I’ve been reading a lot of post-death articles/posts about Jason Arday’s harassment by the British mainstream media and all the people who decided they had something to say about it on social media. It is really disgusting how immense the campaign that led to his death was. Especially considering it was started by an openly racist white man, and yet the media never stopped to think about the larger white supremacist goal of this campaign against Jason. Or they did think about it and decided that was a worthy project to sign their names to and put in all their papers and shit. I know mainstream media, especially in Britain, is racist anyway. I sent in some complaints so hopefully that adds pressure to the media being accountable for this witch hunt.

It did also remind me a lot about when Jas Morgan posted slander and lies about me on social media, and then made a bunch of Tiktoks also (I’m not really involved in Tiktok, although I did laugh at a woman doing the “Knotty pine!” bit from AHS Coven this morning) slandering me and accusing me of all kinds of things I didn’t do. They also recruited many people in the 2 Spirit/Indigiqueer community to support these lies, including many well known Indigiqueer writers and artists. It was a whole nightmare and I know some people worried I would commit suicide over it. I didn’t, obviously, I’m still writing here today. But that doesn’t mean I emerged unscathed. I lost a lot of my community because I didn’t want to allow people who would support that kind of thing to have access to me. This included one long time ex lover who also supported the posts. I also was getting a lot of support, but it was quiet support. It was people sending me messages being so sympathetic. But people weren’t vocally and publicly supporting me. Only one person reposted my writing here about those allegations. I felt mainly alone in my fight. And I think despite getting so much silent support, because it was silent there wasn’t push back publicly by others on the narrative Jas Morgan was painting. And so I think people just assumed I was denying being abusive because anyone would deny being abusive, and that I wasn’t a valued member of the community anymore anyway. It felt that way. Being left alone to struggle and survive a slander campaign is very difficult.

It is very hard to fight slander alone. It is very devastating to see a community I spent almost my whole life in turn it’s back on me, despite the fact I literally gave us a name thousands of people use for their identity. I can imagine Jason Arday also felt like he was abandoned to the wolves. His case is even worse because it went into mainstream media, it fed people who wanted clicks, it sold papers, it invited everyone to dissect him and slam every aspect of his life publicly. And like me he was also disabled. And being neurodivergent and facing something like that is devastating.

I don’t know how I survived. In some ways maybe I didn’t. I did lose a lot of financial support since then. I have trouble getting grants. One person who doesn’t like me can give me low scores and tank my applications, even if the other people on the jury support me. I am sure there are still people in the 2S/Indigiqueer community who fully support Jas Morgan and all their slander campaigns against all the people they feel wronged or slighted by. My career is not where it should be anymore. I have amazing ideas but very little resources to complete them. I keep getting no’s on grant applications. I feel like if even some of the people who privately supported me in messages had actually spoken out publicly in support of me, maybe things wouldn’t have worked out the way they did. I felt like I fought it alone, despite people telling me (privately) that they supported me.

If you see someone being piled on, if you see someone (especially someone disabled or otherwise marginalized) being slandered, say something. And not something gossipy about why they are a bad person and deserve it. Say this shit isn’t okay. This shit is lethal. This shit gets people killed and destroyed. Especially in small communities like the 2S community or the art community. I was failed first by having a bad boss who decided to slander me, and then further failed by a community that only softly and quietly supported me. Support someone loudly. It does save lives.