NOTICE

Since the creation of the Cornelius Castoriadis/Agora International Website in July 1997 with Castoriadis's assistance and support, there has been but a single set of public criticisms--all from one and the same source--concerning our Website and organization. That source is the Editorial Committee of The International Journal of Inclusive Democracy and of its predecessor journal, Democracy & Nature.

We received the following announcement last month from that same Committee:

Dear Subscribers,
This is an important announcement by the Editorial Committee about a slanderous anonymous attack against Takis Fotopoulos, the editor of the Journal, and indirectly against the Journal and ID project themselves in the internet and Wikipedia. This attack was then reproduced by David Curtis in his Agora site, supposedly containing only references to Unpublished Texts By/About Castoriadis!

For those who want to read further about this inaccurate characterization of the bibliographical-webographical practices of the CC/AI Website, they are invited to continue reading the full Notice here: https://www.agorainternational.org/dnweb6.html for some background information and a full set of links. We do not take the criticism seriously. If, however, after reading all pertinent material, anyone thinks there is anything of consequence that remains outstanding, poses unresolved questions, or gives rise to some confusion, that person or persons are welcome to contact the CC/AI Website with their concerns.

The ID Editorial Committee's full statement, where this inaccurate characterization of our practices is repeated and the Committee seems to call for censorship of references to links it dislikes, appears here: http://inclusivedemocracy.org/journal/2012_04_david_curtis_ijid_statement.htm .

In fact, the context for the repeated criticisms of AI from this singular source is an earlier act of censorship on the part of ID's predecessor journal, Democracy & Nature, which had asked Castoriadis to reply to Murray Bookchin and Janet Biehl's 1996 letter of resignation from that journal. Castoriadis confided this task to AI member David Ames Curtis. The resulting text, sent to D&N with Castoriadis's approval:

"On the Bookchin/Biehl Resignations and the Creation of a New Liberatory Project" (see: https://www.agorainternational.org/dnweb1.html for the uncensored version)

could be published in D&N only in truncated form after the D&N Editorial Board demanded removal of a passing footnoted criticism of Noam Chomsky, who was at the time, like Castoriadis and Curtis, an invited D&N International Advisory Board member.

As a result, Castoriadis determined, along with Curtis, that both would leave the D&N Board after publication of Curtis's article, which article was unfortunately held up by D&N until after Castoriadis's death. When this fact was later mentioned in a short CC/AI Website electronic announcement of Bookchin's death, a long polemic ensued:

"Addendum, Or: the Cornelius Castoriadis/Agora International Website Receives a Threat" https://www.agorainternational.org/dnweb2.html

"A Second, Interim Response" https://www.agorainternational.org/dnweb3.html

"A Third, Interim Response, to Inclusive Democracy's Second Final Reply" https://www.agorainternational.org/dnweb4.html

which finally ended with:

"Inclusive Democracy Throws in the Towel on its Empty Threat" https://www.agorainternational.org/dnweb5.html

when no substantive reply was forthcoming from Inclusive Democracy (see http://www.inclusivedemocracy.org/journal/newsletter/autonomy_ID_agora.htm#july 2007).

It was therefore a surprise when Takis Fotopoulos suddenly restarted this long-moribund polemic in recent correspondence with a Greek blogger:

http://metaomadeon.wordpress.com/2012/01/18/the-dark-side-of-takis-fotopoulos/
Omadeon. "Takis Fotopoulos' threats, insults and slander against David Ames Curtis and me (English Translation)."

In recent months, we posted the above reference, along with two others:

http://metaomadeon.wordpress.com/2012/01/19/debunking-takis-fotopoulos-myths
Omadeon. "David Ames Curtis: Takis Fotopoulos has simply made up an invidious scenario in his head and stated it as fact, without any support."

http://metaomadeon.wordpress.com/2012/02/11/curtis-chomsky-and-fotopoulos
"David Ames Curtis Disproves False Claims by Takis Fotopoulos about Noam Chomsky, the Faurisson Case and Himself (EXCLUSIVE)."

since they all contain a number of mentions of Castoriadis, including some by ID Editorial Committee member Takis Fotopoulos himself. Because of the nature of the previous ID installments, in which it is unclear whether they were directed against one AI member, AI as a whole, or Castoriadis, we chose to give them special prominence in the regular CC/AI Website electronic update announcements. But we can include these previous installments, along with the dnweb replies, in a future update of the English-language Webography.

This is the context within which the ID Editorial Committee made its latest announcement, with its strange claim that the CC/AI Website notes the existence only of "unpublished" references.

We reiterate that we will continue to note all relevant reference information (not to be confused with "hosting . . . links"), including such information from Inclusive Democracy, in order that our subscribers may read and consider such texts and make their own judgments, eventually formulating their own responses and written replies.

As for the April 2012 ID Editorial Committee statement itself, the previous dnweb postings assist readers in analyzing the wide variety of ways in which the Committee's arguments fail to hold up to rational scrutiny. In the present instance, the first half of the Committee's recent criticism of the CC/AI Website for not censuring some webographical entries this Committee happens to dislike is based on an apparently unsubstantiated claim that the Greek blogger Omadeon has another two personas, one of them female. (See, in the ID companion post, http://www.inclusivedemocracy.org/journal/2012_04_wikipedia_admins_uncover_omadeon_danae.htm, the strange Greeklish locution "admitted himself implicitly that he is Greek blogger 'Omadeon,'" which does not seem to be followed by corroborating information specifically regarding Omadeon--though this apparently unsubstantiated claim is not really pertinent one way or the other since we do not censor references to relevant links.) Moreover, it should be recalled that neither CC/AI Website English and French bibliographer-webographer David Ames Curtis--the main focus of the Committee's ire since D&N's censorship of Curtis's passing footnote concerning Noam Chomsky in a text Castoriadis asked him to write--nor any other CC/AI Website bibliographer-webographer has ever belonged to Cornelius Castoriadis's "extended family" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extended_family). Thus, the second half of the ID Editorial Committee's statement falls flat, too. It should also be noted that this ID Editorial Committee statement managed to go on for 13 paragraphs without ever even hinting to its readers that Omadeon had published two blog items (see the links above) which include replies in advance to claims made in that statement. This omission illustrates once again the importance of making available to all full and accurate bibliographical and webographical information, without censorship or favoritism, so that all may judge "in full knowledge of the relevant facts."

A final note. AI recently corresponded with Professor Chomsky. Professor Chomsky informed AI that he was completely unaware that fifteen years ago Democracy & Nature had undertaken to prevent a passing criticism of him from being published in the pages of its journal.

23 v 2012