Public communications - was Can you tell me why . . .

[DCR]

I respectfully offer that there are many reasons to use 'care' in our
communications. Of course, there is an ongoing issue with illegal
substances and their traffic and therefore when we use specific words they
should be in context of remedies and healing - not simply 'where can I get
. . . ' . However outside of arguments of 'spying and civil liberties' I
found out the hard way that this list is NOT private in any way. Anyone
may access messages using key word searches and it can cause major
problems. I no longer use my full name on this list for that reason. When
a particularly acute problem was presented I asked this list for
advice/experience/references and a parent saw the 'request'. I had used no
names, and nothing terribly specific - but the father was distraught that I
had posted anything about his child. He further investigated this list
(reading many posts) and decided it was a very unprofessional and ugly
group and the 'profession' of homeopathy was a joke. It had been at an
unfortunate time in this list when there was much name calling, personal
attacks were rampant, etc. Had the list been more professional at that
moment, I could have easily assured him of the value of asking this list
for support. As it was - not only did I lose that family as clients - but
he now has a very bad impression of homeopathy - which he readily shares in
our community.

available
them.
Homeopath.)