MCJ Advent Calendar - Day Fifteen - The Queen Pretty Saga
/This one is a bit complicated, so I will have to walk you through it.
In March of 2004 I get an email from a reader and he tells me about some interesting posts he's found online by one of the members of the Cafe staff. This member posted a lot on usenet groups which became google groups (I think). Suffice it to say, he was posting a bit on these internet forums that were all linked up. So he would post on something called alt.magic.secrets and by clicking on his name there you could see the posts he made on all the other usenet groups as well. Usenet groups such as alt.amazon-women.admirers or alt.fan.cock-sucking.
To see a Cafe staff member posting all over these forums was obviously a goldmine to me. But I'm hyper-sensitive to issues of privacy and secrecy (you should see the stuff people email me that is "for my eyes only" that I never spill to you animals) so I didn't immediately spill the beans on my site. But then I looked at the situation and saw a guy who was posting on a magic message board, under his own name, linked to his work e-mail, and just by clicking on his name you would get all his other posts on these super-sexy message boards, also under his own name, and also linked to his work e-mail. He had made NO effort to disassociate these aspects of his life so I assumed it wasn't an issue.
For the purposes of this little retrospective, we'll call our subject John Richey. That's not his name. On my blog I eventually scrubbed all references to his name and replaced them with Queen Pretty, but that pseudonym makes things a little confusing. So here is how things played out between me and "John Richey."
Monday, March 29, 2004
Still Helping Magicians
Today I'd like to help one of the Cafe's own staff members, grammar host, John Richey.
John is a big fan of "bears" and is looking for fun and friendship. He's "fun and very willing :-)." Oh hell, why don't I just let John tell you what he's looking for:
What say you, all? Know of any "bears" for our friend John?
You can read all of John's insightful posts by searching for his name in the Google "Groups" section. Unfortunately he doesn't post very often at alt.magic.secrets, in fact he only posts there as often as he posts at alt.amazon-women.admirers, but still, you'll get the point.
I applaud The Magic Cafe's progressive outlook that what a children's entertainer does in the privacy of his own home or on alt.fan.cock-sucking, has no bearing on their ability to undangle your participle.
According to his website, John is a proud member of The Magic Circle, but I'll bet dollars to doughnuts that the magic circles he likes the most are brown and stinky.
Man, helping magicians feels great.
[2015: So that post goes out and some people take issue with it. They didn't think it was right for me to link to this guy's posts he made all over these sex message boards. (Sadly, I don't think you can find these posts anymore.) I would have seen their point, but take a look at that screen-shot above, that part that's crossed out, that's his work email address. And remember, ALL of these posts were just a click away from his posts on the magic usenet board.
So the next day I made another post.]
Tuesday, March 30, 2004
alt.fan.johnrichey
A lot of people are up my ass for yesterday's post. I don't care, really. But just so I don't have to write the same email to everyone who complains let me post my sentiments here.
First, I'm sure John Richey is a good guy and my post wasn't meant to imply that he wasn't. My post wasn't meant to be derogatory in any way. It wasn't meant to embarrass John. It was meant to embarrass those prudes at the Cafe who probably didn't know they had such a swinging cat on their staff.
Second, if you search for John Richey's name at alt.magic.secrets you can see his post and then click on a link to see all his other posts. All the posts were written under the same name and account. If he had used a pseudonym or gave me the impression in any way he was trying to keep this secret, I probably wouldn't have made the post.
Third, but then again, I do have a personal vendetta against those at the Cafe. As I said in my post last Wednesday, nobody spoke up in their secret administration forum when the notion of pursuing false charges of child pornography against me in order to shut this website down was brought up. This idea was brought up by Jon Gallagher in a thread titled "IMPORTANT -- Please read," that was originally posted by Steve Brooks. That nobody questioned this idea makes everyone who works at that site suspect in my book. In essence, what was suggested was an attempt to try and ruin my life by falsely accusing me of child pornography because I made fun of their magic message board! If that doesn't seem like the most absurd overreaction possible, then please, slit your throat, because you are a maniac if you think that's a legitimate way of dealing with someone you disagree with. (By the way, other ideas of how to deal with me and this site and the people who enjoy reading it were to 1. Threaten to sue (Mya Angel, Brian Proctor, and others) 2. Send false accusations to Blogspot (Lee Darrow, Steven Steele, Scott F. Guinn). 3. Write a strongly worded letter to my advertisers, an especially stupid idea because I don't have any (Steven Steele, who apparently thinks a link to Penguin's website constitutes an "ad") 4. Find hackers to put the site down continuously (TORA). This all makes me wonder what I'm doing here that they see as such a threat. I really don't understand, I wish I did so I could do it more. All I know is they have yet to challenge me on the merit of anything I post, just my right to post it.)
Fourth, I don't think there's anything wrong if you're a guy and you like a little bit of dick now and then. It's not my style, but I certainly don't think it's an indictment of you in any way.
Fifth, I don't think there is anything wrong with posting at alt.fan.cock-sucking. Nobody is a bigger fan of getting their cock sucked than myself. I have a big foam finger that says "Cock Sucking #1" and a baseball cap that says "Hooray for Cock Sucking."
[Two weeks later I hear from John via the email below. I posted his email on my site, as well as my reply which contains what some scholars believe is the greatest sign off in the history of written communication.]
Dear Sir,
My name is John Richey.
I have been informed that you have decided to destroy me.
Your reasons are clearly stated ...
"First, I'm sure John Richey is a good guy and my post wasn't meant to
imply that he wasn't. My post wasn't meant to be derogatory in any way. It
wasn't meant to embarrass Mr. Richey. It was meant to embarrass those
prudes at the Cafe who probably didn't know they had such a swinging cat on
their staff.... Third, but then again, I do have a personal vendetta against
those at the Cafe.... In essence, what was suggested was an attempt to try
and ruin my life by falsely accusing me of child pornography because I made
fun of their magic message board!"
Well, Sir, you HAVE embarrassed me. Indeed, probably destroyed my good name
and, as I shall show below, falsely accused me. Why? What have I done to
you?
You have taken the advert about "bears" completely out of context without
referring to me first. It was part of a series of jokes my wife and I were
involved with some time ago. But this is a PRIVATE matter between two
consenting adults. It is NOT your business and it has nothing to do with
whether I am a decent person or not.
I hope this doesn't surprise you but -everyone- has a sex life - even
children's entertainers.
I'm a family man with a wife and three lovely children. Possibly we made
mistakes in the early days of using the Internet and now, through you, we
are being pilloried for it.
Sir, I have had a British Police check and I am an honest man.
Please, is there any way you can leave me out of this fight and remove these
references to me from your site? (You will also need to have it removed from
that California site that copies EVERY website in the world for 'historical'
reasons).*
I hope that you will be a honourable man and do as I ask.
Please respond as soon as possible.
Kindest regards
John
* He seemed to think I had the ability to remove his usenet posts from the Internet Archive. Why he thought this, I have no idea. This was my response to him.
Mr. Richey
Had I thought you would have been embarrassed by the whole thing, I don't
know that I would ever have posted it. I certainly wouldn't have posted it
if I thought you would construe it as an attempt to "destroy" you. When I
saw those posts, made under your own name, clearly linked to magic posts
made under your own name, I figured you had no problem with people
connecting those two aspects of your life.
I don't have a problem with removing your name. But I do have a problem
with the manner in which you have asked me to do so. You, unfortunately,
have adopted all the worst qualities of your Cafe brethren and are so
narrow-mindedly self-centered that you believe your own bullshit and expect
me just to swallow it. But I don't.
So let me cover a few issues you brought up in your e-mail:
You say I "destroyed your good name." How did I do anything but link to
the words you wrote under that "good name" and then defend your right to say
it?
You say I took the ad about "bears" completely out of context. How, when I
linked to the original source material, could that possibly be considered
"out of context"?
You say that you would show that I falsely accused you, but I did nothing
of the sort. I didn't accuse you of anything, so how could I possibly have
FALSELY accused you of something?
You say that this is a PRIVATE matter between two consenting adults, and
if that were the case, I never would have mentioned it. BUT YOU ARE THE ONE
WHO POSTED IT ONLINE FOR ANYONE WITH A COMPUTER TO READ. How is that
private? How is that "between two consenting adults"?
The answer, of course, is that it is not.
Had you said to me, "Listen, I made a stupid mistake and posted something
under my name when I shouldn't have. Would you mind removing my name from
your site? I'm worried it might impact my business or personal life." I
would have removed your name that same day. In other words, had you been
honest in your dealings with me, I would have been happy to oblige you. But
the thing I can't stand, and have no respect for, is someone who wants to
blame someone else for something that is clearly their own fault. You do
understand that if and when I do remove your name from my site, anyone who
searches for your name is still going to find all those posts you made.
Right? You understand that, and you understand it has nothing to do with me,
yes?
And finally, I'm amazed that you can take such umbrage against my linking
to YOUR OWN WORDS, yet when the subject of contacting the District Attorney
to try and press blatantly false charges of child pornography against me
appeared on the Cafe's administrator forum, nobody (including yourself)
spoke out to say that it seemed like a bad (I would say "evil") idea. So
don't ask me to be "an honourable man" when you're not guided by honor, only
self-preservation.
The subject line of your e-mail was "Why Are You Using Me." You're
apparently unfamiliar with my website. I have no reason to care, and I honestly don't care, how many people read my site. It is not the Magic Cafe, so the lessons you learned
there don't apply at my site. I am not using you, there are no ulterior
motives. If my site offers anything to the people who read it, it offers
honesty. I'll remove your name from my site this weekend because it is my
choice to do so. I don't need anymore input from you, so please don't waste
your time writing, and certainly don't give me any lectures on being
honorable. And, as we used to say at alt.fan.cocksucking: Suck my dick.
Andy
He would end up writing back to me, apologizing for his tone, and saying he was just a "frightened old man." Maybe he was just playing me, but I couldn't hear that and continue to do anything that would torment the guy so I removed his name from all the posts and replaced it with Queen Pretty. And, unsurprisingly, Steve Brooks cut ties with him not long after that. My hope is that Queen Pretty took the time he didn't have to spend correcting people's grammar and spent it trolling for bears, amazon-women, and some good old-fashioned cock sucking.