Re: List Cleansing

Richard Sullivan (richsul@earthlink.net)
Tue, 12 May 1998 17:05:15 -0600

At 04:01 PM 5/12/98 -0500, you wrote:
>Peter Marshall wrote in part:
>
>>Most of us will be aware of the time lags involved in lists such as these.
>>Perhaps it is also ridiculous to expect that such a controversial decision
>>will just disappear instantly without further discussion.
>
> Indeed! I am dismayed that it has come to this. I come out of lurk
>mode just long enough to say that if the crimes "inflicted" upon this group
>by the man are so horrible as to be a just cause for his removal, then we
>are frail indeed.

I too am saddened by the current events, but I think people must know that
the main war was held off-camera. The Terry and Judy show was not as it
seemed to many. I think the reasons are complex and known only to a few and
I am not privvy to all the machinations and goings on. I am convinced it is
not the things seen here on the list.

I do know that the during the last outbreak there were message sent to me
by one of the "sides" that had a cc list of several dozen names -- I didn't
count, so I could be off quite a bit either way. The gist was that if I
showed any sympathy to the other side, that my good name would suffer. I
recall implications that my business would suffer as well.

I have a pretty thick skin -- I was once called an Alpha Male here and had
to go find out what that was. I was also in the USMC from 1960-1964 and
thin skins were not tolerated. My skin thickened up quite a bit during
those years.

I am not in Gordon's shoes and if I were I might have done exactly what he
did. I was employed by the City of Los Angeles for 26 year and retired as a
manager in the computer department managing systems for Robbery Homicide in
the LAPD. In the 26 years I saw how the workplace environment changed --
mostly for the good, but there was some bad as well. The bad part was that
everything descended to the lowest common denominator as far as sensitivity
went.

Ok, granted this isn't the Marine Corps, but I do think we've gone too far
in the other direction. The list is not a democracy, never was, never will
be, and shouldn't be. Someone needs to bring order to the community. Gordon
does a good job, perhaps this time a little too good.

Terry was stepping all over people here for the last year and I am sure he
annoyed other people as he annoyed me with his know-it-all attitude, his
propensity to answer every post, etc. So what! Maybe I am just lucky to be
an Alpha male.

I wish that all could be nice again and J & T could come out like good
Alpha Males (and Females) and shake hands. It ain't gonna happen!

Terry will be Terry and Judy will be Judy.

Judy will be Judy and probably flame me offline.

And I'll still love her.

--Dick Sullivan

Bostick & Sullivan
PO Box 16639, Santa Fe
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