You cannot protect human beings (or secrets) endlessly. It cannot be done. Of course, there will be mistakes, setbacks, errors, etc. And this is all a part of learning. Join the human race. The open human race.
We do our best. As long as our best includes heart, well, thats the best we can do. Being a control freak doesn't work anymore. And that's the way it is.
All the best to you and to control freaks everywhere!
I'm not suggesting the cone of silence is the only way to talk about the Vajrayana. Nor am I worried that "the secrets" are gonna get out--I'm not trying to "control the information." My main concern is with the apparent flippance and disrespect that come across sometimes when students of Mahamudra, Dzogchen, etc. are talking about how their practice is the most sublime and makes all the other paths look pathetic, or how they lack the need for the pettiness of Pratimoksa vows, etc.
I'm asking people to consider their audience. Even the most "fundamentalist" Dzogpachenpo Lama would not spout off about how much more sublime his yana was in front of a bunch of Lay Vietnamese Buddhists or a bunch of Indian Sadhus..at least, not unless they were really really ripe to hear it and he was a realized being.