[ExI] Personal "backgrounds" and alleged relevance thereof

[estropico]

I will try to keep this civil, ignore those remarks of Vaj's that
border on the slanderous, and put forward a proposal that I feel could
be an acceptable compromise on the topic of Vaj's alleged penchant for
nazi iconography.

On the subject of the alleged Waffen-SS-lookalike business logo:

>  […] my forename being Stefano my initials are SS and so are
>  embroidered on my shirts and boxers, the fact being allegedly a
>  telltale sign of my ideological preferences…

You see, if Stefano's Waffen-SS-like business logo was the only hint
of his borderline (?) neofascist sympaties, I *could* give him the
benefit of the doubt – who knows, perhaps it *is* all just a bizarre
coincidence after all. But (and this is just one example) he describes
himself as an "overhumanist" ("sovrumanista") and has written a more
than sympathetic introduction to Giorgio Locchi's "Political
Expression and Repression of the Overhumanist Principle" * a text in
which we read that fascism is "the first political manifestation of a
larger spiritual and cultural phenomenon, which we can call
'overhumanism'." The coincidence thing suddenly doesn't seem that
convincing anymore.

*http://www.uomo-libero.com/index.php?url=%2Farticolo.php%3Fid%3D293&hash=%20

>  my firm's trademark [was] adopted *7 years before my birth* (!)

What I find simply beyond comprehension is how anyone could not feel
extremely uncomfortable with such a logo for all those years, and not
feel the urgent need to do something about it. I mean we're not
talking about a slight resemblance here, but a veritable Waffen-SS
lookalike! Or maybe, in my old age, lost in my Vaj-persecution-mania,
I've started to see things. I asked already and I'll ask again: if
this logo is as trivial and innocent as Vaj so hard tries to convince
us it is, why not just give us the url so the list can see it and make
up its own mind?

Go ahead, Stefano, just prove me wrong.

But Vaj is being coy with his real name – fair enough. I think the
following might be a reasonable and acceptable compromise: we could
post the animated version of the logo on YouTube, removing the
references to Stefano's business, his real surname and the business'
url.

Stefano, what do you think? If you don't have the time or technical
know-how, I'd be happy to do that for you.

One last thing on the logo. Vaj stated that it was adopted several
years before his birth (therefore, I guess, at some point in the
'50s). However, somebody, at some point, must have taken the trouble
(and expense) to get a web-animated version of the logo – this was
obviously done in much recent times. And in the animated version the
SS logo is even more obvious - at some point it is unencumbered by any
other graphical element and can be admired in all its "splendour"...

On the threats of legal action:

>  I have never instructed any lawyer to represent me with regard to
>  the more or less libelous statements of the author of the message
>  above [estropico]

Somehow I find it hard to believe, but if you say so. Hey, perhaps
it's the people at your legal firm that are embarassed at being
associated with your political writings. Perhaps we should take a leaf
from their book.

>  On the other hands my partners,
>  namely those in charge with the firm's own legal representationare not
>  really happy, irrespective of what they may think of my
>  extra-curricular activities, that somebody may think it funny, for the
>  sake of my moral assassination, to have the firm described on the Web
>  as a business cover for a band of lunatics of dubious political
>  affiliations…

I think your memory might be playing tricks on you. I actually went
out of my way to report your own reply to the logo controversy,
quoting the fact the company is "perfectly respectable". Obviously
that part of my article has now been removed from the web, but I was
in the middle of translating the whole thing into English, so here's a
translation of the passage in question: "And of course there is  the
astonishing choice of a logo for his business by the more prominent
superhumanist, Stefano Vaj (pseudonym of Stefano XXX). Just in case
the logo at the top of the page (www.XXX.com) isn't clear enough,
click on the one at the bottom of the left-hand column for an animated
version with accompanying marching music. Vaj's reply, once this
became known, has been that his company is perfectly respectable and
that none of its clients (which include many well known international
businesses) have ever complained about its logo. That might well be
the case, but it doesn't explain why on earth would anyone want to
include obvious Nazi imagery in one's business logo. And given such a
controversial image we do find it rather embarassing that the postal
address of AIT [the Italian Transhumanist Association] is the same as
Vaj's legal practice."

On the subject of my alleged frustrated aims to become AIT's president
- or whatever:

>  I am now even more glad that the webmaster of
>  www.estropico.com, who was invited. in a spirit of perhaps excessive
>  ecumenism, in view of the interesting stuff he translated in Italian
>  in his web site, eventually declined to participate

Just for the record: I have cut down on the amount of time I'm willing
to spend on transhumanist activism due to changed personal
circumstances (I am now the proud father of a very young girl - what
am I doing spending all this time on this flame is beyond me). My
involvelment with the UK Transhumanist Association is now marginal,
but I decided to keep Estropico.com going. I orginally, and
reluctantly, accepted the offer to be part of the association's
council of "proboviri" (guarantors?), mainly following the urging to
do so by those that saw me as a counterbalance to Vaj's presence.
After several months of waiting without anything happening, and a few
(three), admittedly not particularly forceful, enquiries on my part,
it became apparent to me that there was no point even enquiring any
further... As things stands I don't even think I'm going to renew my
membership, never mind wanting to be associated too closely with AIT -
I'd rather give the money to the Mprize! At any rate, I think Sefano
Vaj underestimates my own knowledge of my own limits: I'm perfectly
aware that I wouldn't make a suitable president for AIT (I'm not a
published author or an academic and I wouldn't have the time for it
anyway), so he can rest assured that, if and when AIT ever has
internal elections, he's very unlikely to get any competition from
myself.

Cheers,
Fabio

>  Message: 25
>  Date: Thu, 6 Mar 2008 17:53:02 +0100
>  From: "Stefano Vaj" <stefano.vaj at gmail.com>
>  Subject: [ExI] Personal "backgrounds" and alleged relevance thereof
>  To: "ExI chat list" <extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org>
>  Message-ID:
>         <580930c20803060853i397b87a5hba05d0b6ac599f84 at mail.gmail.com>
>  Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
>
>  Longish message, only for real lovers of flame wars and human psychopathology...
>
>  On Wed, Mar 5, 2008 at 10:12 AM, estropico <estropico at gmail.com> wrote:
>  >  I am not surprised, though. I originally included the above
>  >  information in an article on my website regarding the neofascist (?)
>  >  transhumanists, but I was forced to remove it following legal threats
>  >  from Stefano "Vaj"'s lawyers. Would he have won in court? I doubt it,
>  >  but he's the managing partner of a big law firm and I'm not... That's
>  >  way I'm going to be careful about what I say on a public forum such as
>  >  this.
>
>  Uff... (what is the emoticon for boredom?).
>
>  Just for the record, and then I will not play any further in the hands
>  of the couple of a few full-time disgruntled would-be presidents of
>  the AIT - significantly 100% absent from any kind of thread in this
>  list that does not concern my humble self - by deigning them with an
>  answer (an entirely different iissue being that of good-faith third
>  parties who may be interested in knowing better my ideas or writings,
>  as a couple of people have privately made me the honour of being):
>
>  - I have never instructed any lawyer to represent me with regard to
>  the more or less libelous statements of the author of the message
>  above, firstly because I am probably not exasperated enough yet,
>  secondly because, as the "true totalitarist" I am accused to be, I
>  prefer to err on the side of... freedom of speech.
>
>  - Yes, I happen to have two names, for family reasons that are
>  nobody's business, and more or less casually I started much time ago
>  of making alternative, rather than joint, use of them, depending on
>  the circumstances. No big conspiracy or secrecy here, as I am widely
>  known with both, and by spending a little time on Google one may even
>  find instances of joint usage. Now, the firm which I am a partner of -
>  and which was founded *27 years* before I joined it as a paralegal,
>  then climbing the career's ladder - happens to bear the same name,
>  which - sinister circumstance indeed - starts with an "S". So that,
>  hear hear, my forename being Stefano my initials are SS and so are
>  embroidered on my shirts and boxers, the fact being allegedly a
>  telltale sign of my ideological preferences, as would be the fact that
>  my firm's trademark, adopted *7 years before my birth* (!), employs
>  angular fonts, which never disturbed the clients making use of our
>  services in five different European jurisdictions, including notorious
>  neo-nazi organisations such as Ford or IBM, the governments of Romania
>  or that of Lombardy, not mention innumerable Jewish and Israeli
>  clients. If anything, the fact that I am using the name Vaj when I am
>  not writing on legal theory or international business law, may
>  "protect" my firm from association with what I do in a purely private
>  capacity, be it my membership in the Rotary International or in the
>  World Transhumanist Association. Certainly not the other way around,
>  as the "discovery" of my firm's name would seem intended to
>  demonstrate, namely that I would be here in some sort of "disguise"
>  (!) of my true self.
>
>  - Do such petty and childish "investigations" and aspersion casting
>  exercises, emphatically reported on the Web, sound as an odious
>  invasion of my privacy? Sure, but life is still too short to pay
>  attention to every such annoyance. On the other hands my partners,
>  namely those in charge with the firm's own legal representationare not
>  really happy, irrespective of what they may think of my
>  extra-curricular activities, that somebody may think it funny, for the
>  sake of my moral assassination, to have the firm described on the Web
>  as a business cover for a band of lunatics of dubious political
>  affiliations, and I am informed that they actually send a letter "to
>  cease and desist" to the webmaster of www.estropico.com, threatening
>  recourse to the appropriate civil and criminal remedies, a threat that
>  I have no doubts was not idle in the least.
>
>  - As for the "unelected national secretary of the Associazione
>  Italiana Transumanisti etc. etc.": the legitimate owner of the name
>  AIT, Riccardo Campa, decided at a point in time with a few fellow
>  transhumanists of very diverse professional, political and
>  philosophical background to incorporate the loose group at that time
>  going under that name as an Italian non-profit legal entity. In fact,
>  I gladly accepted the invitation to be amongst the founders of such
>  entity, who obviously decided by unanimous agreement its inner
>  organisational working and the names and capacity of the initial
>  officers. I am now even more glad that the webmaster of
>  www.estropico.com, who was invited. in a spirit of perhaps excessive
>  ecumenism, in view of the interesting stuff he translated in Italian
>  in his web site, eventually declined to participate - even though he
>  became a member at a later stage, probably with the exclusive purpose
>  of pretending an interest in the sort of the organisation and of
>  justifying his reiterated "denounciations" of its "dangerous drift".
>
>  As for the ideas and programmes of the AIT, one can directly check
>  from its Web site at http://www.transumanisti.it and hopefully have
>  access soon to an English version of the Manifesto that we have
>  recently, and again unanimously, approved. Now, I understand that some
>  people may take its content as a "dangerous drift" away from sectarian
>  and "debatable" positions they promote, but I fear that they will have
>  to live with that in the foreseeable future, since it is now amongst
>  the official charts of the AIT.
>
>  Stefano Vaj