ALCOR-- democracy-- PIZER-- 03-- VanSickle scared.

Here's a revelation about Alcor President's discomfort with Pizer's Cryonet editorials on Alcor's lack of democratic response to Alcor members... [+]

My position has always been the online media is the way to go in penetrating the realities behind the public relations facade of Alcor. When I had suggested "making noise" about it-- I was turned down. As it turns out, Dave Pizer is "making noise" to the extent that we now see some force-feedback in terms of "asking members to desist from talking". This is what I faced a few years ago.

Dave thinks that making the board more accountable involves "voting" priveledges by members. My contention we don't need voting rights as the NEXT step-- what we DO need are more cryonicists who blog-- or at least talk online in public space so that we can hash the issues out-- making cryonics interesting, more honest and INDIRECTLY accountable despite a self-re-electing board. The membership directory released by Alcor has names I've NEVER seen online-- but when it comes to State legislation-- as we saw with Stump a few years ago-- apparnetly ALL cryonicists "come out of the closet". Why don't they "come out of the closet" during relatively normal times?-- instead of waiting for crisis?

It's also interesting to watch Pizer, an ex-board member himself to post to CryoNet where Brown NEVER deletes posts-- as if he's keeping "the" cryonics akashic record or something. Now-- we see Van Sickle ask that our CryoNet debates be "quieted down"-- so what role will Brown play in this?

"Norman Fell"-- a pseudonymn-- makes a good point here about the Alcor secrecy as well. [+]