that I did not understand, but I just skipped over those
and left them in the default mode. But, anyway, I set up this group because no
one else was making a single move to save the group that had just fallen apart.
I was about to leave the group myself, but by setting up the second incarnation
of it I committed myself. Since I take a hands off approach to it you can't
really say that you don't like the way I run it because I am purposely not
running it. But you still may not like the group. You definitely give the
impression that you don't like it just because I am a part of it. I can't do
anything to please you. If I say that my nose itches I would not be surprised
if you said that is only Marxist theory and is not worth consideration.
Everything else I have to say that has nothing to do with Marxist theory you
dismiss as Marxist theory. So let me suggest this. Even though I can't say that
if you don't like the way I run the group you can just leave I can still say
that if you don't like the group you can just leave. If you can for once
refrain from giving up before you even try then you can start your own and run
it the way you like. You just might be surprised at how easy it is to follow
the prompts. These hosting web sites make a point of making it easy so that
anyone can do it. If you absolutely cannot bring yourself to set up one of your
own then there are a lot of them out there to join. If you want blindness
issues you can find countless groups that discuss blindness issues. If you want
to discuss politics there are a lot dedicated to that too. If you don't want a
politically dedicated group there are other groups that are not dedicated to
that, but still allow political posts. I was once subscribed to the Blind
Chitchat group. It was pretty much what the name implied, but people still
regularly posted articles and political opinions. If you want a group that
simply does not have me on it then there are a whole lot like that. What you
don't have to do is to stay here and put down everything I say or do. I am not
a Mustafa. I will not follow you around the Internet pestering you with things
that you are not interested in and do not want. So give that some thought. If
you dislike me so much you do not have to subject yourself to me.
Carl Sagan “Why do we put up with it? Do we like to be criticized? No, no
scientist enjoys it. Every scientist feels a proprietary affection for his or
her ideas and findings. Even so, you don’t reply to critics, Wait a minute;
this is a really good idea; I’m very fond of it; it’s done you no harm; please
leave it alone. Instead, the hard but just rule is that if the ideas don’t
work, you must throw them away.” ― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science
as a Candle in the Dark On 12/9/2020 4:25 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
Roger,
Certainly, it is possible, and often very rewarding, to participate on lists
composed of fully sighted people. I did that when I was buying Audible books.
There was an Audible list composed of predominantly sighted people which
discussed books, of which I was a member. But there was also a Blind Audible
list that focused more on technical issues facing blind people in which I also
participated. The lists had different functions. And many years ago, Carl and I
were both briefly on a list of sighted people that another member of this list
told us about. I think it was called Secular Humanists, but it was all about
politics. Both of us left because the list was so busy, but it was a really
great list. But it does matter to me to have a discussion list made up of
mostly blind people. There are things that we've talked about in the past,
blindness issues, our feelings and attitudes, that are not appropriate for a
sighted list.
Now, you are correct. I assumed that the discussion group of which you are a
member, is a socialist discussion group. I made that assumption because of the
fact that the person whom you invited who did briefly join, is a member of the
SWP. I apologize. But it is true, isn't it, that when you post articles or
explain things, the articles are from Marxist publications and the scientific
explanations that you offer of events and economics, are derived from Marxist
theory? Am I incorrect about The Militant? What about Pathfinder Books?
You say that you thought it was time to invite more people so that we could
have more participants in our discussions. Did it not occur to you to ask the
rest of us who are already on the list of this was OK with us? After all, this
is Blind Democracy. You say that most of the people who are your followers on
Facebook are probably adherents to bourgeois liberalism. And you, incorrectly,
label me as also being one. I would suggest that you think about what happens
when people join the list who have opinions that differ from yours and who
choose to voice those opinions. You define what takes place as discussion. But
if it were friendly discussion, then the people would remain on the list.
Everyone who has disagreed with you and debated with you, left the list, except
for Mustafa who, apparently, enjoyed the viciousness of the arguments and might
have continued forever. The people who have stayed, are silent.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Roger Loran Bailey
(Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Wednesday, December 9, 2020 2:33 PM
To: blind-democracy <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: FW: blind democracy list direction
Over time I have accumulated a number of followers on Facebook. Most of them
sent me friend requests based, apparently, on the articles I post.
I don't send friend requests there myself except to some old acquaintances whom
I have not been in contact with for years. Of the ones who have sent me friend
requests two of them seem to have a connection to the SWP. One of them, David
Rowland, subscribed to this list very briefly, but he left before he even got
to answer my question to him about the SWP's current Israel policy. Based on
the articles and comments the rest of my followers post I think I would
classify them as adherents to bourgeois liberalism. One seems to be a fanatic
supporter of Bernie Sanders, for example. I have invited them all before, but
the only one of my followers who did subscribe was the one I just mentioned,
David, and he went away very quickly. Enough time has passed since I made my
last invitation that I thought it was time to do so again. My purpose in
inviting them is to get some discussion by people other than the very few who
speak up here regularly and to get some more perspectives. If all of them
subscribed it would be mostly bourgeois liberal perspectives. As to whether
they are blind or sighted, None of them have ever mentioned whether they are or
not, but since blindness is a low incidence disability I would assume that they
are mostly sighted.
So what? Very little of the discussion here is about blindness anyway.
Now, as for your assumption that if I invite anyone to subscribe I will be turning the
list into a Marxist discussion group, that is a prejudice of yours that I have been
trying to talk you out of ever since I subscribed myself. If I offer a personal opinion
on virtually anything you automatically dismiss it as Marxist theory even if it has
nothing to do with Marxism. Now the assumption is that if I invite anyone to subscribe
then I could only be inviting hardcore Marxists. I have encountered that attitude long
before I ever knew about you. I remember when I was in the Committee Against Registration
and the Draft, which was full of the alphabet soup of socialists, I was once talking
about the same attitude in the CARD office. I said that it was hard to overcome this
attitude from so many people that a communist is some kind of alien being and doesn't
even go to the bathroom. A man who was a representative of the Communist Party
(Marxist-Lenist) quipped, "I dunno, man. I haven't gone for years." Okay, he
made a joke, but I think the joke may have been a way of addressing what I had just said.
The attitude that I described also tends to assume that a communist has no sense of humor
either. I remember another time that I mentioned the same thing to a comrade and he told
me this story. He was located in another city from mine and he said that once a new hair
salon had just opened.
As part of their grand opening they were offering free haircuts on a first come first
served basis. So he was standing in line for a free haircut and ahead in the line there
was a woman who kept turning around to look at him and kept laughing. He said that he had
no idea who she was. Finally she said to him, "I would like to know what this has to
do with socialism." Well, it didn't have anything to do with socialism. It had to do
with getting a haircut. So here is some news for you, Miriam.
I do go to the bathroom. I haven't had a haircut for a while, but that has
nothing to do with Marxism. And I do have relationships and contacts with
people who are not Marxists and I do invite them to join into discussion with
us.
___
Carl Sagan “Why do we put up with it? Do we like to be criticized? No, no
scientist enjoys it. Every scientist feels a proprietary affection for his or
her ideas and findings. Even so, you don’t reply to critics, Wait a minute;
this is a really good idea; I’m very fond of it; it’s done you no harm; please
leave it alone. Instead, the hard but just rule is that if the ideas don’t
work, you must throw them away.” ― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science
as a Candle in the Dark On 12/8/2020 12:39 PM, Miriam Vieni wrote:
-----Original Message-----
From: Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, December 8, 2020 12:26 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: blind democracy list direction
God, am I old and slow. I saw Roger's posts about inviting new people
to subscribe 3 hours ago, but its importance didn't click until now.
This list has always been a list for blind people and their sighted
friends, the purpose of which is to discuss a variety of subjects.
Mostly, politics and blindness issues dominate, but we talk about
some personal stuff as well. I don't want it to turn into a Marxist
discussion list for predominantly sighted people. Was that the
meaning of Roger's proposed invitations to folks on Facebook?
Additionally, people who use Facebook, don't need an email list, but
some of us on this list use email lists precisely because we don't
use the latest social media. I'm requesting that all of our silent list members
give their opinions on this issue, if they have opinions.
Miriam
