Blogger Truthiness
Without going into gory details, a feminist blogger whom I used to count among my friends was booted off my private FB page two years ago after I caught her leaking info. The stuff she leaked was often filtered through her truthiness meter, which is to say what you say and what she repeated often had little resemblance to one another. I haven’t spoken to her in about 2 years, and one of her nastier acts of revenge was posting a truthiness article last summer – clearly directed at me – which strongly implied I’d given her an interview. Which I had not. I never gave her an interview about the subject she posted. Ever.
Another dirty trick is her spreading the lie that I hate cosplayers because they don’t buy books, and won’t attend shows with cosplayers. This is ridiculous. She paraphrased a conversation on my private FB page and attributed a writer’s comments to me. I simply didn’t make those comments.
Here is a screen shot of what I actually wrote on my private FB page. I can’t violate anyone else’s privacy by repeating what they said as well, and would not do so, but my position was simply that some cons are party cons, and some cons are book cons, and some cons are celebrity cons, and you should know your market. Not all shows are going to be good book sale shows. This is, like, Sales 101.
This blogger is not trusthworthy in any respect, and I will not speak to her in the future. But this canard got back to me again recently, and I feel I have a right to defend myself.
If people want to go to a con to party, what is it to me? Some cosplayers buy books in great honking quantities. Every show is different. Find what works for you and do that.
Apparently, making up shit about pros is what some bloggers do, but hey, gotta feed the gossip gristmill, otherwise no one will support your Patreon.
10 Comments
Steve Chaput
Won’t even try to speculate who this might be. Known too many folks in my years in fandom (Did I really publish my first apa-zine in ’80?) that I learned will turn on you for the slightest imagined slight. Life is way too short to lose sleep or waste time over that. The good folks way out number the bad, IMHO.
Colleen
Dude, you nailed it. Well said.
And yes, please don’t speculate, not necessary. Without regard to whether I like them or not, I have pretty much blocked the industry bloggers from my computer. There are other things to do with my life than read those things. I go for weeks at a time without seeing a single industry blog. And when I do, there is a five minute timer. The entire industry is blocked after five minutes of read per day.
I do not miss the drama.
Sarah Beach
It sucks that you even have to take the time to make the corrective declaration. But… these days you can’t let some things float free on the internet.
What’s worse is the number of people who would repeat gossip without checking, especially if they don’t even know much about you.
Colleen Doran
Yeah. And what really bugs me is that people confuse a first person account with gossip. If I post something that I directly experienced, that is not gossip, that is my life. These people don’t do that, they play telephone game with the lives of others.
It’s not like we can stop them, we certainly can’t bother to sue these people, it’s not like they have any money. And frankly, I have no doubt some of them actually believe what they are saying. It’s easy to misread something or paraphrase it and change the meaning.
But people who are not favorably disposed toward you will routinely put the most negative spin on whatever you say. And then you get to deal with it.
Jeremy_A
What you say about cons is true not just for pros but also for attendees. I’ve seen some gripe about some shows being more celebrity-centric or predominately cosplayers. No one is forcing them to go to those conventions. I stick to one that is comic-centric. Has it’s share of cosplayers but I don’t see it as a negative. Not interested in the ones that are mostly celebrity autograph sessions. Not hard to find a con suited to one’s tastes. Guess people need something to gripe about instead of enjoying life.
Breaking trusts is abhorrent. Shouldn’t have to tell supposed friends “off the record” when having a discussion. Pathetic that some only view people as page views to their blogs.
Colleen Doran
Can’t agree more. Had a pro with whom I was acquainted who would run to the phone to gossip the minute we got off the phone. One pro told me that one night this person called to gab about me for four hours straight. When I angrily denied the stuff he’d been told, it got back to her and then SHE wailed about how I’d gossiped and lied about her. Seriously, she’s the one who went running to everyone in sight to gossip about me, someone she barely knew, but I’m the bad guy for defending myself.
I try not to confuse friends with professional acquaintances, but obviously, I’ve been burned a few times.
I think the hardest was when a male non-fiction writer who writes unauthorized bios for a living was found to be writing – you guessed it – an unauthorized bio of me. I thought we were friends and I must have dozens of letters where he swore up and down he was a human vault, he respected my privacy. Which he totally didn’t.
Someone else beat him to the punch by publishing another unauthorized bio of me. It’s pretty terrible.
I still find it hilarious ANYONE would publish a bio of me. For crying out loud.
He used to read my blog neurotically, searching for info about himself, terrified I would out him for what he did. It’s been well over a decade, and he was on the blog two days ago. Maybe he’s still working on that bio. Asshole.
Jeremy_A
Seems like the ones who write those unauthorized bios aren’t “telling you the truth that they don’t want you to know” but rather want to peddle whatever gossip they heard or made up citing “anonymous sources” that are just themselves.
Some don’t get it when topics are kept at an impersonal level because they can’t be trusted. If you blab about others to me, why should I think you’ll protect my privacy? I tend to compartmentalize aspects of my life yet some feel like I am obligated to share every little thing. Why talk about the art I bought so you can mock me later? Some people just aren’t worth it.
Colleen Doran
What this guy mostly does is just compile articles from different sources, he doesn’t necessarily know much about what he’s writing about. He’s been trying to brand himself as a pop culture expert for decades, but one of my more amusing letters from him is how he’d never even read Chronicles of Narnia until about 2 weeks before his all-about-Narnia book was due at the publisher. I later found out that, though he’d brag to everyone in sight (me included) that he knew all about my work, he’d never read my work, either. He just sort of cozies up to people and fandoms, gets a bunch of articles together, crash courses himself on the material, and BAM! Instant expert.
Most of his career consists of writing unauthorized bios and companion books about an author he’s never even spoken to. And who, for the most part, holds him in contempt. He does know a lot about a handful of writers, but mostly he’s just throwing edited compilations at the wall to see what sticks.
I doubt I’ll be having problems with him in future, but for awhile he went around telling everybody he ran my entire life and career, I never made a move without him, he was really my agent and manager, and I had the hots for him on top of all that.
None of the above was true, and I was enraged when I found out what he was telling people. Haven’t had anything to do with him since. Been well over ten years now.
Jeremy_A
Drug dealers are more honest about their careers than this guy.
Knowing “all about” a work isn’t the same as actually knowing the work itself. Cursory and second-hand knowledge don’t enable someone to have a strong understanding of the work. Might be able to write a better bio book by actually making an effort to appreciate the art rather than simulate the Matrix and take a knowledge dump of the facts.
Colleen Doran
Can’t argue with that, his behavior is alien to me, I always knew there was something off about the guy. He’s out to make a buck and that’s about it.