I suppose clubs ban people on the theory that banning
one person will bring in more people. Its usually not true.
People who didn't join before don't join after. Chess is
not a game for snobs. The image of wealthy Englishmen
playing chess in their private clubs is not where American
chess has its roots. Chess was brought to this country
by poor immigrants from Russians and other countries.

There was the case of the Tamarkin trial at the Manhattan.
Larry was actually defended by a lawyer who was with the
ACLU. There wasn't any "ism" involved. She just showed
that Larry had not done what he was accused of doing. The
people who falsely accused him should still be hanging their
heads in shame. But I guess we have a high tolerance for
dishonesty.


Matt Nemmers wrote:

"Sam Sloan" wrote in message
...
When is it appropriate to ban a player from a chess club?

Veteran Master Boris Feldman has recently been banned from the
Marshall Chess Club. He will not be allowed to enter the club until
December 31, 2003, but he will be allowed to return to the club after
that. His membership dues are paid up-to-date and will not be
refunded.

The person who initiated the proposal to ban Feldman was John
Fernandez. Grandmaster William Lombardy is strongly opposed to the
ban. New club president Doug Bellizzi and Asa Hoffmann both support
the ban.

I feel that nobody should be banned from playing chess, except under
very extreme circumstances. We should welcome back Raymond Weinstein
among others. Invariably, the players who are banned are regular and
frequently strong chess players who come to the chess club every day.
It is mostly masters who get banned, not average players. They
alienate a few opponents, win a few too many games, and suddenly they
are out.

I think that some objective standard should be established on when to
ban or not to ban. I would like to start a discussion about this.

Usually, when a player is banned, nobody knows except the parties
directly involved. The player usually does not want it known that he
has been banned. Therefore, it is only in a few exceptional cases that
we find out that a player has been banned.

For example, someone recently remarked that Rudy Blumenfeld was banned
from the Manhattan Chess Club. Blumenfeld is a strong player, rated
nearly 2400. I do not know why he was banned but I played him many
times in the Manhattan Rapids and I can understand why some members
might want him banned.

Another example is Stephen Krasnov, a 1900 player, who was banned from
the Mechanics Institute Chess Club in San Francisco while Jim Eade was
the director. In that case, I felt that the ban was totally and
completely unjustified. I do not know what happened, but apparently
Krasnov appealed to the directors of the library and he was
reinstated. The Mechanics Institute is an unusual situation. Although
it calls itself a chess club, it is actually a library which has a
room where library members are allowed to play chess. This is why
Krasnov was able to appeal to the non-library members to get himself
back in.

More recently, Grandmaster Roman Dzindzichashvili has been banned from
the Mechanics Institute Chess Club. I do not know the current
situation, but I imagine that he is back in by now.

I will create a semi-hypothetical situation. Ralph Martinelli died
recently so he is a good example. Ralph Martinelli, also known as Big
Ralph, was a player in Washington Square Park and in Liberty Park. He
was a strong player at blitz chess, about 2300, but he never played
tournament chess and he had no rating. I saw him win many games
against Grandmaster Roman Dzindzichashvili at blitz chess. He never
applied to join the Manhattan or the Marshall Chess Club. However, if
he had applied to join, his application would have been rejected. In
his case, I feel that they would have been justified in denying his
application for membership.

The reason? Actually, I cannot provide a rational reason. Ralph was a
big man, about 6 foot three inches, weighed about 400 pounds. His very
presence was intimidating. I several times saw him get into loud
heated arguments, but I never saw him hit anybody. I imagine that he
spent time in jail, but I do not know that for a fact. I do know for a
fact that in the 1960s he often brought prostitutes into the Chess and
Checker Club of New York on 42nd Street. They hung around Ralph
because he provided them with friendship and protection.

Does all this add up to a good reason to ban Ralph from the Marshall
Chess Club? Yes and no. Many members would not have been comfortable
playing in the club with Ralph around, so perhaps that would be a good
reason to ban him.

Let us take another example. Asa Hoffmann is a strong player rated
about 2400. He comes to the club every day. Some members want to ban
him. I do not know how many. The reason: One thing they do not like
about Hoffmann is that he only plays when he is virtually guaranteed
to win. He can win every game against simple masters, but he cannot
beat the grandmasters. So, he hangs around the tournaments until the
last moment. If no grandmasters enter, he joins the tournament and
wins the money. If somebody like Michael Rohde shows up, Hoffmann
refuses to play.

Is that a reason to ban Hoffmann?: Of course not, but some people also
do not like the fact that he plays in Liberty Park every day for
money.

So, my questions a

1. When should a player be banned or not banned?

2. Should the USCF regulate the question of when and whether clubs
which are USCF affiliates are allowed to ban certain players? Can a
club ban whomever they feel like banning? Should a player be allowed
to appeal a ban to the USCF?

3. Can under USCF Rules Boris Feldman be banned from playing in a USCF
rated tournament which is held at the Marshall Chess Club?

Sam Sloan


Nobody I've ever heard of gets banned for no reason. Yes, we're scraping
the bottom of the barrel for players (e.g. Sam Sloan) and we need all the
people we can get. If you can fog a mirror, you can be a member of a chess
club -- simple as that.

Getting banned from a tournament, let alone a club, is pretty tough to do.
You either have to have caused severe problems for the players and/or the
director, blatantly disregarded the rules while playing, become violent to
the point of throwing pieces and/or threatening physical violence, or just
been a complete and utter jackass to be banned. I'm sure John Fernandez can
enlighten us on what's gone down at the Marshall and the reasons for this
player's "suspension" from the club -- I'm quite positive there was good
reason for it. You'll forgive me if I don't blindly swallow every tidbit of
information Sloan spews onto this forum.

True to form, Sloan is (once again) screaming at the top of his lungs about
a perceived injustice without even knowing the facts of the matter.
Typical. Even the so-called examples he cites make no sense, yet he seems
to think that his hypothesese support his idea. They don't.

The USCF absolutely CANNOT regulate what clubs can and cannot do. Maybe the
ACLU, NAACP, or some other similar civil rights organization (or even our
broken judicial system) could raise a big enough stink about it to get
somebody who was banned reinstated if they could prove racism, sexism, or
any other ism you can think of that supports the theory that the club was
being prejudiced, but the USCF is pretty much out of the loop on this one.
Chess clubs, like the motto on many of the bars I frequented in my more
unruly days, have the right to "refuse service to anyone."

Regards,

Matt