Everyone has a reason to quit.
A privileged few have a reason to stay.

Here's Mine.

No matter how hard you try, you're only as good as the face people put on you, and if a tree falls in the forest and crushes the person listening to it, it making a sound becomes immaterial. Dylan Thomas once wrote "Do not go gentle into that good night", and he was right for saying it; you are not given leave to leave until you're done everything you possibly can. Step out of the tiger cage early and a worse fate awaits you.

I almost realized it too late.

Not long ago I was suffering from the same dilemma as someone I deeply admire. It seems our assumed battle standards had been broken and justification of each soldier became increasingly difficult. If there a point where your efforts no longer accumulate to a quantifiable and recognizable goal? What happens when the sun sets on your throne? Do you light a candle and fend off the assasins hiding in the twilight or wait for your blood to reach room temperature and your body be whisked to the roughly hewn coffin of history's heinous calculation?

It's easy when you decide you don't have a choice. Taking a bullet in the back is easier when you realize that's the way you've got to have it.

I've complained loudly to chosen few in recent months about the state of the Apocolypse in E2 and if you dig into me deep enough I have opinions about everything. Put aside you shouts of sour grapes and understand that as an ancient I have a right to the feeling and opinions I have, especially since most of my peers feel the same way but are in the same spiral as I: the man must push with all his might and still not move the boulder. while the boulder takes no toll of itself to stay unmoved and only a little push will crush the man.

Some people in positions of power have said that if I don't agree with what's happening I should just cut my loses and leave. But where is the logic in that? Leaving enhances nothing. Leaving leaves the prairie a bleaker place. If I left it would be an acceptance of the way things are, an admittance that they were right and I was wrong.

I am not wrong.

Some may have power, but manifest destiny is not something I ascribe to. The color of the axe doesn't make the beheading any more holy and the ends do not justify the means. And if I fled without trying to put things right I would be more at fault than anyone else because in the end acceptance is surrender and if you're not part of the solution then the problem is that much stronger.

My contribution is as great at anyone's and I will not rest until I am given the chance to bestow greatness on every fellow noder who gives pause to do so. The only way to save a thing is to love a thing. And I love E2. I love every God, Editor and noder. While I may not agree with every descision made, I will continue to be Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition and fully support the managment in every just function, but I will also make my voice know as well as everyone should. I would be doing E2 a dis-service if I did not.

I stay because Everything is a community and I am a part of it.

So are you.