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Old 06-19-2013, 11:30 AM   #19
George S. Ledyard
 
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Dojo: Aikido Eastside
Location: Bellevue, WA
Join Date: Jun 2000
Posts: 2,670
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Re: Bruce Klickstein Update

Quote:
Joe Curran wrote: View Post
Dear George,
This article /blog has been done to death.Why the rehash? Cheers, Joe.
Joe,
Since I was at the center of previous efforts to make people aware of past events and make sure that Klickstein did not re-enter the Aikido community, I can tell you that in my communications with Aikido community leaders there were some, even some very highly ranked who either had the attitude of "that was years ago, time to forgive and forget" or who still seemed to doubt that the accusations had been true in the first place since they were never aired in court. Therefore, this news, which is current and not a rehash, is important to help those folks perhaps reevaluate their attitudes, which fortunately were in a minority.

As difficult as it was for the Europeans to understand what had happened here, since they had been given very skewed accounts of the issue by Klicksetin himself, I wished to make sure that they could see that the efforts to keep Klicksetin from rejoing the Aikido community were in fact justified and that their decision to dis-invite him from participation in a very wonderful memorial event for Saito Sensei saved them from a great deal of potential embarrassment. I have been thanked for bringing this to their attention and they did not know about these latest developments. My relations with the organizers are quite cordial.

Frankly, the folks that fought the good fight way back when Klicksetin was first "outed" never really felt that they had been vindicated publicy for having done so and I think that making sure the community was aware of what has happened serves to show that those early efforts were important and not just some over reaction.

George S. Ledyard
Aikido Eastside
Bellevue, WA
Aikido Eastside
AikidoDvds.Com
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