From rdumain@igc.apc.org  Sun Apr  6 12:02:45 1997
From: rdumain@igc.apc.org (Ralph Dumain)
Date: Sun, 6 Apr 1997 04:02:45 -0700 (PDT)
Subject: M-TH: Re: M-I: PANIC LEFT: TAKE THREE
Message-ID: <2.2.16.19970406060139.23bf1d88@pop.igc.org>

I hope that now that we have all gotten our various revulsions off our
chest, we can soberly consider once again the history and future of the
spoons marxism lists.  All these reorganizations have been handled very
badly, and it is ultimately due to the incompetence of the moderators.

>From what I can see, spoons is a project of cloudy cultural avantgardists
clueless about what to do with themselves or why, but who have been generous
enough to provide Marxists, with whom they have no concern whatever, to use
their resources to embarrass themselves in cyberspace.  Clearly, the marxist
component of spoons has proven to be nothing but one huge pain in the ass,
and we should be thankful that spoons still tolerates its presence, though
if the marxist lists had exhibited a consistently intelligent character,
they might have been able to instruct the avant garde space cadets in a
thing or two.  That opportunity has been pissed away.

My recent experience on the marxism-and-sciences list clarified matters for
me.  Ultimately, spoons's only responsability and competence is to provide
the space. The moderators have all the power.  Hence the task is to choose
competent and intelligent moderators.  But spoons can only choose those who
have volunteered.  Hence the responsibility devolves upon us and our moderators.

The multiple reorganizations of these lists have proven to be a complete
fiasco.  Now we should have learned that the attempt to subdivide marxism by
focus of interest was a completely mistaken idea.  The real need was not to
separate out various topics, but to keep separate various groups of people.

For some time now, thaxius has been essentially dead as a doornail.  It only
comes to life when someone enters, stirs up anger, and all of a sudden the
list comes to life, but organized around nonsense.  And where are the
moderators, by the way?  Off having a wank?

We seem to again stand at a crossroads.  The phantom Buffalo comedy troup
has invaded us, following in the footsteps of Malecki and others like him.
Now Uncle Lou is a refugee from the sectarian cranks and decides that he is
pitching tent here and will we please not rile him and make him
uncomfortable in his new home?  So once again, there is no escape and no
refuge for those of us who do not want to get swept up in all this mess again.

The policy of openness is a total mistake.  There should be cyberforums for
all, but not cyberforums open to all.  There should be one for the
irredeemable crackpots to function in.  There should be another for Proyect,
Henoood, the relatively sane leftovers from m1 who couldn't leave, someplace
for Jerry Levy if he and Henwood can be kept out of the ring together,
another place for Rakesh, Justin, Hans, Jukka, and other people whose
intelligence I respect, including, I'm ashamed to admit, the likes of Juan
Inigo.  Tbe moderators should be ruthless dictators who make sure that
certain people are not allowed together in the same forum and that disputes
among one cohort do not leak into another forum.  Somebody who migrates to a
list where he doesn't belong should be thrown out.  The beauty of cyberspace
is, that unlike a union hall or community center, there is no physical
restriction on how many people can occupy the building.  The principles both
of free speech overall and freedom of association mean that everyone can
participate in a forum, but not everybody is forced to rub shoulders with
everyone else.



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