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winston churchill's novel

nothing has changed in south hadley

they're calling it "the mean girls of south hadley" and 2 girls are being "disciplined" for bullying a girl who came there from ireland, and killed herself. like everything else involving groups of ppl that don't want to look at themselves it's being treated as an isolated incident. but if you read the comments after the article, it's SO clear that it's not.

i don't like to admit that i ever lived there. it was a terrible place. no one has ever believed me when i've tried to tell my story. south hadley is a place of physical beauty. it's full of nature. there are horses, there are trees. there's a lake. sort of. there's a prestigious women's college, so one would assume that it's like any other "college town", full of intellectuals, rich with culture. right? wrong... if any intellectuals live there, they send their kids to private schools. the south hadley public schools are... well until i read this article i would have said "were" and i might have gone along w/the belief that it's all in my head... but no, it's real and it's still happening. they're bigoted and racist and closed-minded and basically horrible. the kids are encouraged to root out anyone who's not to their liking and torment them. the adults look the other way if they don't outright egg it on.

i was off to a bad start when i started public school for the first time in south hadley in 4th grade, having skipped 3rd after just returning from a year in holland, where i'd attended a very small village school with only 8 kids in my 2nd-grade class, so we were combined with the 3rd grade. we wore those pointy wooden shoes for practical reasons - stuffed with a bit of straw they were warm and they kept the mud out. before holland, i'd gone to private school in northampton. but then we returned to the states and a decision was made that i should start public school. i was having trouble remembering how to speak english and even before school started, kids on my street were laughing at me when i accidentally would start speaking dutch.

my mom didn't know better, i'm sure... but she told me to wear those wooden shoes to school on my first day. i remember her saying to me "the kids will be so fascinated!" but it wasn't just the kids who were fascinated. my homeroom teacher enjoyed my shoes so much that she made a mockery of me, sending me on errands up & down the stairs all day, so that the sound of my shoes echoed loudly throughout the school for everyone's entertainment. they didn't have to try very hard to figure out i was weird. i can't blame them for that.

i posted this after the other comments i read about this girl's death, tonight. it has grieved me. just knowing a) that south hadley hasn't changed, and b) that all the ppl who told me it was all my imagination were totally WRONG, and c) that still it's not being looked at as a town-wide problem w/a long, long history... it's made everything kind of come pouring back, all this stuff i've tried to forget. things could have been worse. no one raped me in the woods. i didn't get murdered or kidnapped. but how to explain to anybody in my adult life who i am and why i act weird sometimes? i can't. it's impossible w/out context. so i read this article and context is all it is. i wish i could be there to do something to comfort this girl's parents. i just wish i could hug them. i wish i could make south hadley STOP being south hadley. i can't do that. i don't even know if what i'm about to do is totally stupid or not.. but i'm doing it... i'm copying here the comment i left after the other comments. there were stories not so unlike my own. i have been ashamed my whole life of the way i was treated, because it feels like it was my fault. looking at the picture of this beautiful girl makes me feel a bit less ashamed for me and more ashamed of that horrible town. it's not *me* who's disgusting. that's what i've spent my whole life trying to convince myself, anyway...

---

i attempted suicide when i was 18 and having spent a number of years being tormented in south hadley public schools was ABSOLUTELY one of the main causes. i was tormented by my entire class from 4th grade through 8th, at which point i finally got my parents to send me to private school. 8th grade was so traumatic that i deliberately started in 8th grade again at my new school and pretended that the first 8th grade, in south hadley, had never happened. for many years i actually blocked it out of my mind, completely forgot about it. when it came back, it was almost too much to handle.

i know why i was tormented. i was the new kid, and i was different. i did not come from a catholic working-class family but rather from a non-religious, academic family. i did go to church to try to fake catholicism, but it's hard to hide a jewish nose. i could not go out in public w/out fear of being bullied. i did make some friends: if you look at my 5th grade birthday party picture you'll see the vietnamese girl (i remember the day the class bully took her glasses off her face and smashed them...), the bow-legged girl, the one black girl in town, her little brother, one "normal" girl who lived down the street, and me.

i had a crush on a boy named colin who lived on my street. he killed himself when he was 16. i don't remember anyone asking why, and no one bothered to tell me b/c no one knew or cared that i knew him. but colin was the ONE person in my neighborhood i was not afraid of. he was schizophrenic, they said. but we would make eye contact and a communication would pass between us, when we saw each other on the wood-path. colin was nice to me. but then he was dead.

i lived my life in fear. my parents, unfortunately, were no help at all. i couldn't decide if it was worse being at home or being out, so for the most part i stayed in my room, hid in bed under the covers and read books to escape.

on the school bus, i'd be yelled at by the driver for not sitting down, but all the kids would scream "UGLY!" at me as i came by trying to find a place to sit. no one would let me sit w/them. i got in daily fistfights (even to this day i marvel at the very thought that it is such a luxury, not getting punched in the stomach every morning, not getting the wind knocked out of me every day.) i got spat on, and entire classes of kids, and often the entire cafeteria, would chant at me. when i walked down the halls of the middle school, all the kids would make monkey noises and scratch their armpits.

kids would yell "ugly!" "disgusting" "eeew!" at me... i didn't know what i could do. i couldn't get a great haircut or perfect clothes and even if i did, i knew that wouldn't fix it. i was just cursed. i went to the teachers for help but of course i was told to ignore the kids & they'd stop it (they didn't) and so i withdrew into myself, learned to stare at the ground as i walked, developed bad posture, learned to trust no one. the best i could do was to hide in a bathroom stall during lunch, to avoid the cafeteria, but i was rarely able to pull that off. the most luxurious week i ever had was when i managed to get in enough trouble that i "had" to eat in the principal's office for a week. i remember how angry he was when i thanked him, because i was supposed to be unhappy with the "punishment" and not "enjoy" it... but for me it was one week of relative safety.

back then they had "tracking" and i was in the highest-level classes, where kids were a bit more decent, and i remember one girl trying to talk to me in a friendly way... but i couldn't talk to her... i couldn't trust that she hadn't been put up to it and there wasn't a group of kids somewhere waiting for her to report back so they could mock me more.

i did my best to escape south hadley but somehow little traces of it managed to follow me. there was one particular kid who started the bullying and led the hoards in their chants... i remember going on a trip to mt. tom when i was in boarding school, and he was on the lift & he spotted me, and yelled out the usual insults. i couldn't get away.

it is so many years later now... but three times in the last three years, car-fuls of young adults have passed me by and shouted out the window in unison, "UGLY!" as they drove past. i know it's not possible that these were the same people, or that they knew who i was. i have learned, after many many years, that i am not ugly. i know it's not ME those kids are yelling at now... but they're doing it... it has to be a coincidence that i've been shouted at 3 times, but just the fact that it's still happening i think is pretty sick.

there is no doubt in my mind that i would be long dead if i had not been saved by books... and by having the good fortune to get the hell out of that place and go to where nobody knew me. i did learn, even at a young age, that only in south hadley did they know i was to be mocked, and so long as i could go elsewhere and hide my identity, i would be safe, so long as none of them could find me and tell everyone in my community that i was to be tormented.

i have lived in many places and i have never been treated as horribly as i was in the south hadley schools, or seen other kids treated that way. i hoped that with the 70's being over with teachers would have better sense now. in other countries, teachers will intervene if kids start mobbing one another. not here. it is extremely disturbing to learn that this still goes on. it's disgusting, it's sickening, and i know that it's based on bigotry and ignorance. the things i heard kids say about other people - puerto ricans mostly (and anyone non-catholic... i heard kids explaining to each other that jews, for example, did not believe in "god") were horrible. i know they learned it from their parents and grandparents.

there is nothing wrong with being different, but in south hadley at least, difference is treated as a valid reason to be singled out and treated absolutely horribly. not even the teachers were innocent. even my favorite teacher did things to me that people can't believe when i try to tell them about it. i got in trouble in 4th grade because we got to put our classroom seating choices in a ballot box, and my mom got a call because not one kid wanted to sit near me. my mother yelled at me for that - for some reason she was furious, it was if i'd done something to get "in trouble". and the next day i went to school and found that my desk had been put behind a barrier, next to the one other girl who was also entirely rejected. she was poor & got free lunch. her teeth were green. the two of us sat at our desks hidden from the rest of the class by a row of bookshelves. that's how the teacher dealt with the situation.

and she was the best teacher i had. in 5th grade my homeroom teacher was such a drunk that he gave me 13 detentions at once for talking back (i.e. speaking w/reason) and at recess i erased the detention marks off the board. he was too drunk to notice.

i have recovered inasmuch as i have entirely changed my identity and i rarely admit to anyone that i ever lived in that horrible place. thinking about it brings back more trauma than i can handle. the fact that a girl committed suicide after landing in south hadley from another place is sadly no surprise at all to me. i know that every "new kid" in any school has some trouble adjusting, but south hadley takes the prize for racism, hatred, bullying and general.... well, what i would call "evil" if i believed in evil. but i don't. i just think that kids there are encouraged to root out anyone who dares to be different, even if it's not their fault, and smash them to bits. my heart goes out to this girl's family and her friends... she had at least one. to everyone else: i hope they will understand that they helped push her over the edge and i hope they will learn something from this and teach themselves to become better people, as it is clear that there is no culture of acceptance there to guide them in a better direction.

in defense of me - about a year ago

hi freedom centers,

i used to be a freedm center in good standing (& my downward dog was alrite too). i lepht the groop because 1) i found it hard to communikate because i have mental problemz and 2) becoz i felt like there was a higharchy to the groop which went against my own inner anarchy. i felt alienated by the groupthink & thinktank and i always felt like a fish out of a watertank.

follow me now. i must be brief. i have hash browns sizzling in a pan, and i don't mean that metaforkickly.

if you freedom centers let jenna wikler go & leave the fredum center you are shooting yrselfs in the foot. she is a foot souljer who works in the trenches and who kares deeply about saving people's lies. mr. will haul does a great radio show whose library should be kept in the National Archives. i think he's a decent human being and has a nice set of hair. but he & his kind have alwayz struck me as being more into the cause of the freedum center (and cause-celebré) than the atchual people in the centir. and here cums jenna wikler with her monkey backpack and anybody who thinks she hates the freedum center is like those fox newshounds who think protesters hate america. ok, just so that's understoood.

will haul has a nice set of teeth and he is a great propagandist for the freedim center, which is to say that he makes it look like the freed em' center is a great giant organisation that has all the alternativ answers to proper mental health for those krazy like us. it's a mission that's doomed to fale. because there ar no eesy answers. "dey's only mo' questions", says niggah sambo. and people to look at questioninglee with kare.

the chickens have cum home to roost.

sure jenna's bin half crazy lately. dat's wut make her poifect for being a fredum center. but i'm afrade that gal is also perfectly sane. and wot she points out about "the guidelines, goals, and facilitation of freedom center are not personal opinions that should then be turned into the subject of debate on the list and meetings. that is not the purpose of the list. our guidelines, goals, and facilitation are terms of agreement that you enter into when you become part of freedom center." points to a facscism not meanly intended but nuntheless stubbornly klung to by the old guard who won't let the new guard IN 'cuz they don't want to let their gard down. i just thought this sekund of garter belts, teehee. if that makes me a racist, then throw me in a cell with a buncha niggaz and i'll wear my garter belt and get fucked in the ass. dat's what's happening wif da phredim center right now only they don't even know it.

you are failing a test to fall in love.

i wached many many peeple leave the freedum center all becuz of wot's going on here, this hype. c'mon peeple, smile on yoor bruther but don't be afrade to call a nigger a nigger, or a jew a big-nosed money grubber.

furthermoor, yoo should take all of the people that have the ansers in freedum center and poot them in a concentration kamp, only one where they are forced to wach marx bruthers moovies all day. then take all dem niggers dat don't know day from nite and give dem freedum centers badges and let them houl at the moon and spread their day-glo pheces around and party like its 1984.

in my unhumble & eegomaniacal opinyon, you shood get miz wikkler back even if yoo haf to beg. otherwize yoor center might as well cell itz sole doun the river for a blowjob with the noo york tymes.

kindlly & respeckably,

marc israel

grrrrrrumph!

3 things what piss me off:

1) sheeple.

2) sociopaths.

3) the willfully ignorant.

another one from the archives

jenna & sage go to hollywood! from Jenna Wikler on Vimeo.

i had a little something to say to the ci-tay... as always...

oh, paradise city...

wow... adam cohen, surveillance-cam apologist extraordinaire, i am truly impressed by your flood of posts over the last several days, offering "evidence" of the wonders of surveillance.

i would like to make you a proposal. i am willing to consider your position(s) under one condition: that you buy me one of these amazing high-tech spy cams that can do what you claim - work at a slow shutter speed in the dark to capture would-be wrong-doers. i'll set it up in my window, and i'll see how things go. if things get better in the city i'll publicly admit on this very forum that you're not out of your mind. but i get to keep the camera after the experiment is over.

i'm not joking! please buy me a camera. because in truth, i have (for purposes of my own, involving a desire to find out who's outside my door before answering my doorbell) done a bit of research into spy-cams and i have not been able to find anything in my miniscule price range that would actually work in any way. now... i know you have experience videotaping stuff in well-lit rooms and i don't know anything about what experience you may or may not have videotaping in the dark. but i've been playing with cameras for many years and my experience and research have taught me that your claims about the wonders of modern spy-cam technology (as far as what regular people can afford) are a bit exaggerated.

i'll just address the shutter speed issue. i believe you mentioned slow shutter speed as a way to slow down the recording so that one could capture more video on less tape (or hard drive) as well as bring in more light. 2 different issues. the first would actually be addressed by stop-motion, something that's not a feature on all cameras - like having the camera capture one frame every ten seconds, for example. slow shutter speed itself has one major advantage: it brings in more light. but the down-side is that anything that moves will be very blurry. my own video camera has about the best night-mode i've ever seen, but people have to hold still if i want to capture their faces in the dark.

i'd really love it if you bought me a camera so you could prove me wrong. i LOVE being proven wrong! i don't want to be right about how creepy all of this is.

but now onto other serious matters: i have a few things to address and i might as well address them all now.

i am the first person who invoked the spectre of "1984" and suggested people read it. i admitted that it sounded far-fetched even to me, but i stand by my original statement that it would be informative for us all, and help us consider how we react to these incidents. and actually i don't think it's as far-fetched as it sounds. if you don't feel like reading (or re-reading) the book, check out the movie. i just happened to watch the movie for the first time a couple weeks ago (before this spate of fires.) it was shot in london in 1984. watching it, i was struck by how much of it really resembled things that have gone on in this country and others since 9/11/01. consider the fact that all of london, for example, is now under surveillance 24/7. did that prevent more bombings of the subways? maybe, or maybe not. did we ever find out who caused those? the only thing *i* ever found out was that the emergency response personnel had been running mock emergency scenarios involving subway bombings at the exact same time when the real bombings occurred (just like how all of our airborne emergency response teams of the U.S. military were in training scenarios on 9/11, involving mock hijackings, which caused the FAA to be unable to distinguish actual hijackings from mock ones and were the reason why jets were not scrambled in time to intercept the planes that flew into the WTC. EVERY SINGLE military air base was doing practice exercises on that day at that time.)

i say watch that movie, 1984. it's creepy. it's probably a lot more creepy now than when it first came out, because it resembles our current reality much more closely now.

next issue: let's pretend that i'm "the arsonist" (personally i don't think that one or even three people could pull off 9 successful fires and many other attempted fires in 175 minutes, but let's suspend disbelief for this one.) i am on this forum. i am going to the meetings too, and i know everything the rest of you know about how little anyone knows. this is encouraging. but now i realize that there might be more cameras put up all over town. am i worried? no, i'm not! why not? ski mask, that's why not! black clothes and a ski mask. that's all i'm going to need to maintain my anonymity. but boy do i feel like i've got one over on y'all for lurking on the forums.

next issue: i totally second everything caty has said so i won't repeat it but her posts are worth re-reading (not in small part b/c she backed up my own points... heh...)

next issue: i'm assuming that the mad scramble for citizens to purchase their own cameras to spy on their neighborhoods is due to an assumption that there are no resources for such surveillance within the policing community. that is probably true in terms of northampton itself. but will someone PLEASE explain to me, then, how it is possible that a friend of mine who lives on main street (and is involved in NO illegal activities whatsoever, although there are surely one or two drug users in any given apartment building and his would be no exception) has been having to live with daily surveillance of his building for the last several months? when he first told me about it (he watches the watchers with his binoculars) i thought perhaps he was just really sleep-deprived, but i've seen enough to know that it's true, as have at least two of his other friends. for some reason his building has been under surveillance for a while. it seems very clear that the spies (i'll use that term because i don't know what agency these people are from) come from out of town. i suspect south boston, simply because of the "undercover" dress the spies wear (which is unlike how anyone in northampton dresses - it's a true southie style) and because of the transponders in the windows of the SUVs they arrive in, which indicate that they drive on the mass pike. every day he has watched as these SUVs start arriving at 6am and they stay until nightfall. those of us who have gone outside to have a closer look have noted some high-tech gadgetry inside... i'm talking remote-controlled cameras that follow movement, monitored on laptops. i'm talking hinges and ball-bearings. i'm talking about people with money, or people tryign to justify getting some money from homeland security funds. or something. whatever... there's money involved. there is no other way to have multiple spies devoted daily, for months, to the surveillance of one building. these people must be making some sort of salary and the equipment and vehicles cost money...

so there is money for surveillance out there somewhere. why it is being spent on spying on innocent people is a mystery to me. but i'm NOT making this up. in fact, i've seen them watch me as i left his building and walked back to my own, and then saw them waiting for me to come back out, hours later. when i made eye contact w/one of them who was smoking in the usual non-vehicular hangout, by the side door of one of the municipal buildings, he immediately tossed his cigarette to the ground & ducked inside the building. but he was not a local person (seriously... a local undercover agent would be more likely to dress as a hippie than to wear a baseball cap with a hoodie over it & a big puffy jacket over that, which is the uniform-du-jour of the high-tech SUV spies.)

i know that mr. cohen and others will react to what i am saying with some retorts involving my wild imagination. so i will preemptively retort to that. you know how you may never notice a mazda miata until you decide that you want to buy one, and then all of a sudden you see them everywhere? it's like that. i am indeed hyper-sensitive to surveillance people and surveillance cameras, in large part because of my own personal situation in the building i live in. i already wrote about how much i do not like having a camera on me when i take out my garbage & recycling (and yes, i've run into a "hobo" at the dumpster myself but he wasn't setting it on fire... he was trying to survive by scavenging and my immediate impression was that he was ahead of the game, because more and more of us will be living that way as time goes on.) but i've had other issues. for example, the management of my building had a surveillance camera aimed at my own door for several months. it was there, in theory, to stop homeless people from coming in the hallway and resting their weary souls. it was also there to try to catch the bad, bad person who kept using shims to prop open the hallway door so that delivery people and/or guests could get to their destinations, i.e. the very sturdy dead-bolted doors (w/peepholes for extra security!) of their target residents. so the camera was supposedly looking at the entrance to the hallway, but it just happened that i was the only person on my floor who could not enter or exit my own apartment without being on camera, due to my proximity to that hallway entrance (every other person on the floor had the option of avoiding the camera by using the other door. i could not get to the other door without first passing by the camera.) i took offense. and then the management installed wireless doorbells for everyone as a solution and insisted that we keep the hallway door locked at all times. this made my apartment door's peephole useless, and i had a big problem with the situation because if the doorbell rang there was no way for me to find out who was there without revealing my presence (and often much of myself, if i happened to be coming out of the shower & just wearing a towel.)

i have my own personal stalker in town, so i petitioned the management to allow me (at my own expense) to install a spy cam in the hallway so that i could see who was ringing my doorbell. they refused, and the only option they offered me was to remove my doorbell entirely. this is how i wound up researching spy cams in the first place and finding out that they were too expensive for me - and those were the ones with no options on shutter speed and no low-light features,etc. (i don't mean to ream the management of my building personally, but they were also major backers of the BID and i did the head hancho the honor of singling him out for violation of my privacy, at a city council meeting.)

and then... i've videotaped our local cops occasionally when i've seen them "in action" (harrassing hippie kids in the park, etc.) and they have always been on the defensive & asked me if i was part of "copwatch". i have told them in all honesty that as long as we citizens are under surveillance (bush at the time was pushing to grant local police the power to infiltrate "suspected terrorist organizations" and spy on innocent citizens - and if you haven't checked out the way terrorist is now defined, let me inform you that it includes vegans, animal-rights people, and anyone opposing big pharma, for starters) that i thought we citizens should be surveilling them right back. the cops didn't even know about bush's plan. when we talked about it, they were nice, i was nice, we worked it out, i didn't film more than a few seconds... we have nice police here. but they're just local cops. there are larger forces at work.

and it is my personal opinion that all of us should be thinking hard about exactly what forces might be at work in this current situation. what i said before about getting people to relinquish their rights willingly is something i stand by, as it is a proven technique for sneaking fascism in under people's noses. but that's only one possibility. we do not know what the motive/s of the arsonist/s are/were. but to assume that the motive was just "evil" or "destruction" would be naive. what has happened so far was carried out thoughtfully (not humanely, but with thought. could any of you - i mean aside from the villain/s who is/are surely lurkign here as you read this - seriously pull off such a stunt without getting caught? whoever did it had some brains and/or some backing and most likely some forethought.) given that, i have to assume that there was a larger motive at work as well. someone who could cause such destruction so successfully without getting caught very likely was looking for a partiuclar outcome.

i posit that the outcome of the mystery villain (or phase 1 of the desired outcome, anyway) has been successful so far. we're all up in arms, people are terrified and pointing fingers and blaming "hobos" and the "mentally ill" (i don't know how on earth that arsonist-profiler even got away with posting that description of the mind of an arsonist, as it did nothing but help people point more fingers, stigmatize mental illness - a term we already know is entirely relative - and i did not see any reference to primary research articles or anything else to back it up.) people are leaping onto the spy-cam bandwagon. people are willing to give up their privacy rights (which are already well eroded. see: patriot act. see: RFID chip in your passport.) so, let's think about why someone or someoneS (like an agency of some sort) would want to cause a whole town to start freaking out. i don't have the answer for this, but i'm pretty sure it would have to be something more than just enjoying watching people freak out. that can be done without murdering people. that can be done without harming a fly.

to sum up:

1) adam cohen, i'll take you seriously after you buy me my very own camera that can actually capture discernable images of moving people in the dark. oh - and thank you in advance! i really love when people buy me presents, especially cool gadgets. as it's such a rare occurrance, i'm super-duper-extra grateful in advance.

2) adam cohen, why don't you buy me a camera just for the hell of it, because coincidentally my favorite camera was stolen from that very building that was under surveillance, WHILE it was under surveillance. it only seems fair.

3) adam cohen, not to single you out here, but regarding your defense of single-family homes with 2-car garages and happy motoring, i'll get back to you on that later. i believe it was ellen who already pointed out the obvious - that more people would ride buses if they had useful routes and sensible schedules. the fact that our buses don't run at good times, stop running at night (and many of them take 2-hour breaks right around noon as well) and that we don't even have late-night cab service here does not in any way mean that cars are the solution. but that's a discussion for another day.

4) SOMEONE has the money to spy on one apartment building using high-tech gadgetry and multiple spy personnel. and i think it's state and not city funding.

5) OBVIOUSLY whomever is behind all this is lurking at meeings and in every forum possible so let's keep that in mind. (hey lurker/s: you can buy me a camera too, if you like. i'm willing to put on a good show of acting hysterical and pointing a terrified finger at every person crossing my path who looks "off" in any way. but i expect a really extra-super-cool, expensive camera with hinges and ball-bearings, if it's coming from you.)

6) it has already been pointed out that it took a lot of marbles (all in one place, i.e. someone/s had their marbles together, not bats in the belfry) to set 9 successful fires in such a short time span without getting caught.

end of today's rant! coming next from yours truly - keep your eyes peeled, your teeth gritted and your fists clenched - a manifesto on the duty of northampton's citizens to stop the destruction of our city (die, hilton, DIE!!!) no matter what it takes, propriety be damned (to any dyslexics reading this: i said "propriety" not "property" so don't accuse me of being a wannabe property-destroyer. i'm a wannabe historic landmark-saver!)

all my love and kisses too,

jenna

die, hilton, die!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i will not ever be able to accept the hilton and i don't care if it has the most wonderful cafe in the world even if they lower themselves to allowing locals to dine there. it is simply wrong to plop down an enormous and UGLY piece of bad architecture in the middle of an historic town, dwarfing all the other buildings and destroying life for all the residents of the green street apartments. it has already ruined the property values of its neighboring buildings. the dead-end alleyway it will be creating, with the trash compactor at the end, will be a perfect venue for rape and murder. or simple mugging, if people are lucky. the people in the green st. apts. will be much less safe & more likely to be robbed.

i am in an extreme state of grief over the destruction of my town. and higgins IS destroying it. what happened with the old state hospital was criminal, as was the way that the "multi-use condo village" experiment became kollmorgan hill. i don't know how much she had to do with smith's takeover of green street but that's a whole other thing.

it is not ok with me under any circumstances to have that hotel there. it will never be ok. higgins thinks people will be excited to visit northampton what with its fancy new hilton garden inn & all. she's thinking only about tourist dollars and tax revenue from the hotel. but one of the things that makes northampton the place it is, is that we have very few chain stores here. those we do have (not including king street, which is where the hilton should go if it has to be here) simply occupy buildings that are already there, and those buildings can become something else in the future. urban outfitters didn't knock down the whole bank to put their store there, so it's still a gorgeous building and when they go out of business, which i expect will be soon, something else & hopefully more local can take its place.

the hilton is the first major criminal attack on main street. it to me is on par with the taliban destroying the spiritual statue things in afghanistan, and the bagdhad museum being unprotected & looted.

i'm not going to be argued out of it. but i am trying very hard to understand how anybody is able to cope with it. perhaps they haven't looked at the plans. perhaps they think it will be pretty, even though it's crowding out everything around it. perhaps they think it will be nice to have a new, manicured park.

but it will no longer by our public park. it will become the hilton park. and it is the only public space we have downtown. the ONLY public space, and it's going to have a hilton garden inn towering 5 stories over it. i am seriously at a loss. my only sliver of hope is that the dollar will become worthless before he can actually build it. i would rather become homeless and die in the winter on the city hall steps than live here with a hilton. except i'm actually going to keep having a home as long as i can manage it. if my mother weren't here & i hadn't promised her i would never let her wind up in a "retirement home", i would seriously think about running away, but i don't have anywhere to go. i don't want to have to move. but i cannot figure out how to cope with this thing.

the hilton is not ok, and yet in spite of my denial and disbelief it is apparently going to be built no matter what. it is the helplessness that is the worst thing - i think feeling helpless leads a lot of people to despair. the citizens of northampton tried everything to stop this project but it was already a "done deal". i can't believe that even the two lawsuits didn't work out. nothing we say matters. and this is a big deal because it cannot be un-done. the mayor thinks that the building can be used for something else should the hilton go out of business, but she doesn't even think about having destroyed an historic landscape.

i know that everybody is going to accept compromises because they (think they) have no choice, but this is architectural serial killing, what she's doing. it's aesthetic slaughter. and there are many documentations of the fact that aesthetics can contribute enormously to a person's state of mind, that beauty really does matter and it makes us happier. i know that to be very true for myself. i love our downtown and it is being murdered. imagine if all the citizens here were forced to have the nike logo branded onto their foreheads. that's how it feels to me. she sold our city down the river for a dollar. to a FRANCHISE.

end of rant. for now.

best love letter i ever got!!!

Jenna the pest?

Man have I been thinkin about you- whew-

I originally asked you for an email address to write you a love letter, based solely on you inviting me to make out. I think I'll still write that letter, but then I'll expand on how the events of the evening made me appreciate you even more- But beware, cause I can lay down the cheese pretty thick, ha! I wish I could do more than write you a letter- Little did you know that when you popped that magic question "Do you wanna make out?" - That not only is one of my favorite things in the world to do, but your timing was amazing- I told that to one of my best friends and she said "Oh wow, that's like your dream, for a girl to ask you that!" I guess I can't ignore the fact that I was on e- and maybe you can chalk up my whole "thank you thank you thank you, you incredibly sexy woman you!" on me being drugged up, but I personally don't think that's accurate- it definitely had an effect on the evening for sure, in many ways (cough, ahem- ha)- well-. Hmmm.

I remember EVERYTHING, which is awesome. You lit my world on fire that night, all alone, by just taking me over to the side and kissing me for a bit. How incredibly FUN. I'll obey you, and never forget you telling me that I'm cute, and to never forget it- you were so nice to me. You were soooo nice to me. You're so nice. You're so sexy. You were so intimidating, yet so comforting to me- I don't think I've ever felt so vulnerable and safe at the same time. It's not that I think you seduced me, you incredibly sexy being, but I felt seduced. It felt really good. YOU felt really good. I loved watching you, after finding out that you were makin out in the car w/Emma- that's why I had to say something to you. I felt safe in saying something because I thought you weren't interested in guys, and that it would be a harmless compliment. I'm glad that wasn't the case. I'm soooo glad. I loved your sexual energy- I loved helping you down from that ledge and holding you, you saying that I was strong- I loved makin out in the car. I loved asking you if you were cold, and giving you a naked hug- Mmmm- I could so go on and on and on and on- I loved watching you share your sexy girlfriend- shit, I loved Emma, and she's with you because you're so - Jenna. I thought it was the coolest thing in the world when she said "You guys fucked, didn't you!? You suck!" ha ha ha- that was honestly one of the coolest things i've ever, ever heard, considering the circumstances-

I don't want to turn the evening into something it wasn't, so don't take the emotional content of this letter the wrong way- I just thought you deserved to know how you touched me that night, I owe you that at the very least. Again, I wish I could do more than write you a letter- and part of me wants to share all the dirty thoughts I've been having the past 48 hrs too- speaking of which, the scene was a bit dirty in some (fun!) ways, but us being naked under sooo many stars will forever live in my memory as an incredibly beautiful, sexy fucking moment Jenna. I honestly don't expect to ever see you again- but would love for you to visit, or anything really, with no expectations of course- it would be a welcome, pleasant surprise- and when I say it would be kool to hang out again, I say that as innocently as I said I thought you were sexy. By the way, I think you're so fucking sexy it's crazy. Thanks- for such a beautiful memory- you really were the love of my life for the evening-

Eric
Los Angeles, Ca

the greatest things burn out most fastest

and might i say: 1) what a waste; and 2) GRRRRRRRRRRRRR.

there's no rock bottom, only more black hole.

i just went out to cornucopia to get food i needed from there before it closed at 9pm. also needed to get a file from acme surplus. ducked thru as many back alleys as possible but couldn't help encountering hoards of happy talking people on my way. i had to avoid them kind of like how you play frogger. and that's when i realized that i know how i can describe this mental state i've been stuck in for months but now with increasingly few moments of respite and increasingly dark thoughts, darker places than i've ever known.

it's like this: imagine the worst acid trip ever. it's a supremely paranoid acid trip revolving around a dark force that is trying to convince you to jump off a really tall building (but somehow you know you should fight this force and you wish you had some motivation, like something to look forward to should you conquer it, but there's nothing) and an intuitive knowledge that none of your friends want anything to do with you in your current state. the only people who want to see you are the ones who don't know you're in the middle of a really bad acid trip. you can't talk to anybody. and you're thrown outside amongst hoards of happy people and you don't know for sure if they can see you or not because you're extremely aware that they are in an entirely different reality. physically, your autonomic nervous system is on red alert, causing a deep feeling of panic and dread at all times. your heart is racing, you find you're gritting your teeth, and you're poised for flight at all times. everywhere you go you're checking for escape routes.

now realize this is not an acid trip at all, this is your life. it stays this way.

so that's how my mental state is and that's why i can't be around people no matter how much i love them or they think they love me. i feel extremely guilty at all times, when confronted with anything from outside myself (i.e. people, life, money, receipts, things to do, etc.) because i know everyone is thinking i just need to pull myself up by my bootstraps & snap out of it. everyone is having a hard time, these are tough times, is what people think. what do i have to complain about?

i have not much to complain about and that's not the problem and that's why nobody can understand unless they're going through it themselves. i am writing this now because i don't think anybody actually reads this blog & this is the stuff nobody wants to hear because then they feel like they're supposed to do something about it, and it's a burden. in general, being a downer is a burden. i don't want to burden people. i hate burdening people. but these last few months, almost for the last year, i feel like the message i'm getting from the universe is completely consistent and persistent: if you have problems, you are on your own and do not even dare to think you could ever be worthy of love. generally speaking.

specifically i've just been experiencing over & over that i am too much, too "intense", for people to take. even the people i thought were my closest friends have told me either explicitly or in a roundabout way that dark jenna is not welcome here. only happier happyish funny smart jenna is wanted. dark sad terrified needy freaked-out jenna is not worthy of anyone's attention, except unwanted attention from creeps, who don't care what jenna's mental state is because that's why creeps are creepy, because they don't read cues and don't see a woman as a person, so her thoughts are irrelevant.

but creeps are not my problem. my problem is that i've had to isolate myself more & more & more, the worse things get for me. and the worse things get the more i alienate the very people who were giving the most meaning to my life. black hole energy is contagious and i don't want to suck anyone into it... but it just becomes a bummer when it goes on & on & on & never ever ever ever ends. i try to hang out with people when i'm feeling relatively optimistic but it's excruciatingly painful. even the best interactions cause me enormous anxiety... even "happy" interactions. after even the best interaction with even just one person i love, once i'm alone i dissociate and return hours later to find i've really fucked something up. this is one way i continue to injure myself, although my physical injuries are also one of my big problems. and that's because i am a wimp about pain and after a while when i'm overwhelmed enough and everything just hurts inside & out, i cry. i cry in public, walking down the street. i cry in class. i do not want to cry around any of the friends i may have left. this crying shit is pathetic and it alienates people.

i don't want anyone to do anything for me... i don't wish someone would come to rescue me from myself... i just wish i didn't have to be alone in this. but i do. it's my own personal trauma and it's no one else's problem. and that's all there is to it. i am doing everything i possibly can to get help for myself (seriously - i've got a psychiatrist, a therapist, i finally got a doctor after years w/out one, and i'm seeing a PT and an OT and i work hard to get sleep, though i often fail at that as well as at getting proper nutrition. i've learned a lot about "alternative healing modalities" too and i do whatever i can manage. and i practice movement and meditation.) i don't expect anyone to help me... i just wish i could be around people without having to lie about how i am. i mean, in a crowd of strangers it's not lying, no one cares & nothing matters. but to be with friends i have to be not the way i am. and because i really can't control it, i can't be how i should be and so i have to stay alone.

i really hate it. the worst part is just that there's nothing to even pretend to look forward to. i would be happier if i were just wishing the "right person" would come along and we'd be in love. and it's not that i don't believe in love or believe i can be loved. i believe that this winter i was truly seen for who i am and truly loved for who i am, and then informed that in spite of that love i'm really not good enough for anyone's company. my emotions are too intense. i get triggered too easily. i trigger others. sometimes i find that i'm collaborating with someone on an art thing and that gives true meaning to my life, it really does. it's all i need, to have a reason to live. but my collaborations are gone, all fucked up because i'm fucked up, and my mind is a blank when it comes to risking this again. it's just full-on panic.

anyway i have no escape, no delusional idea that everything is other people's fault & if i just meet the right people or go to the right places etc. everything will be better. it's like i've already gotten the spoiler to my life's movie. there's no suspense. i already know, because i've experienced it so many times, that it is a waste of my time and anyone else's time for someone to try & woo me or whatnot. they might not believe me, and they may not see what the big deal is about just giving it a shot. but i am so fucking sick and tired of having to wait & watch the process unfold time & time again - first fascination & lust, a bit of putting me on a pedestal, and then continued lust but a growing discomfort, and then the final realization that i am a basket case & not the person they'd projected on to me... i know this could be a self-fulfilling prophecy but it's just how it is. i know what happens.

this is PTSD. and i have spent my entire adult life trying to exist without confronting my worst trauma, all the while totally unaware that the worst trauma wasn't the only thing that could completely undo me. turns out there are layers and layers and layers of things i always thought i had no emotion about, but actually it was just repressed or dissociated and it's still here in my body. it's repeatedly relived in the present, because i haven't dealt with it and put it in its proper place in history, which is what needs to be done. and it's all gotten triggered at once all by accident & much has come as a total shock and i never ever ever would have purposely thrown myself into this horrible mess but it's more like a piano that fell on me when i wasn't looking. so here i am.

"bullet in the brainpan, squish!"

hey look, it's us on MSNTV...

we really are "a town divided" thanks to the growing divide betw. rich & poor as well as empathic vs. self-centered. this video doesn't do the BID issue justice but i myself am mired in an issue similar to this on a more macro scale... will most likely be returning here to rant quite soon... been busy but i'm about to blow my lid over this insane "doorbell" issue i'm having.

this is not about me though, this is about a big conflict in northampton, MA. all these images of downtown are my neighborhood, right outside my door, what i see when i look out the window. this is my home where i'm staying and planning to fight it out, whatever it is that needs to be fought. or defended.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

time to play "what's my damage?"!!!

ok i'm annoyed at some stupidity.

i was looking up trauma/neglect/abuse/recovery stuff last night in hopes of finding a lead.

i decided to find out if what happened to me, regarding my injuries & other medical issues for which i requested & was denied help, would fall under the legal definition of "neglect" under today's law, if not the law of my day. (not like i'm complaining, looking to point fingers... i long ago did the whole "forgiving" thing & i take responsibility for my own craziness. i just need to figure shit out, starting w/the least-scary stuff.)

it turns out that it easily would, but there are a couple things about the law which seem insane to me.

1) in some states, it doesn't count as "neglect" if it's due to the parents' inability to pay/provide.

although i agree with this i would take it farther - it's at this point the STATE'S inability to provide which is at fault, and to take it another step it shouldn't be the state who's in charge of these matters anyway, it should be the community. but we have been separated from one another by our culture and real community is rare.

when i was a child i longed to be rescued from my situation - but not by the "state". i don't think that ever occurred to me. but there were other adults everywhere - my parents' friends/colleagues at the colleges, my teachers, neighbors, my father's students at mt. holyoke who sometimes lived with us...

no one ever said anything so i assumed that everyone was in agreement that nothing was wrong. i don't really know how they saw our family. i'm sure no one knew about the major issues, but plenty of people bore witness to the general overtones & the way my father was rigid & controlling & how he belittled me. nobody said a word, ever. not till i was 16 and got drunk and kissed john grayson, whose sister shelley used to ride in a carpool w/me to macduffie. she wouldn't even look at me when my father was having at me, and the rest of the time she & her friends - at macduffie there were probably only 5 or 10 black girls and they all ganged up together - just teased me about stupid stuff.

john grayson told me that everyone thought my father was a lunatic.

which brings me to point #2.

2) many states make exceptions for the denial of medical care falling under the definitions of "abuse" or "neglect" if it's due to a parent's religious beliefs. christian science is given extra special exemption.

THIS PISSES ME OFF BECAUSE:

• why is RELIGION the only acceptable excuse fro raising your children according to what you believe to be true?

• how is RELIGION any better than INSANITY?

seems to me, RELIGION gets a free pass while INSANITY has entirely different repercussions.

and again: fuck the state. this is where COMMUNITIES should be close enough to act as an extended family and if a child is being harmed for whatever reason, people who know the family should step in. no sending kids away to some strangers in the very dangerous foster care system. NO FUCKING STATE. but people should not look the other way, not for anybody's sake. and yet because we are all controlled by mass-hypnosis if not simply the rules of the state, people pretty much have to.

what do these laws have to say about my particular situation? well, let us examine.

my dad was raised as a christian scientist. although he claimed to be an athiest and a communist, he led his life by a very bizarre belief system which I may never understand. he "ruled the house with an iron fist" as he would have put it, controlling all aspects of everybody's lives using the powers of physical force and psychological torture. he was also clinically insane. even his colleagues pretty much knew that, though he had tenure in the math department so it really didn't matter.

who's to say when a judgment call should be made and by whom? this is very murky territory.

for example, most people take for granted that all children should be taught to brush their teeth. my sister and i were forbidden from brushing our teeth, although i for one kept asking to. we were told that only adults developed plaque, and what children needed was a "milk rinse" every night before bed. my sister and i found this to be especially embarrassing when we had friends over.

one could debate the science of my dad's theory but who cares. the point is, he was different. where does one draw the line between right and wrong? religion vs. insanity?

ironically, when i was 8 years old someone DID step in - while we were living in a tiny village in holland andn my sister and i attended the village school. one day a dental van came to the school to give all the children free dental care. after examining me & my sister, somebody called our parents & had a meeting with them & my sister and I were given our first toothbrushes and from then on we were allowed to brush our teeth. I get the feeling my parents did not enjoy getting busted on whatever it was - in my recollection my father would push any matter until some "authority" such as a doctor drew the line & said flat-out "you can't do that".

what's the difference between RELIGION and a PERSONAL BELIEF system??? and who gets to judge what is insanity and what is not? why should a christian scientist be immune to charges of neglect or abuse when an insane person would have no rights at all?

so, my dad was raised in a christian science way but he said there was no god. he believed that the sun would heal all things. i'm with him on that on ly to a point. i believe it is not the STATE'S business to make laws about what vaccines are mandatory for babies, what education kids should have, etc. but then there is this pesky thing we call "common sense" which is closely related to something called "science".

how would one apply the law to this incident:

i was 7 or 8 years old, and i had an accident on my bike. our road had just been re-tarred & graveled, so there was still mucky tar & loose gravel everywhere.

i remember parts of this with perfect clarity, other parts with extreme vagueness or no memory at all.

i was making too tight a turn when i skidded and fell. i was alone on the street. i didn't feel any pain until i looked at my left foot & saw that the top of it had been shorn clear off and i could see everything in there, including the tar and gravel now embedded in the mess. at which point i began to scream at the top of my lungs.

adults came running - 5 or 6 people surrounded me to see if i was ok. i didn't recognize any of them. then my father, hearing the commotion, came out. he broke through the circle, scooped me up, and carried me into the house.

he brought me into the laundry room where we had a big sink, and dangled my foot under the tap for perhaps a minute.

from that point until the next part of the memory is a blank for me. my mother recently told me she will never forgive herself for not taking me to the doctor (i assured her it was the least of my traumas & that i held nothing against her.) she said i was not allowed to touch my foot or try to clean it in any way (neither of my parents were to touch it from then on either. it was never properly cleaned.) the sun was supposed to heal it. our house, by the way, was filthy. i got around the house by moving around like a crab, with my left foot held as high in the air as i could manage.

how much time went by i do not know, but my memory kicks back in when my mother finally did sneak me off to a doctor (we had insurance - it was never a matter of care not being available) when my foot was finally covered in a 1/2" layer of pus, tar and gravel of course still embedded.

what happened AT the doctor's office is another story for another time, or possibly not.

the QUESTION is:

what would the law say about my dad refusing to allow me medical care? he was raised as a christian scientist, after all. but perhaps an insanity plea would get him off?

my life is a tapestry of murky situations like this example, which i used because i have little to no emotion when i think or talk about it, and yet it has been on my mind a lot since learning so much new stuff about bodywork.

the stupid shit that is pissing me off is that i don't think it's right to make laws about what is or is not "abuse" regarding how people raise their children, and then give certain groups exemptions. excuse me but what the fuck happened to the separation of church & state? ok i KNOW what happened... it went *poof* but this kinda pisses me off. a kid is a kid and i don't see why religion gets a free pass. of course it doesn't help me sort out my own personal narrative in the slightest way.

[end rant]

the freedom center is neither...

HELEN

Jenna:

next person to call helen, please tell her if she ever calls me again i'm going to do something horrible like try to get her put away & stripped of all her personal rights forever and ever w/a rogers order, or burglarize her home & put nair in her shampoo or shave her cat or somethign. i want her to believe that calling me would be a bad idea for HER sake b/c she obviously has no problem annoying ME.

i didn't listen to her message b/c she should know bettter than 2 call me and i just deleted it as soon as i heard her name, as i had jumped out of bed woken from desperately needed sleep to find the phone thinkng it might be re: my friend's whereabouts

p.s. until further notice there will be NO more organizers mtgs at my apartment.


Caty:

I have to say I'm truly shocked and appalled to see an fc organizer want to threaten someone coming to the fc for help with psychiatric abuse & other awful things just b/c the organizer is upset that the person is calling her too much. Even if it was meant in jest or anger or both, I never thought I'd see those words on our list. Especially when the person called us for help about a Roger's Order that is truly oppressing her.


Kevin:

Blah, Blah, Blah and WHAT THE FUCK!!!!!!!

Let me set a few things straight right now for the record.

Or better yet, let's all take a little stroll down Madness Ave. in Jenna's shoes shall we?

Let me start by saying I have a very personal knowledge of Ed's time in Jenna's life, what a holy shitshow that was, and still is and, now, FC's role in allowing this to happen (positive, positive, positive...hey, let's go tell someone whois HIV+ about the wonderful uses of the word "positive") and FC's utter lack of support in Ed's continual harassment of Jenna. Yeah great, he's gone away...for now.

Let me continue by delving into the constant ass-reaming Jenna takes on this list for expressing her opinions, feelings and visions for this "organization" (A word I'm using about as loosely as FC throws around the word "positive")...I don't think I need to, nor do I have the entire week to fully document this but I can sum it up with phrases like "continual marginalization" and "utter lack of ANY kind of support".

Put on top of this the fact that facilitating SG was essentially foisted on her by someone who then had a shit fit on her for taking over facilitating SG. Put on top of that a wonderful party plan turned into an e-list cat fight. Put on top of that calls for transparency and inclusion being met with much criticism and derision (and BTW I take this personally as I was part of that meeting and those "calls").

Now, put on top of this the duress of a friend in a life or death situation. For the record, I need to clarify what I now know. It wasn't Jenna but her friend Betty who asked FC to help, thinking as so many erroneously do that we're in a position to actually DO something for someone. Nevertheless, the situation gets extremely urgent and instead of help or support, Jenna gets an earful about FC ideology (yeah...dogma, dogma, dogma...and meanwhile someone is out there FUCKING FREEZING HIMSELF TO DEATH in the name of a delusion!!!!!!)

Put on top of all this, and I'll say it again because it really has become a fucked-up feedback loop, the constant lack of support of any kind Jenna has gotten from the vast majority of y'all here (and those of you who I'm not speaking of, you know who you are) while she has willingly co-facilitated Support Group and hosted Org. Meetings 2x/month.

Now, put on top of this the pressure she's under between Massage School, the seriously life/death situation with Chris, and all the ethical conundrums she has had to work out practically on her own (and for the record, I was the first/one ofthe first to suggest hospitalization for Chris) and, I'll say it one more time in the spirit of the ol' feedback loop, the amount of bullshit/amount of support ratio Jenna has received from FC proper (my bad, you can't make a ratio when one of the numbers is "0").

Now, top it all off with the fact that this "Helen" will not stop calling her when it is clear Jenna can do nothing for her.

Is anybody here "shocked and appalled" now that Jenna may have such an extreme reaction to this latest chapter of madness?

Or, am I the one in need of a Rogers for pointing any/all of this out?

Kevin,

At this rate, a soon-to-be former FC member


Lee:

Hey Kevin,

A bunch of us are talking about moderation of this list so that conflicts like this don't explode so easily because it seems to be a drain of our organizational energy and seems to be effecting most members in a negative emotional way.

Sarcasm is not an easy sentiment on email, and however sarcastic Jenna is being it's really rough to make jokes on an email list about rogers' ordering someone and taking away their rights...regardless of her current state of madness and stress.

The other things you mentioned in your email are all things that are going on, but they are not immediately relevant to jokes about rogers orders etc.

Lee


Jenna:

hello list,

i would like to apologize for the rather evil email i sent earlier regarding the annoying phone call i got. if i had taken ten deep breaths & thought things through before sending, it wouldn't have been sent.

i said what i did because i've been accused a couple times recently (NOT accusing anyone here) of wanting to put a rogers order on somebody, and as i cannot at ALL imagine EVER wanting to do that, in fact one of the worst things about my current experiences in my other life (for which i started the other list) has been having to struggle with doing something i think is going to be incredibly horrible (not that, specifically) to someone that i deeply love. the idea that i would ever wish such a thing upon ANYBODY is entirely laughable to me - or it would be if it were not all so tragic.

and because i have been given so much shit by so many people who really know nothing about me, accusing me of having motives i do not have (based on their own projections, based on not knowing me at all) i was pissy, and i was bitchy.

and i should not have acted out that way on the list.

and i am apologizing. i am sure everyone knows i never for a second thought someone would actually call helen & say "jenna says if you ever call her again she's gonna..." etc. etc. i mean, i know that none of you would ever be stupid enough or mean enough to do such a thing.

but i understand that my message was scary to people.

i will not be posting here again until i've got my personal problems under control & have found a way to get regular sleep and have figured out what i really think about fc & whether future involvement will be good or whether it will destroy me and everyone around me.

sincerely,

jenna

Amanda:

i feel very strongly that this list should *not* be moderated. i think we are all capable of overstepping, and also capable of calling out those who overstep. i think it is a dangerous idea and one that will create an undercurrent...stronger than any we have now...of bad feelings. and who would moderate????? keely????? i think not. she is not a psych survivor, and tho she means well, there are many things she may not understand. i think it is really fucked up to have one person have censored info on another...

that said, i do think there are other avenues to attempt before setting into motion an attempt at censorship.

i think it is important to call individuals out on their personal behavior. when this has been done appropriately, there have been apologies and no hard feelings. when it is not done appropriately, or done in an attacking manner, that is where we have gotten into problems. what the fuck is wrong with saying you hurt my feelings? or your post really freaked me out...what is going on. this is junior high shit man! come on.

i think if a person is continually x-ing these lines then something should be done on an individual level...ie...you will be removed from the list for a while.

this is about accountability...if this list is moderated we will lose this precious gift of learning to be accountable, learning to see our destructive behaviors, and then someone else (the moderator) has all this shit on us to use against us. keep it open...keep it honest... step up and call people out when you are upset by something... take responsibility for yourself and your actions.

just because we are psych survivors does not mean we cannot be accountable or responsible... but sometimes it does mean we overstep, over react, or just go plain nuts. it means we need to find ways to support each other, and also listen to when we are triggered or are triggering another

i guess what i am saying is that there are other options to try first, and the first response is not always the best response.

Lee:

Hey Amanda,

I feel like there is some confusion about what moderation is. Moderation is not one person making the rules and imposing them on everyone else. We can all makes the rules, and simply ask one person to make sure we "play fair". I thought Keely would be good because she is a bit removed so nothing can be considered personal, but it doesn't have to be her, it could be you, Amanda. It could be Melissa. It could be anyone. The important thing is not who moderates. The important thing is that we do it.

Most list-servs have a moderator. It's basic protection to avoid people coming on and being able to say absolutely anything... it keeps the focus of a list.

I would like to think we could just "know" when we're "overstepping" but I have no confidence in that. It's been months now and the list has still gone on like this and I don't think people have been held accountable at all. It's exhausting to try to keep up with the amount of things people need to be held accountable for and it's not a good use of our organizational energy.

Many many people already got off the list in the last few months and we lost a number of allies. In addition to that, Oryx is talking about getting off the list. Kevin just got off it. Jenna's taking a break from it. Will and Caty are both upset about it. And if something is not done about this list I am getting off it and I have been on it for almostthree years.

If someone has a *concrete* proposal other than moderation they can make it but otherwise I'm going to work on basic guidelines for moderation and bring it to the group as a proposal for us to look at. This is an organizing list and it's gotten too personal and little to no organizing has been done on it for a while.

FC can and should has lots of room for personal relationships and connections and people to share their personal lives, but I don't think the organizing list should be one of those forums. If it is, I'm just not interested anymore.

Lee


Kevin:

Holy Crap,

Yes I am coming in late again, as I've just gotten home from work, but shit I've got alot to say.

First of all, yes I know Jenna has since apologized for her post this morning...however apparently I have to state the obvious just in case anyone completely skipped over/ignored the words "EXTREME reaction" in regard to my defense of Jenna at the beginnings of yet another ingloriously judgemental e-mail campaign against her.

Clearly, I do not condone WHAT Jenna wrote...I mean, for fuck's sake why do I even have to state this, has activism met political correctness at a point so low that one needs a long, long ladder to see the wart-ridden ass of reality?

As for my own post in defense of Jenna the human being. I do not and will not apologize for any of that. The fact that it was my use of sarcasm and some shit about how we can't condone making Rogers' test jokes were the only things commented on by anyone really speaks volumes to me about FC as an organization. Having said that, at least there was ONE person who had the guts to post, as utterly wrong-headed as I thought it was. The waves of silence from the rest of you are beyond deafening. Why did no one (other than the other members of this oppressed majority, who I will excuse based on the fact that they are in the same boat anyway) at least carry on with the issue of Jenna's treatment in FC?

Look, I came into FC what, four months ago, wanting to give of myself and wanting to be involved in an organization whose history shared much in common with my own life story. What I didn't realize is what I was getting into and what I was about to witness.

I've given this quite a bit of thought over the course of a very slow evening on the job and the conclusions I have come to do not speak very highly of FC. As I found myself pondering things in a workplace that is every bit as maddening as FC, I came to the sad realization that it is OK to enter into established organizations and institutions, and even more endearing if you come in as someone who cares or wants to care. However, the minute you actually do or say anything that shows how much you care, all shit breaks loose and all shit is often dumped upon the new person who cares enough to want to see this established institution become the best it can be, and perhaps even cares enough to do what it would take to make that happen.

This has been my FC experience to date. I have apparently encountered an organization that talks a quite frankly mediocre game when it comes to inclusion but when the chips are down not only has marginalized those members who have brought issues regarding the organization forward (in the interest of making a better organization), but find themselves on the back end of all matter of negativity and downright slander.

I have witnessed quite a few organizational issues simply get swept under the rug and I have also witnessed an active campaign, wittingly or unwittingly (like THAT fucking matters), to destroy two of our members...often in defense of an institutional success story (oops, better state for the 58th time that I have nothing against this institutional success story).

Fuck, if I wanted to get involved with an organization that swept issues under the rug and acted to destroy the lives of those people who brought these issues to light, I'd have gotten involved with the federal fucking government.

As I type this, I am as absolutely 100% besides myself with anger and rage as I was when I read Caty's response to Jenna's off-color post. And while it was, even by Jenna's own admission, inappropriate, how the fuck is it that FC, as a mental-health self-determination organization that alleges to have all of these fucking resources has practically driven at least one of its members to the verge of emotional collapse...And how is it that when this manifests itself, all the next person in line can do is pile on by writing this "shocked and appalled" condemnation...And how is it that when another FC member points out how FC has driven this person to this extreme, this member gets ONE, repeat ONE comment from ONE, repeat, ONE person about their sarcastic tone and the still deplorable nature of rogers test jokes (again, at least this ONE, repeat, ONE person had the guts to say ANYTHING!)

So here I am tonight, realizing that all the time and energy spent just today dealing with this garbage could have been spent on another list I'm part of trying to save somebody's life in a meaningful way. And it is in this and other realizations that I have come to realize something. As of tonight, I have come to realize that the last four months I have spent on the FC Organizer's List has been a complete fucking waste of my time...and right now I am on the verge of tears as I fucking realize that I have known this all along.

I suppose the only comfort I can take, and about the only thing that is keeping me from turning into a blubbering mess at this time, was knowing that I tried to be part of meaningful progress within this organization, and even if all that meant doing was spending alot of my time speaking in defense of the two FC members this organization set out to destroy (again wittingly or unwittingly, though I fail to see where that makes a difference) and I can at least take comfort in the hope that perhaps there is some small deed I have done here that has kept one or both said members, two of the kindest, most compassionate people I have met in a very long time, if ever, from completely coming undone in all of this.

Finally, I would like to say for the record that it is really fucking sad commentary that it took Jenna sending a self-admittedly over-the-top post as she did for someone to realize that we can't treat each other with enough fucking respect as human beings to self-moderate our own e-mail list.

So put it all together and I am in a no-win situation with this list and an "organizer" with FC (and I use the term "organizer" loosely on my own behalf)

On the one hand, I will NOT be part of an e-mail list moderated by an outsider. On the other hand, I will not be part of an e-mail list where the people involved cannot treat each other with a sense of basic human decency and especially in the case of a group such as FC, basic human sensitivity.

As such, I ask at this time that I be removed from this e-mail list.
Furthermore, I will no longer attend FC Organizer's Meetings and have no interest in being involved in FC as an organizer.

Finally, unless I contact any of you personally via e-mail or otherwise, I ask that nobody on this list make any contact with me, as any attempts at unwelcome contact will, at best, be left unanswered and any e-mails with [fc-organizers] in the heading will simply be deleted.

Sincerely,
Kevin

Will:

hi everyone,

over the past several months i have watched people get hurt and leave this list. i have been hurt and have stepped back from the list myself.

everyone has good intentions and is doing what they can. we have all spiralled into insensitivity here, and I am no exception. but posts to this list have continued to violate our community guidelines and basic principles of freedom center mutual support and respect.

the purpose of this list is to accomplish freedom center organizing goals, not to have extended interpersonal dialog around feelings and conflicts.

freedom center is based on clear guidelines, specific goals, and facilitated meetings. it is not an open social forum.

and the guidelines, goals, and facilitation of freedom center are not personal opinions that should then be turned into the subject of debate on the list and meetings. that is not the purpose of the list. our guidelines, goals, and facilitation are terms of agreement that you enter into when you become part of freedom center.

I want to specifically ask people, Why are you here as organizers? The goal of being a Freedom Center *organizer* is to accomplish activist tasks in pursuit of our mission. It is not a club or society or internet community to join where we invest our energy and time into conflict, drama, gossip, attacks, and defensive mutual accusation.

We're going to a facilitated list so that email can serve its purpose with respect. My apologies to everyone who has suffered because of the delay in putting this policy into practice.

I specifically want to apologize to people who have felt the need to leave this list or who have become silent.

If you have a concern about this policy, please email me directly or call 413.210.2803. This list is not a place to discuss list policy or respond to this email, but I am willing to do so off list, within reasonable limits and in a manner of mutual respect.

I realize that in acting in this way we/I will be accused of censorship and dictatorship. This is a misunderstanding of the basic needs of group facilitation and organizing, and the importance of having shared guidelines and creating basic safety.

Anyone who wants to continue with free-form, no-guidelines interpersonal dialog, is invited to inform me, and I will set up a non-moderated list specifically for that purpose. the icarus project actually has a 'rants and rages' forum that is quite popular and serves a valuable purpose.

Jenna:

hello, will.

i would like to let you know that i am officially leaving the freedom center as of today. i uploaded the last madness radio show but you can find someone else to do that for free for you now.

i am absoultely disgusted with this organization but you have made yourself clear here about where you stand and i see no need for discussion.

you have effectively shut down any and all possible venues for any kind of dissent by stating that neither organizers meetings nor the list are a place for personal opinions.

you also stated this:

"the guidelines, goals, and facilitation of freedom center are not personal opinions that should then be turned into the subject of debate on the list and meetings. that is not the purpose of the list. our guidelines, goals, and facilitation are terms of agreement that you enter into when you become part of freedom center."

i do not recall EVER in my almost 3 years of involvement with the freedom center being told that by "joining" i agreed to the guidelines, goals, and facilitation of the "freedom center". i was not asked to sign any paper. i was never informed that this was a condition of my involvement.

in some of freedom center's propaganda, it is described as a place where people decide for themselves what healing avenues are best for them and work toward that. this completely contradicts what you said above.

if i had heard a statement such as yours when i joined, i would NOT have joined. i am sorry i wasted so much time and energy on this group. please enjoy your fabulous future.

i do not wish to hear back from you or anybody and will delete any and all emails i receive from this so-called "collective".

sincerely,

jenna