A modest proposal refused by intrigues, time after other ...

Correspondence with the husband of the woman who writes under pen name Elena Maria Vidal.

Excuse me, did your wife, formerly my friend, block me? And if so, why is she still following my blogs?

The one important thing where I did bother her was about "shrt (dot) st (slash) ujx" (a link that has been signalled as abusive, which I still cannot post as a link, abusively enough!) and asking her to either do an edition herself or spreading the word. I wonder because I saw, under Christine Niles' status, comments directed at [initials and first names of Elena Maria Vidal].

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Hans-Georg, I honestly have no idea. I'm sorry that I can't be of more help.

I take it you are married to [Elena Maria], and if you have no idea, you would be in a better position to ask her than I whom it seems she has blocked.

[later:]

Christine Niles just unfriended me. [see below]
a) she attacked the Catholic blogosphere as including Calumny and Detraction
b) when I tried to tell her this anti-internet campaign in certain Church quarters blocked me from my living, she unfriended me. Would your wife possibly have had similar motives? Or is that guess too wild?

Mr. Lundahl, I am currently focused entirely on securing full-time employment, so I haven't been following either [Elena Maria's] or Mrs. Niles' posts closely.

You are focussed on securing full time employment?

• a) do you totally rule out entrepreneurship on your own?
  
• b) if not, would you take a try at printing as books or booklets and selling my work, as explained in the conditions on link I could not post as such? And it is blatantly irrelevant if you had followed your [your wife's] FB postings closely or not. My first missive here started with a request to simply ask her, even leaving her free to do the answering.

Mr. Lundahl, your cause would be better served if you took a far less antagonistic and demanding tone with people you've never met. If you have written works of merit that you would like to publish, I would strongly recommend you consider Lulu.com or one of the numerous other, new self-publication solutions available. Many new authors are experiencing success well beyond what they could otherwise expect via traditional publishers: http://is.gd/dtnTB3 I must now conclude this dialogue. Good luck and Godspeed to you, sir.

My dear, I would not be taking an antagonistic tone if there had not been loads of people who could well have used my self-publishing scheme for their own and - if they gain sufficiently - my profit, who nevertheless prefer foisting on me schemes incompatible with it.

• The electronic version of my essays can be read for free, and I do not think they are inferior to an e-book. There are, however, people who will not touch internet, there are also people who like reading on paper on occasions when internet is inavailable. That is one area where my proposal - already made, I do not intend to withdraw it - comes in. For others and for me, financially. = 1
  
• 2) Another would be people who do themselves only read me online, but who think I merit support for being readable for free (Maecenas, et c). For me, financially.
• 3) A third would be people printing me and gaining money, but being themselves too poor to send me money. For them financially. That case would be morally incating for second category.

Point is, I have accomodated all three by the conditions I have given, I have been doing this for long - years, actually, and people who take your attitude have been less than supportive with getting categories 1 and 3 going, less than generous as category 2. Thus, I think one can by now have some sympathy for an attitude you brand as "antagonistic" and "demanding".

Especially as your position "securing time employment" seems to put you potentially in categories 1 or 3 rather than 2.

HGL

Oh, by category 1, I was rather describing their potential customer base than themselves, but smart as you are, I hope you got it.

And, no, what I ask has NOTHING, NADA to do with affirmative action of some kind because I am in the street. But I think the suspicion of your being guilty of such, if helping me to publish outside editing professionals, may have something to do with your rejection.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQ84b-KdTV8

John H. McWhorter, who is speaking against affirmative action as it is now applied, is one of my black heroes. Since in 2005 I read his The Missing Spanish Creoles. I wrote both your wife and Christine Niles not to hesitate to comment about something that sucks - saying it sucks - by using comments section under the blogposts.

Christine Niles, when challenged if she thought me guilty of calumny, detraction or rash judgement assured me she had read none of my blogs - but she did not explicit which ones in Catholic blogosphere (in which there are hundreds) she thought failed her moral standards. And my problem when trying to spread word about my project is precisely people who have read nothing on my blogs. And still think them worth avoiding to read.

Mr. Lundahl, as stated in my previous message, I am unable to continue and must now conclude this dialogue. I wish you luck in your endevours.

I get the feeling - btw, since this is internet, take your time! Take up the concluded dialogue today or tomorrow or next week or after easter as you wish! - that your "disability" to answer is a question of being privy to either some info about me, that you are afraid would offend me, or some intrigue against my project, that you do not wish me to speak up against.

Funnily enough, this morning among the personnel of a homeless guys' coffee club, I met an informatician who wanted very much to know the obvious facts I have told over and over - that I have been a teacher but much longer either student or out-of-work before getting out-of-home, and, that I do my blogging from libraries. Usually I even sign each post with the name of the library where I wrote or finished it. Networking related to the fact that I contacted you?


I did not quote above letter to expose Elena Maria Vidal - I take her pen name, and the letter was to her husband - or him (I here post only the fact he is her husband) BUT to show a kind of attitude I have been having to deal with year after year since it became known in France that I write on internet.

Christine Niles has no pen name, she is known under her own name at her university. The status on which the unfriending was done was about "calumny, detraction, rash judgement" which according to her there was plenty of in the Catholic Blogsphere.

Since in St Nicolas de Chardonnet it had been unfairly preached against FB after it became known I am on it, I suspected she or the priest who had prompted her to post the status, had similar motives: to counteract me getting known.

So, I challenged her basically to check my blogs, see if there was any calumny on it, if yes, to condemn it in comments under the blog post in question, if no to clear me of suspicions.

Since she unfriended me I have no access to my own comments, her original status included a link to a passage of catechism, here are her other ones:

• Christine a écrit :
  
  « Hans, I have no earthly idea what you're talking about. »
  
  [presumably I tried to explain]
  
  
• Christine a écrit :
  
  « Hans--There are hundreds of Catholic bloggers, and I have never read a single post from any of your blogs, so why you think I was targeting you in particular is beyond me. I didn't even have you remotely in mind. »
  
  [As occurred to me: I the most obvious suspect of calumny in blogging - obvious suspect since my writings are obviously calumnied - anyway, Moslems would consider it calumny to compare Mohammed to Joseph Smith, as I have done or to raise obvious questions about Moslems actually hunting slaves themselves among black and Europeans and considering it righteous jihad: and Catholic clergy in France would be very eager to listen to them and not so eager to tell them they find no fault in my writings, especially since I do not join their attacks on the Ayesha marriage of Mohammed and advocate, to anger of secularists and feminists, a marital age lowered back to 14/12 from 18/18 limit current all over most of Europe. Even so, if she has not read me, whom has she read to tick her off on that note? My feeling is, she was passing on a message from some priest, and he did not care to either comment or clear me either, but went through her, as knowing we were friends on FB - yes, that info is public to all of her and all of mine friends, or was till she unfriended me. And us having been friends so long and her having read no single post of my blogs? It is not for lack of invitations, really!]
  
  
• Christine a écrit :
  « Time to revise my FB friends list... »

Which is where I lost access to my part of the conversation. Her parts came not only on her wall, but also as e-mail notification.

I take this again:

http://o-x.fr/s006 - short link to my profile, linking to my blogs;
http://shrt.st/ujx - --- to English version of proposal made
http://shrt.st/ui1 - --- to French version of proposal made.

As to "why not e-book?" see my answer above to husband of Elena Maria Vidal.

Hans-Georg Lundahl
Bibliothèque de Mouffetard
Paris V^e Arrondissement
April 9^th YooL 2011.