C'mon guys. This is a MAILing list. We send EMAIL to one another. Sometimes we like what we read, sometimes we don't. Regardless, nothing is at stake except our understanding of things, and nobody has any coercive power to make anybody else understand something in a way they don't want. Right? Our livelihoods are not at stake, America's honor is not at stake, the social-democracy principles of European government are not at stake.
So, under these circumstances, what exactly is a "crisis?" What's "critically important" here? Little-to-nothing. In fact, there are only two ways a crisis -- that is, bad things happening beyond one's control -- can happen. One: some person starts spewing filth everywhere and he can't be shut off. We have a pretty good working definition of what that involves, and nobody here fits that definition. Yet. Two: (and this is more subjective) one grants oneself license to attack something or someone on principle alone, in effect surrendering control over ones's actions and causing one to inch closer and closer to the sort of behavior described in "One" above. "One" is an objective state of crisis. "Two" is a subjective state of crisis that one projects onto the list and even helps to establish through a lack of self-control. Neither is pretty to watch, and neither does anything to improve a mailing list in any respect. In short: nobody can cause a crisis by himself, except in situation "One," and such crises are easily remedied. In all other crises, the alleged crisis-causer must be aided and abetted by those with whom he argues. If the "crisis" can't persist with one's help egging it on and nagging it and wailing over it, then one has oneself become the source of the "crisis." Marvin Long Austin, Texas
