From: Richard Caddel <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Date: 14 November 1998 23:44

|However, I do think it's important to keep the list as a place of
|*public dialogue*, i.e. dialogue with other members of the list, and
|to post *part of* a correspondence on it is potentially misleading,

I asked Tim Fletcher to publish my objection to the *personal *abuse of
Griffiths and others in the article he published. He refused and then
*partly quoted and alluded to my objection in a circular, the recipients of
which he has only partially disclosed. In that circular, which he prevents
me from answering, he calls me intemperate, preposterous, ludicrous and
authoritarian. I may well be; I may not be. I have no means of replying.

I could easily have posted both my letters. I have no inclination to type
out 2pp of Tim Fletcher's. I have no intention of copying the
article. I did not post both my letters because it would have added nothing
very useful. The second makes the point. Anyone is welcome to the first. It
could be better. It isn't very good.

|It's not about "standing together" or not
It ought to be. The standing together I speak of is not of any particular
grouping. I am referring to an inclusive commununity rather than what we
have at the moment which is more inconclusive.

The present case is on a specific
|article, and what it does and doesn't say, and indeed its critical
|fairness.
**and **its **personal **abuse

No one should be attacked in this way and we should react strongly to anyone
who so attacks unprovoked. If we do not, then what exactly are we all
writing about?

The-slime-who-write-provocative-articles-in-order-to-make-a-name-without-goi
ng-through-the-labour-of-writing-anything-useful we have with us always. I
wait to see if anyone DOES anything about what can be done, especially the
personal injury. I did what I thought appropriate and possible for me.

It is NOT just a matter of the article. The article would not be available
to anyone if it had not been published. It seems to me entirely appropriate
to investigate and expose the intentions, or lack of them, of the publisher.
There's quite a lot of "outrageous" and "unacceptable" going on
back-channel. Much use that is.

I have considered this matter at some length. I think the listowner is
wrong.

I considered withdrawing from the list. I shall probably have little to say
beyond providing information until and if I see some action on this matter.
I don't see much point in chatting about this and that while ne're-do-wells
libel our peers and only an eyebrow is raised.



Lawrence Upton














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