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6/02/2009

Calling "Fraud"

OK.

I have a history for this particular move.


Once, a very long time ago, when I was still a very new blogger, I called out the "queen bee" of the blogging universe because there was simply no earthly way that my rational mind could accept that what she wrote on her blog day after day, and presented as reality, could be possibly happening in any kind of real world relationship. It was a ball-sy sort of stand for someone who had barely dipped toes into the universe of writing in this forum, but it was what I believed at the time, and I was driven to say what seemed true.

It didn't earn me any points, and she came after me with a vengeance, but my call turned out to be accurate in the end. For me it was an important lesson. It was critical for me, as I began to reach out into this cyber community, to understand that not everyone tells the whole truth all the time, and not everyone is what they claim to be. If a blogger develops a devoted following, it is pretty easy for the ego to expand beyond what is actually reasonable. The distance and relative anonymity that gives many of us license to write here can encourage some to fabricate and exaggerate. Arrogance can masquerade as expertise and there is not a darn thing we can do about it. I've seen it happen and written about it on other occasions, too: here and here. But we do not have to endorse it when people mislead others by intention or otherwise, and we do not have to stand silent while it happens.

Fraud. That is (in my view) what is being perpetrated by a writer in our circle. Because, in the last couple of weeks, Vivian, who writes at The Disciplined Feminist has published an e-book entitled "How to Get the Spanking You Want." She has been touting this new endeavor, of course, as have some others around the circle, and that is fine. People can surely support her in this effort as seems appropriate to them.

However, I've been following Vivian since she first appeared on the scene (brand new to the very limited practice of Domestic Discipline) in December of 2006. She is, undoubtedly, a bright and talented writer. The pieces that she puts up every so often are well written and thought provoking, but they have been few and far between. In fact, in the just about 30 months that Vivian has been sharing her thoughts on her blog, she's written 37 posts. Much of what she writes concerns the paradox that she perceives between her feminist philosophies and her orientation to spanking. Woven in between is the painful accounting of the largely unsuccessful attempts of she and her partner to establish what she calls a "traditional DD relationship." Comments to "The Disciplined Feminist" are strictly moderated, so Vivian has little need to engage in dialog with most of the rest of our community.

Now, she is pushing a book which is almost certainly based solely on her imaginings of how things must be. There is, if one can believe what she's written on her blog, little or no solid experience to back the words. Master attempted to engage her in discussion of this through her comments, but there is that matter of "comment moderation..."

I imagine she'll draw from a certain following, and some without much knowledge will be taken in by the sham of this new publication. There is a real hunger for information about our lifestyle and orientation from those who are new and seeking, and that is an easy market for a book titled as hers is. How is someone newly exploring their own spanking orientation supposed to know who can be trusted to provide credible information and guidance? Vivian is not the first, and she surely won't be the last to seek to cash in on those who are desperate for guidance and information about our kind of erotic orientation. It still isn't right. If you don't know beyond a few fancy sounding theories: if you don't have the expertise and actual experience; then playing yourself off as some sort of guru is a cheat and a fraud.

I doubt that my opinion will make any difference at all to Vivian or to those who are backing her book venture, but I won't endorse this endeavor by my silence.

swan

7 comments:

  1. Jelly5:42 AM

    Thank you for saying what needed to be said.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Swan, your reaction mirrors mine exactly when I first started exploring the cyber world. WHAT? EVERY day? Several times a DAY? And hell, I thought I had a great deal going at home! Then I began to think it through rationaly - like realities - TIME for instance - jobs, chores, kids, you know, those annoying little interferences REAL people deal with every day! And let's not factor in illness, or stress, or other demands ....

    and I realized.

    99% of the stuff out there is BS.

    and you know what? BORING with it! I mean just how many times can you describe the same thing day in and day out?

    My envy was short-lived and I quickly found my own interests lie with real people in real situations and all the myriad little things that make up a real life.

    I had a quick look at her site and agree with your assessment completely.

    The sad thing is that all these well-meaning, credulous people will buy into it and becuase it is not based on realities, it probably won't work and then instead of blaming the "teacher" they'll see themselves as failures.

    ReplyDelete
  3. HAHAHA, Swan! Good for you!

    Yeah, I was on her email list about the book. Imagine my surprise since we don't do spanking, nor did I have a problem asking for it when we DID, (nor did Dan have a problem wacking away on my ass, lol) but anyway, I totally understood she was just promoting her book by emailing everyone she could find on D/s lists, etc. Which is fine, I have no problem with promoting one's book via email.

    What was curious, though, is that she didn't appear to understand when I wrote back explaining I wouldn't be interested due to lack of interest in spanking. She wrote back and said she was sorry but I was on a list of subs. I wrote back, well, yes, I AM sub, I've been writing about it off and on since 2003 but we just don't spank. She didn't write back. Not that she needed to.

    Anyway. I got the impression it hadn't occurred to her before. Maybe I'm wrong on that but...it made me wonder how she could set herself up as an expert on the subject if she was unaware that several couples do DD or D/s and do NOT spank. I've known a few over the years. We're not the majority, true, but we're not unknown, either.

    And I do remember running across her blog before; wasn't she having a great deal of trouble with her partner? I don't remember reading much that was positive, was there? Seemed like it was pretty angsty stuff. He didn't want it and she did or he'd get mad at her or...dunno. It hardly seemed smooth waters there.

    Maybe I'm thinking of someone else; so many blogs over the years, oy.

    And I remember Patty too, of course. I remember at the time you pointed out you'd written about being suspicious long before. I've been fooled before her (and since then) but she was the most upsetting to me. Because I just wholeheartedly believed her. Her so-called "husband" reminded me so much of my Dan, even to the arguments they would have. Someone later suggested that she may have borrowed some of what I wrote. Possible. Since it was all fantasy, she probably "borrowed" from everything she read.

    I still felt stupid, though. Just...foolish. Still do, in a way. Not in a bad way, just an eye-rolling way.

    There are people who don't have a problem with those who project lies about themselves and people who do have a problem.

    I have a major problem with it.

    I'm glad you spoke up about it; I had suspicions but as I said, I didn't really follow this one closely enough to know.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Swan, thanks for this. Your words mirror my thoughts almost exactly. I didn't post about it only because I haven't been following her blog very long and thought I might have missed something. I have no interest in buying the book, but I am curious to hear the reviews from anyone that reads it.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Anonymous11:00 PM

    So it was YOU who outed Patty? haha! I always wondered who did it. I have to admit that I was heartbroken when I found out the truth. I used to read her every day, and I BELIEVED what she wrote. I can't tell you how much I learned from that experience...ie, learning that what I was buying in to was simply a concoction of someone's imagination, and perhaps also stealing. But it made me grow up, at least in the internet world. Everything I read now is taken with a grain of salt, and pondering as to the truthfulness of the written words. Everything. Thanks, swan. I haven't responded to any of your writings before, but I have read you quite faithfully for a long time now, and you are a good source of thought for my menial brain. I appreciate your candor. Maybe I won't always be a lurker in the future...who knows. I wish you and yours the best in your journey. I find it to be quite remarkable...

    Sincerely,
    Rhonda

    ReplyDelete
  6. No, Rhonda -- I didn't "out" Patty. I simply stated in my customary blunt fashion that the stuff she wrote didn't make any sense to me, and I couldn't believe that her stories were representative of the actual truth. It was long before she was "outed" as you put it, and I resisted the urge, when it finally happened, to say, "I told you so..."

    swan

    ReplyDelete

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