First, I'd like to apologize to the membership of this group for the
following post. I realize it's off topic but that really can't be
helped. I will not, under any circumstances allow my group, my staff
or myself to be slandered in such a fashion by this person. It's not
right and as a person who is persecuted daily for his religion, I've
decided that I am making a stand here.

First, let me say that I do run one of the largest Pagan general chat
groups on Yahoo, which, incidentally is what this is actually about.
It has nothing whatsoever to do with censorship. My group has over
1400 members. That is what this is about. Merriam-Webster's
Dictionary defines censorship as "stopping the transmission or
publication of matter considered objectionable." Obviously, this
means that anything Mr. Turmel had to say was not allowed on my group.

First, let me point out that Pagan Way is a group for those practicing
one of the Pagan Religions and those curious about it. While the
issues he represents may well be important to Canada, only a very
small percentage of my membership is actually from there. Most are
from either America or Europe. Thus, there is little we could do to
support his causes, even were we so inclined. However, that was not
the reason some of his posts were rejected. Our primary problem is
bandwidth and volume. We lose more members because of the large
number of posts, over 100 a day at present, than any other reason.
Our second largest reason, which is tied to the first, is the amount
of room our group takes up on individual mail servers. Most have a 3
meg limit. One of his posts is the equivalent of 4 or 5 of our
regular memberships. This means that members boxes fill and they
start to bounce messages. Thus, they leave.

Since he obviously posts ridiculously long posts that are topic
specific to Canadian political causes that do not involve Pagans
directly, my rejections were based on several factors. One, his posts
had no relevance to Pagan lifestyle, religious beliefs, or the
politics of a majority of our membership. Two, his posts were not
accompanied by any attempt to be part of the group. They were simply
cross-posts that, in my view, seemed to have no relevance, and three,
they were excessively long thus causing both bandwidth and storage
problems.

However, not all my moderators felt the same and he did post 5 posts
to our group that got through. Posts numbered #18351, #18477, #18492,
#18814 and #19017 did get through and are part of our archives. The
only responses generated by my group to any of these were in the form
of private emails to me requesting that I do "something" because we
maxed out their storage again. As losing 11 members is not worth the
hassle of having one member post ridiculously long and irreverent
posts, I rejected any further posts until I could try, somehow to
explain the situation to him.

His response was to post what I'm currently replying to all over the
Internet. Very well, I have decided to hunt down each and every one
of these wherever they live and post my response. I am not trying to
start a war, simply make sure that my side of this is also heard. Mr.
Turmel is an emotionally disturbed individual who seems to have a
variety of personality disorders and needs some severe help. I hope
someone reading this gets him that help before real harm is done.

Now, back to censorship. I host 12 groups on Yahoo. Pagan Way is the
main group. I also host two different political groups that derive
their membership from Pagan Way. He was offered the chance to join
and post his causes to those groups but refused. At the end of his
post, he acknowledges that he knows of their existence but still sends
two flame posts through my group demanding that I allow them through
or be, as he eloquently put it in his email, "A chicken in shame...".

Since censorship means, "stopping the transmission or publication of
matter considered objectionable.", I'd like to know exactly how I did
that. 5 posts were allowed to be posted. Anyone is welcomed to check
my archives and verify that. I do have the right to keep my groups on
topic. That comes with being a list owner. He was offered a place
where his posts would be welcomed and yet he refused and, instead
flamed me on this group, numerous others and my own. He, in fact,
flamed me twice on my group. I do have the right to enforce the rules
of my list. That also comes with being a list owner. No flaming is a
general rule on most groups. He demanded that I let my membership
know what was happening and I did comply with that request.

So, how am I guilty of running anything more than a topic oriented
list? I should, in fact, be praised for creating other lists for
people who choose to debate politics and discuss other more specific
topics. Running 12 lists is not an easy matter when none of them are
under 100 members. I will add one more thing. Approaching my staff
and asking that they post for him since, he is gagged until I get a
personal apology and a posted apology on each and every group that he
posted this nonsense on, was definitely a complete demonstration of
the class shown by this individual. If he is, indeed an advocate for
anything, I would seriously suggest finding one more credible since,
to be frank, he shows the maturity of a 12 year old. God knows what
damage he is doing or could do to, what I see, as legitimate causes in
Canada.

This man was not censored. He was censured for acting like an idiot
and flaming the list owner in an attempt to intimidate his way past
me. However, he picked the wrong Englishman to do that. Pagans have
issues that literally involve life, death, and the welfare of our
children in the United States. We can be attacked without legal
recourse. We can have our kids taken from us because of our religious
beliefs. We don't need to break any laws for this to happen and a
proven law breaker will often get more sympathy than we do. I know.
It's happened to me. I'm sorry that Mr. Turmel was unhappy with my
group but that gives him no excuse to post this all over the internet
in an attempt to cause me problems. He needs to grow up and get a life.

I again apologize to the membership for this intrusion. I felt I had
something that needed to be said and since he set the battlefield, not
me, I had no other choice but to respond in this fashion. Pagans are
not evil people. Nor are we any of the things many people have heard.
Mostly, we want nothing more than to be left in peace. However,
we're not punching bags either. We are as human as you and deserve
the same rights as every other person here.

Sincerely;

Sir Raymond E. Nieman DD HKOS
Ordained Minister
Doctor of Divinity
Holy Knight in the Order of Saints
The Amber Adept

--- In UNILETS@yahoogroups.com, turmel@f... wrote:
> THE PAGAN WAY
> http://yahoogroups.com/group/the_pagan_way
> -------------------------------------------
>
> JCT: I'd hoped pagans would prove better than this: