Kicking Out Robert Johnson

William Bangs (wbbangs@U.WASHINGTON.EDU)
Sun, 12 Mar 1995 00:19:46 -0800

Well, folks, I hope we're all proud of ourselves. Let me ask everyone on
this list: how much trouble would it have been simply to press the delete
key re Robert Johnson? Or, failing that, how hard would it have been to
engage him in some sort of meaningful dialougue, rather than
unceremoniously making ourselves feel good and him feel bad? If this
list is dedicated to discussing "all aspects of the study of mankind" (or
maybe that's the newsgroup sci.anthropology) then we've failed ourselves
in our own charter. More importantly, what have we gained? Piece of
mind? Really? Who goes next? Anthro-l isn't a club (or shouldn't be);
it's a forum for working on just such issues as Robert Johnson raised.
We don't have to like his stance -- but did we really need to kick him out?

Ben Bangs

Do what's right, not what's easy!