X-Message-Number: 1451
Date: 16 Dec 92 03:18:36 EST
From: Thomas Donaldson <>
Subject: Re: cryonics: #1444 - #1449

Comments to several messages:
1. About internal politics. While I think P. Metzgar's ideas are important
   and deserve to be followed, I will also say that I have ALREADY been
   cautiously trying to get CRYONICS on newstands. And a funny thing has
   happened: bookstores that will totally refuse to carry our promotional
   material (such as CRYONICS: REACHING FOR TOMORROW) will be quite happy
   to carry CRYONICS. I suspect that is because CRYONICS talks very much
   about what is REALLY happening, both the good and the bad. And internal
   politics is, yes, one of the bads --- but by publishing it CRYONICS
   becomes that much less of a happy, lions and lambs dancing together,
   problems who ever heard of problems kind of thing. That is, it becomes
   more REAL. And that is exactly what we need for promotion.
2. Yes, a lot of the political discussion has been pathetic. Even bathetic.
   And like many members I've been tuning it out. But it has also, I think,
   caused real damage which many of us will certainly come to regret.
3. About governments: my problem with governments, and governments taking
   over responsibility for cryonics patients (!!!! right now a pure dream;
   whether a paradisacal one or a nightmare remains unknown) is quite 
   simply that most governments do NOT keep their promises over a very
   long time scale. The next time there are calls for economy all the 
   patients cared for by the government of the day will wind up stored
   a high subfreezing temperatures in Antarctica; much worse, the govern-
   ment will then unleash a high-powered publicity beast to convince 
   everyone that it hasn't really compromised on suspension quality by
   doing that. Just think back into history: in the US, social security
   was SUPPOSED to be supported by the workers and devoted solely to their
   support ----  and only about 60 years later it turns out that all the
   taxes for social security go into the general fund, to be disbursed
   on all kinds of government projects. What governments are really good
   at, of course, is unleashing high-powered publicity to convince people
   that everything is fine and they've been doing well. After all, they
   even got control of most ofthe schools. What do you think would happen?
					Best
						Thomas

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