Early in 1996, sometime during the first three months of the year, RKBA will cease to be a Mensa SIG.
The SIG has been doing well, but its continued affiliation with Mensa has threatened to limit its ability to attract members in the numbers befitting its focus. As Mensa has experienced critical problems, including efforts to censor or chill the expression of politically incorrect views in regional as well as some SIG newsletters, I have become only more convinced that I, personally, do not wish to continue to subsidize the organization with my dues.
Nor do I wish to have Mensa’s troubles, which will inevitably lead to a decline in membership (especially among those who do not embrace PC orthodoxy) adversely affect my ability to produce and distribute the best pro-freedom newsletter I possibly can.
The Armed Genius will not cease publication. Rather, it will be continued by me as the primary (and, at least for the time being, sole) operation of a company I will form after the first of the year. This company will acquire the SIG’s cash assets (from prepaid RKBA dues) and its obligations, and will also have additional capital to finance efforts to attract new subscribers.
Subscription rates will not rise anytime soon; the volume and quality of the newsletter will likewise be unaffected, except in the interest of improvement.
The benefits to the newsletter of breaking away from Mensa are several. First, there will be absolutely no danger of any content standards being imposed by the Mensa organization, or by any other organization—the company will be entirely independent of any such supervision, having only the expectations of its paying subscribers to reckon with.
In addition, the label of Mensa affiliation will no longer hamper my efforts to attract new readers who may not know of Mensa, or who will conclude that the newsletter is only for Mensans. Also, being free of Mensa’s rules against profitability will afford me an additional incentive to pursue more readers and therefore get the information and opinions contained in The Armed Genius exposed to more of the public.
More readers will mean—hopefully—that the economies of scale will enable me to continue to improve your newsletter while keeping the price down. If any rate adjustments are needed, however, those paid-in-full subscribers receiving The Armed Genius prior to March 31, 1996 will be “grand-fathered” for renewals at the current rate for as long as possible.
