P.O. Box 795
Berkeley, CA 94701
May 29, 1986
To the members of the TNS Executive Committee and other
members of the society who have become involved in the matters
currently before the Committee (Michael Huston, Roy Langston,
Richard May, Scott McFarland, Ron Penner):
We have two urgency matters before us at this writing, which
I will take up below, and several other pieces of business, which
I will get to further on.
I intend to make a number of proposals to be voted on by the
Executive Committee. I view it as extremely important that there
should be sufficient time for debate on these proposals. I think
that a month should be sufficient for debate and voting; there-
fore let us try to conclude voting on these matters by June 30.
I suggest that members of the Committee not send in their votes
until June 23, one week before the projected tallying date (I
think that's a better way to put it than "the deadline"; I don't
see what gives me the right to set a deadline for the rest of
you), so that those who have differing views may have the
opportunity to attempt to influence the vote. In a free marketplace
of ideas, truth and sound policy will most likely prevail.
I have asked our Regent, Louis Mathe, to tally the votes on
my proposals because I believe his integrity is trusted by
everyone on the Committee and, as a recent addition to the
Committee, he can be presumed not to have an axe to grind.
The Membership Status of Anne Paradise
This is an issue that should never have been brought up before
the Committee. I can't see that any valid purpose is served by
questioning Anne's membership status.
I think that what's going on here is a witch hunt, occasioned by
Anne's close association with Ron Penner. I will have more to say
later about the responsible parties and the action I believe to be
appropriate in dealing with this.
Contrary to the assertion of Scott McFarland, he was never
asked by the Executive Committee to respond to "the issue" of
"Ann [sic] Paradise and her qualifications for the office of
Ombudsman for the Society." I've spoken with everyone on the
Committee but Barry Kington within the past few days; no one had
any knowledge of Scott's assignment to this task before receiving
his letter of May 3.
If we were to ask someone to review Anne's qualifications for
membership, it would be in the worst possible taste to delegate
that task to someone outside the Committee.
I find Scott's letter to be extremely one-sided and adversarial.
It purports to have been submitted to the Executive Committee
in an advisory capacity, but informs us of how we ought to
vote on this sensitive matter while hypocritically maintaining a
facade of openmindedness and fair play. In case there is any
doubt as to the accuracy of this characterization of Scott's
letter, I reproduce the following paragraph:
What is the ultimate farce? Given that we currently
allow honorary members to run for office, it is
entirely possible that during the year we will accept
another honorary member into the society; and that
person will run for the Office of Regent in 1987 and
win. TNS could then have an individual (perhaps
with an IQ of 102) running our "elite" Hi-IQ Society.
I shall not amplify further.
I object particularly to Scott's statement that "The issuance of
a card with the [membership card] wording is erroneous and
fraudulent in its statement."
Fraud is intentional deception for gain. There is no evidence
of any such thing with regard to this matter.
While it may have been poor judgement on Anne's part to
mention her reservations about the I.Q. standard for
membership in the society in the context of this matter, it is
quite irrelevant to the issue under examination here and
should not have been included in Scott's letter.
According to Michael Huston's letter of March 11, 1986, and
to his letter mailed with Anne's letter of May 21, Catherine
Brueckel, Alice Grant, and Ron Penner all were involved in
conferring membership in the society on Anne Paradise, and
Alice Grant made the decision to confer regular membership
status. That the decisions made by these former officers might
have been mistaken (when viewed from a hypothetical
absolute ethical standard) is also irrelevant to the matter at hand.
My ethical concern is that the society stand behind the decisions
of its officers and not subject innocent parties to embarrassment
and deprivation of their membership rights on the pretext of
setting right actions years in the past.
Anne was admitted to the society in May 1981 and the
Constitution was not ratified until December of that year. To
ask Anne to submit evidence of qualification for membership
at this late date makes no more sense than to demand such
evidence from the many members of TNS admitted on the
basis of their ISPE membership when the society was founded.
As one of the five founding members of the Triple Nine Society,
I find such actions to be antithetical to our intention of
establishing a society where the individual rights of members
would be protected against the arbitrary actions of officers.
The steps recommended to the Committee by Scott McFarland
amount to expulsion of Anne Paradise from membership in the
society. The constitution is silent on the question of whether
expulsion shall be by action of the Executive Committee or of
the membership. I feel that this is a serious shortcoming in the
Constitution and that it should contain a specific provision that
no member may be expelled without a two-thirds vote of the
membership. I trust that no one will stoop to the sophistry of
contending that someone who has been carried on our
membership rolls for five years never was a member in the first
place.
The Constitution does provide that "Members shall only be
expelled for actions which seriously damage the Society..." I
would interpret this to mean actions by them--not by someone
else--and I doubt very much that the society has been seriously
damaged, unless it is by Anne's accusers. Therefore, there is no
action which may properly be taken by the Executive Committee
with regard to this matter.
A further note: When I spoke to Louis Mathe, he informed me
that Barry Kington had told him that he had the votes to remove
Anne Paradise from the office of Ombudsman (which my own
canvass of the Committee showed not to be the case) and had
discussed the issue with him in a way which led Louis to call for
formalization of the vote to remove Anne from office. In the
course of our conversation, I supplied Louis with the gist of the
line of reasoning reproduced above. He concluded that his action
had been taken without full knowledge and said that he now
intends to vote no on his own proposal. Louis called for votes to
be tabulated by Scott McFarland. Scott, please record my no
vote.
The Editorship of Vidya
I am among those who feel that the Editor of Vidya should be
unpaid and that Vidya should be mailed third class to conserve
postage money.
Furthermore, I don't like to be threatened. I'm not impressed
by Ron Hoeflin's threat to found a competing top .1% society
if he doesn't get his way. If Cliff Barnes wants to found
another oil company I'm not going to lose any sleep over it.
[Historical note: Cliff Barnes was an oil man (who, come to
think of it, reminds me of George W. Bush) who was always
losing out to J.R. Ewing in the TV classic "Dallas."]
Nonetheless, I don't think we should fire Ron as Editor.
First of all, he's doing a reasonably good job. He's been
responsive to the criticisms of his editing and is trying to
improve Vidya. I don't always agree with Ron; I find him
difficult to work with at times and somewhat erratic, but
we'd have to go a long way to find an Editor more dedicated.
Most of our members don't seem to mind the small size of
Vidya, according to the poll conducted on the most recent ballot
(although this vote was another annoying trick of Ron's, as we
had not authorized placement of these items on the ballot).
The only thing Ron's been really stubborn about is third
class mailing, and he's right that the cost difference is relatively
small as long as we stay under an ounce.
We should continue to study this issue, looking toward the
day when we'll have enough good quality submissions to need a
larger journal. Until then, let's leave well enough alone.
The Membership Officer and Publicity/Elections Officer
I am very disturbed by the attempt by Barry Kington, aided
and abetted by Scott McFarland, to remove Anne Paradise from
the office of Ombudsman and to disqualify her from membership
in the society after five years of membership and two of service to
the society as Ombudsman.
I am disturbed because it is a needless attack on an innocent
person and because of the way it has been done.
I am aware that Barry Kington has contributed much time and
energy to the society and that Scott McFarland has also made a
contribution, and I do not lightly recommend the course of action
which now seems necessary to me, but I cannot ignore the actions
of Barry and Scott in the handling of the matter of Anne's
membership status, the very area of Barry's office.
Barry has practiced deception on Louis Mathe and on the
Committee, as mentioned above. He has asked Scott McFarland
to investigate Anne's membership status in the name of the
Executive Committee without consulting the rest of us. He seems
to feel that he is above the Constitution.
Scott has produced what I find no way to regard as anything
other than a malicious attack on Anne Paradise.
As a result of these actions, I find that I have lost confidence in
the performance of these appointive officers. I therefore offer
the following proposals:
1. The appointment of Barry Kington as Membership Officer is
terminated, effective upon the selection of a replacement. A
call for volunteers for the position of Membership Officer is to
be printed in the next available issue of Vidya.
2. The appointment of Scott McFarland as Publicity Officer
is terminated, effective upon the selection of a replacement. A
call for volunteers for the position of Publicity Officer is to
be printed in the next available issue of Vidya.
3. The appointment of Scott McFarland as Elections Officer
is terminated, effective upon the selection of a replacement. A
call for volunteers for the position of Elections Officer is to
be printed in the next available issue of Vidya.
The Executive Committe has the authority to take these actions
under Article IV, Section 1 of the Constitution, which further
provides that the Membership Officer shall not participate in
his own evaluation.
Chairmanship
The Executive Committee must appoint a chairman, as provided
by Article III, Section 1 of the Constitution and as pointed out
by Ron Hoeflin in his letter of May 15. I therefore propose:
4. Norman Treloar is appointed Chairman of the Executive
Committee.
Executive Committee Secrecy
I agree with Ron Penner, in his letter postmarked March 17
(Ron unfortunately doesn't date his letters), that it is contrary
to the democratic and collegial spirit of the society that the
business of the Executive Committee is conducted without the
knowledge of the membership as a whole.
There is too much business to make attractive reading if
reprinted in its entirety in Vidya. I like Ron's suggestion of a
journal of official business like Mensa's Interloc. We would
need an editor and a frequent publication schedule (monthly) in
order to be able to transact business by this means, but it's
the best solution I know of. Mensa makes Interloc available by
request; I think that shouldn't prove too expensive and it will
provide a means of entry for those who wish to become active
in the affairs of the society.
Therefore, I propose:
5. The Executive Committee shall appoint an Official
Business Editor to publish all official communications
within the Executive Committee on a regular monthly
schedule. The journal of official communications shall
be available to any member of the society on request.
Is there someone who is willing to volunteer to be Official
Business Editor?
Publicity
I know a man who has been successfully conducting a mail
order business for 40 years. When I was beginning to market
my LAIT, he offered me some advice. "There are three cardinal
rules in the mail order business," he said, "Test, test, and test."
We have had good results from our bimonthly advertising in
the International Section of the Mensa Bulletin (as indicated
in Barry Kington's letter of January 30), which is encouraging,
but may not represent a limit to the effectiveness of our
advertising in Mensa publications. I offer the following proposal:
6. The Publicity Officer is instructed to advertise the society in
issues of the National and International Sections of the Mensa
Bulletin for alternate months, using some means for
distinguishing inquiries resulting from the one and the other.
Advertisements are to be placed in the Canadian national
journal simultaneously with those in the American National
Section of the Mensa Bulletin.
Logo
The membership has indicated its preference for having an
official logo for the society. I think we should respond by
setting in motion a procedure for selecting one.
This procedure should be comprehensive and fair (unlike Bill
Bavin's attempt to narrow down choices to three). We should
reproduce all of the approximately 150 logo designs which
have been printed in Vidya over the years and also call for
submission of new designs by a deadline, then proceed to a
membership vote on the proposed designs, using a preferential
system which will make it possible to narrow down this huge
field of possibilities.
The following proposals are offered to this end:
7. The Editor is instructed to print a final call for logo designs.
All designs to be considered must be postmarked not later
than September 30, 1986.
8. The logo designs for the selection of which a bribe was
offered to the society in Vidya #56 are disqualified from
consideration.
Back Issues Policy
The back issues policy announced in issues of Vidya through
#67 is unduly restrictive. Members should not have to return
damaged copies to get them replaced. I think we can trust our
members not to cheat us out of an extra copy. And, of course,
the society should pick up the tab for replacement copies; the
Editor should not have to pay for them out of his own pocket. I
propose:
9. Replacement copies of Vidya shall be made available to
members on request; the cost shall be borne by the society.
Sincerely,
Kevin Langdon