"Eliezer S. Yudkowsky" wrote:
>
> I never trusted Authority over my own perceptions - not at age
> five, and not at any age. And I'm proud of it.
As a gay man, I have had to endure a similar process of jettisoning
social expectations. However, being an only child from a Protestant
family of rather casual religious observance, and with no tight-knit
extended family in the immediate geographical vicinity, I was
able to "fade" out of the family orbit without any confrontations
or formal announcements. I don't imagine an Orthodox Jew has
the option to quietly drift away like that, which makes your
courage all the more impressive. It's a shame you have to endure
and inflict such emotional pain in order to be true to your
intellectual gifts, but I'm sure the best wishes of everyone on
this list go with you. I'm glad the technology of the Internet
happens to be available at this moment to provide something
of a support net for you during this crisis, poor a substitute as
it may be for the family connections that are being disrupted.
All the best.
Jim F.
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Mon Oct 02 2000 - 17:35:10 MDT