NANFA-L-- NANFA is more than this list!


Subject: NANFA-L-- NANFA is more than this list!
ichthos-in-comcast.net
Date: Tue Aug 31 2004 - 16:50:15 CDT


All you guys who are judging NANFA, hating NANFA, or quitting NANFA solely on whether the BOD tolerates or attempts to control off-topic discussions on this email list, are looking through the wrong end of the telescope!
NANFA is more than a free email list server and the virtual sense of community it provides. NANFA is a quality publication. It's education and conservation grants. It's annual conventions. It's cool t-shirts. It's local collecting trips and grassroots conservation efforts. Many of the people who are turning their back on NANFA today because of this email list were here 10 years ago when NANFA had nothing -- no publication (or a very shoddy and inconsistent one), no money, no conventions, no t-shirts, no public outreach, no grants, no credibility and respect among the academic, government, and conservation sectors -- and certainly no email list. Yet despite these tremendous strides, you choose to judge NANFA solely on whether people on the email list share your political views, or are nice to you, or that they even dare ask you to refrain from irrelevant or off-topic posts. That just doesn't make any sense to me.
Furthermore, it absolutely drives me batty knowing that there are people quitting or refusing to join NANFA because of all the off-topic chatter on this list ... and that there are people quitting or refusing to join NANFA because any attaempt to control this chatter is deemed censorship. Does anyone besides me see how stupid this is?
And speaking of censorship, what's so gosh-darn wrong about limiting this list to discussions about fish? If Bob Sinclair submitted reviews of his favorite gangsta rap albums to AC, would you want to read them? Would I be guilty of censorship for refusing to print them?
Chris Scharpf
(currently up the street from Puget Sound)
/-----------------------------------------------------------------------
/ This is the discussion list of the North American Native Fishes
/ Association (NANFA). Comments made on this list do not necessarily
/ reflect the beliefs or goals of NANFA. For more information about NANFA,
/ visit http://www.nanfa.org . Please make sure all posts to nanfa-l are
/ consistent with the guidelines as per
/ http://www.nanfa.org/archive/nanfa/guidelines.html. To subscribe,
/ unsubscribe, or get help, visit the NANFA email list home page and
/ archive-in-http://www.nanfa.org/archive/nanfa/.



: Wed Sep 29 2004 - 12:24:26 CDT