X-Message-Number: 20352 From: "davepizer" <> References: <> Subject: Becoming part of the community Date: Wed, 23 Oct 2002 10:45:24 -0500 Iggy said: > Do you think that the fact that cryonicist back up Creekside Preserve can > backfire? People with deep religious beliefs, ultra-right, conservatives and > Republicans :o) - folks from all walks of life would either "blacklist" it > or "badmouth" or "boycott" it. > Eventually, there will be enough info available on the Net, word of mouth, > people in neighboring towns will talk... Is this being addressed? Can this > be a concern at all? Or is it too much to even think about? Clearwater, > Florida comes to mind as HQ for Church of Scientology and all the > controversy surrounding the town. This is a concern I have had. To counter any possibility we at Creekside/Ventureville, (those of us who are Venturists and cryonicists), intend to make our company, (and ourselves) valuable members of the local community by our financial support of worthwhile community efforts, and also, by our conduct around, and our support of, local merchants and residents. When possible we buy things locally. If a local group needs some support for a fund rasing project, I help out. We show respect for our neighbors and their ideas. We never belittle things they are interested in. When in public we never talk negative about any part of the community. (that would be hard to do because it is such a nice little community). We have already made a lot of new friends! Some of them know about our cryonics philosophy. We don't push it on them, but if they ask us about it we try to honestly answer their questions. It is impossible to hide our cryonics affiations (even if we wanted to), as I have been on the front page of the state's largest newspaper, (The Arizona Republic), several times in stories about cryonics, and have been interviewed by Arizona television stattions many times. THINGS ARE CHANGING AND COMING OUR WAY. I think it was Paul Genteman who once told me that all great movements go through 3 stages: (1) ridicule, (2), interest and investigation, (3) support. I think cryonics is now moving from phase one to phase two. Now people don't think you are crazy if you are signed up for cryonics, even though they may not want it for themselves. Twenty years ago, when you told someone you were signed up for cryonics, they thought you were crazy. The other thing going in our favor is the conservative and libertarian mentality in Arizona. We are a state that likes to think of ourselves as evloving from the old wild west. We let others do their thing (as long as it doesn't hurt us), and we do our own thing as long as it doesn't hurt others. We are kind of a live and let live mentality. Who would have dared tell Wyatt Erp that he couldn't be frozen? When I helped move Alcor to Arizona, one of the things I promised the borad of directors was that the mentality in Arizona was better towards cryonics than California was. For instance in Riverside the government was trying to make cryonics illegal, they stopped our research for a starter and they were in the process of making us dismantle our top story in our building. There were all kinds of other attacks as many of you may remember. When we got to Arizona, not only was the climate better, but the mayor of Scottsdale, Mr. Herb Drinkwater, invited our President, Mr. Steve Bridge, to his office and welcomed him and Alcor to Scottsdale. Turns out he and Steve had some things in common about liquid nitrogen, I think both he (or his father) and Steve's father both had the fun of artifically inseminating cows with frozen semen. (rule one: wear gloves when inserting the semen). In conclusion, there is only so much we can do, and we are aware of the potential problems and we are doing all that we can to be accepted and be judged favorably. ALL OTHER IDEAS ON HOW TO BE MOST FAVORABLE ACCEPTED INTO THE COMMUNITY ARE APPRECIATED. Thank you. David Pizer President of The Society for Venturism Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=20352