Tom:
>I just wanted to say welcome back to David Mayne!

I guess I get to say welcome only (as opposed to welcome back), since he
was before my time ;)

>I think that Internet is having a real impact on the raw community,
>and this list (raw-food) seems to be the most influential. Because
>of Internet, otherwise isolated raw fooders have access to extensive
>information and, in some cases, free advice. Since people started
>comparing notes regarding their experience with raw diets on Internet,
>the raw community appears to be opening up to new ideas and approaches.
>The "party line" is being challenged, and people are more willing to
>try different approaches.

This is a thread of great interest to me. By the time I got online (a
couple years ago) I was well into skepticism of the instincto hardline.
Nevertheless, I didn't realize how far I had to go to crawl out from under
it. Looking back, it was surely the online experience which had the
greatest effect on my thinking. This effect was basically twofold: 1]
watching and interacting with extremists whose own sense of absurdity makes
me try to avoid their pitfalls at all costs, and 2] watching and
interacting with folks like Ward, Tom, Peter, JL, and others whose own
sense of integrity makes me try to live up to that standard.

Having mostly gone on "book info" for many years of raw, I didn't really
know of any rawists as close personal friends and had very little feedback
about what experience others were having with raw diets. A brief visit to
France in the late 80's was enough to sense that all was not idyllic in
instincto-land but still everyone involved would rave about the recoveries,
the super-health, etc etc found among instinctos. I found out otherwise
online.

Specifically, I began to experiment with instincto taboos in order to
assure myself that instincto lore was indeed true. Instead, I found to my
surprise that cooked veggies, raw dairy, and conservatively cooked animal
foods were not the evils I had "been taught" by instincto lore.

Ward's H&B interview, especially Part III, had a great impact on me. He had
crystalized what until that point had been a lot of free-floating confusion
about the weird psychology of rawists (including myself). Indeed, I went
through the same steps in the final months of Ward's helm at the M2M as I
have over a couple years on this mailing list: delight at being able to
"talk raw", followed by disillusionment that so many rawists were
so...well, weird ;), followed by a deep introspection of my own weirdness
on the matter, followed by a "decompression" stage of non-instincto
experimenting.

Perhaps it was seeing so many folks stuck into a blinder mode (all the
while considering themselves oh so open-minded, forward thinking, etc etc)
that jolted me into even deeper introspection. I sure didn't want to be
that way myself. If it is true that it is much easier to see faults in
others than in oneself, then I was taken aback enough to turn the focus on
myself and get on with it. It is safer to f-ck with a man's wife than his
cliches--or so says Tom Robbins in Another Roadside Attraction, if I am
remembering it correctly.

>Of course the extremists are still around, and many of them are quite active
>on Internet (figuratively, making a "big noise"). However, the truth is
>getting out as well

I suppose that is true, yet I am mostly struck by how certain folks will
cling to the extremists, defend them, etc. in the face of _any_
information. Blatent plagerism, pedophilia, lying, bullying--sometimes it
seems the only thing left unreported is raw skinheads and/or raw mass
murderers. (Maybe that's just around the corner :( see
http://www.io-online.com/~nature/vallee.html for the c r e e p i e s t raw
stuff I have ever seen) It really appears that reason will not defeat
unreason, especially in the arena of fringe diets.

I realize I have spent (too) many posts in the last years on the idea that
vegan idealology may not be the last word in morality or health. In
penance, I hope I have been an equal opportunity critic in the last months
concerning instincto ideology (and to a much lessor degree paleo-diets).
Indeed, in a way I have learned more from the extremists than I have from
Ward and Tom and Peter and JL etc etc. I have learned what to watch out for
in myself. I have learned that a raw diet is no surity of mental health,
that if some 100% raw folks can do the Tony Robbins infomercial bit, if
some rawists can be so completely emaciated, if some can be so belittling
of their fellow humans (whether cooked, omnivorous, whatever), some so
gawdamn spacey--well...what's left of such an ideology (rawism) if it can
enable such behavior.

In a sense, the extremists stole my ideology from me. I truly thought at
one time that a raw diet would mellow folks out! I was guilty of the
greatest sin of raw extremism: I thought everyone's experience would be
like mine ;) :/ :)

Anyway, I have been challenging myself as I challenged so many others on
this list, and I feel I owe a thank you to one and all for putting up with
me. In a way, being able to lock horns with extremists and wash my dirty
underwear "in public" on this list was, in retrospect, probably an
ESSENTIAL prerequisite for my own growth on the raw theme.

So, in way too many words, that is some of the impact the raw internet has
had on me. Love to hear some other folks chime in on this one.....

Cheers,
Kirt