Date: Thu, 17 Mar 94 23:20:51 GMT
From: mfy@sli.com (Mike Yoder)
Message-Id: <9403172320.AA16027@ravel.sli.com>
To: schuldy@zariski.harvard.edu
Cc: DCROSS@bentley.edu, carolingia@bloom-beacon.mit.edu
In-Reply-To: Mark Schuldenfrei's message of Fri, 11 Mar 1994 15:19:46 -0500 (EST) <9403112019.AA10695@math.harvard.edu>
Subject: A Plot to keep our burough "members"


Tibor wrote:

>I have been thinking about this idea all day.  I can't quite put my finger
>on why it bothers me so terribly much. But it surely does.
>
>Perhaps I think it contains the seeds of exploitation: pretty soon,
>newcomers could get the idea that to join the SCA you have to do favors for
>a local big shot...

After reading this, I first picked my jaw off the floor, and then removed the
lint from it.  Next, I thought about the statement for a couple of days.

I assume you are using "join" here in the larger sense.

Do you really, in all earnestness, believe that this is not already required
for all practical purposes?  The usual euphemism for the system is "service."
General service seems to be either (1) simply ignored, or (2) dismissed on the
grounds that the worker is just doing it to get an award.  [Irony alert] After
all, if so-and-so were really acting out of unselfish motives, they ought to be
willing to work for someone else, right?  [End irony alert]

Working without a patron in the SCA (oh, all right, in Carolingia) is like
running up a down escalator with oil spills on it while people shoot salt
pellets at you, and folk like Cariadoc argue that the speed of the escalator
should be turned up a few notches.  (I am referring to his position on AoAs.)

It isn't only at the Board level that our system has problems, Tibor.
Just my opinion.

    Franz Joder von Joderhuebel (Michael F. Yoder) [mfy@sli.com]

Or are these things just stories, without point or truth, brought to mankind
from the pages of poets?
	-- Euripides, _Iphigenia at Aulis_