From bright_crow at mindspring.com Fri Oct 1 13:56:05 2004 From: bright_crow at mindspring.com (Mike Shell) Date: Fri, 1 Oct 2004 13:56:05 -0400 (GMT-04:00) Subject: [saymaListserv] SEYM Peace & Social Concerns: Tenth Month Message-ID: <3372856.1096653365463.JavaMail.root@wamui09.slb.atl.earthlink.net> Friends, Southeastern Yearly Meeting's Peace & Social Concerns website (http://seympeace.org/) has just been updated for Tenth Month. I particularly encourage you to look at two items: 1) "Violence and Crisis in Islam" (http://seympeace.org/mideast.html#new3), to which Free Polazzo just referred us 2) "War is a Force That Gives Us Meaning" (http://seympeace.org/#new1), a powerful essay on war psychology and the public by Chris Hedges, with related links. Blessed Be, Michael. From freepolazzo at comcast.net Sat Oct 2 10:53:06 2004 From: freepolazzo at comcast.net (free polazzo) Date: Sat, 02 Oct 2004 10:53:06 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager Message-ID: <6.1.2.0.2.20041002102648.02eaf7e0@mail.comcast.net> Dear Friends, The quaker sweat lodge was well attended at SAYMA's yearly meeting, the year we invited George Price to lead it at Warren Wilson College 9 years ago in June of 1995. George had been leading a workshop on the Quaker Sweat Lodge since 1989 and it has been very well attended every year he did. Over 1,000 Quaker teens and a few hundred Quaker adults participated to rave reviews. Some Native American people attended a few of the sweats we held at Boone, NC. Last year some Friends have decided to turn this well attended work workshop into a cause celebre, calling it "cultural appropriation". Chuck Fager, who we know from Quaker House in Fayetteville, NC, has written about this concern. While a long piece, there are many key concerns discussed and I recommend it to you. I pray that out of this heat will come the Light of the Spirit to show us the way forward. Blessings, Free >From: CHUCKFAGER at aol.com >Date: Thu Sep 30, 2004 2:05:30 PM America/Chicago >To: qpr at quaker.org >Subject: The Quaker Sweat Lodge Issue-Some Thoughts > >Dear Friends, > > Here are some personal thoughts on the cancellation of the Quaker > sweat lodge at the 2004 FGC Gathering. I commend them to your attention, > and feel free to share them if you are so moved. > >Chuck Fager >- - - - - - - - - - - - - >The Quaker Sweat Lodge: Some Reflections > >Chuck Fager > >“Cultural appropriation”? This phrase was new to me; I guess I don’t get >out enough. But with some surfing and much reading, I began to get a sense >of it. > >Quakers know about “cultural appropriation.” At least we should. On a >shelf near the desk where I am writing is an empty bottle, the label of >which proclaims that it was once filled with “Old Quaker” whiskey. Back in >the early 1900s Indiana Yearly Meeting regularly petitioned the state >legislature to ban such misuse of their name; to no avail. > >Then of course there’s Quaker Oats, a multinational never owned or >operated by Friends. In the Eighties, they tried an oatmeal promotion >featuring “Popeye the Quaker Man,” in which Popeye eschewed eating spinach >for oatmeal, and then knocked the stuffing out of various “evildoers.” >Rather clever, really; but it could not withstand the protests of several >First Day School classes, who had better luck than Indiana Yearly Meeting. >Of course, Quaker Oats goes on. > >Then there’s Quaker State motor oil; and up in Buffalo you can get Quaker >Bonnet ice cream. Wilmington College dubs its sports teams the “Fighting >Quakers.” > >My personal favorite in this line is based in Pittsburgh: “Quaker Steak >and Lube,” a growing chain which styles itself as “America’s #1 >motorsports-themed family restaurant.” (Makes me wonder which is #2 – >Presbyterian Steak & Lube?) > >We can smile at many of these; at least I can. But some others aren’t so >amusing. What of the secular groups that purport to operate on “Quaker >consensus” and mangle it at every turn? And haven’t many of us, on meeting >Friends from other branches, said (or thought, or better yet, overheard), >“They’re not REAL Quakers”? Ah, yes. > >Or take some other public images. In the movie “High Noon,” (picked as one >of the 25 “greatest" American films by the Library of Congress), Grace >Kelly as the Quaker heroine is portrayed as a fool and a coward who only >wants to run away from evil and conflict – until she “redeems” herself by >picking up a gun and shooting the bad guy, in the back. I find this deeply >offensive, and there are other such cinematic portrayals of pacifists as >fools-who-learn-better. > >How do Friends cope with all this unauthorized use of our name, image, and >practices? Mostly we ignore it; sometimes we wring our hands. But it’s >fair to say that all in all, we’re surviving it. > >All this was in the back of my mind as I tried to make sense of the great >Sweat Lodge flap of 2004. Having missed the earlier meetings that agonized >over it, I’ve been studying hard to get up to speed. And the more I learn, >the more I wonder: What on earth has gotten into us? > >Here’s how it looks: for 13 years or so a ritual called a “Quaker sweat >lodge” had been presented at the Gathering, mainly involving high school >Friends. There were numerous testimonies (among them from my own son) that >this experience was spiritually important, even life-changing for many of >them. This is not, by the way, true for me; somewhere (not at the >Gathering, I think), I was invited into a sweat, but found it much too hot >and stayed only a few minutes. It may be wonderful for some, but it wasn’t >my cup of tea. > >At any rate, a sweat had been approved for the 2004 Gathering; but last >March, a letter came in from Alice Lopez, a member of the Mashpee >Wampanoags, denouncing the sweat lodge as “a flagrant example of racism,” >and Bang! Panic and pandemonium, with the workshop’s abrupt cancellation >being only one piece of the fallout. > >What was it that made the sweat so horrible, in the complainant’s eyes? It >was “cultural appropriation.” I’ll call this CA for short. > >Now, if the accusations had been of, say, bank robbery or stock fraud, a >couple of important processes would have thereby been triggered: First, >the organizers would be entitled to a fair trial; and second, they would >be presumed innocent until proven guilty. And a key preliminary of such >due process would be, “to be informed of the nature and cause of the >accusation,” in the language of the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution. > >If we can expect this in worldly courts, can’t we expect at least as much >among Friends? After all, Quaker books of Discipline for two centuries >have insisted that we take great care with Friends’ reputations. At stake >here, first of all, are the reputations of the organizers, George Price, >Breeze Luetke-Stahlman and Cullen Carns-Hilliker. They are not strangers >among us; together they have well over thirty years of attendance and work >at the Gathering; add in their other family members’ attendance, and the >attendance total easily doubles. > >But that is not all. Also on the block are the validity of 13 years of >committee discernment, the stacks of glowing reports by participants, and, >not coincidentally, the credibility of FGC in its dealings with its own, >especially the best of the rising generation. > >With so much in play, what have we seen in the way of being informed of >“the nature and cause of the accusation”? > >Well, among all the material sent me in this matter, no such explanation >has appeared, nor any sign of actual investigation and considered verdict >as to whether the organizers and their workshop were indeed guilty >thereof. Simply saying the words “Racism” and “cultural appropriation” >appears to have been sufficient. > >Indeed, the minutes of the LRCP from 4th Month 2004, record the Committee >for Ministry on Racism as declaring, “When someone is so strongly offended >by our behavior we must take heed, no matter what our intentions.” Thus, >to convict the organizers of “flagrant racism” and “cultural >appropriation,” merely making the accusation seems to have been enough. > >It is not enough for me. The committee “procedure” as described offends >every meaning of “due process” and good order that I know of, in or >outside Quakerism. Reference has been made to the secular court system. It >is worth noting here that organizations like FGC have been successfully >sued for defamation over episodes like these; and they deserved it. I hang >my head in shame when I read the accounts of what happened and am >humiliated to recall that my name is on that committee’s membership list. > >But my feelings are not the point here. To repeat the query: what are >these alleged infractions, exactly? And what evidence is there that the >FGC sweat lodge was a culpable example thereof? And on what ground can >disregarding the task of dealing with these fundamental questions of >fairness be justified? > >Since the concept of “cultural appropriation,” at least as some kind of >actionable offense, was new to me, I’ve worked hard to figure out exactly >what it is, how to identify it, and what can be done about it. > >In this effort, there have been problems. Definitions, for one thing. >Finding them was not the issue; I found many. [Ten such definitions are >included in the Appendix.] But none are the same, none seems definitive, >and there are no agreed-upon criteria for establishing it. Nevertheless, >overall they indicate that the phenomenon takes different forms, of which >at least three can be distinguished: > >First, the taking of actual artifacts and other tangible property. Second, >stereotypical, demeaning images and portrayal by one culture of another, >as in sports team names and mascots. And third, use or mimicry by one >culture of the rituals, beliefs, or symbols of another. > >The first kind of cultural appropriation is the easiest to identify. It >has been addressed by various laws, and is not involved in the FGC >situation. Nor, to my knowledge, is the second. The complaints about the >sweat lodge evidently come out of the third level. And at this point, as >Julie Deichmann, writing on “The Cultural Appropriation Debate,” put it, >this level of “‘Cultural appropriation’ however, is a much more nebulous >concept.” This especially the case when one seeks criteria for positively >identifying it. > >You wouldn’t know this from reading the louder critics of CA; they insist >that any cross-cultural mimicry, use, or adaptation of other people’s >spiritual practices is obviously and unarguably a crime, indeed it’s >genocide. Consider Russell Means: “We are resisting this because >spirituality is the basis of our culture. If our culture is dissolved, >Indian people as such will cease to exist. By definition, the causing of >any culture to cease to exist is genocide.” > >What is the remedy for this? As Lynna Landstreet wrote, “some native >activists have explicitly told people of European ancestry to start >working with their own ancestral religions instead of pirating native >beliefs.” > >Ward Churchill is one of the most vocal of this school. Landstreet quotes >Churchill as telling European “wanna-bes”[a common phrase]: > >“We are not unique in being indigenous. Everyone is indigenous somewhere. >You are not necessarily part of the colonizing, predatory reality called >‘Europe.’ You are not even necessarily ‘Germans,’ with all that implies. >You are, or can be, who your ancestors were and who the faith-keepers of >your cultures remain: Angles, Saxons, Huns, Goths, Visigoths. The choice >is yours, but in order for it to have meaning, you must meet the >responsibilities that come with it.” > >(It intrigues me that Churchill would preach thus to a German audience. >Didn’t many in that culture undertake to reconnect with their primordial >indigenous roots back in the 1930s? As I recall, that effort didn’t turn >out so well, for them or for the world. But let that go.) > >One part of me strongly resonates with this appeal: knowing our religious >roots is a good idea; that’s largely why I offered workshops on Bible >study at the Gathering for ten years. I also agree that dilettantish >spiritual consumerism is as unappealing as any other kind. > >And yet, if this advice were made into a rule, a big problem immediately >leaps from the page: where would it leave me–and the half of Quakers today >who are likewise convinced members? For my part, I’d be stuck in Mel >Gibson Catholicism, a personal fate too awful to contemplate. > >And where, Friend, would that leave thee? > >Not to mention all the rearranging of cultural furniture it would require >across the board: are we really ready to banish the Christmas trees, >Easter baskets, Halloween costumes, and all the other stuff that our >culture imported (stole?) from other traditions, some we can’t even >remember? The sternly plain Quakers or 200 years ago would have said “Yes, >Indeed” to this query. (And I wouldn’t miss Easter baskets much.) But that >was then. > >Speaking of Christmas trees brings up another key point: reading through >the literature, I discovered that “cultural appropriation” was only one >name for interchange between cultures, at least in the voluminous learned >discussions thereof. > >It seems there is also such a thing as “hybridity,” where two (or more) >cultures somehow blend, at least in part, to form a new cultural practice. >It happens in art – jazz, for instance. It certainly happens in religion >too, where it tends to be termed “syncretism,” sometimes approvingly, >sometimes not. And “hybridity” seems to be regarded as more or less okay >by those who are passing judgment, though this sentiment is not universal. >I will have more to say about this. Then there’s “appropriate cultural >sharing”; the Unitarians like that one. Google even turned up a >description of a major scholarly project on the Ethics of Cultural >Appropriation. Sounds illuminating –– but it’s just getting started; no >results yet. > >All this was intriguing, but it was easy to see more tough issues ahead: >how do we distinguish presumably legitimate “hybridity” or “appropriate” >cultural sharing from nasty old CA? For that matter, is all CA truly as >evil as some say? (Do I REALLY have to go back to being a Catholic??) If >not, how do we tell which is which? > >And then there’s the CA-is-“genocide” matter. This is a daunting charge, >one that might put an end to any discussion –– except that, fortunately, >the facts don’t bear it out. Certainly the Euro-American treatment of the >natives has included efforts at genocide, some of them gruesomely >successful. But during the last twenty years, the American Indian >population and their cultures have been burgeoning, not disappearing. The >2000 census reported a 26 per cent increase in their numbers in only ten >years. And as scholar critical of CA acknowledges, > >“Native Americans have rebounded from the population low point during the >first half of the twentieth century (Nagel 1996). At that time, many >officials believed that because of the tumultuous history Indians had >faced, they would disappear as a separate race. This has changed and >Indian culture is growing stronger, and has even taken root in the >mainstream population. Part of this upswing has its roots in a political >and cultural rebirth that has fueled community pride and political >struggle (Cornell 1988; Nagel 1996).” > – Gibbons, “New Age Cowboys and Indian Religion: Boundary Maintenance > and Religious Inter-Cultural Borrowing.” > >All this burgeoning happened, however, in the same years that saw the >proliferation of “Indian”-influenced workshops, seminars, souvenirs, etc., >etc. So if these are an attempt at “genocide,” cultural or otherwise, they >have been a miserable failure – and thank goodness for that! Rather, it >seems to me the vigor of the native protests against the “New Age” >vulgarization and commercialization of some versions of native practices >is if anything a reflection of this renewing vitality. This, plus the >peoples’ underlying ability to vent their feelings, and then get on with >their individual and communal lives. > >And here too, maybe a word of caution is in order: a practice that looks >to me like a cheesy ripoff of some spiritual tradition, may be for many >participants a profound and life-changing spiritual experience. Who, >exactly, is to make this judgment? And how? (And what was it our >indigenous spiritual teacher Jesus said about judging?)What about >(re)learning to live and let live, especially in these “nebulous” areas? >And are these really new insights? > > >This point reminds me of early Friends history: there is a fat book in the >larger Quaker libraries, “Bibliotheca Anti-Quakeriana,” published in 1873, >filled with the titles of thousands of anti-Quaker books and tracts from >the first generations. Most were variations on a common theme: that >Quakerism was a spiritual fraud, a rip-off, a corrupted, perverted >counterfeit, masquerading as “authentic” Christianity. The chorus was >quite loud, and the song of vituperation went on for a long time. > >So Friends, have been down this road before? Were we supposed to just fold >out tents in the face of this opposition? What have we learned from this? >What have we forgotten? > >And so it is in the Native American world. Yes, there are loud voices >denouncing anything that resembles the various versions of “cultural >appropriation”; but theirs are not the only voices. There are also native >teachers who have worked quietly with devoted non-natives to find ways to >share what is good in their traditions, because they think the underlying >spirituality could be of benefit, even to us whites. > >Which brings me back to George Price and the Quaker sweat lodge. > >The Lopez letter dismisses all this talk of work with native tahers and >mentors, declaring that the Quaker sweat lodge “is predicated on an >assumption that an almost exclusively white non-Native group has the right >to usurp any spiritual practice it finds meaningful.” > >But have the Quaker sweat lodges in fact been predicated on such an >assumption? What is the evidence for this assertion? The only “evidence” >cited in the Lopez letter is the sixty-one word workshop description in >the 2004 Gathering Advance Program. Let’s review that: > > “Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience: Since 1989 young Friends have > participated in a sweat lodge at the Gathering, evolving in into an > experience deeply meaningful to many. This workshop offers participants > an opportunity to build the lodge, sweat, and discuss the history, Quaker > presence, and spiritual nature of the sweat lodge experience. Led by > George Price, Cullen Carns-Hilliker, and Breeze Luetke Stahlman. ” > >In any fair, Friendly, or competent inquiry, this brief description would >be the beginning, not the end. And even here, note that it does not >mention Native American spirituality or ceremonies. The organizers state >that this is not an accident; they assert that the experience has become >distinctively Quaker, not imitation anything. They are not the >much-condemned “wanna-bes.” > >Now let us imagine that a proper inquiry had been made into these >competing statements. One of the first items it would have discovered is >George Price’s article in the February 2002 Friends Journal, which >explains how his Native American teachers led the early sweats at the >Gathering, and then instructed him to continue them > >By his own account, George has spent many years studying and working with >such native teachers. These studies have been both formal and informal, >leading to academic degrees as well as life changes. But they have not >been limited to Native American rituals. He has found and studied parallel >rituals in European and Asian cultures too, and intentionally put the >Quaker sweat in a “universalist” context. > >(In this whole process, by the way, Price has been acting on a central >aspect of the traditional FGC ethos, namely an openness to truth from >wherever it may be found. Pages of quotes from books of Faith & Practice >could be quoted in support of this. To be sure, such cross-cultural >seeking should be done with sensitivity and care; but the record shows >that’s what he has displayed.) > >The inquiry would then have turned to the other leaders. Take Breeze >Luetke-Stahlman. It might be worth noting that though not yet 26, she has, >among other achievements, studied at the only all-native university in the >US, visited and worked on the Pine Ridge reservation, and even served as >the national lobbyist for the “Free Leonard Peltier” campaign. (How sweet, >how bitter the irony that the Lopez letter denouncing her “flagrant >racism” arrived on “Free Leonard Peltier” letterhead.) > >None of this, of course, gives her a “free pass” from being examined for >bias and CA. But it should give pause to any who thinks her work with the >Quaker sweat was that of an insensitive dilettante or a disrespectful New >Age dabbler. (I have not yet interviewed Cullen Carns-Hilliker.) > >Breeze told me, however, that while FGC sent someone from Philadelphia to >Mashpee to consult extensively with Lopez, no one even telephoned her to >find out about her perspective on the matter, never mind her background or >training. What accounts for this? Her youth? Ethnicity? Lack of hyperbolic >and overheated rhetoric? > >Price explained further in a response to the Lopez Letter that: > >“…… We do not pretend to be Native Americans and we make it clear at all >lodges that what we are doing is not a Native American sweat. We do not >use a pipe. We do not use prayer ties nor prayer flags. We do not sing >Native American songs…….We have researched non-Native American sources of >the sweat, the Celts of Ireland, the Finnish sauna, the Russian bannia, >the Edo sweats of Japan, and we have found inspiration and a sense of the >universality of the sweat lodge.” > >These statements do not seem at all congruent with an “assumption that an >almost exclusively white non-Native group has the right to usurp any >spiritual practice it finds meaningful.” Rather, it sounds peainstakingly >respectful. And once they are actually examined, the track records of the >organizers and the character of the workshop show a great deal of >awareness and sensitivity to the cultural issues involved, long predating >the criticism. Moreover, the Lopez letter presents no evidence that Price >or Breeze or Cullen are speaking falsely or disingenuously about this. Was >any other such contrary evidence sought out or presented? If not, why were >the charges of “flagrant racism” and “cultural appropriation” accepted >without it? > >Instead, the Lopez letter attempted to pre-empt and prevent any such >inquiry by insisting that, “No matter who gave who permission, trained the >leader, etc. for Friends to use a sweat lodge is a violation and >desecration of one of the most private and sacred aspects of native >spiritual practice.” > >But there are serious problems with this assertion. For starters, if >heeded it would prevent any hearing of the workshop leaders and their >side. This is patently unfair, though it is essentially what happened. > >For another, what standing does Lopez have to denigrate and dismiss the >witness of other Native leaders and teachers, especially without hearing >them either? How respectful is that?Among them, as Price also testified, >was Clyde Bellacourt of the American Indian Movement. Bellacourt also >encouraged Price to continue the sweats, when Bellacourt visited the >Gathering in 1989. If we are not calling Price a liar, such encouraging >statements are as valid as the Lopez criticism; and coming from persons >who actually came to the Gathering and dealt with Price, they have more >credibility with me. So why is FGC to privilege the Lopez statements and >not theirs? > >Moreover, exactly how is a Quaker sweat lodge a “violation and >desecration” of Native practice? > >It is possible to gauge the harm in actual practice. That’s because the >Gathering was held in Amherst once before, in 1994. The record indicates >that there was a Quaker sweat lodge there. At that time, there were (and >are) no less than twelve Native American bands, tribes or nations in the >same region, among them Abenaki, Nipmucs, Ponkapoag, and Pequot, all >nearer to Amherst than the Mashpee, who are a hundred miles away on Cape Cod. > >What do we know about the 1994 experience? The Gathering came and went, >the sweat happened. And when it was done, these dozen native groups in the >region still had all their land; none of their cultural and ritual objects >had been stolen; none of their members had been subjected to public >displays of demeaning or stereotyped images; none of their ceremonies had >been usurped, spied upon, or copied; none of the groups, one suspects, >even knew the Quaker sweat had happened. > >As “desecration” and “cultural genocide”goes, this was a rather mild, even >innocuous example. If it was in fact wrong, which is by no means clear, it >was hardly an emergency requiring the discarding of any semblance of due >process or fair-minded, careful seeking. > >There are two final questions that have nagged me increasingly as I >consider this whole episode. > >The first is: what kind of precedent is being set here for FGC? Are we now >to submit our seventy-plus workshops to a new round of reviews by >self-appointed outsiders, persons and groups with no involvement in FGC, >no presence at the Gathering, because they might take exception to some of >what is on our program? Having offered many workshops at the Gathering >myself, this is not a hypothetical question for me. > >After all, Friends, let us recall that there are many aspects of the >Gathering that unquestionably are offensive to some, or many, in the >outside culture. Does anyone else remember 1981 at Berea, when we were >threatened with a mass march of outraged fundamentalists said to be coming >to cleanse the campus of the abomination of gays and lesbians were open >and affirmed among us? > >Now we are advised that the LRCP clerk has been contacting selected >native-related persons in Virginia about the advisability of having a >sweat at the 2005 Gathering in Blacksburg. If this is deemed good >practice, how can we properly limit it to that topic? > >Should we not also interview prominent Southern Baptist ministers around >Blacksburg, Virginia about women in leadership roles, nontheistic >workshops, FLGC meetings, sessions on past lives, and women’s rituals at >our Gathering? We could start with Jerry Falwell, who is just about the >same distance away as the Wampanoags were from Amherst. What if he didn’t >like those ideas, as one strongly suspects he would not? > >Or how about the area’s Catholic bishops? Let’s see: reproductive rights, >same sex, disdain for hierarchies–don’t get me started on all that! > >Then there’s the Virginia legislature. We already know what it thinks of >our welcoming same sex married couples – they’re attempting to outlaw >them. Should we defer to that? We’re supposedly a law-abiding bunch, on >the whole. > >But it appears in these cases we are prepared to trust our own judgment >and discernment, which seems to me the wisest course. > >And this much can be said on behalf of the Virginia Baptists and their >homophobic legislators: chances are good that if we keep our dangerous >notions on the campus, they will go about their business and ignore us, >leaving us to the judgment of the God Whom we are both sure is on our >side. I wonder why some feel a need to go looking for trouble on this >particular score? Haven’t we had enough? > >So again: is this a wise precedent? I believe it is more like a can of >worms – no, a can of snakes, that bite. > >The second question gets more personal, because its effects reach to my >own family, which among ourselves has at least fifty person-years of >Gathering attendance: Breeze tells me their sweat lodge has had more than >300 participants, among them many of the most active young adult Friends >in the FGC orbit. The feedback from many of them, and some of their >parents, about FGC’s treatment of her and the sweat lodge has been angry >and alienated, and has not subsided. > >How dangerous is that? Let me put it this way: if I was hired by some >enemy of FGC to undermine the future of the Gathering, I could not have >hatched a better scheme than this for making it happen. Karl Rove would be >proud. > >Listen well, Friends: As this generation comes to understand that their >most cherished part of the Gathering can be summarily dumped, and its >respected leaders defamed as “flagrant racists,” based on a single >unsubstantiated complaint from someone who has never been at the >Gathering, has no presence in FGC, and knows no more about it than a >sixty-one-word blurb – such an understanding will ultimately be ruinous to >FGC and the Gathering. Ruinous. I may not know a lot; but I know that >much. It is not rocket science. > >And I can be more personal still: Since 2000, I have been bringing my >granddaughter Amber to the Gathering. Amber is multi-racial. Her >ethnic-cultural heritage includes African, native, and European strains. >Religiously, it takes in black Baptist, Gurdjieff-Jungian astrological >mysticism, Quakerism and humanism, all in addition to the more removed >background of Catholicism. > >What do we call this? If Amber is not a living, breathing embodiment of >“hybridity” and “syncretism,” who or what is? Right now it is natural to >her. No one has yet told her it is “cultural appropriation” and all wrong. >But when she gets old enough, in just a few years, to begin conscious >spiritual explorations to find her own way, how much of this heritage will >be fenced off from the FGC context, to prevent her giving any possible >offense to unknown and unidentified persons or groups? Will FGC be feeding >her pious absurdities about finding and sticking to somebody else’s notion >of her “indigenous” roots? > >Go ahead. But remember: with Amber’s “hybridity” comes awareness of >options. Watch how quickly she'll dump FGC and seek another spiritual home >where she will be free to do the work she needs to do. And she would not >leave by herself. > >To sum up: Friends, the sweat lodge controversy is on the brink of >becoming a major train wreck for FGC, one largely self-inflicted. I think >– I hope, the damage can be controlled. > >How? Here is my recipe: > >First, Breeze, George and Cullen deserve an apology from FGC for the >unconscionable way they have been treated. > >Next, have the LRCP and Central Committee minutes formally record a >withdrawal and repudiation of any and all charges, allegations, and >insinuations of racism associated with them or their work. At the very >least, such charges are completely unproven. My own view is that they are >false, defamatory and bring deep disgrace on the body. > >Third, include these three, and experienced Quaker sweat lodge alumni, as >full partners in all negotiations, internal and external, aimed at finding >a way to re-incorporate the sweat lodge experience into the Gathering, >especially for youth, in some mutually agreeable form. And make that >re-incorporation a goal, one worth bearing witness for as much as we bear >witness to our welcoming LGBT Friends. > >And fourth, admonish those who are carrying concerns for “racism” or >“cultural appropriation” within FGC to follow good order and show >scrupulous care for the reputation of Friends involved, taking pains to >avoid “talebearing and detraction” in pursuing their efforts. In >particular, any such allegations are to be dealt with by careful, full, >and fair inquiry, with the presumption of innocence. Our expectation for >Quaker “due process” is that it will be more equitable than that of the >secular world, not less. > > And by the way: none of what has been said here is meant to imply that > FGC in its history and culture has somehow been free of racism. I’ve > studied FGC history more deeply than most, and sadly know the truth is > otherwise. Given my family’s multi-racial character, this is an item high > on my agenda. I particularly affirm and appreciate the work being done by > Donna McDaniel and Vanessa Julye to fill in and bring to us the details > of this humbling and painful story. If I thought the Quaker sweat lodge > was a current example of this racist taint, I would say so. > >NOTE: The Landstreet & Churchill quotes are from: >http://www.wildideas.net/forest/library/ecospirit14.html > >The Soul of Nature: The Meaning of Ecological Spirituality, by Lynna >Landstreet > >Julie Deichmann, “The Cultural Appropriations >Debate,” >http://www.aabc.com/lotos/cultural.htm > > > APPENDIX: Cultural Appropriation: Ten Definitions > >“Cultural Appropriation - refers to the process by which members of >relatively privileged groups “raid” the culture of less powerful or >marginalized groups, and removing [sic] cultural practices or artifacts >from historically or culturally specific contexts.” > > ­ From the Glossary of the Municipal Cultural Planning Project (Canada) > http://www.culturalplanning.ca/mcpp/ib_glossary.html#c > > >Q. “What is cultural appropriation? > >A. The textbook definition of cultural appropriation is the ‘taking >[a.k.a. appropriating] from a culture that is not one’s own of...cultural >expressions or artifacts [or] history.’ Many people hold that cultural >appropriation is wrong because by stealing an element from someone’s >culture and then representing it in a different (and often shallow) >context, you both damage and dishonor the culture you have taken the >ritual from.” > > ­ Body Modification Ezine > FAQs > http://www.bmezine.com/ritual/susp-faq.html#Q3-5 > > [Note: The “textbook” in question was not identified.] > >The [Unitarian] Reverend Marjorie Bowens-Wheatley defines cultural >appropriation as consciously or unconsciously seeking to emulate concepts, >beliefs, or rituals that are foreign to a particular framework, >individual, or collective. It is incorporating language, cultural >expressions, forms, lifestyles, rituals, or practices about which there is >little basis for direct knowledge, experience, or authenticity into one’s >being. It is also the superficial appreciation of a culture without regard >to its deeper meaning.” > > ­ Jacqui Jame, Anti-Oppression Programs and Resource Director, > Unitarian-Universalist Assn., “Reckless Borrowing or Appropriate Cultural > Sharing?” > > >“ . . .the unspeakable indignity of having our most precious Lakota >ceremonies and spiritual practices desecrated, mocked and abused by >non-Indian "wannabes," hucksters, cultists, commercial profiteers and >self-styled "New Age shamans" and their followers . . . .” > > ­ Declaration of War Against Exploiters of Lakota Spirituality, 1993 > http://www.aics.org/war.html > >“The task of defining “cultural appropriation” is a more difficult >endeavor than defining “cultural property”. With property we have >something concrete such as bones or artifacts which indigenous communities >are now requesting that many museums around the world “repatriate”. Laws >have been enacted such as the Native American Grave Protection and >Repatriation Act . . . . “Cultural appropriation” however, is a much more >nebulous concept. > >Cultural appropriation, the borrowing of cultural elements, is a >consistent fact of the twentieth century.” > > ­ Julie Deichmann, “The Cultural Appropriations > Debate,” > http://www.aabc.com/lotos/cultural.htm > >“At its core, appropriation is nothing more than a dressed-up word for >stealing. In fact, many victims of cultural appropriation have denounced >the phrase, claiming that is de-emphasizes the true nature of what they >consider a crime. Appropriation occurs when one party takes upon itself to >uncover and absorb the practices of another culture without proper >understanding, training, respect or permission.” > > ­ “Interfaith Exchange and the Western Overculture” > http://www.mothersmagic.net/theology/CA2.html > > > >“Cultural appropriation is the theft of rituals, aesthetic standards and >behavior from one culture by another, generally by a ‘modern’ culture from >a ‘primitive’ culture ­ often this involves the conversion of religion and >spirituality into ‘meaningless’ pop-culture.” > > ­ [From: > http://encyc.bmezine.com/?Cultural_Appropriation] > > > >“Cultural appropriation is usually considered to be a majority group >(usually Whites or otherwise Eurocentric folks) mining a minority culture >for the jewels of its heritage for their own pleasure or benefit while the >voices of that culture remain silent or silenced.” > > ­ [From: > http://www.mothersmagic.net/theology/CA.html] > > > >“[The authors] first offer a working definition of cultural appropriation >as ‘the taking - from a culture that is not one’s own - of intellectual >property, cultural expressions or artifacts, history and ways of knowing’. >. . . .” > > ­ Borrowed Power: Essays on Cultural Appropriation. Bruce Ziff and > Pratima V. Rao. Rutgers University Press. > > >“[C]ultural appropriation ­ that is, those practices involving the >non-consensual apprehension and/or misuse of cultural knowledge outside of >its local and traditional contexts.” > > ­ Description, “Ethics of Cultural Appropriation” Research project, > University of Victoria, British > Columbia. > http://www.csrs.uvic.ca/Cultural.htm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From lingle at bellsouth.net Sat Oct 2 13:15:07 2004 From: lingle at bellsouth.net (Larry Ingle) Date: Sat, 02 Oct 2004 13:15:07 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager Message-ID: <20041002171754.NSEO1789.imf25aec.mail.bellsouth.net@[216.78.248.47]> I know little about this affair, other than what appears below and a bit that Free Polazzo has told me, and I have not been to what is called the Gathering since 1994, but I want to unite with what Chuck Fager has written. Let someone fling around phases such as "racism," "genocide," and the like at them, and "liberal" Quakers will rush to cave in, backtrack, and forget all their traditions, as seems to have been done in this case. Hence I agree with Chuck Fager's recommendations and hope that the relevant groups within FGC immediately repudiates the act of last spring and summer and begins to reconstruct itself in a truly Quakerly-like way. For what it's worth. Larry Ingle Chattanooga Meeting From nc_stereoman at charter.net Sun Oct 3 08:41:55 2004 From: nc_stereoman at charter.net (Steve Livingston) Date: Sun, 03 Oct 2004 08:41:55 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager In-Reply-To: <6.1.2.0.2.20041002102648.02eaf7e0@mail.comcast.net> Message-ID: <415FBB53.18729.54F1C9@localhost> Dear Friends, While the events surrounding the cancellation of the 2004 FGC Gathering's Quaker Sweat Lodge may indeed be unfortunate, we Quakers are blessed with the ability to continue our discernment around the matter, with the possibility of coming to a new and more spiritually grounded conclusion. We are wise to consider Chuck's ruminations, but let us not wring our hands for too long lest the soreness distract us from the valuable work of improving our process. As Chuck points out, we may benefit from listening more thoroughly as we seek clearness on this and other matters. But we also may benefit from trusting one another on a deeper level, and seek not only to clarify what appears to have been an error in judgment, but also to understand how our brothers and sisters in the Spirit arrived at this judgment despite seemingly overwhelming evidence of its error. As I see it, there is no more value in arriving at the next Gathering with sweat lodge reinstated at the expense of alienating some several Friends than there is in arriving at the next Gathering with sweat lodge prohibited at the expense of alienating some several Friends. Neither of these two choices resonates with me. What do we know about the process that resulted in the withdrawal of the 2004 workshop? I have found only one phrase in Chuck's essay adddressing it, and it sounds most unFriendly. Can we hear from those who were involved? Perhaps they already feel that an error in judgment was made. Perhaps they have more information to offer that is germane to their discernment. I found Chuck's references to Nazi's and Southern Baptists to be inflammatory and inappropriate comparisons in the context of discerning the presence of institutional bigotry, flying in the face of what I understand to be the definition of this practice. Perhaps I am completely misguided on this issue, or perhaps these examples were intended to be almost comedic. In either case, I am reluctant to rush to judgment. For me there are two central questions. First, how did the planning committee examine the question of cultural appropriation in the matter of the Sweat Lodge offering? Secondly, why was their discernment so suddenly overturned by the intervention of Alice Lopez? Steve From bonnipeg at charter.net Sun Oct 3 09:47:58 2004 From: bonnipeg at charter.net (Peggy Bonnington) Date: Sun, 3 Oct 2004 08:47:58 -0500 Subject: [saymaListserv] Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager In-Reply-To: <20041003120005.3B19B193D5@kitenet.net> Message-ID: <004201c4a94f$9e758930$864a7044@default> Is there some way to locate Chuck Fager's recommendation since it didn't come through with the list send? Thanks, Peggy -----Original Message----- From: sayma-bounces at kitenet.net [mailto:sayma-bounces at kitenet.net] On Behalf Of sayma-request at kitenet.net Sent: Sunday, October 03, 2004 7:00 AM To: sayma at kitenet.net Subject: sayma Digest, Vol 21, Issue 4 1. Re: Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager (Larry Ingle) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Message: 1 Date: Sat, 02 Oct 2004 13:15:07 -0400 From: "Larry Ingle" Subject: Re: [saymaListserv] Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager To: free polazzo , sayma at kitenet.net, Chuck Fager Message-ID: <20041002171754.NSEO1789.imf25aec.mail.bellsouth.net@[216.78.248.47]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" I know little about this affair, other than what appears below and a bit that Free Polazzo has told me, and I have not been to what is called the Gathering since 1994, but I want to unite with what Chuck Fager has written. Let someone fling around phases such as "racism," "genocide," and the like at them, and "liberal" Quakers will rush to cave in, backtrack, and forget all their traditions, as seems to have been done in this case. Hence I agree with Chuck Fager's recommendations and hope that the relevant groups within FGC immediately repudiates the act of last spring and summer and begins to reconstruct itself in a truly Quakerly-like way. For what it's worth. Larry Ingle Chattanooga Meeting ------------------------------ _______________________________________________ Southern Appalachian Yearly Meeting and Association mailing list sayma at kitenet.net http://kitenet.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sayma End of sayma Digest, Vol 21, Issue 4 ************************************ From perryt at bellsouth.net Sun Oct 3 12:43:46 2004 From: perryt at bellsouth.net (Perry Treadwell) Date: Sun, 03 Oct 2004 12:43:46 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] sweat lodge Message-ID: <41602C41.9020601@bellsouth.net> It is disappointing to see the emails concerning the sweat lodge. So much ignorance, so little time. One respondant didn't even know the the Long Range Conference Planning Committee was a subcommittee of FGC or that it must have written permission from the host yearly meeting to hold the Gathering in the area. The clerks of the Gathering Committee are appointed by LRCP from the yearly meeting. I have been clerk of LRCP for the past three years during the sweat lodge discernment. Chuck Fager never attended a meeting that was concerned with this so I have had to correct several of his perceptions. Below you will find the chronology of the discerment. Another meeting for listening was held yesterday (Saturday) in Philadelphia. I was not able to attend. If you desire further information please write me. Perry Treadwell > Chronology: Why the Sweat Lodge Workshop for the 2004 Gathering was > Canceled > > The Long Range Conference Planning committee began discerning the role > of the sweat lodge at the Gathering in 2002. This chronology is > focused on the cancellation of the workshop for this Gathering. > > ? As LRCP prepared for its spring meeting scheduled for the first > weekend in April, the sweat lodge workshop had been approved for the > 2004 Gathering. > > ? On March 29, 2004, FGC?s Committee for the Ministry on Racism and > LRCP received a letter from Alice Lopez for the Mashpee Coalition for > Native Action and the Mashpee Wampanoag Tribe dated March 26, 2004. > The letter cited the workshop description in the advance program for > the 2004 Gathering. The letter called the workshop ?a flagrant example > of racism? and insisted that ?this workshop be permanently discontinued.? > > ? LRCP asked for advice from CMR on how to respond. > > ? The evening of April 2 was devoted to discerning the response to the > letter. Present, beside members of LRCP, were the presiding clerk of > Central Committee of FGC, the general secretary, and the clerk of CMR. > A report on a consultation by members of CMR strongly recommending > cancellation of the workshop was heard; and a letter from George > Price, who has led the sweats at Gatherings for many years, responding > to the Mashpee Wampanoag letter and supporting continuation of the > workshop was read.. > > . The committee then heard from other attendees. > > ? After considerable discussion and discernment over that evening and > the next day the committee responded to the letter by minuting its > cancellation of the workshop for the 2004 Gathering. It also > recommended informing those who signed up for the workshop and posting > a general statement on the web site replacing the workshop description. > > ? A Meeting for Listening over concerns about the cancellation was > proposed for the Gathering as well as another Meeting for Listening to > approach the concern of cultural appropriation in the fall. > > ? Correspondence supporting the Mashpee Wampanoag letter has also been > received from the Ministry and Council Working Party on Racism of New > England Yearly Meeting and the Wampanoag committee of Cape Cod Monthly > Meeting. From freepolazzo at comcast.net Sun Oct 3 16:52:19 2004 From: freepolazzo at comcast.net (free polazzo) Date: Sun, 03 Oct 2004 16:52:19 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Note that the "sweat lodge" is actually the "Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience" In-Reply-To: <41602C41.9020601@bellsouth.net> References: <41602C41.9020601@bellsouth.net> Message-ID: <6.1.2.0.2.20041003133105.02e6d4d0@mail.comcast.net> Dear Perry, cc: Dave Miller, Co-Clerk of FGC LRCP SAYMA List Atlanta Friends Meeting List Jewish Friends List George Price Breeze Luetke-Stahlman Cullen Carns-Hilliker Chuck Faeger, member of LRCP I would expect that after 3 years of your committee dealing with this concern, the name of the workshop being discussed could be cited correctly. It is listed in the FGC Gathering 2004 Advance Program as the "Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience. It was NEVER, EVER presented as a Native American Sweat. George Price was always clear about this and I ask that the FGC LRCP committee also be clear about this and use the correct name when discussing this with anyone. Otherwise it shows a bias that aught not be held by those who claim to be searching for the Light. If you, as clerk of an important FGC committee cannot keep straight the name of the workshop under discussion, what else is not being understood by this committee? If FGC's LRCP committee is truly searching for the truth about the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience, then begin by using the correct name for the workshop. The Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience has many cultural traditions that it honors, besides the Native American one. I have always seen the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience as a way to honor the earth and all that exist on it and above it and below it. This is something that seems central to ALL indigenous cultures. The Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience has more in common with Meetings for Worship led by Quaker Earthcare Witness (formerly Friends in Unity with Nature) than it has with anything else. The participants are asked to honor all life, even where we cannot "see" it, as in the rocks we heat and the earth we sit upon. The wind is honored and there are many traditions that understand how breathing in and out is a way to the Spirit. Friends who see this connection between everything on the Earth and ourselves are doing the spiritual work of witnessing the Earth and learning to care for it. This is not easily taught and to have a workshop at the FGC Gathering that does this so successfully is something Friends could celebrate. As the FGC Gathering theme for 2004 was "Simple Lives", this was a very appropriate workshop to have listed. I was glad that the 2004 Gathering Workshop Committee had, after much prayer, decided to proceed with this workshop. Instead word came that the Quaker Sweatlodge Experience was cancelled by a meeting of the FCG LRCP committee and that racism was the major reason for that. Why didn't the Native American who led the Quaker Sweat Experience and who taught George about their interpretations of the Native American Sweat call this workshop racist? When the workshop is called racist, are you and the committee saying that the over a thousand Friends who participated in the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience which was blessed by many Native Americans over the years didn't understand that this was a racist workshop? Even people who lead workshops at the FGC gathering on undoing racism have attended the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience and did not consider that this was a racist activity. What about the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experiences that took place at the many of FGC's Yearly Meetings where George Price was invited to lead them? Were they all condoning racist behavior, too? The only people who say this is racist are people who HAVE NOT ATTENDED a Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience. Yet, FGC's LRCP committee of FGC Central Committee chose to NOT listen to the thousands of Friends who had experienced the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience and instead to listen to people who "knew" what was going on without ever speaking to the people involved. The cry of "cultural appropriation" has been raised to defend the action of canceling the workshop, in addition to the racism charge, but that is hard to believe. It seems to me that Friends appropriate my culture, routinely, without even a second thought. As a Friend of Jewish origin, I must say that to raise the issue of "cultural appropriation" in a Religious Society that regularly tramples on my ancestor's Faith tradition is the height of hypocrisy. This is another can of worms that I won't go into at this time, but are your sure that your committee wants only workshops at the Gathering that are "purely Quaker"? We Jewish Friends have not had very much success being heard by FGC's committees, even when a song which says that Jews are responsible for the death of Jesus Christ was and still is published as part of the Friends Hymnal. The main issue for me was clearly spoken in a message I heard at a Meeting for Worship for Healing held this past summer at the FGC Men's Center around the concern over the cancellation of the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience. The message was: "Why do Quakers want to close a door to the Spirit?" Who Owns the Spirit? One Race? Any Race? Any Group? Are we not permitted access to that "door" because of an accident of birth? We Quakers already "borrow" and "adapt" the Spiritual practices from many different cultures. Does FGC's LRCP committee of FGC Central Committee really want Friends to give up all those practices? Holding us all in the Light, Free Polazzo Anneewakee Creek Friends Worship Group and Atlanta Friends Meeting, Douglas County, GA PS: Dave Miller, a copy of this email will be being sent to FGC's LRCP committee via snail mail.. As co-clerk could you please distribute it to the committee's members? Thanks. At 12:43 PM 10/3/2004, you wrote: >It is disappointing to see the emails concerning the sweat lodge. So much >ignorance, so little time. One respondant didn't even know the the Long >Range Conference Planning Committee was a subcommittee of FGC or that it >must have written permission from the host yearly meeting to hold the >Gathering in the area. The clerks of the Gathering Committee are appointed >by LRCP from the yearly meeting. I have been clerk of LRCP for the past >three years during the sweat lodge discernment. Chuck Fager never attended >a meeting that was concerned with this so I have had to correct several of >his perceptions. Below you will find the chronology of the discerment. >Another meeting for listening was held yesterday (Saturday) in >Philadelphia. I was not able to attend. If you desire further information >please write me. Perry Treadwell -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nc_stereoman at charter.net Sun Oct 3 20:49:42 2004 From: nc_stereoman at charter.net (Steve Livingston) Date: Sun, 03 Oct 2004 20:49:42 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Note that the "sweat lodge" is actually the "Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience" In-Reply-To: <6.1.2.0.2.20041003133105.02e6d4d0@mail.comcast.net> References: <41602C41.9020601@bellsouth.net> Message-ID: <416065E6.31958.2EF406F@localhost> Free, thank you for your offerings regarding this issue. It makes for very illuminating reading. I don't think it's appropriate to say on the list but wouldn't you like to have been a fly on the wall during the two days of laboring over the decision to pull the workshop! The question in my mind right now is raised in your post, when you point out that the decision to pull was made entirely by Friends who had never experienced the workshop. How did it happen that out of the more than a thousand Friends who had had the experience, not ONE was present for this meeting??? We Quakers like to think that we encourage diversity, and I would think that includes hearing diverse opinions from differing points of view. Did it happen that the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience became the Native American Sweat Lodge Ripoff because some voices were not heard? Was this addressed at the Meeting for Listening? Perry, I appreciate as well your taking the time to explain a few things from the point of view of the Planning Committee. I am so ignorant as to not even have known of the existence of the committee, so am learning as I go along, possibly at others' expense. I invite your comments on the above questions as well, since you were in the apparently unusual position of having been on the wall when this fly was elsewhere. Steve From freepolazzo at comcast.net Sun Oct 3 21:09:01 2004 From: freepolazzo at comcast.net (free polazzo) Date: Sun, 03 Oct 2004 21:09:01 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Note that the "sweat lodge" is actually the "Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience" In-Reply-To: <416065E6.31958.2EF406F@localhost> References: <41602C41.9020601@bellsouth.net> <416065E6.31958.2EF406F@localhost> Message-ID: <6.1.2.0.2.20041003205811.02e4ca60@mail.comcast.net> Steve, I did not say that nobody who was at a workshop wasn't consulted. Some on LRCP might have been in one of the Quaker Sweat Lodges. I don't know all the names of either group. I know that the workshop leaders were not present when the decision to withdraw was made. What I did say was that the people that were calling this racist were not people who have experienced the Quaker Sweat Lodge. I also said, pretty much, is it possible that the thousands of Quakers (mostly teenagers, including some from minority cultures, who experienced the Quaker Sweat Lodge all be so racist that nobody noticed (including the Native Americans who led/attended the Quaker Sweat Lodge) it was racist or called them on it? How could it wasn't until someone who had only read the workshop description was able to declare on that the workshop was blatantly racist? I smell ulterior motives and hidden agendas. Just MHO. Free At 08:49 PM 10/3/2004, Steve Livingston wrote: >Free, thank you for your offerings regarding this issue. It makes for >very illuminating reading. > >I don't think it's appropriate to say on the list but wouldn't you like to >have been a fly on the wall during the two days of laboring over the >decision to pull the workshop! The question in my mind right now is >raised in your post, when you point out that the decision to pull was >made entirely by Friends who had never experienced the workshop. > >How did it happen that out of the more than a thousand Friends who >had had the experience, not ONE was present for this meeting??? > >We Quakers like to think that we encourage diversity, and I would >think that includes hearing diverse opinions from differing points of >view. Did it happen that the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience >became the Native American Sweat Lodge Ripoff because some >voices were not heard? Was this addressed at the Meeting for >Listening? > >Perry, I appreciate as well your taking the time to explain a few >things from the point of view of the Planning Committee. I am so >ignorant as to not even have known of the existence of the >committee, so am learning as I go along, possibly at others' >expense. I invite your comments on the above questions as well, >since you were in the apparently unusual position of having been on >the wall when this fly was elsewhere. > >Steve From listener at bellsouth.net Sun Oct 3 22:27:07 2004 From: listener at bellsouth.net (Kit Potter) Date: Sun, 3 Oct 2004 21:27:07 -0500 Subject: [saymaListserv] Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager In-Reply-To: <6.1.2.0.2.20041002102648.02eaf7e0@mail.comcast.net> Message-ID: <002401c4a9b9$a58160e0$6701a8c0@heyoka> Dear Friends, Thank you for your concerns, your caring for our fellow Friends, and your seeking Truth. To me, the key for us is to insist on respectful and full Quaker process in the Spirit. The work, of necessity at this point, will continue for some time. Also of necessity, it will not involve most of us directly except in one way: Friends of SAYMA, I call upon all of you to hold this situation and process in the Light. Daily, if possible. I also respectfully request that we: 1) Cease to speak authoritatively of that which we do not have in the full story - let us not risk increase of harm or negativity 2) Release all pre-conceived perceptions, and, while sending love energy to all who are involved, do our best to remain open to the sharing which is sure to come from those who are actively involved and care very, very deeply -- deeply enough to spend hours and days in prayer and seeking in order to wrestle with this concern. 3) Discern whether we may have a strong personal leading and concern about this, and if so, seek the support and connection necessary in order to participate actively in the work of discernment and healing. 4) Expect accountability to the wider Friends community (as stated above.) There has been injury done - that much is clear. It is time to use the central discipline of our faith tradition in the service of healing and love, moving forward and more deeply into the Truth and the Light as a society. Your prayers and love will make all the difference. Thank you, Kit Potter [Kit Potter] -----Original Message----- From: sayma-bounces at kitenet.net [mailto:sayma-bounces at kitenet.net]On Behalf Of free polazzo Sent: Saturday, October 02, 2004 9:53 AM To: Atlanta Friends Meeting; sayma at kitenet.net Subject: [saymaListserv] Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager Dear Friends, The quaker sweat lodge was well attended at SAYMA's yearly meeting, the year we invited George Price to lead it at Warren Wilson College 9 years ago in June of 1995. George had been leading a workshop on the Quaker Sweat Lodge since 1989 and it has been very well attended every year he did. Over 1,000 Quaker teens and a few hundred Quaker adults participated to rave reviews. Some Native American people attended a few of the sweats we held at Boone, NC. Last year some Friends have decided to turn this well attended work workshop into a cause celebre, calling it "cultural appropriation". Chuck Fager, who we know from Quaker House in Fayetteville, NC, has written about this concern. While a long piece, there are many key concerns discussed and I recommend it to you. I pray that out of this heat will come the Light of the Spirit to show us the way forward. Blessings, Free From: CHUCKFAGER at aol.com Date: Thu Sep 30, 2004 2:05:30 PM America/Chicago To: qpr at quaker.org Subject: The Quaker Sweat Lodge Issue-Some Thoughts Dear Friends, Here are some personal thoughts on the cancellation of the Quaker sweat lodge at the 2004 FGC Gathering. I commend them to your attention, and feel free to share them if you are so moved. Chuck Fager - - - - - - - - - - - - - The Quaker Sweat Lodge: Some Reflections Chuck Fager “Cultural appropriation”? This phrase was new to me; I guess I don’t get out enough. But with some surfing and much reading, I began to get a sense of it. Quakers know about “cultural appropriation.” At least we should. On a shelf near the desk where I am writing is an empty bottle, the label of which proclaims that it was once filled with “Old Quaker” whiskey. Back in the early 1900s Indiana Yearly Meeting regularly petitioned the state legislature to ban such misuse of their name; to no avail. Then of course there’s Quaker Oats, a multinational never owned or operated by Friends. In the Eighties, they tried an oatmeal promotion featuring “Popeye the Quaker Man,” in which Popeye eschewed eating spinach for oatmeal, and then knocked the stuffing out of various “evildoers.” Rather clever, really; but it could not withstand the protests of several First Day School classes, who had better luck than Indiana Yearly Meeting. Of course, Quaker Oats goes on. Then there’s Quaker State motor oil; and up in Buffalo you can get Quaker Bonnet ice cream. Wilmington College dubs its sports teams the “Fighting Quakers.” My personal favorite in this line is based in Pittsburgh: “Quaker Steak and Lube,” a growing chain which styles itself as “America’s #1 motorsports-themed family restaurant.” (Makes me wonder which is #2 – Presbyterian Steak & Lube?) We can smile at many of these; at least I can. But some others aren’t so amusing. What of the secular groups that purport to operate on “Quaker consensus” and mangle it at every turn? And haven’t many of us, on meeting Friends from other branches, said (or thought, or better yet, overheard), “They’re not REAL Quakers”? Ah, yes. Or take some other public images. In the movie “High Noon,” (picked as one of the 25 “greatest" American films by the Library of Congress), Grace Kelly as the Quaker heroine is portrayed as a fool and a coward who only wants to run away from evil and conflict – until she “redeems” herself by picking up a gun and shooting the bad guy, in the back. I find this deeply offensive, and there are other such cinematic portrayals of pacifists as fools-who-learn-better. How do Friends cope with all this unauthorized use of our name, image, and practices? Mostly we ignore it; sometimes we wring our hands. But it’s fair to say that all in all, we’re surviving it. All this was in the back of my mind as I tried to make sense of the great Sweat Lodge flap of 2004. Having missed the earlier meetings that agonized over it, I’ve been studying hard to get up to speed. And the more I learn, the more I wonder: What on earth has gotten into us? Here’s how it looks: for 13 years or so a ritual called a “Quaker sweat lodge” had been presented at the Gathering, mainly involving high school Friends. There were numerous testimonies (among them from my own son) that this experience was spiritually important, even life-changing for many of them. This is not, by the way, true for me; somewhere (not at the Gathering, I think), I was invited into a sweat, but found it much too hot and stayed only a few minutes. It may be wonderful for some, but it wasn’t my cup of tea. At any rate, a sweat had been approved for the 2004 Gathering; but last March, a letter came in from Alice Lopez, a member of the Mashpee Wampanoags, denouncing the sweat lodge as “a flagrant example of racism,” and Bang! Panic and pandemonium, with the workshop’s abrupt cancellation being only one piece of the fallout. What was it that made the sweat so horrible, in the complainant’s eyes? It was “cultural appropriation.” I’ll call this CA for short. Now, if the accusations had been of, say, bank robbery or stock fraud, a couple of important processes would have thereby been triggered: First, the organizers would be entitled to a fair trial; and second, they would be presumed innocent until proven guilty. And a key preliminary of such due process would be, “to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation,” in the language of the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution. If we can expect this in worldly courts, can’t we expect at least as much among Friends? After all, Quaker books of Discipline for two centuries have insisted that we take great care with Friends’ reputations. At stake here, first of all, are the reputations of the organizers, George Price, Breeze Luetke-Stahlman and Cullen Carns-Hilliker. They are not strangers among us; together they have well over thirty years of attendance and work at the Gathering; add in their other family members’ attendance, and the attendance total easily doubles. But that is not all. Also on the block are the validity of 13 years of committee discernment, the stacks of glowing reports by participants, and, not coincidentally, the credibility of FGC in its dealings with its own, especially the best of the rising generation. With so much in play, what have we seen in the way of being informed of “the nature and cause of the accusation”? Well, among all the material sent me in this matter, no such explanation has appeared, nor any sign of actual investigation and considered verdict as to whether the organizers and their workshop were indeed guilty thereof. Simply saying the words “Racism” and “cultural appropriation” appears to have been sufficient. Indeed, the minutes of the LRCP from 4th Month 2004, record the Committee for Ministry on Racism as declaring, “When someone is so strongly offended by our behavior we must take heed, no matter what our intentions.” Thus, to convict the organizers of “flagrant racism” and “cultural appropriation,” merely making the accusation seems to have been enough. It is not enough for me. The committee “procedure” as described offends every meaning of “due process” and good order that I know of, in or outside Quakerism. Reference has been made to the secular court system. It is worth noting here that organizations like FGC have been successfully sued for defamation over episodes like these; and they deserved it. I hang my head in shame when I read the accounts of what happened and am humiliated to recall that my name is on that committee’s membership list. But my feelings are not the point here. To repeat the query: what are these alleged infractions, exactly? And what evidence is there that the FGC sweat lodge was a culpable example thereof? And on what ground can disregarding the task of dealing with these fundamental questions of fairness be justified? Since the concept of “cultural appropriation,” at least as some kind of actionable offense, was new to me, I’ve worked hard to figure out exactly what it is, how to identify it, and what can be done about it. In this effort, there have been problems. Definitions, for one thing. Finding them was not the issue; I found many. [Ten such definitions are included in the Appendix.] But none are the same, none seems definitive, and there are no agreed-upon criteria for establishing it. Nevertheless, overall they indicate that the phenomenon takes different forms, of which at least three can be distinguished: First, the taking of actual artifacts and other tangible property. Second, stereotypical, demeaning images and portrayal by one culture of another, as in sports team names and mascots. And third, use or mimicry by one culture of the rituals, beliefs, or symbols of another. The first kind of cultural appropriation is the easiest to identify. It has been addressed by various laws, and is not involved in the FGC situation. Nor, to my knowledge, is the second. The complaints about the sweat lodge evidently come out of the third level. And at this point, as Julie Deichmann, writing on “The Cultural Appropriation Debate,” put it, this level of “‘Cultural appropriation’ however, is a much more nebulous concept.” This especially the case when one seeks criteria for positively identifying it. You wouldn’t know this from reading the louder critics of CA; they insist that any cross-cultural mimicry, use, or adaptation of other people’s spiritual practices is obviously and unarguably a crime, indeed it’s genocide. Consider Russell Means: “We are resisting this because spirituality is the basis of our culture. If our culture is dissolved, Indian people as such will cease to exist. By definition, the causing of any culture to cease to exist is genocide.” What is the remedy for this? As Lynna Landstreet wrote, “some native activists have explicitly told people of European ancestry to start working with their own ancestral religions instead of pirating native beliefs.” Ward Churchill is one of the most vocal of this school. Landstreet quotes Churchill as telling European “wanna-bes”[a common phrase]: “We are not unique in being indigenous. Everyone is indigenous somewhere. You are not necessarily part of the colonizing, predatory reality called ‘Europe.’ You are not even necessarily ‘Germans,’ with all that implies. You are, or can be, who your ancestors were and who the faith-keepers of your cultures remain: Angles, Saxons, Huns, Goths, Visigoths. The choice is yours, but in order for it to have meaning, you must meet the responsibilities that come with it.” (It intrigues me that Churchill would preach thus to a German audience. Didn’t many in that culture undertake to reconnect with their primordial indigenous roots back in the 1930s? As I recall, that effort didn’t turn out so well, for them or for the world. But let that go.) One part of me strongly resonates with this appeal: knowing our religious roots is a good idea; that’s largely why I offered workshops on Bible study at the Gathering for ten years. I also agree that dilettantish spiritual consumerism is as unappealing as any other kind. And yet, if this advice were made into a rule, a big problem immediately leaps from the page: where would it leave me–and the half of Quakers today who are likewise convinced members? For my part, I’d be stuck in Mel Gibson Catholicism, a personal fate too awful to contemplate. And where, Friend, would that leave thee? Not to mention all the rearranging of cultural furniture it would require across the board: are we really ready to banish the Christmas trees, Easter baskets, Halloween costumes, and all the other stuff that our culture imported (stole?) from other traditions, some we can’t even remember? The sternly plain Quakers or 200 years ago would have said “Yes, Indeed” to this query. (And I wouldn’t miss Easter baskets much.) But that was then. Speaking of Christmas trees brings up another key point: reading through the literature, I discovered that “cultural appropriation” was only one name for interchange between cultures, at least in the voluminous learned discussions thereof. It seems there is also such a thing as “hybridity,” where two (or more) cultures somehow blend, at least in part, to form a new cultural practice. It happens in art – jazz, for instance. It certainly happens in religion too, where it tends to be termed “syncretism,” sometimes approvingly, sometimes not. And “hybridity” seems to be regarded as more or less okay by those who are passing judgment, though this sentiment is not universal. I will have more to say about this. Then there’s “appropriate cultural sharing”; the Unitarians like that one. Google even turned up a description of a major scholarly project on the Ethics of Cultural Appropriation. Sounds illuminating –– but it’s just getting started; no results yet. All this was intriguing, but it was easy to see more tough issues ahead: how do we distinguish presumably legitimate “hybridity” or “appropriate” cultural sharing from nasty old CA? For that matter, is all CA truly as evil as some say? (Do I REALLY have to go back to being a Catholic??) If not, how do we tell which is which? And then there’s the CA-is-“genocide” matter. This is a daunting charge, one that might put an end to any discussion –– except that, fortunately, the facts don’t bear it out. Certainly the Euro-American treatment of the natives has included efforts at genocide, some of them gruesomely successful. But during the last twenty years, the American Indian population and their cultures have been burgeoning, not disappearing. The 2000 census reported a 26 per cent increase in their numbers in only ten years. And as scholar critical of CA acknowledges, “Native Americans have rebounded from the population low point during the first half of the twentieth century (Nagel 1996). At that time, many officials believed that because of the tumultuous history Indians had faced, they would disappear as a separate race. This has changed and Indian culture is growing stronger, and has even taken root in the mainstream population. Part of this upswing has its roots in a political and cultural rebirth that has fueled community pride and political struggle (Cornell 1988; Nagel 1996).” – Gibbons, “New Age Cowboys and Indian Religion: Boundary Maintenance and Religious Inter-Cultural Borrowing.” All this burgeoning happened, however, in the same years that saw the proliferation of “Indian”-influenced workshops, seminars, souvenirs, etc., etc. So if these are an attempt at “genocide,” cultural or otherwise, they have been a miserable failure – and thank goodness for that! Rather, it seems to me the vigor of the native protests against the “New Age” vulgarization and commercialization of some versions of native practices is if anything a reflection of this renewing vitality. This, plus the peoples’ underlying ability to vent their feelings, and then get on with their individual and communal lives. And here too, maybe a word of caution is in order: a practice that looks to me like a cheesy ripoff of some spiritual tradition, may be for many participants a profound and life-changing spiritual experience. Who, exactly, is to make this judgment? And how? (And what was it our indigenous spiritual teacher Jesus said about judging?)What about (re)learning to live and let live, especially in these “nebulous” areas? And are these really new insights? This point reminds me of early Friends history: there is a fat book in the larger Quaker libraries, “Bibliotheca Anti-Quakeriana,” published in 1873, filled with the titles of thousands of anti-Quaker books and tracts from the first generations. Most were variations on a common theme: that Quakerism was a spiritual fraud, a rip-off, a corrupted, perverted counterfeit, masquerading as “authentic” Christianity. The chorus was quite loud, and the song of vituperation went on for a long time. So Friends, have been down this road before? Were we supposed to just fold out tents in the face of this opposition? What have we learned from this? What have we forgotten? And so it is in the Native American world. Yes, there are loud voices denouncing anything that resembles the various versions of “cultural appropriation”; but theirs are not the only voices. There are also native teachers who have worked quietly with devoted non-natives to find ways to share what is good in their traditions, because they think the underlying spirituality could be of benefit, even to us whites. Which brings me back to George Price and the Quaker sweat lodge. The Lopez letter dismisses all this talk of work with native tahers and mentors, declaring that the Quaker sweat lodge “is predicated on an assumption that an almost exclusively white non-Native group has the right to usurp any spiritual practice it finds meaningful.” But have the Quaker sweat lodges in fact been predicated on such an assumption? What is the evidence for this assertion? The only “evidence” cited in the Lopez letter is the sixty-one word workshop description in the 2004 Gathering Advance Program. Let’s review that: “Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience: Since 1989 young Friends have participated in a sweat lodge at the Gathering, evolving in into an experience deeply meaningful to many. This workshop offers participants an opportunity to build the lodge, sweat, and discuss the history, Quaker presence, and spiritual nature of the sweat lodge experience. Led by George Price, Cullen Carns-Hilliker, and Breeze Luetke Stahlman. ” In any fair, Friendly, or competent inquiry, this brief description would be the beginning, not the end. And even here, note that it does not mention Native American spirituality or ceremonies. The organizers state that this is not an accident; they assert that the experience has become distinctively Quaker, not imitation anything. They are not the much-condemned “wanna-bes.” Now let us imagine that a proper inquiry had been made into these competing statements. One of the first items it would have discovered is George Price’s article in the February 2002 Friends Journal, which explains how his Native American teachers led the early sweats at the Gathering, and then instructed him to continue them By his own account, George has spent many years studying and working with such native teachers. These studies have been both formal and informal, leading to academic degrees as well as life changes. But they have not been limited to Native American rituals. He has found and studied parallel rituals in European and Asian cultures too, and intentionally put the Quaker sweat in a “universalist” context. (In this whole process, by the way, Price has been acting on a central aspect of the traditional FGC ethos, namely an openness to truth from wherever it may be found. Pages of quotes from books of Faith & Practice could be quoted in support of this. To be sure, such cross-cultural seeking should be done with sensitivity and care; but the record shows that’s what he has displayed.) The inquiry would then have turned to the other leaders. Take Breeze Luetke-Stahlman. It might be worth noting that though not yet 26, she has, among other achievements, studied at the only all-native university in the US, visited and worked on the Pine Ridge reservation, and even served as the national lobbyist for the “Free Leonard Peltier” campaign. (How sweet, how bitter the irony that the Lopez letter denouncing her “flagrant racism” arrived on “Free Leonard Peltier” letterhead.) None of this, of course, gives her a “free pass” from being examined for bias and CA. But it should give pause to any who thinks her work with the Quaker sweat was that of an insensitive dilettante or a disrespectful New Age dabbler. (I have not yet interviewed Cullen Carns-Hilliker.) Breeze told me, however, that while FGC sent someone from Philadelphia to Mashpee to consult extensively with Lopez, no one even telephoned her to find out about her perspective on the matter, never mind her background or training. What accounts for this? Her youth? Ethnicity? Lack of hyperbolic and overheated rhetoric? Price explained further in a response to the Lopez Letter that: “…… We do not pretend to be Native Americans and we make it clear at all lodges that what we are doing is not a Native American sweat. We do not use a pipe. We do not use prayer ties nor prayer flags. We do not sing Native American songs…….We have researched non-Native American sources of the sweat, the Celts of Ireland, the Finnish sauna, the Russian bannia, the Edo sweats of Japan, and we have found inspiration and a sense of the universality of the sweat lodge.” These statements do not seem at all congruent with an “assumption that an almost exclusively white non-Native group has the right to usurp any spiritual practice it finds meaningful.” Rather, it sounds peainstakingly respectful. And once they are actually examined, the track records of the organizers and the character of the workshop show a great deal of awareness and sensitivity to the cultural issues involved, long predating the criticism. Moreover, the Lopez letter presents no evidence that Price or Breeze or Cullen are speaking falsely or disingenuously about this. Was any other such contrary evidence sought out or presented? If not, why were the charges of “flagrant racism” and “cultural appropriation” accepted without it? Instead, the Lopez letter attempted to pre-empt and prevent any such inquiry by insisting that, “No matter who gave who permission, trained the leader, etc. for Friends to use a sweat lodge is a violation and desecration of one of the most private and sacred aspects of native spiritual practice.” But there are serious problems with this assertion. For starters, if heeded it would prevent any hearing of the workshop leaders and their side. This is patently unfair, though it is essentially what happened. For another, what standing does Lopez have to denigrate and dismiss the witness of other Native leaders and teachers, especially without hearing them either? How respectful is that?Among them, as Price also testified, was Clyde Bellacourt of the American Indian Movement. Bellacourt also encouraged Price to continue the sweats, when Bellacourt visited the Gathering in 1989. If we are not calling Price a liar, such encouraging statements are as valid as the Lopez criticism; and coming from persons who actually came to the Gathering and dealt with Price, they have more credibility with me. So why is FGC to privilege the Lopez statements and not theirs? Moreover, exactly how is a Quaker sweat lodge a “violation and desecration” of Native practice? It is possible to gauge the harm in actual practice. That’s because the Gathering was held in Amherst once before, in 1994. The record indicates that there was a Quaker sweat lodge there. At that time, there were (and are) no less than twelve Native American bands, tribes or nations in the same region, among them Abenaki, Nipmucs, Ponkapoag, and Pequot, all nearer to Amherst than the Mashpee, who are a hundred miles away on Cape Cod. What do we know about the 1994 experience? The Gathering came and went, the sweat happened. And when it was done, these dozen native groups in the region still had all their land; none of their cultural and ritual objects had been stolen; none of their members had been subjected to public displays of demeaning or stereotyped images; none of their ceremonies had been usurped, spied upon, or copied; none of the groups, one suspects, even knew the Quaker sweat had happened. As “desecration” and “cultural genocide”goes, this was a rather mild, even innocuous example. If it was in fact wrong, which is by no means clear, it was hardly an emergency requiring the discarding of any semblance of due process or fair-minded, careful seeking. There are two final questions that have nagged me increasingly as I consider this whole episode. The first is: what kind of precedent is being set here for FGC? Are we now to submit our seventy-plus workshops to a new round of reviews by self-appointed outsiders, persons and groups with no involvement in FGC, no presence at the Gathering, because they might take exception to some of what is on our program? Having offered many workshops at the Gathering myself, this is not a hypothetical question for me. After all, Friends, let us recall that there are many aspects of the Gathering that unquestionably are offensive to some, or many, in the outside culture. Does anyone else remember 1981 at Berea, when we were threatened with a mass march of outraged fundamentalists said to be coming to cleanse the campus of the abomination of gays and lesbians were open and affirmed among us? Now we are advised that the LRCP clerk has been contacting selected native-related persons in Virginia about the advisability of having a sweat at the 2005 Gathering in Blacksburg. If this is deemed good practice, how can we properly limit it to that topic? Should we not also interview prominent Southern Baptist ministers around Blacksburg, Virginia about women in leadership roles, nontheistic workshops, FLGC meetings, sessions on past lives, and women’s rituals at our Gathering? We could start with Jerry Falwell, who is just about the same distance away as the Wampanoags were from Amherst. What if he didn’t like those ideas, as one strongly suspects he would not? Or how about the area’s Catholic bishops? Let’s see: reproductive rights, same sex, disdain for hierarchies–don’t get me started on all that! Then there’s the Virginia legislature. We already know what it thinks of our welcoming same sex married couples – they’re attempting to outlaw them. Should we defer to that? We’re supposedly a law-abiding bunch, on the whole. But it appears in these cases we are prepared to trust our own judgment and discernment, which seems to me the wisest course. And this much can be said on behalf of the Virginia Baptists and their homophobic legislators: chances are good that if we keep our dangerous notions on the campus, they will go about their business and ignore us, leaving us to the judgment of the God Whom we are both sure is on our side. I wonder why some feel a need to go looking for trouble on this particular score? Haven’t we had enough? So again: is this a wise precedent? I believe it is more like a can of worms – no, a can of snakes, that bite. The second question gets more personal, because its effects reach to my own family, which among ourselves has at least fifty person-years of Gathering attendance: Breeze tells me their sweat lodge has had more than 300 participants, among them many of the most active young adult Friends in the FGC orbit. The feedback from many of them, and some of their parents, about FGC’s treatment of her and the sweat lodge has been angry and alienated, and has not subsided. How dangerous is that? Let me put it this way: if I was hired by some enemy of FGC to undermine the future of the Gathering, I could not have hatched a better scheme than this for making it happen. Karl Rove would be proud. Listen well, Friends: As this generation comes to understand that their most cherished part of the Gathering can be summarily dumped, and its respected leaders defamed as “flagrant racists,” based on a single unsubstantiated complaint from someone who has never been at the Gathering, has no presence in FGC, and knows no more about it than a sixty-one-word blurb – such an understanding will ultimately be ruinous to FGC and the Gathering. Ruinous. I may not know a lot; but I know that much. It is not rocket science. And I can be more personal still: Since 2000, I have been bringing my granddaughter Amber to the Gathering. Amber is multi-racial. Her ethnic-cultural heritage includes African, native, and European strains. Religiously, it takes in black Baptist, Gurdjieff-Jungian astrological mysticism, Quakerism and humanism, all in addition to the more removed background of Catholicism. What do we call this? If Amber is not a living, breathing embodiment of “hybridity” and “syncretism,” who or what is? Right now it is natural to her. No one has yet told her it is “cultural appropriation” and all wrong. But when she gets old enough, in just a few years, to begin conscious spiritual explorations to find her own way, how much of this heritage will be fenced off from the FGC context, to prevent her giving any possible offense to unknown and unidentified persons or groups? Will FGC be feeding her pious absurdities about finding and sticking to somebody else’s notion of her “indigenous” roots? Go ahead. But remember: with Amber’s “hybridity” comes awareness of options. Watch how quickly she'll dump FGC and seek another spiritual home where she will be free to do the work she needs to do. And she would not leave by herself. To sum up: Friends, the sweat lodge controversy is on the brink of becoming a major train wreck for FGC, one largely self-inflicted. I think – I hope, the damage can be controlled. How? Here is my recipe: First, Breeze, George and Cullen deserve an apology from FGC for the unconscionable way they have been treated. Next, have the LRCP and Central Committee minutes formally record a withdrawal and repudiation of any and all charges, allegations, and insinuations of racism associated with them or their work. At the very least, such charges are completely unproven. My own view is that they are false, defamatory and bring deep disgrace on the body. Third, include these three, and experienced Quaker sweat lodge alumni, as full partners in all negotiations, internal and external, aimed at finding a way to re-incorporate the sweat lodge experience into the Gathering, especially for youth, in some mutually agreeable form. And make that re-incorporation a goal, one worth bearing witness for as much as we bear witness to our welcoming LGBT Friends. And fourth, admonish those who are carrying concerns for “racism” or “cultural appropriation” within FGC to follow good order and show scrupulous care for the reputation of Friends involved, taking pains to avoid “talebearing and detraction” in pursuing their efforts. In particular, any such allegations are to be dealt with by careful, full, and fair inquiry, with the presumption of innocence. Our expectation for Quaker “due process” is that it will be more equitable than that of the secular world, not less. And by the way: none of what has been said here is meant to imply that FGC in its history and culture has somehow been free of racism. I’ve studied FGC history more deeply than most, and sadly know the truth is otherwise. Given my family’s multi-racial character, this is an item high on my agenda. I particularly affirm and appreciate the work being done by Donna McDaniel and Vanessa Julye to fill in and bring to us the details of this humbling and painful story. If I thought the Quaker sweat lodge was a current example of this racist taint, I would say so. NOTE: The Landstreet & Churchill quotes are from: http://www.wildideas.net/forest/library/ecospirit14.html The Soul of Nature: The Meaning of Ecological Spirituality, by Lynna Landstreet Julie Deichmann, “The Cultural Appropriations Debate,” http://www.aabc.com/lotos/cultural.htm APPENDIX: Cultural Appropriation: Ten Definitions “Cultural Appropriation - refers to the process by which members of relatively privileged groups “raid” the culture of less powerful or marginalized groups, and removing [sic] cultural practices or artifacts from historically or culturally specific contexts.” ­ From the Glossary of the Municipal Cultural Planning Project (Canada) http://www.culturalplanning.ca/mcpp/ib_glossary.html#c Q. “What is cultural appropriation? A. The textbook definition of cultural appropriation is the ‘taking [a.k.a. appropriating] from a culture that is not one’s own of...cultural expressions or artifacts [or] history.’ Many people hold that cultural appropriation is wrong because by stealing an element from someone’s culture and then representing it in a different (and often shallow) context, you both damage and dishonor the culture you have taken the ritual from.” ­ Body Modification Ezine FAQs http://www.bmezine.com/ritual/susp-faq.html#Q3-5 [Note: The “textbook” in question was not identified.] The [Unitarian] Reverend Marjorie Bowens-Wheatley defines cultural appropriation as consciously or unconsciously seeking to emulate concepts, beliefs, or rituals that are foreign to a particular framework, individual, or collective. It is incorporating language, cultural expressions, forms, lifestyles, rituals, or practices about which there is little basis for direct knowledge, experience, or authenticity into one’s being. It is also the superficial appreciation of a culture without regard to its deeper meaning.” ­ Jacqui Jame, Anti-Oppression Programs and Resource Director, Unitarian-Universalist Assn., “Reckless Borrowing or Appropriate Cultural Sharing?” “ . . .the unspeakable indignity of having our most precious Lakota ceremonies and spiritual practices desecrated, mocked and abused by non-Indian "wannabes," hucksters, cultists, commercial profiteers and self-styled "New Age shamans" and their followers . . . .” ­ Declaration of War Against Exploiters of Lakota Spirituality, 1993 http://www.aics.org/war.html “The task of defining “cultural appropriation” is a more difficult endeavor than defining “cultural property”. With property we have something concrete such as bones or artifacts which indigenous communities are now requesting that many museums around the world “repatriate”. Laws have been enacted such as the Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation Act . . . . “Cultural appropriation” however, is a much more nebulous concept. Cultural appropriation, the borrowing of cultural elements, is a consistent fact of the twentieth century.” ­ Julie Deichmann, “The Cultural Appropriations Debate,” http://www.aabc.com/lotos/cultural.htm “At its core, appropriation is nothing more than a dressed-up word for stealing. In fact, many victims of cultural appropriation have denounced the phrase, claiming that is de-emphasizes the true nature of what they consider a crime. Appropriation occurs when one party takes upon itself to uncover and absorb the practices of another culture without proper understanding, training, respect or permission.” ­ “Interfaith Exchange and the Western Overculture” http://www.mothersmagic.net/theology/CA2.html “Cultural appropriation is the theft of rituals, aesthetic standards and behavior from one culture by another, generally by a ‘modern’ culture from a ‘primitive’ culture ­ often this involves the conversion of religion and spirituality into ‘meaningless’ pop-culture.” ­ [From: http://encyc.bmezine.com/?Cultural_Appropriation] “Cultural appropriation is usually considered to be a majority group (usually Whites or otherwise Eurocentric folks) mining a minority culture for the jewels of its heritage for their own pleasure or benefit while the voices of that culture remain silent or silenced.” ­ [From: http://www.mothersmagic.net/theology/CA.html] “[The authors] first offer a working definition of cultural appropriation as ‘the taking - from a culture that is not one’s own - of intellectual property, cultural expressions or artifacts, history and ways of knowing’. . . . .” ­ Borrowed Power: Essays on Cultural Appropriation. Bruce Ziff and Pratima V. Rao. Rutgers University Press. “[C]ultural appropriation ­ that is, those practices involving the non-consensual apprehension and/or misuse of cultural knowledge outside of its local and traditional contexts.” ­ Description, “Ethics of Cultural Appropriation” Research project, University of Victoria, British Columbia. http://www.csrs.uvic.ca/Cultural.htm -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From lingle at bellsouth.net Mon Oct 4 05:59:39 2004 From: lingle at bellsouth.net (Larry Ingle) Date: Mon, 04 Oct 2004 05:59:39 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager Message-ID: <20041004095943.JSGL1757.imf24aec.mail.bellsouth.net@[216.78.253.11]> Kit Potter respectfully requests: 1) Cease to speak authoritatively of that which we do not have in the full story - let us not risk increase of harm or negativity But how are we to have the full story unless someone who knows informs us. Perry Treadwell has helpfully given us a chronology, but very little else. For what it's worth. Larry Ingle Chattanooga Meeting -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From bright_crow at mindspring.com Mon Oct 4 09:42:34 2004 From: bright_crow at mindspring.com (Mike Shell) Date: Mon, 4 Oct 2004 09:42:34 -0400 (GMT-04:00) Subject: [saymaListserv] Fwd: URGENT: Please Call Senators Today About Kyl Amendment Message-ID: <3677739.1096897354938.JavaMail.root@wamui01.slb.atl.earthlink.net> Friends, Please share this information with others. Thanks, Michael. ALAWON: American Library Association Washington Office Newsline September 30, 2004 In This Issue: URGENT: Please Call Senators Today About Kyl Amendment Please call your Senators TODAY and ask that they oppose the Kyl amendment to S. 2845, the "National Intelligence Reform Act of 2004." Senators Durbin (D-IL) and Craig (R-ID) are leading the opposition to the Kyl amendment, which contains the largest expansion of federal powers since the USA PATRIOT Act, with the most serious consequences for civil liberties that have been proposed since the demise of the much-maligned "Domestic Security Enhancement Act," also known as PATRIOT Act II. The issues proposed in the Kyl amendment go outside the scope of the 9/11 Commission's recommendations and should be debated next year during the debate on the PATRIOT Act. S. 2845 is too important to be bogged down with contentious amendments. If passed, the bill would weaken the public's right to privacy in their library, medical and other personal records by eliminating the already inadequate safeguard in the USA PATRIOT Act of an order by a secret court. 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Susan Susan Dillinger Library Director New Port Richey Public Library 5939 Main Street New Port Richey, FL 34652 (727) 841-4547 x292 (727) 841-4559 (fax) dillins at tblc.org --- You are currently subscribed to fla as: mshell at coj.net To unsubscribe send a blank email to leave-fla-206409X at lists.netimpact.net From nc_stereoman at charter.net Mon Oct 4 09:54:50 2004 From: nc_stereoman at charter.net (Steve Livingston) Date: Mon, 04 Oct 2004 09:54:50 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] three nuns put Quaker principles into practice Message-ID: <41611DEA.8318.8424BC@localhost> Dear Friends, Many of us are aware of the long-standing "Plowshares" effort to bring attention to America's huge arsenal of long-range missiles armed with nuclear warheads. The purpose of this effort is not to physically damage these weapons, but rather to symbolically diminish their value through simple acts of civil disobedience involving tiny hammers, paint, and even the protesters' own blood. An unexpected but welcome turn of events in Colorado comes with a zealous U.S. Attorney determined to brand three gentle nuns as virtual traitors, charging them with obstructing the U.S. defense rather than simple misdemeanor trespass, as if their symbolic actions actually threatened our nation's ability to launch a pre- emptive nuclear holocaust. A year of litigation has kept the case -- and the question of the efficacy and morality of such weapons in a post cold war world -- in the news. Last year, a jury found the three nuns guilty as charged and sentenced them each to prison terms of at least two years. But the judge left open the door for appeal, and their case was heard this past Friday by the appellate court. Hundreds of supporters showed up to monitor the proceedings. Two articles appeared in the Denver Post to describe the case. Background and Description of Plowshares Case News Story on Friday's Appeal Hearing Readers were treated to a description of exemplary non-violent activism that modern Friends might find familiar, instructive, inspiring. The crime committed by the nuns consisted of cutting through a chain-link fence, then tapping on the huge weapon of mass destruction with ball-peen hammers, the drawing peace signs and a large crucifix using vials of their own blood. During the initial trial, the nuns were depicted as "pray[ing] for their prosecutors and beseech[ing] the Almighty to shower his blessings on all the judges who sentence them . . ." The government was forced to admit that their case for sabotage was based not on the ludicrous argument that the nuns might have damaged the missile, but instead on the ludicrous argument that the cutting of the fence and the use of human blood constituted a threat to national security. During last week's hearing, hundreds of supporters convened at the University of Colorado campus as well as packing the courtroom and the street outside. "It's been very wonderful," one of the attorneys for the nuns reportedly beamed. Steve -- Steve Livingston nc_stereoman at charter.net -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From mcgahey at yancey.main.nc.us Mon Oct 4 16:32:21 2004 From: mcgahey at yancey.main.nc.us (Geeta Mcgahey) Date: Mon, 04 Oct 2004 16:32:21 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Re: sayma Digest, Vol 21, Issue 7 In-Reply-To: <20041004120004.E8F6D185CF@kitenet.net> Message-ID: <5.1.0.14.0.20041004160113.033b4ec0@yancey.main.nc.us> Perry, Steve, Kit, Larry, Chuck, Free, Thank-you for your thoughtful comments on the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience on the SAYMA list serve. I know that many friends are eagerly awaiting word about the discernment at the meeting on Saturday. I have been on the workshop committee for the past three years as we approved this workshop. It has not been without difficult discernment because the logistics are complex and some among Friends are very opposed to any ritual other than meeting for worship either on chairs inside or chairs outside. FGC has welcomed several semi-programmed meetings into its fold, but many monthly meetings have difficulty with hymn singing, let alone any other programming. It seems that the Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience serves as a ritual that pulls its young participants together. Ritual and bonding are crucial for support in our fractured culture. Many of our young Friends are isolated in schools with very different beliefs. They want opportunities for communion other than our traditional forms of Quaker worship and business, but within the concept of being Spirit-Guided and non-creedal. The listening on this subject has been deep. However communications either oral or written cannot capture the depth of sitting together in the Divine Presence. The challenge remains how can these Friends who have grown in a participatory way of doing business in the Divine Presence have an opportunity to not only feel listened to but feel a part of the decision making. Most of us are trained and seasoned in Yearly Meetings and many find it difficult to trust decisions to representatives. When I first came back to FGC Gathering after a long absence, I was horrified to see members of the HS program smoking. I saw it as a health protection issue which needed a top down solution. I was labored with and have come to see the importance of their participation in discernment as the problem has been addressed. We, the FGC Gathering Committee worker bees, are often told that there are areas where we have no input, the LRCP decides. When many friends do not know who or what this is, there is great possibility for misunderstanding. Many Friends focus just on their MM. Some participate in YM and others in FGC gatherings. There is no reason not to be thankful for a new opportunity to introduce a wider circle of Friends to LRCP so they can learn about the process that Friends are come to serve on this pivotal committee and the types of discernment which it makes. Geeta This is a difficult discernment and transparency is crucial. At 12:00 PM 10/4/2004 +0000, you wrote: >Kit Potter respectfully requests: > >1) Cease to speak authoritatively of that which we do not have in the full >story - let us not risk increase of harm or negativity > > >But how are we to have the full story unless someone who knows informs us. >Perry Treadwell has helpfully given us a chronology, but very little else. > >For what it's worth. > >Larry Ingle >Chattanooga Meeting "If you really want to do something for freedom and justice, then it is best if we do this without rage or hostility. With inner tranquility and an honest readiness, we can work hard for thirty, forty years" - The Dalai Lama XV Geeta Jyothi McGahey 300 Dharma Way Burnsville, NC 28714 828-675-5535 mcgahey at yancey.main.nc.us From jewen at bellsouth.net Sat Oct 2 12:01:31 2004 From: jewen at bellsouth.net (Julia Ewen) Date: Sat, 2 Oct 2004 12:01:31 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Re: [afmdiscussion] Quaker Sweat Lodge Reflections by Chuck Fager References: <6.1.2.0.2.20041002102648.02eaf7e0@mail.comcast.net> Message-ID: <002d01c4a899$15a9aac0$6101a8c0@amd1gig> Free's and Chuck's letters bring out several of my own concerns. I have in the past objected to appropriating the sweat lodge ritual for Quaker youth both because it is an out of context use of somebody else's sacred form without the cultural and spiritual life that grounds it, and because it is a ritual. As unprogrammed Friends we are agreed not to rely on rituals but on our own direct corporate and individual experience of the Spirit, as free as possible from outward forms. That said, I am heartened to see in Chuck's description that the practice has included the Celtic and other European uses of sweating as a spiritual discipline or tool and the Japanese. Participating in worship forms with members of other religious groups and being open to the Spirit moving in them is not in my view a bad thing. I was open to experiencing and learning from African spirituality while I was living there in the early 70's. But I still think that is quite different from coopting a form, distorting and diluting it, to make something quite different from the original and still calling it the same thing. I think it would be appropriate to call this method of spiritual gathering something other than a sweat lodge. (Presumably Scandanavian Americans will not have a problem if we called it something like a Sauna for Meditative Mysticism??--(grin). Or perhaps just call it a Spiritual Sweat, and leave out the word "lodge" which in North America is associated with Native American dwellings and gathering places) I think that Ms Lopez has a point. European Americans feel much freer to borrow and modify Native American culture's spirituality for our own purposes than we do for example Catholic or Jewish ritual. We would certainly understand if the Catholic diocese objected to our calling a nonCatholic ritual a mass, particularly if we purported to pass around the genuine blood and body of Jesus during same...There have been wars between Catholics and Protestants over this very thing...There are also Jews who doubtless feel offended when Gentiles purport to be celebrating Passover with a seder. However, I do agree with Chuck that the reaction to Ms Lopez's concern was both pricipitous and irrational and circumvented our Quaker process, which is there for good reason. So that we do not act out ill considered people pleasing notions and act from Truth. Three blind spots of FGC Quakers have been illuminated Ms Lopez's concern: One, the assumption that Quakers because we have been civil rights activists are never unaware of how our actions impact on members of other ethnicities; Two, our assumption that the only kind of ethnic or power based arrogance that merits our attention is racism against African Americans, and Three, that any accusation about offending people not of European descent is an automatic conviction and should be dealt with summarily. We are working on number One in our Meeting. Numbers Two and Three though have a strong grip on both Atlanta Meeting and SAYMA as well as the FGC Gathering. While, as I said, I have my doubts about the sweat lodge, at least under that name, I think we should apply Quaker process and not just toss it out summarily. The Spirit may show all of us something that will resolve the matter much more lovingly and creatively than we can see how at the moment. Julia Parker Ewen From judylumb at btl.net Tue Oct 5 15:52:27 2004 From: judylumb at btl.net (Judy Lumb) Date: Tue, 5 Oct 2004 13:52:27 -0600 Subject: [saymaListserv] laboring with the issue Message-ID: <010001c4ab14$d7fcefb0$83f51bce@toshibauser> Perry, in your chronology, I didn't see any laboring with the people who raised the issue. I know several young people, including my sons, who have been profoundly affected by the sweat lodge experience. I am very sorry that was not available to those young people attending the 2004 Gathering. I wonder if there might have been a way to work with those raising objections so as to keep the experience, albeit in some revised form or description that does not offend. Judy Lumb Producciones de la Hamaca PO Box 6, Caye Caulker, BELIZE, Central America Tel: 501-226-0197 Cell: 501-600-4710 email: judylumb at BTL.net Web Site: http://www.judylumb.com/ Producciones de la Hamaca is dedicated to: - Celebration and documentation of Belize's rich, diverse cultural heritage, - Protection and sustainable use of Belize's remarkable natural resources, - Inspired, creative expression of Belize's spiritual depth. From bonnipeg at charter.net Wed Oct 6 00:07:27 2004 From: bonnipeg at charter.net (Peggy Bonnington) Date: Tue, 5 Oct 2004 23:07:27 -0500 Subject: [saymaListserv] The Quaker Sweat Lodge Experience In-Reply-To: <20041004023410.E365318D93@kitenet.net> Message-ID: <011c01c4ab5a$014d5c70$864a7044@default> I can only hope that my ignorance and "simplicity" (simpleness) concerning this issue may serve others than merely myself... I am trying to follow along but with less than enough time to dwell on others' words, to ponder, reread and consider. My personal past history with the spirituality of sweats compels my interest in the topic, however ... I understand (though would argue in defense) the concept /concern about "straying" from Quaker tradition. I believe someone else has already mentioned the many other exploratory "paths" to spirituality our present-day Friends embrace/pursue besides the Sweat Lodge. And our tradition as Seekers certainly seems to support this exploration - thankfully so, in my opinion. I do not understand at all the accusation of "racism," however. While not wishing to inconvenience anyone by my slowness, I recognize that some Friends will probably be glad to expound further on particulars - maybe to explain to me ... Racism??? How indeed? Is it not possible that sometimes "bending" to the accusation of racism too quickly is a sort of form of racism in itself? Peggy From nc_stereoman at charter.net Sun Oct 17 12:15:02 2004 From: nc_stereoman at charter.net (Steve Livingston) Date: Sun, 17 Oct 2004 12:15:02 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Vermont Woman Practices Active Non-Violence Message-ID: <41726246.11962.D2DC0A@localhost> Dear Friends, I came across this inspirational article last week. It reports on a hearing that took place on 10/7. ====================== BENNINGTON, Vt. -- Rose Marie Jackowski, the Bennington war protester convicted of disorderly conduct last month, said in court Thursday what she has always wanted to say, just before being sentenced to appear before a board that could instruct her to perform community service. "I, and many other protesters that I know, would gladly spend the rest of our lives in jail, if only the United States would stop bombing children," she told the court. Friends, a relative and Jackowski herself appeared in Bennington District Court to offer emotional testimony both on Jackowski's character and the 13,000-plus civilians killed so far in the Iraq war, the latter a point that was not shared as liberally with the jury last month. But most surprising was an address by Jackowski's lawyer, Stephen Saltonstall, in which he told of her hard existence, including rape, a husband who abandoned her, poverty and harrowing court experiences related to all of the above. Judge David Suntag sentenced Jackowski to a short, suspended jail sentence and probation. He also directed her to appear before a reparative board of community members, which could instruct her to perform community service or write a letter of apology, among other things. "I encourage you to at least sit down with these people and talk to them," Suntag said. "They deserve that and so do you." Jackowski was sentenced on a conviction stemming from a March 20, 2003 protest. She and 11 others were arrested for blocking traffic while protesting the Iraq war in the center of Bennington. Because Jackowski's crime so directly affected the town of Bennington, Suntag said appearing before the board would be an appropriate punishment. "In this instance, the community itself was offended to some degree," he said. But Jackowski, whose sentence will not be executed until an appeal is carried out, expressed doubt that she would actually appear before the reparative board. Her conscience, she said, precludes her from it. "It's kind of a little subtle way of humiliation," she said after the sentencing. "Personally, I find the word 'reparative' very insulting," she told Suntag. There is a strong difference between the court making her do something and telling her to do something, she said, noting that she would have accepted a jail sentence. In fact, Saltonstall asked Suntag to impose just that - time served for being detained on the day of her protest, and if not, a few days in jail. Deputy State's Attorney Daniel McManus suggested 200 hours of community service. Jackowski, who said she helps the community on her own time, said it would be against her conscience to serve at the direction of the court. She spent most of her time in court talking not about herself, but about children killed in U.S. bombing campaigns on Iraq. It is an issue she has made efforts to push to the forefront of her legal battle, often unsuccessfully. Calling members of the Bush administration war criminals and holding a photo of the president, Jackowski reiterated that her conscience was the one thing she would not compromise. She spoke strongly and loudly throughout, not once wavering or losing her train of thought. "I pray for the day when factory workers join with farmers and police officers join with poets and judges join with veterans in protesting the illegal acts of our government," she said. "Now is a time in history when silence is the greatest of all crimes." Suntag listened, at times smiling, but said afterwards that the course of international events would not affect Jackowski's fate. "I am not foolish enough to try to engage in a debate with you," he told her before reading her sentence. What was at issue in court, he said, was the law, not the war in Iraq. McManus called the sentence "totally" appropriate. "She's not a bad woman. She wanted to make a message, but she chose the wrong way to do it," he said, noting that he, also, does not support the war. Two combat veterans now involved with the group Veterans for Peace testified that Jackowski, who served in the U.S. Air Force in the 1950s, was a patriot, standing up for her beliefs in the face of the law. "We know that serving our country demands more than saluting the flag," said Elliot Adams, a paratrooper who served in Vietnam and Korea. "It demands a hard look." "I ask that you recognize that my friend and fellow veteran acted, unlike most of us would, as a true patriot." When not testifying, Adams sat with his face pointed toward the floor, resting his forehead on his hands, struggling with the proceedings before him. Told later that her sentence would be on hold pending appeal, Jackowski smiled, telling Saltonstall "I love you." Supporters, about a dozen of whom attended the trial, broke into applause. Saltonstall represented Jackowski pro bono, meaning he did the work for free. The two lawyers came into conflict while making their sentencing requests to Suntag. Jackowski, McManus said, used her trial as a launching board for media coverage. He mentioned white supremacists as a group who also, under fairness of the law, should be tried not on what they believe, but on what they do. Saltonstall called the comparison "inappropriate" and accused McManus of playing up media coverage. "I didn't see him running away from the news cameras after the trial," he said. Later, McManus called Saltonstall's interpretation of his comments "troubling." Jackowski's daughter, Christine Jackowski, also testified, choking up, and eventually crying, before finishing a short statement to the court. Asking for a sentence of time served, Christine Jackowski spoke of her mother's "unwavering commitment to children," as well as her care to raise her daughter to understand the value of peace. "She is an example of bravery to us all," she said, breaking into tears. Jackowski is planning to take part at an anti-war protest in Manchester Sunday. The protest is organized by Veterans for Peace. "I do not have any illegal acts planned at the moment," she said, eliciting laughter from her supporters. From losborne at cn.edu Mon Oct 18 17:04:54 2004 From: losborne at cn.edu (Larry Osborne) Date: Mon, 18 Oct 2004 17:04:54 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Web-based peace studies certificate program available Message-ID: ________________________________ From: jimsandy foster [mailto:jimsandyfoster at yahoo.com] Sent: Fri 10/15/2004 1:37 PM Subject: WCIAS FALL 2004 PROGRAM BULLETIN--PLEASE FORWARD Please forward the attached Fall 2004 WCIAS Program Bulletin to other peacebuilders who may have an interest in graduate level education. Thanks. 'Han Lheem Vice President for Academic Affairs WCIAS ________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail - CNET Editors' Choice 2004. Tell them what you think. -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 2-WCIAS, PROGRAM BULLETIN, FALL 2004.doc Type: application/msword Size: 153088 bytes Desc: 2-WCIAS, PROGRAM BULLETIN, FALL 2004.doc URL: From freepolazzo at comcast.net Thu Oct 21 11:29:38 2004 From: freepolazzo at comcast.net (free polazzo) Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 11:29:38 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Alternet: The Unknown Soldiers Message-ID: <6.1.2.0.2.20041021112601.030e0f48@mail.comcast.net> Hi, A very important story that you won't hear in the main stream press. There is a reason this story is not being covered. It raises basic questions about why we are at war in Iraq. Since our faith prevents us from using violence as a solution to problems we face, we need to let others know more about the truth about war. Let's not wait for another "MASH" TV series to show our friends and family and co-workers how horrific war is. This is just but one reason why "War is Not the Answer"! Blessings, Free ------------------------------------- The Unknown Soldiers http://www.alternet.org/story/20254 The reality of the suffering in Iraq has been rendered invisible by media hype and partisan battle. One doctor, who has treated some of the thousands, speaks about the war wounded. ------------------------------------- From jhminshall at comcast.net Thu Oct 21 12:19:19 2004 From: jhminshall at comcast.net (Janet Minshall) Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 12:19:19 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] [earthcare] Fw: Earth Policy News - Path to Oil Independence, relevant to Friends widely expressed social and spiritual concerns Message-ID: Dear Friends, I thought many of you might be interested in these messages. Any discussion would be most welcome. Janet Minshall Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 12:07:50 -0400 To: earthcare at yahoogroups.com From: Janet Minshall Subject: Re: [earthcare] Fw: Earth Policy News - Path to Oil Independence Cc: , Bcc: X-Attachments: Dear Allan Connor and Earthcare Friends, Thanks so much for forwarding the message (below) from Lester Brown on oil independence. I also read his article, an edited text of his FGC plenary talk, in the recent environmental issue of Friends Journal. I am most gratified that a leader in the environmental movement is publishing widely a speech and articles suggesting the further development and use of hybrid gas/electric engines in vehicles and wind energy in general to meet the energy needs of the world and thus make cleaner the atmosphere of the Earth. One other issue about which I am exceedingly concerned is the availability of clean water around the world. It is one which can be solved, I believe, with either wind or solar power used to desalinate the ocean water. Doing so would not in any way harm the environment and could be tied into water systems already in place. It would require a significant expenditure on connections from ocean desalination sites to city and town water supplies around the world. Even so, it would be considerably less expensive over time than water supplied by the major interests which have been buying up global water rights since the 1970s. Is there work in progress in this area? Is anyone making the effort to design and build such wind or solar-powered desalination equipment? Have such efforts been supported by significant funding? A response from anyone who is knowledgeable on this matter would be most appreciated. Janet Minshall ----- Original Message ----- From: Viviana Jimenez To: alconn at provide.net Sent: Wednesday, October 13, 2004 10:07 AM Subject: Earth Policy News - Path to Oil Independence Eco-Economy Update 2004-12 For Immediate Release Copyright Earth Policy Institute 2004 October 13, 2004 THE SHORT PATH TO OIL INDEPENDENCE Gas-Electric Hybrids and Wind Power Offer Winning Combination http://www.earth-policy.org/Updates/Update43.htm Lester R. Brown With the price of oil above $50 a barrel, with political instability in the Middle East on the rise, and with little slack in the world oil economy, we need a new energy strategy. Fortunately, the outline of a new strategy is emerging with two new technologies. These technologies--gas-electric hybrid engines and advanced-design wind turbines--offer a way to wean ourselves from imported oil. If over the next decade we convert the U.S. automobile fleet to gas-electric hybrids with the efficiency of today's Toyota Prius, we could cut our gasoline use in half. No change in the number of vehicles, no change in miles driven--just doing it more efficiently. There are now three gas-electric hybrid car models on the market: the Toyota Prius, the Honda Insight, and the hybrid version of the Honda Civic. The Prius--a midsize car on the cutting-edge of automotive technology--gets an astounding 55 mpg in combined city/highway driving. No wonder there are lists of eager buyers willing to wait six months for delivery. Ford has just released a hybrid model of its Escape SUV. Honda is about to release a hybrid version of its popular Accord sedan. General Motors will offer hybrid versions of several of its cars beginning with the Saturn VUE in 2006, followed by the Chevy Tahoe and Chevy Malibu. Beyond this, GM has delivered 235 hybrid-powered buses to Seattle with the potential to reduce gasoline use there by up to 60 percent. Other cities slated to get hybrid buses are Philadelphia, Houston, and Portland. Hybrid engines are catching on. With gas-electric hybrid cars now on the market, the stage is set for the second step to reduce oil dependence, the use of wind-generated electricity to power automobiles. If we add to the gas-electric hybrid a plug-in capacity and a second battery to increase its electricity storage capacity, motorists could then do their commuting, shopping, and other short-distance travel largely with electricity, saving gasoline for the occasional long trip. This could lop another 20 percent off gasoline use in addition to the initial 50 percent cut from shifting to gas-electric hybrids, for a total reduction in gasoline use of 70 percent. The plug-in capacity gives access to the country's vast, largely untapped, wind resources. In 1991, the U.S. Department of Energy published a National Wind Resource Inventory in which it pointed out that three of our 50 states--Kansas, North Dakota and Texas--have enough harnessable wind energy to satisfy national electricity needs. Many were astonished by this news since wind power was widely considered a marginal energy source. Yet in retrospect, we know that this was a gross underestimate simply because it was based on the wind turbine technologies of 1991. Advances in design since then enable turbines to operate at lower wind speeds, to convert wind into electricity more efficiently, and to harness a much larger wind regime. The average turbine in 1991 was roughly 120 feet tall, whereas new ones are 300 feet tall--the height of a 30-story building. Not only does this more than double the harvestable wind regime, but winds at the higher elevation are stronger and more reliable. In Europe, which has emerged as the world leader in developing wind energy, wind farms now satisfy the residential electricity needs of 40 million consumers. Last year, the European Wind Energy Association projected that by 2020 this energy source would provide electricity for 195 million people--half the population of Western Europe. A 2004 assessment of Europe's offshore potential by the Garrad Hassan consulting group concluded that if European governments move vigorously to develop this potential, wind could supply all of the region's residential electricity by 2020. Wind power is growing fast because it is cheap, abundant, inexhaustible, widely distributed, clean, and climate-benign. No other energy source has all of these attributes. The cost of wind-generated electricity has been in free fall over the last two decades. The early wind farms in California, where the modern wind industry was born in the early 1980s, generated electricity at a cost of 38¢ per kilowatt-hour. Now many wind farms are producing power at 4¢ per kilowatt-hour, and some long-term supply contracts have recently been signed at 3¢ per kilowatt-hour. And the price is still falling. (For data see http://www.earth-policy.org/Updates/Update43_data.htm. ) Unlike the widely discussed fuel cell/hydrogen transportation model, the gas-electric hybrid/wind model does not require a costly new infrastructure. The network of gasoline service stations is already in place. So, too, is the electricity grid needed to link wind farms to the storage batteries in cars. For this new model to work most efficiently, we would need a strong integrated national grid. Fortunately, the need for modernizing our antiquated set of regional grids, replacing them with a strong national grid, is now widely recognized--especially after the blackout that darkened the U.S. northeast in 2003. One of the few weaknesses of wind energy--its irregularity--is largely offset with the use of plug-in gas-electric hybrids, as the batteries in these vehicles become a part of the storage system for wind energy. Beyond this, there is always the tank of gasoline as a backup. Some 22 states now have commercial-scale wind farms feeding electricity into the grid. Although there is occasionally a NIMBY problem, the PIIMBY response ("put it in my backyard") is much more pervasive. This is not surprising, since a single turbine can easily produce $100,000 worth of electricity in a year. The competition among farmers in Iowa or ranchers in Colorado for wind farms is intense. Farmers, with no investment on their part, typically receive $3,000 a year in royalties from the local utility for siting a single wind turbine, which occupies a quarter-acre of land. This quarter-acre in corn country would produce 40 bushels of corn worth $120 or in ranch country perhaps $10 worth of beef. Communities in rural America desperately want the additional revenue from wind farms and the jobs they bring. In addition, money spent on electricity generated from wind farms stays in the community, creating a ripple effect throughout the local economy. Within a matter of years, thousands of ranchers could be earning far more from electricity sales than from cattle sales. Moving to the highly efficient gas-electric hybrids with a plug-in capacity, combined with the construction of thousands of wind farms across the country feeding electricity into a national grid, will give us the energy security that has eluded us for three decades. It will also rejuvenate farm and ranch communities and shrink the U.S. balance-of-trade deficit. Even more important, it will dramatically cut carbon emissions, making the United States a model that other countries can emulate. # # # Additional data and information sources at www.earth-policy.org or contact jlarsen(at)earth-policy.org For reprint permission contact rjkauffman(at)earth-policy.org If you find this Update useful, please feel free to share it with friends and colleagues, to post on your website, or to distribute on your listserv. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From nc_stereoman at charter.net Thu Oct 21 13:26:34 2004 From: nc_stereoman at charter.net (Steve Livingston) Date: Thu, 21 Oct 2004 13:26:34 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Friend Willoughby Goes to Jail Message-ID: <4177B90A.1353.1434737@localhost> Dear Friends, Lillian Willoughby was featured in the May 2004 issue of Friends Journal. If you haven't read this background story, it's worth your time to acquaint yourself with a steadfast and faithful practitioner of the Peace Testimony. On March 20, 2003, she and several other persons were arrested in Philadelphia for obstructing the entrance to the Federal Courthouse. The following article was written by Joseph A. Slobodzian and distributed by Knight Ridder Newspapers. ================= Bundled in two sweaters and a jacket against the biting wind as she sat in her wheelchair, 89-year-old Quaker antiwar activist Lillian Willoughby went to jail. "I never dreamed I'd get this kind of send-off," said Willoughby, of Deptford, as she sat this morning in front of the U.S. courthouse in downtown Philadelphia surrounded by about 50 banner-holding members of the Brandywine Peace Community. The gathering was both a peace vigil and show of support for Willoughby and five other demonstrators as they reported to the Federal Detention Center to begin seven-day sentences for blocking the courthouse entrance on March 20, 2003, the day after the Iraq war began. "It will be worth it if it gets the message out and people start working for peace," Willoughby said. Willoughby and the five other demonstrators - Michael Brix, 28; Marion Brown, 58; and Jason Fultz, 29, all of Philadelphia; and Cassandra Heino-Haw, 22, and husband Christopher Haw, 23, of Camden, N.J. - were among 107 arrested March 20, 2003. The six were among the last to plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge and elect seven days in jail rather than a $25 fine. But the presence of Willoughby, just three months shy of her 90th birthday, and husband George - active members of the peace movement for more than 60 years - brought an element of star quality to the event. It was Willoughby's first arrest as a peace activist, and at times she seemed almost embarrassed by the attention. "I have no worries whatsoever," said George Willoughby, who has been arrested many times in nonviolent demonstrations and was honored two years ago in India for promoting the precepts of Mohandas K. Gandhi. "She knows how to take care of herself and she is doing this for the right reason." Also present at the vigil's start, in full dress uniform, was Marine Lance Cpl. Elliot Ruiz, recently returned home to North Philadelphia from Iraq. Though he chose not to speak publicly, Ruiz quietly thanked several demonstrators for promoting peace. The group remained in front of the courthouse, on Market Street between Sixth and Seventh Streets, for 75 cold minutes handing leaflets to tourists and passersby and ignoring several truck-drivers who blew their airhorns in counter-protest, one of whom added an obscene gesture. There were brief speeches by some of the six, including Brown, who railed at the government for starting the war the day her grandchild was born, and Brix, who pointed out his pregnant wife. "I go to jail for my unborn boy because I don't want him, 25 years from now, to have to do the same thing I'm doing," Brix added. Then it was time for the brief walk one block north on Seventh to Arch Street and the Federal Detention Center, where they will spend the next six days. Detention Center spokesman Tony Alexander said staff were not making special accommodations for Willoughby: "We are a completely handicapped-accessible facility. We're well equipped to meet her needs." With some difficulty, Willoughby was wheeled through the front doors and then transferred to a prison wheelchair. Her five associates joined her inside to a burst of applause and a chant from those outside: "We love you, Lillian!" From freepolazzo at comcast.net Fri Oct 22 10:23:12 2004 From: freepolazzo at comcast.net (free polazzo) Date: Fri, 22 Oct 2004 10:23:12 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] A look at how hard it is to believe the truth about something we were wrong about Message-ID: <6.1.2.0.2.20041022101601.02fa90b0@mail.comcast.net> Dear Friends, Since we, Friends, value Truth so highly that we make Integrity one of the key foundations for our faith and practice, this article is refreshing in that is deals with the dilemma of "why are people still thinking Iraq had WMD or WMD programs or Ties to Al Quida" when we invaded, when all "official" sources say that there were none. This article from Alternet.com does a good job of explaining why "facts" don't often have anything to do with what people see as the truth. Free >------------------------------------- >The World According to a Bush Voter >http://www.alternet.org/story/20263 > >A new survey reveals that Bush supporters choose to keep faith in their >leader than face reality. >------------------------------------- From nc_stereoman at charter.net Fri Oct 22 17:46:26 2004 From: nc_stereoman at charter.net (Steve Livingston) Date: Fri, 22 Oct 2004 17:46:26 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] A look at how hard it is to believe the truth about something we were wrong about In-Reply-To: <6.1.2.0.2.20041022101601.02fa90b0@mail.comcast.net> Message-ID: <41794772.11711.21EF2B0@localhost> Dear Free and other Friends, I saw the original report this morning. It is very troubling, especially when viewed in the context of the very lengthy and mercilessly revealing study of our Commander in Chief which appeared in the New York Times weekly magazine.The article, entitled "No Doubt" and written by Ron Susskind, can be viewed on the web at http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/17/magazine/17BUSH.html?page wanted=1 A glimpse into how many of our fellow citizens are enticed into accepting what they are offered by the White House, from Susskind's "No Doubt": ============== In the summer of 2002, after I had written an article in Esquire that the White House didn't like about Bush's former communications director, Karen Hughes, I had a meeting with a senior adviser to Bush. He expressed the White House's displeasure, and then he told me something that at the time I didn't fully comprehend -- but which I now believe gets to the very heart of the Bush presidency. The aide said that guys like me were "in what we call the reality- based community," which he defined as people who "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality." I nodded and murmured something about enlightenment principles and empiricism. He cut me off. "That's not the way the world really works anymore," he continued. "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do." ============== I hope that once this election is over, we Friends will find the time and energy to deeply listen to our fellow citizens who choose this Imperial Reality over the Empirical one, so that we may fully understand why they make this choice. No matter who wins, our national psyche has been critically wounded, and recovery seems unlikely unless we are able to understand the injury. Steve -- Steve Livingston nc_stereoman at charter.net -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From freepolazzo at comcast.net Mon Oct 25 10:26:03 2004 From: freepolazzo at comcast.net (free polazzo) Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 10:26:03 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] News on Corporate Social Responsibility Message-ID: <6.1.2.0.2.20041025100938.03010138@POP.Business.Earthlink.net> Hello Friends, I hope and pray that Friends don't need to make "enemies" or "bad guys" of people who work in corporations in order to fell like they are "doing good". To help that prayer along, I submit the current copy of the Net Impact "Corporate Social Responsibility Weekly". Read about how corporations around the world are working to improve our environment. The people who work at these places want alot of the same things that Friends want. We can create a more peaceful and healthy world by learning more about those businesses and, dare I say it, even starting or joining existing businesses in order to influence who goods and services are distributed. Did you notice how many of the corporations and organizations discussed in the newsletter are overseas? Globalism also works to bring ideas to the USA that can help with solutions to problems that Friends have identified. Free >Date: Sun, 24 Oct 2004 19:04:08 -0700 (PDT) >From: Net Impact >Reply-To: Net Impact > >To: >Subject: CSR Weekly #86 > >5f471251.jpg > > > >October 25 th , 2004 > > > > > >No. 86 > > > > > >Feature Article > > > >Corporate Responsibility in Business Schools >This article featured in Australia’s e-journal of social and political >debate, On Line Opinion, illustrates the growing importance of corporate >responsibility engagement and education in business schools. The article >highlights the Australian Graduate School of Management and mentions >Columbia, Duke, Harvard, London Business School, Stanford and Net Impact. > >“Business schools are no longer considering whether to include business >ethics and social responsibility in their curricula,” the article states. >“It’s a must." The article continues,“our future business leaders need the >skill to accurately assess the social context of their business decisions. >They also need to be able to develop strategies addressing the social >context." >Read >the full article here. > > >Have you recently changed your email, address, or employer? Please update >your member profile at >http://www.net-impact.org/index.php?id=437. >5f471270.jpg > >»California Wine Industry Issues First Industry-Wide Sustainability >Report » BT Signs Three-Year Renewable Energy Contracts To Supply Most of >Its U.K. Operations »New U.S. Sentencing Guidelines on Corporate >Governance Expected To Take Effect in November » U.S. Health Insurance >Provider To Cover Obesity Prevention and Treatment »Wal-Mart and Tyson >Foods Join U.S. EPA Transport Initiative To Cut Fuel Use, Emissions » >Abercrombie & Fitch Joins PETA’s Boycott of Australian Merino Wool > > >Top Stories > > > > > >CSR Reporting > > > >California Wine Industry Issues First Industry-Wide Sustainability Report >The California Sustainable Winegrowing Alliance – a group of vintners and >growers that promotes sustainable practices in the state’s wine industry – >has released its first sustainability report that provides a baseline for >13 areas of sustainable winegrowing practices. Each area will serve as a >benchmark for California vintners and growers looking to improve their >sustainable practices. According to GreenBiz, this is the first time an >entire industry has publicly reported sustainable practices using a common >assessment tool. The report reviews the practices of facilities >responsible for about 40 percent of California’s wine production and >nearly 25 percent of the state’s total wine acreage, and indicates that >many wine producers have already undertaken sustainable practices for >water conservation, pesticide risk reduction and soil management. >According to the report, areas needing improvement include energy >conservation, solid waste handling and environmentally preferred >purchasing. The Modesto Bee notes that the report also reviews the >industry’s human resources practices and relations with its community and >neighbors. The executive summary of the California Wine Community’s >Sustainability Report is available at >www.wineinstitute.org/communications/Executive >Summary.pdf. >-- BSR News Monitor summary of articles from GreenBiz, October 11, 2004, >www.greenbiz.com >and The Modesto Bee, October 9, 2004, >www.modbee.com > > > >Green Power > > > >BT Signs Three-Year Renewable Energy Contracts To Supply Most of Its U.K. >Operations >U.K. telecommunications firm BT Group plc announced that it had made the >largest purchase of “green” energy in the world, which it will use to >power almost all of its U.K. operations in an effort to reduce the firm’s >reliance on fossil fuels. According to Reuters , BT has entered into a >three-year contract with British Gas (owned by U.K. energy firm Centrica >plc) and Npower (owned by German utility RWE AG) to supply the firm with >renewable energy – including solar, wind, wave and hydroelectricity. The >renewable energy will be used to power 6,500 BT telephone exchanges, >offices, and satellite stations. BT says its green energy plan will lower >its carbon dioxide (CO 2) emissions by 324,000 tons annually – equivalent >to that released by 100,000 cars or 50,000 homes. AFX News reports that >since 1991, BT has cut its CO2 emissions from its energy use by 80 percent >at an average rate of about 1.5 million tons per year. >-- BSR News Monitor Summary of articles from Reuters , October 14, 2004, >ww.reuters.com and AFX News, October 14, 2004, >www.afxnews.com > > >Governance Standards > > > >New U.S. Sentencing Guidelines on Corporate Governance Expected To Take >Effect in November >The updated U.S. Federal Sentencing Guidelines – which expand and specify >federal expectations of corporate governance and ethics programs – are >scheduled to take effect on November 1, 2004 with the aim of deterring and >detecting criminal conduct in the workplace. The guidelines clarify that >companies are required to involve senior executives in all compliance >monitoring, develop incentives to promote compliance programs and evaluate >ethics programs for effectiveness. Companies that fully implement such >measures could face reduced punishment should a firm or executive be >convicted for criminal conduct. According to American Lawyer, the new >guidelines are likely to become the “de facto industry standards with >serious consequences for those who ignore them.” Nick Akerman, a partner >at the U.S. law firm Dorsey & Whitney LLP says that failure to implement >the guidelines could also result in civil liability lawsuits from >shareholders. The guidelines still need final approval by the U.S. Supreme >Court, but Barry Boss, a partner at the U.S. law firm Cozen O’Connor, >believes that “regardless of what happens, the vigor of the prosecutions >will continue, and these criteria will serve as the gold standard.” >-- BSR News Monitor summary of article from American Lawyer, October 1, >2004, >www.americanlawyer.com > > >Product Development > > > >U.S. Health Insurance Provider To Cover Obesity Prevention and Treatment >In an effort to address the rising health risk and costs of obesity, U.S. >health insurance provider Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina has >announced that it will cover the prevention and treatment of obesity under >a new plan called Health Lifestyle Choices. According to company president >and chief executive Robert Greczyn, “[Obesity] is the public health crisis >of the 21 st century… We will treat [it] as a primary condition.” The firm >says that half of its 3 million members are overweight or obese, costing >the insurer more than $83 billion in 2003 from related healthcare >problems, such as high blood pressure and diabetes. According to The >Washington Post , about 1.1 million members will have access to the new >plan that will cover four annual doctor visits to identify and treat any >weight problems, prescriptions for two weight-loss drugs (Meridia and >Xenical), nutritional counseling and stomach stapling surgery, if >necessary. While the insurer does not know how much the new plan will >cost, it believes the initial costs will be offset by the prevented >weight-related health problems and costs. Helen Darling, president of the >U.S. business coalition National Business Group on Health, says, “Other >insurance companies and health plans and employers will be watching this >very closely.” >-- BSR News Monitor summary of article from The Washington Post, October >13, 2004, p. A2 > > >Climate Change > > > >Wal-Mart and Tyson Foods Join U.S. EPA Transport Initiative To Cut Fuel >Use, Emissions >U.S. meat processing firm Tyson Foods, Inc. and U.S. retail chain Wal-Mart >Stores, Inc. have joined a voluntary initiative of the U.S. Environmental >Protection Agency (EPA) – called the SmartWay Transport Partnership >program – which seeks to reduce fuel consumption, costs and emissions from >freight transportation. The SmartWay program has gained the participation >of 84 firms since its introduction in February 2004. EPA director Mike >Leavitt says, “We’re looking for companies just like Wal-Mart and Tyson. >These are among the largest trucking fleets in the country.” The Arkansas >Democrat Gazette reports that Tyson and Wal-Mart are currently estimating >their emissions baseline and will set their reduction targets within six >months. The EPA provides participating firms with software to calculate >their emission levels and then helps them develop reduction strategies. >Through the initiative, the EPA hopes to demonstrate the benefits of >voluntary pollution controls, as opposed to regulations, and seeks to >reduce carbon dioxide emissions by up to 72 million tons annually by 2012. >The Associated Press reports that according to the EPA, truck idling alone >causes 11 million tons of carbon dioxide and 180,000 tons of nitrogen >oxide emissions annually. >-- BSR News Monitor summary of articles from The Arkansas Democrat >Gazette, October 5, 2004, www.ardemgaz.com and The Associated Press, >October 4, 2004, >www.ap.org > > > >Treatment of Animals > > > >Abercrombie & Fitch Joins PETA’s Boycott of Australian Merino Wool >Just-Style reports that U.S. apparel firm Abercrombie & Fitch Co. is the >first firm to join a global boycott of Australian merino wool that was >launched by the international animals rights group, People for the Ethical >Treatment of Animals (PETA). According to PETA, Australian lambs are >subjected to a surgical operation called “mulesing” without the use of >painkillers. The operation cuts excess skin from the animals’ hindquarters >to prevent infection from flies. PETA also claims the lambs are not >properly cared for when they are in transit to slaughterhouses. According >to The Columbus Dispatch, merino wool accounts for 85 percent of wool >production in Australia – which is the largest wool producer and exporter >in the world. Abercrombie spokesperson Thomas Lennox says there are other >sources of wool available, adding that the company will not knowingly sell >products containing Australian merino wool until conditions improve for >the animals. Lennox notes that Abercrombie considers its decision “a good >thing for our market and our shareholders.” According to PETA campaign >coordinator Matt Rice, Abercrombie has “set a new standard by pledging not >to sell Australian merino wool. We hope other retailers follow suit.” >Comments from Australian wool producers were not included in the articles. >-- BSR News Monitor summary of articles from The Columbus Dispatch, >October 14, 2004, >www.columbusdispatch.com >and Just-Style, October 14, 2004, >www.just-style.com > > >Back to Top >5f4712af.jpg > > >Net Impact CSR Weekly is an electronic newsletter excerpted from the BSR >News Monitor published weekly by Business for Social Responsibility (BSR). >Contact Net Impact at 111 Sutter Street, 12th Floor, San Francisco, >California 94104 USA, Phone: +1 415.984.3300, Fax: +1 415.984.3301. Visit >Net Impact's website at >www.net-impact.org >for information on the features and benefits of membership in Net Impact. >BSR News Monitor is an electronic newsletter published weekly by Business >for Social Responsibility (BSR), a global nonprofit partner for companies >pursuing commercial success in ways that respect ethical values, people, >communities and the environment. Contact BSR at 111 Sutter Street, 12th >Floor, San Francisco, California 94104 USA, Phone: +1 415.984.3200, Fax: >+1 415.984.3201. Visit BSR's website at >www.bsr.org >for a broad range of information on corporate social responsibility, as >well as information on the features and benefits of membership in BSR. >COPYRIGHT >Copyright © 2004 by Business for Social Responsibility. All content in >News Monitor is original and copyrighted material. Reproduction or >distribution in full or in part by any means, electronic or mechanical, is >prohibited. >DISTRIBUTION >Individuals and organizations receiving the Net Impact CSR Weekly may not >distribute the newsletter to other individuals or organizations. Net >Impact members (except "limited" members) may receive a complimentary >subscription to Net Impact CSR Weekly by updating their member profile at >www.net-impact.org. > >SUBSCRIPTION >Subscription to the Net Impact CSR Weekly is complimentary for members of >Net Impact (except "limited" members). To subscribe, please join Net >Impact at www.net-impact.org To unsubscribe, please update your member >profile on the Net Impact website at >www.net-impact.org. >CORRESPONDENCE >Please visit >www.net-impact.org >for general comments or questions. >EDITORIAL >Send corrections to monitoreditor at bsr.org. >BSR does not accept submissions for the News Monitor and does not use >press releases as source material. BSR does not provide back issues of the >News Monitor. >SOURCES & CITATION >BSR makes every effort to accurately cite news sources. The summaries >excerpted from the News Monitor are meant to reflect the content and tone >of news stories cited with no additional analysis provided by BSR. BSR >cannot provide the full text of articles summarized in the News Monitor >because of copyright restrictions but can provide publication information. >Direct URLs are referenced after article summaries when the article was >initially found online and when direct links are available. > > >You are subscribed to this list as free at friendlysystems.com. To >unsubscribe, please login to the Net Impact website and update the >subscription options in your member profile. >or Click >here >to unsubscribe, or send email to >unsubscribe.12191.11323782.8938262353495974278-free_friendlysystems.com at en.groundspring.org. > >111 Sutter Street >12th Floor >San Francisco, California 94104 >United States >tag. >[] > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 5f471251.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 48553 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 5f471270.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 5893 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 5f4712af.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 7911 bytes Desc: not available URL: From Rblissfam at cs.com Mon Oct 25 12:31:28 2004 From: Rblissfam at cs.com (Rblissfam at cs.com) Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 12:31:28 EDT Subject: [saymaListserv] News on Corporate Social Responsibility Message-ID: <13d.4643420.2eae8460@cs.com> Don't believe everything you read. Especially upset with Walmart. Sure they and Tyson are trying to cut back on fuel usage.....saving money is important to companies like them who are forcing local producers and local businesssmen out of business. Read between the lines. Also insurance companies should be concerned about obesity. They are first of all interested in their bottom line....healthy people cost them less. Just a couple examples. Rachael -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From freepolazzo at comcast.net Mon Oct 25 15:43:27 2004 From: freepolazzo at comcast.net (free polazzo) Date: Mon, 25 Oct 2004 15:43:27 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] Re sending of Corporate Social Responsibility Newsletter Message-ID: <6.1.2.0.2.20041025153854.03165278@mail.comcast.net> Hi, Several people could not read the previous message, so it is being resent in another format. Thanks Free >Date: Sun, 24 Oct 2004 19:04:08 -0700 (PDT) >From: Net Impact >Reply-To: Net Impact > >To: >Subject: CSR Weekly #86 > >6052aedd1.jpg > > > > >October 25 th , 2004 > > > > > >No. 86 > > > > >Feature Article > > > >Corporate Responsibility in Business Schools >This article featured in Australia’s e-journal of social and political >debate, On Line Opinion, illustrates the growing importance of corporate >responsibility engagement and education in business schools. The article >highlights the Australian Graduate School of Management and mentions >Columbia, Duke, Harvard, London Business School, Stanford and Net Impact. > >“Business schools are no longer considering whether to include business >ethics and social responsibility in their curricula,” the article states. >“It’s a must." The article continues,“our future business leaders need the >skill to accurately assess the social context of their business decisions. >They also need to be able to develop strategies addressing the social >context." >Read >the full article here. > > >Have you recently changed your email, address, or employer? Please update >your member profile at >http://www.net-impact.org/index.php?id=437. >60690d3e.jpg > >»California Wine Industry Issues First Industry-Wide >Sustainability Report » BT Signs Three-Year Renewable >Energy Contracts To Supply Most of Its U.K. Operations >»New U.S. Sentencing Guidelines on Corporate Governance >Expected To Take Effect in November » U.S. Health >Insurance Provider To Cover Obesity Prevention and Treatment >»Wal-Mart and Tyson Foods Join U.S. EPA Transport >Initiative To Cut Fuel Use, Emissions » >Abercrombie & Fitch Joins PETA’s Boycott of Australian >Merino Wool > > > >Top Stories > > > > >CSR Reporting > > > > >California Wine Industry Issues First Industry-Wide Sustainability Report >The California Sustainable Winegrowing Alliance – a group of vintners and >growers that promotes sustainable practices in the state’s wine industry – >has released its first sustainability report that provides a baseline for >13 areas of sustainable winegrowing practices. Each area will serve as a >benchmark for California vintners and growers looking to improve their >sustainable practices. According to GreenBiz, this is the first time an >entire industry has publicly reported sustainable practices using a common >assessment tool. The report reviews the practices of facilities >responsible for about 40 percent of California’s wine production and >nearly 25 percent of the state’s total wine acreage, and indicates that >many wine producers have already undertaken sustainable practices for >water conservation, pesticide risk reduction and soil management. >According to the report, areas needing improvement include energy >conservation, solid waste handling and environmentally preferred >purchasing. The Modesto Bee notes that the report also reviews the >industry’s human resources practices and relations with its community and >neighbors. The executive summary of the California Wine Community’s >Sustainability Report is available at >www.wineinstitute.org/communications/Executive >Summary.pdf. >-- BSR News Monitor summary of articles from GreenBiz, October 11, 2004, >www.greenbiz.com >and The Modesto Bee, October 9, 2004, >www.modbee.com > > > > >Green Power > > > >BT Signs Three-Year Renewable Energy Contracts To Supply Most of Its U.K. >Operations >U.K. telecommunications firm BT Group plc announced that it had made the >largest purchase of “green” energy in the world, which it will use to >power almost all of its U.K. operations in an effort to reduce the firm’s >reliance on fossil fuels. According to Reuters , BT has entered into a >three-year contract with British Gas (owned by U.K. energy firm Centrica >plc) and Npower (owned by German utility RWE AG) to supply the firm with >renewable energy – including solar, wind, wave and hydroelectricity. The >renewable energy will be used to power 6,500 BT telephone exchanges, >offices, and satellite stations. BT says its green energy plan will lower >its carbon dioxide (CO 2) emissions by 324,000 tons annually – equivalent >to that released by 100,000 cars or 50,000 homes. AFX News reports that >since 1991, BT has cut its CO2 emissions from its energy use by 80 percent >at an average rate of about 1.5 million tons per year. >-- BSR News Monitor Summary of articles from Reuters , October 14, 2004, >ww.reuters.com and AFX News, October 14, 2004, >www.afxnews.com > > > >Governance Standards > > > >New U.S. Sentencing Guidelines on Corporate Governance Expected To Take >Effect in November >The updated U.S. Federal Sentencing Guidelines – which expand and specify >federal expectations of corporate governance and ethics programs – are >scheduled to take effect on November 1, 2004 with the aim of deterring and >detecting criminal conduct in the workplace. The guidelines clarify that >companies are required to involve senior executives in all compliance >monitoring, develop incentives to promote compliance programs and evaluate >ethics programs for effectiveness. Companies that fully implement such >measures could face reduced punishment should a firm or executive be >convicted for criminal conduct. According to American Lawyer, the new >guidelines are likely to become the “de facto industry standards with >serious consequences for those who ignore them.” Nick Akerman, a partner >at the U.S. law firm Dorsey & Whitney LLP says that failure to implement >the guidelines could also result in civil liability lawsuits from >shareholders. The guidelines still need final approval by the U.S. Supreme >Court, but Barry Boss, a partner at the U.S. law firm Cozen O’Connor, >believes that “regardless of what happens, the vigor of the prosecutions >will continue, and these criteria will serve as the gold standard.” >-- BSR News Monitor summary of article from American Lawyer, October 1, >2004, >www.americanlawyer.com > > > >Product Development > > > >U.S. Health Insurance Provider To Cover Obesity Prevention and Treatment >In an effort to address the rising health risk and costs of obesity, U.S. >health insurance provider Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina has >announced that it will cover the prevention and treatment of obesity under >a new plan called Health Lifestyle Choices. According to company president >and chief executive Robert Greczyn, “[Obesity] is the public health crisis >of the 21 st century… We will treat [it] as a primary condition.” The firm >says that half of its 3 million members are overweight or obese, costing >the insurer more than $83 billion in 2003 from related healthcare >problems, such as high blood pressure and diabetes. According to The >Washington Post , about 1.1 million members will have access to the new >plan that will cover four annual doctor visits to identify and treat any >weight problems, prescriptions for two weight-loss drugs (Meridia and >Xenical), nutritional counseling and stomach stapling surgery, if >necessary. While the insurer does not know how much the new plan will >cost, it believes the initial costs will be offset by the prevented >weight-related health problems and costs. Helen Darling, president of the >U.S. business coalition National Business Group on Health, says, “Other >insurance companies and health plans and employers will be watching this >very closely.” >-- BSR News Monitor summary of article from The Washington Post, October >13, 2004, p. A2 > > > >Climate Change > > > >Wal-Mart and Tyson Foods Join U.S. EPA Transport Initiative To Cut Fuel >Use, Emissions >U.S. meat processing firm Tyson Foods, Inc. and U.S. retail chain Wal-Mart >Stores, Inc. have joined a voluntary initiative of the U.S. Environmental >Protection Agency (EPA) – called the SmartWay Transport Partnership >program – which seeks to reduce fuel consumption, costs and emissions from >freight transportation. The SmartWay program has gained the participation >of 84 firms since its introduction in February 2004. EPA director Mike >Leavitt says, “We’re looking for companies just like Wal-Mart and Tyson. >These are among the largest trucking fleets in the country.” The Arkansas >Democrat Gazette reports that Tyson and Wal-Mart are currently estimating >their emissions baseline and will set their reduction targets within six >months. The EPA provides participating firms with software to calculate >their emission levels and then helps them develop reduction strategies. >Through the initiative, the EPA hopes to demonstrate the benefits of >voluntary pollution controls, as opposed to regulations, and seeks to >reduce carbon dioxide emissions by up to 72 million tons annually by 2012. >The Associated Press reports that according to the EPA, truck idling alone >causes 11 million tons of carbon dioxide and 180,000 tons of nitrogen >oxide emissions annually. >-- BSR News Monitor summary of articles from The Arkansas Democrat >Gazette, October 5, 2004, www.ardemgaz.com and The Associated Press, >October 4, 2004, >www.ap.org > > > > >Treatment of Animals > > > >Abercrombie & Fitch Joins PETA’s Boycott of Australian Merino Wool >Just-Style reports that U.S. apparel firm Abercrombie & Fitch Co. is the >first firm to join a global boycott of Australian merino wool that was >launched by the international animals rights group, People for the Ethical >Treatment of Animals (PETA). According to PETA, Australian lambs are >subjected to a surgical operation called “mulesing” without the use of >painkillers. The operation cuts excess skin from the animals’ hindquarters >to prevent infection from flies. PETA also claims the lambs are not >properly cared for when they are in transit to slaughterhouses. According >to The Columbus Dispatch, merino wool accounts for 85 percent of wool >production in Australia – which is the largest wool producer and exporter >in the world. Abercrombie spokesperson Thomas Lennox says there are other >sources of wool available, adding that the company will not knowingly sell >products containing Australian merino wool until conditions improve for >the animals. Lennox notes that Abercrombie considers its decision “a good >thing for our market and our shareholders.” According to PETA campaign >coordinator Matt Rice, Abercrombie has “set a new standard by pledging not >to sell Australian merino wool. We hope other retailers follow suit.” >Comments from Australian wool producers were not included in the articles. >-- BSR News Monitor summary of articles from The Columbus Dispatch, >October 14, 2004, >www.columbusdispatch.com >and Just-Style, October 14, 2004, >www.just-style.com > > >Back to Top >60690d4d.jpg > > >Net Impact CSR Weekly is an electronic newsletter excerpted from the BSR >News Monitor published weekly by Business for Social Responsibility (BSR). >Contact Net Impact at 111 Sutter Street, 12th Floor, San Francisco, >California 94104 USA, Phone: +1 415.984.3300, Fax: +1 415.984.3301. Visit >Net Impact's website at >www.net-impact.org >for information on the features and benefits of membership in Net Impact. >BSR News Monitor is an electronic newsletter published weekly by Business >for Social Responsibility (BSR), a global nonprofit partner for companies >pursuing commercial success in ways that respect ethical values, people, >communities and the environment. Contact BSR at 111 Sutter Street, 12th >Floor, San Francisco, California 94104 USA, Phone: +1 415.984.3200, Fax: >+1 415.984.3201. Visit BSR's website at >www.bsr.org >for a broad range of information on corporate social responsibility, as >well as information on the features and benefits of membership in BSR. >COPYRIGHT >Copyright © 2004 by Business for Social Responsibility. All content in >News Monitor is original and copyrighted material. Reproduction or >distribution in full or in part by any means, electronic or mechanical, is >prohibited. >DISTRIBUTION >Individuals and organizations receiving the Net Impact CSR Weekly may not >distribute the newsletter to other individuals or organizations. Net >Impact members (except "limited" members) may receive a complimentary >subscription to Net Impact CSR Weekly by updating their member profile at >www.net-impact.org. > >SUBSCRIPTION >Subscription to the Net Impact CSR Weekly is complimentary for members of >Net Impact (except "limited" members). To subscribe, please join Net >Impact at www.net-impact.org To unsubscribe, please update your member >profile on the Net Impact website at >www.net-impact.org. >CORRESPONDENCE >Please visit >www.net-impact.org >for general comments or questions. >EDITORIAL >Send corrections to monitoreditor at bsr.org. >BSR does not accept submissions for the News Monitor and does not use >press releases as source material. BSR does not provide back issues of the >News Monitor. >SOURCES & CITATION >BSR makes every effort to accurately cite news sources. The summaries >excerpted from the News Monitor are meant to reflect the content and tone >of news stories cited with no additional analysis provided by BSR. BSR >cannot provide the full text of articles summarized in the News Monitor >because of copyright restrictions but can provide publication information. >Direct URLs are referenced after article summaries when the article was >initially found online and when direct links are available. > > >You are subscribed to this list as free at friendlysystems.com. To >unsubscribe, please login to the Net Impact website and update the >subscription options in your member profile. >or Click >here >to unsubscribe, or send email to >unsubscribe.12191.11323782.8938262353495974278-free_friendlysystems.com at en.groundspring.org. > >111 Sutter Street >12th Floor >San Francisco, California 94104 >United States >tag. >[] > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 6052aedd1.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 48553 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 60690d3e.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 5893 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 60690d4d.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 7911 bytes Desc: not available URL: From perryt at bellsouth.net Tue Oct 26 10:18:24 2004 From: perryt at bellsouth.net (Perry Treadwell) Date: Tue, 26 Oct 2004 10:18:24 -0400 Subject: [saymaListserv] LGBTQ Friends Message-ID: <417E5CB0.30202@bellsouth.net> Seldom have I had such a spiritual experience as I did last December (12th month) in the Meeting room of Atlanta Friends Meeting. The sun was going down and gave the room a soft, orange glow. The clerk's caucus was reporting to the Executive Committee of the Central Committee of Friends General Conference. A draft minute was read: "Our experience has been that spiritual gifts are not distributed with regard to sexual orientation or gender identity. "Our experience has been that or Gatherings and Central Committee work have been immeasurably enriched over the years by the full participation and Spirit-guided leadership of gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, and queer Friends. We will never go back to silencing those voices or suppressing those gifts. Our experience confirms that we are all equal before God, as God made us, and we feel blessed to be engaged in the work of FGC together." The meeting sat in worship for some time. No wordsmithing was suggested and the body united with the minute and agreed to take it to the next Executive Committee meeting and to Central Committee. Last Friday night the Central Committee heard the minute and several spoke in its favor. Central Committee approved of the minute with joy. I cried with release and joy along with many others. Perry. From moriah at preferred.com Sun Oct 31 09:06:23 2004 From: moriah at preferred.com (Mary Calhoun) Date: Sun, 31 Oct 2004 08:06:23 -0500 Subject: [saymaListserv] viaYMaa>>election eve candlelight vigil Message-ID: <03b201c4bf4b$9c277320$6464a2c6@abc> 6-Story Newsletter Template + ImagesThe SAYMA office has received -- ----------------------------------------- an AFSC e-publication ----------------------------------------- Toward Peace & Justice ----------------------------------------- Nov '04 issue ----------------------------------------- election eve vigil ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ <|> as of Friday night Oct 29, in the SAYMA region there were candlelight vigils planned for Atlanta and Blount County, Alabama. <|> there is a link below to find out more about participating or organizing mc\aa Mary Calhoun Admin Assist, SAYMA AdminAsst at sayma.org 276-628-5852 (machine) (in-person Tu & Th 5-7:30p) PO Box 1291, Abingdon, VA 24210-2191 [ ~~~end ~~~ ] __________________________________________________ To subscribe to SAYMA's list-server, sayma at kitenet.net, visit http://kitenet.net/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sayma. ------------------------------------------------------------------- ----- Original Message ----- From: American Friends Service Committee To: adminasst at sayma.org Sent: Friday, October 29, 2004 11:57 AM Subject: AFSC/Toward Peace & Justice/November 2004 Toward Peace and Justice In This Issue: November 2004 ? Reminder: Organize or join an election eve vigil ? New resources to help you promote fair trade ? Immigrants protest, celebrate in California ? Help create a fairer U.S. economy ? Insecurity in Iraq ?extends far beyond kidnappings? ? Your contribution will help make AFSC?s work possible Reminder: Organize or join an election eve vigil People in more than 30 states have answered AFSC?s call to organize nonpartisan election eve candlelight vigils. On Monday, November 1, gather with your friends and neighbors to ? hold our nation in the light ? show that democracy matters ? call for clean elections ? remember the things we all care about?peace, justice, security Build democracy. Vote on November 2. There?s still time to organize a vigil or join one near you. Immigrants protest, celebrate in California In early October, immigrants and their allies in San Diego organized a series of activities to protest Operation Gatekeeper, the blockade-style U.S. border control initiative that has terrorized immigrant communities for 10 years. Simultaneously, the second Tamejavi Festival in Fresno celebrated immigrant contributions to U.S. society with an outdoor market, forums, and cultural presentations. Both stories are on the revamped ?Immigrants? Rights? section of the AFSC website, along with more news and information. Read more. Insecurity in Iraq ?extends far beyond kidnappings? In a recent Des Moines (Iowa) Register editorial, AFSC?s Iraq Country Representatives, Rick McDowell and Mary Trotochaud, wrote: ?Kidnapping of international humanitarian workers is only a new twist to the insecurity of life in Iraq. Hundreds or thousands of Iraqi citizens are routinely kidnapped. While the goal can be money or disruption and fear, most Iraqis have reduced or abandoned their daily activities. The lack of security extends far beyond the kidnappings.? Read the full editorial. New resources to help you promote fair trade Visit the new ?Trade Matters? section of the AFSC website and find out what you can do to promote fair trade. For example, you can order an activist toolkit to help you spread the word about fair trade in your community, buy a Fair Trade Peace Pack to help fuel the demand for fair trade products, and get action alerts. The site also includes information that spells out why fair trade is an issue we all need to be concerned about. Promote fair trade today. Help create a fairer U.S. economy After you help promote fair trade, learn more about economic justice in the United States. AFSC's economic justice programs advocate for just public benefits and services, and help communities organize for social change. The new ?Economic Justice in the United States? section of our website will help you learn about and engage in creating a fairer economy. Issues addressed include ? hunger in the U.S. ? federal budget priorities ? living wage campaigns ? affordable housing Find out more. Your contribution will help make AFSC?s work possible AFSC is able to work for peace, provide humanitarian relief, and transform lives around the world only because of the support we receive from people like you. To make a contribution call 1-888-588-2372 and learn about ways you can support AFSC. There also are several ways to contribute online. Toward Peace & Justice is a monthly publication of the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), a nonprofit Quaker organization that includes people of various faiths who are committed to social justice, peace, and humanitarian service. Copyright 2004 by the American Friends Service Committee, 1501 Cherry Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102 Feel free to forward this email to your friends. See the AFSC website at www.afsc.org Update Profile | Unsubscribe | Confirm | Forward -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From sgernandt at earthlink.net Sun Oct 31 10:21:54 2004 From: sgernandt at earthlink.net (Suzanne Gernandt) Date: Sun, 31 Oct 2004 09:21:54 -0500 Subject: [saymaListserv] (no subject) Message-ID: <410-2200410031142154578@earthlink.net> Please take me off the sayma mail list. Textures - For The Finely Crafted Home 828-452-0058 sgernandt at earthlink.net -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: