Warning - long Rant ahead

["Sasnett, Zella L (Zella)" <zsasnett@lucent.com>]

Excuse me while I blow this bug out of my nose. 

WARNING - Rant approaching.....

To all the subscribed professional radiation safety people, I apologize for
this email and taking up bandwidth. You already know the reason for
RADSAFE's existence.

To all the other subscribed members.

BEGIN RANT

I have noticed in the past couple of months an increase in membership from
the non-radiation safety community. While I think that this can have its
benefits, from members with differing points of view to provide input and
broaden all horizons, I wish to point out a vital fact.

"The Radiation Safety Distribution list is an electronic mailing list for
Health Physicists, Medical Physicists, Radiological Engineers and others who
have a professional interest in matters related to Radiation Protection."

This quote is taken from the RADSAFE subscription page on the internet at
http://www.ehs.uiuc.edu/~rad/radsafe.html.

Several times it has been mentioned that this list has a distinct
Pro-Nuclear flavor.

"Professional Interest" I think are fairly key words here. Most of the
members of this list participate in (sometimes extremely) lively debates and
in exchanges of information pertinent to OUR JOBS - Radiation Protection.

While I cannot speak for the rest of the community of RADSAFE, I think it
may be a safe assumption that we are not a group of pro-nuclear "activists"
sitting around waiting to pounce on the first unsuspecting passer-by. We are
a group of professionals simply trying to do our jobs the best we can. And
sometimes we take questions to the list, to the more experienced of the
membership for answers or for guidance. So this list is not "Pro-Nuclear".
This is a listserv for professionals in Radiation Safety. 

Are any of us pro-nuclear? That would be a question for each individual to
answer. But most of us do have jobs in the nuclear industry in one form or
another. We do not take what we do lightly nor do we treat it flippantly. I
think it is also fair and safe to assume that the professionals that make up
this membership have had many years of education, both in school and in the
work place. They have opinions that are not dictated or influenced by the
media and the hysteria that is running so rampant in the public domain.

If you want to engage in emotionally charged debate of "pro" vs. "anti",
join a "pro" list. If you want to know what the current industry standards
are for radiation safety, detection, safety philosophy, stay with us. Ask
questions.

Give us a little credit...There might be some basis to what we know.

END RANT
<heading into my asbestos bunker for the anticipated flaming>

Zella Sasnett
Standard disclaimers about my opinions not representing those of my
employers...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Zella L. Sasnett
Health Physicist
Radiation Protection Group
Environmental Health and Safety
1F-101A
Murray Hill, NJ 07974

908-582-6439
zsasnett@lucent.com
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


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