From: Ruletherod@aol.com <Ruletherod@aol.com>
To: FG@hotmail.com <FG@hotmail.com>
Cc: Ruletherod@aol.com <Ruletherod@aol.com>
Subject: Re: Bahais terminate my AOL account (Re: fw Ruletherod on AOL Re:
Personal St...
Date: Monday, March 08, 1999 1:30 PM
So they finally did it. I'm not surprised because most of the regulars at
the
AOL board (there are many more where they came from) are the intolerant
supporters of Baha'i orthodoxy. And then you have the rabid fanatics (mostly
women in my opinion) who think they own the Baha'i faith ("Don't you go
messing with MY religion, buddy!"). Even some Baha'is who've recently
joined
the Faith think it's their exclusive club and that you and I were born
yesterday--that we're the unwelcome Strangers in the Night. The irony is that
they're reducing the religions of both the Bab and Baha'u'llah to a series of
sentimental tea cliques and spoiled brat clubs for women. I had higher hopes,
but what can you accomplish when you're routinely perceived as one of the
enemy to be shunned.
It's their shunning mentality, backed up by select writings, that kills it
for
me. (They conveniently forget the other writings about fanaticism, reason over
emotion, justice, etc.) The more they hold those self-serving writings up like
a crucifix and cloves of garlic, the more resigned I am never to support the
Baha'i faith again. If they want enemies, they'll have them. And their
definition of the word "enemy" is: "Think like us or you're
not one of us."
One of our friends recently told me: The Baha'is like Wendy, Sunni
and Zaynab are doing untold damage to the reputation of the Faith themselves
(in they eyes of neutral lurkers) with their narrow-minded, smug and
exclusionary attitudes...and that the harm they're doing to the Faith is an
unrecognized justice. They're their own worst enemies but they're too filled
with "holy certitude" to know this. They think I'm the one with a
screw
loose......but that's another story.
Let me know how things ultimately turn out for you. There's no one else to
side with me at the board anymore (as PL has left and Larry is too turned off)
and the regular crowd is giving me the cold shoulder in the hope that I'll
just leave. I've pretty much done that for now.
Mark's arrival has somehow dulled everything. It was better when it was a
free-for-all and the non-Bahai folder was at the top of the list. The threat
of censorship chills everything.
I was also surprised to learn that many of the regulars at the board like
Wendy, Roger, Debbie and some others are far older than I me.
I'll be 46 myself this May.
Please keep these thoughts confidential or they'll hang me with them.
Thanks.
Take care, friend.
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