From: garygm@leland.Stanford.EDU (Gary Brainin)
Subject: Dear Mr. Tai
Organization: Stanford Law School, Stanford University
Date: Wed, 8 Apr 92 07:54:35 GMT


   I hope you had a good weekend.  Below is an article I posted last
Friday, and which you did not respond to, presumably because you were
away.  (Please forgive me and repost if I have merely missed your
reply; my news reader has been less than reliable recently.)  I am
both posting and sending this directly.  Please respond on r.o.m so
others may see your response.

Included article follows--------

   Forgive me.  I spent three days keeping myself from responding to
this multi-thread, but I can't do it any longer.

In article <1992Apr3.181027.6614@ncsu.edu> tai@ailab.ncsu.edu (Scott Tai) writes:
> [. . .]
>I'm not making an error.  There have been a number of posts from MENSA
>members stating that they joined primarily to make friends that were
>on 'their' level.  To me, this is equally as bad as someone only having
>friends that are 'their' race.

Scott:

   To give an analogy:  I am now living on the West coast of the
United States.  I was born, and lived most of my life, on the East
coast.  While I am very happy with the move, and intend to stay, I
find that West coast people--or, more precisely, native Californians
--do not generally share my love for irony nor my adeptness at
sarcasm.  Therefore, while I do not discourage friendships with
natives, I do to some degree seek out friendships with transplanted
East coasters like myself.  I do this mainly because there are aspects
of my personality which I find I cannot share with those who do not
already have them themselves, and not because I find either type of
person to be "better" than the other.  It is merely, for me, an
association which allows me to do things I otherwise could not.

   Now, you may or may not believe that my seeking out such
companionship is a bad thing.  It is most certainly discrimination, in
the weak sense of differentiating between.  If you do not believe that
what I am doing is wrong, then what is different about someone seeking
companionship in a group where they are more likely to find someone of
similar intillectual level?  (Note I am _not_ asking about the
_group's_ policies, but rather about the motivations of the group
members, which you called into quesiton above.)

   If you do believe that what I am doing is a bad thing, then I am
afraid you must be prepared to admit that your concept of "bad
discrimination," if you will, is radically different from others'.  In
which case you owe it to those with whom you are having a discussion
on the topic to explain that you are using the word in a sense that
they are not.  Furthermore, if you believe that your sense is correct
and theirs is not, then you must defend, or at least explain, why, or
else risk being written off completely.

			-Gary
-- 
|Gary Brainin                     |BITNET: garygm%leland.stanford.edu@stanford|
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