Re: keeping this list inclusive and focused

[Leston Buell <bulbul at fizzylogic dot com>]

In my original message i quoted from two messages. The longer quotation, 
and the one i found particularly insensitive, was part of a signature. I 
didn't notice that it was in a signature because i get this list in 
digest form (which is hard to read because of the way that people tend 
to respond to messages without cutting out all the quoted portions of 
the message to which they're responding). Had i noticed that this was in 
a signature, i probably wouldn't have written my original message in the 
first place. My apologies.

I still think that it's important to respect all those who might be on 
the list and i don't think doing so is difficult. I further think it 
would be kind of silly to have to move the Quranic software off this 
list, because it's a natural fit with a software Arabization project and 
the Quranic project will obviously benefit from the awareness of other 
people working on and using other Arabic software for Linux. That said, 
i don't see why messages can't be written in such a way that everyone on 
the list is respected. This doesn't mean that references to religion 
should be prohibited, but merely that messages should not give the 
impression that this list is only for Muslims and that non-Muslims will 
be unwelcome, which is exactly the impression that the two quotations gave.

I'm sorry that others have previously voiced objections in private 
e-mail messages with offensive language. That obviously doesn't help 
anyone! I think that such messages are ultimately unavoidable, 
regardless of what action is taken and regardless of how respectful you 
try to be, because religion fires up people's emotions and because there 
are many immature people out there. My own intent was merely to ensure 
that the list remain inclusive and welcoming to all, which will help 
ensure that the Arabization effort attracts and retains the greatest 
number of like-minded participants possible.

And just for the record, looking at the screenshot of QtQuran, it looks 
really cool!

Leston