From: Dale Thorn <dthorn@gte.net>
Date: Mon, 4 Nov 1996 22:15:36 -0800 (PST)
To: Lucky Green <shamrock@netcom.com>
Subject: Re: Censorship on cypherpunks [RANT]
In-Reply-To: <Pine.3.89.9611041122.A16513-0100000@netcom9>
Message-ID: <327EDB5A.7DDF@gte.net>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Lucky Green wrote:
> On Mon, 4 Nov 1996, Dale Thorn wrote:
> [Quoting Adam]
> > > This has been taken far too seriously.  Cypherpunks is a *PRIVATE* list.
> > > There is no obligation to accept anyone.
> > Isn't this the same argument used by the state whenever they want to differentiate
> > between your "rights" and your "privileges"?  Can they reject one of your privileges
> > whenever they want to, at their discretion?  No.

> Government != private. Why is this so difficult to understand?[snip]
> "It" does not decide. "He" does. John Gilmore is the list *owner*. He can
> decide to remove anyboy from this list. Anytime. For any reason or no
> reason at all. He can even shut down the entire mailing list anytime he
> pleases, for any reason or no reason at all.

I've been looking up some of the words tossed around in this thread, in a dictionary
and elsewhere, to see if I can understand you.  It still sounds to me as though you
believe totally in authoritarian systems.  I don't consider myself a Socialist, but
I believe that some of the well=known concepts of ownership (the U.S. Constitution
has some of these) have both a popular meaning and a hidden meaning.

Question:  When you say *owner*, does this mean he runs the list on his own personal
computers, at his home, or at his business which he owns himself, or could it
mean that he's functioning on behalf of an educational institution and the term
*owner* has a different meaning than what most people would assume?

Maybe I shouldn't ask this kind of question, out of fear or something like that.