Posted by pancho from ? (64.79.4.2) on Sunday, February 24, 2002 at 8:17PM :
I have sent a letter to Jackie's organization asking to join. All that is required of other Assyrians is that they fill out an application and pay their annual dues. There is no other requirement or screening process...YET.
I was stopped from showing my sculptures to Assyrians at the convention and denied the right everyone else had of speaking freely. I am not aware of any such prohibitions in Jackie's group. There is so much misinformation put out there as to what happened to the Shumirum, the Hammurabi...what I have delivered to people and what I have stolen, that I need to go wherever I can to at least give my side of the story. The longer my side goes unexplained, the more likely people will become convinced of what they hear, and from people uninformed when they aren't actively spreading lies and half truths.
There is no good or legal reason to deny me membership. I know that in the past they have voted people out for being persistantly obnoxious, and I can understand that. But that is not my intention, and if I was good enough to have late night gab fests with Jackie at her home alone, I am certainly good enought to be allowed into what is supposed to be the "House Of All Assyrians".
Neither at the convention, or in my desire to join their club, is there any other motivation but to continue what has been my Life's work for the past 25 years...making and showing and talking about Assyrian sculpture and the heritage that inspired them. This has only become a crime and source of trouble to one or two individuals who have shown themselves willing to stand Law and rules and common decency on their heads in order to acieve their own personal goals.
As a recognized non-profit, with some sanction to operate as such from the Federal Government, they cannot engage in discrimination against anyone, let alone one of their own. They would either have to change their bylaws just in order to keep one Assyrian out, or they would have to give a good reason, a legal reason, for keeping me out based on more than the pique of one woman or her "fears" that I might prove disruptive. In this country one is presumed innocent before action is taken against one as if he were guilty already. Should I become disruptive, in actual and real ways, I would expect them to oust me.
-- pancho
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