To members of the group 'Celia Green and Oxford Forum' on Facebook:*
As you may know, we are aiming at building up Oxford Forum into an independent university with a number of departments, a residential college, and an associated publishing company.
Please bear in mind that the books we have been able to write and publish, and especially the material we put on our blogs, does not represent what we would be doing if we were able to behave like fully financed academics. Because we have so far always been in the position of an embryonic organisation trying to get properly established, our output has been determined by (a) the limitations imposed on us by the absence of support staff and other aspects of infrastructure, and (b) the fact that the output has had to function as a form of advertising. The phrase I often use is “distress flares”.
It is difficult for someone to understand our position unless they are willing to recognise three features of the modern situation. First, notwithstanding any amount of nonsense talked about “gifted children” and so forth, the modern ethos is hostile to high ability, and in particular to the concept of innate ability. Second, the modern ideology states that everything carried on within accredited institutions is good, and anything done outside that system is to be despised. Social approval is everything. Third, to disagree with this, and to assert one’s claim on the resources being provided for academic research, without having received accreditation from a sufficiently large number of people inside the system, is to break a serious taboo. People who assert a need for the conditions of an academic life are (so the logic goes) moral criminals and deserve to be shunned. And shunned is what, to a large extent, we are.
There are a number of things you could do to help us.
1) Borrow our books from your college or public library. This will encourage them to stock them.
2) Buy our books from bookshops or Amazon. This will encourage bookshops and Amazon to stock them.
3) Encourage your friends to borrow or buy our books.
4) Let us know a postal address so we can send you some complimentary copies of our books.
5) Encourage your friends to visit our website and blogs, so they know about us.
6) Visit us in Cuddesdon, an attractive village near Oxford, so we can tell you about our need for workers of all kinds, and for financial and moral support (or encourage your friends to do so).
7) Spend some or all of your vacations with us doing voluntary work, or encourage others to do so.
With regards,
Celia Green
*This refers to the following page on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/?ref=home#!/group.php?gid=22687233093&v=wall
update
the above Facebook page has now been superseded by the following group page:
(unfortunately group pages cannot be accessed unless one is logged into Facebook)
http://www.facebook.com/groups/oxfordforum
