Tritorella
As some of you are aware I've not actually been active in the Highlander fandom for that long. I think its about a year a bit now. I'm still very much a newbie really. As such I'd like to relate one of my 'newbie' experiences to you all.
When I took that first swandive into the Highlander fandom I did the usual thing of going to Y!Groups and joining as many HL slash lists as possible. Obviously one of these lists was ODM (OnlyDuncanMethos), which is run by lastrega and the other was SDM (StrictlyDuncanMethos) which is, or was, run by mslasha.
Upon receiving the FAQ for SDM I was somewhat startled by the fact that one of the rules was that there was to be no mention of the writing of or discussion of the person known as tritorella on list. There was also a selection of her other aliases given just to avoid any confusion. At this point, I hasten to add, I didn't *know* Trit. I had seen some of her posts on other lists and read some of her fic but I'd no actual personal experience with her.
This seemed a little *odd* as a rule for a lists so I actually took the step of emailing the mods/owner and asking what on earth this was all about. One of the mods replied as did mslasha personally with a lengthy explanation of their grievances and also a link to webpage (now removed) which had excerpts of emails from Trit amongst other people and purported to be examples of trollish behaviour. Now this disturbed me.
Firstly, I was very uncomfortable with the fact that someone was posting emails on a webpage like this. Secondly, I admit quite freely that I assumed that there is no smoke without fire and that Trit must be a fairly difficult person and done something fairly bad to warrant this sort of treatment. So, I made some comment about how shocked I was, I even offered my services in a legal capacity should the owner or mods of SDM suffer any similar problems in the future and then I went my own sweet way and forgot all about it.
Okay, lets fast forward a month or so. I'm now easing my way into the fandom and big tart that I am, I manage to attract the attention of various lovely people who invite me to join some private HL related lists. One of these people is my darling lastrega who invited me to join a private list she modded. It turns out this list was actually owned by Trit. I thought nothing of it really as I had no actual beef with Trit and liked her stories.
Move forward another month or so. I get involved in writing a Round Robin with various members of Trit's list including lastrega, tritorella herself , litalex, dkwilliams and darthhellokitty . This eventually evolves into Comes A Scotsman and is posted on various lists.
Imagine my surprise to then receive an email from one of the mods of SDM which asked me if I was indeed a member of Trit's private list. I replied saying "Yes" and asking, "why she wanted to know this?" I then got back a decidedly snippy email accusing me, amongst other things, of being a spy for Trit on SDM and associating with people known to be sympathisers with her. As you can probably imagine my response to that was somewhat less then civil. It's also worth mentioning at this point that at no time on Trit's list had mslasha or any of her friends been mentioned nor the disagreement that existed between them been alluded to. Anyway, I exchanged various mildly irritated emails with the mods and the owner of SDM and I did think that the situation had been resolved as I heard nothing further from any of them.
At the same time I was less then polite on Trit's list. I basically posted something along the lines of, "what the flying fuck is all this crap and why am I getting dragged into it?" *That* was the first time I actually heard the 'other' side of the story from both Trit, herself and from lastrega. Taking all this on board, I'm afraid my response was pretty much still, "all well and good but frankly I don't *care* what happened or about what someone has or hasn't done and bollocks to the lot of you, leave me out of it!"
Shortly after this, I attempted to access the SDM archive and found I was no longer a member of the list. When I tried to email mslasha to ask why I had been removed from the list, my email was returned because my email address had apparently been blocked.
So I washed my hands of the whole affair and moved on.
Over time I have got to know tritorella better. She is without a shadow of a doubt, an acquired taste. She's opinionated, she's blunt and sometimes she is rude. I have on occasion disagreed vehemently with things she has said on lists. This does not however stop me regarding her as an excellent writer, a great contributor to fandom and someone I have the utmost respect, admiration and friendship for. Of late she has kindly volunteered to host my Kink!Fic Challenge on her webpage and also to update it for me, even though she now has left the Highlander fandom.
I can't comment on what has caused all the animosity between Trit and mslasha and her friends. I wasn't around when it happened. I can however make the following observations:
1. Disagreeing with someone, even hating them is understandable. We are not all going to like each other in fandom and sometimes this will involve frayed tempers all round. I am as guilty as anyone of this. Look at the whole J-Blo mess! That said, posting lists of email addresses, IP addresses and various aliases publically on the web, of people you don't like, is *not* acceptable for *any* reason. It's an infringement of personal privacy and doubly so if you cannot even get these correct and implicate people who have nothing to with your little fight.
2. Squealing constantly on lists and in LJ about how badly the person you disagree with has treated you and how they are 'stalking' you, starts to wear slightly thin after the first year or so. Particularly when the person you disagree with hasn't mentioned your argument at all, anywhere.
3. It's a good idea to have clear proof that someone has done you wrong before you start waging a campaign of hate against them across several fandoms. Funnily enough uninvolved third parties might actually consider behaviour like that as stalking and troll-like.
4. Accusing people you don't know of spying for your enemies is pathetic. It may come as a shock to you but many people could not care less about your dispute, nor do they want to hear about it.
mslasha, wickdzoot, houseofsnark, and xander_spike you have brought all this on yourselves by your ridiculous behaviour. I have no sympathy and I certainly shall be regarding any of your future whines about being stalked and harassed with a very large pinch of salt. I see that now, you have deleted most of the controversial comments from your LJ's. I think that says it all.
Everyone involved in this hideous mess should take a deep breath, get some perspective and back away from the argument before things get seriously nasty. I know it's a hard thing to ask for mature behaviour in fandom but you know, I live in hope! I'll leave it up to whoever reads this to make their own minds up about who is telling the truth. If you want to abuse, shout, comment or talk to me about what I said please do. I have simply stated the facts as I see them. Undoubtably I'm going to be accused of bias in favour of Trit because of my interaction with her. I think however the majority of people who read this will realise I have no axe to grind.
There is one thing I would like to add to this. The comment here made by gabixenafen about Trit is a complete and utter lie. I don't care how 'reliable' the so-called source was. I was at HLDU5 with Trit and present for all her interactions (which were few) with the various guests of honour. I can state categorically that this *never* happened! Spreading lies like this is malicious and nasty and says more about the people who make them then anything about Trit. The organisers of HLDU5 would be equally horrified to see that false accusations such as these are being made. I strongly suggest to the owner of this LJ that this comment is removed.
Now, lets *never* speak of this again.
When I took that first swandive into the Highlander fandom I did the usual thing of going to Y!Groups and joining as many HL slash lists as possible. Obviously one of these lists was ODM (OnlyDuncanMethos), which is run by lastrega and the other was SDM (StrictlyDuncanMethos) which is, or was, run by mslasha.
Upon receiving the FAQ for SDM I was somewhat startled by the fact that one of the rules was that there was to be no mention of the writing of or discussion of the person known as tritorella on list. There was also a selection of her other aliases given just to avoid any confusion. At this point, I hasten to add, I didn't *know* Trit. I had seen some of her posts on other lists and read some of her fic but I'd no actual personal experience with her.
This seemed a little *odd* as a rule for a lists so I actually took the step of emailing the mods/owner and asking what on earth this was all about. One of the mods replied as did mslasha personally with a lengthy explanation of their grievances and also a link to webpage (now removed) which had excerpts of emails from Trit amongst other people and purported to be examples of trollish behaviour. Now this disturbed me.
Firstly, I was very uncomfortable with the fact that someone was posting emails on a webpage like this. Secondly, I admit quite freely that I assumed that there is no smoke without fire and that Trit must be a fairly difficult person and done something fairly bad to warrant this sort of treatment. So, I made some comment about how shocked I was, I even offered my services in a legal capacity should the owner or mods of SDM suffer any similar problems in the future and then I went my own sweet way and forgot all about it.
Okay, lets fast forward a month or so. I'm now easing my way into the fandom and big tart that I am, I manage to attract the attention of various lovely people who invite me to join some private HL related lists. One of these people is my darling lastrega who invited me to join a private list she modded. It turns out this list was actually owned by Trit. I thought nothing of it really as I had no actual beef with Trit and liked her stories.
Move forward another month or so. I get involved in writing a Round Robin with various members of Trit's list including lastrega, tritorella herself , litalex, dkwilliams and darthhellokitty . This eventually evolves into Comes A Scotsman and is posted on various lists.
Imagine my surprise to then receive an email from one of the mods of SDM which asked me if I was indeed a member of Trit's private list. I replied saying "Yes" and asking, "why she wanted to know this?" I then got back a decidedly snippy email accusing me, amongst other things, of being a spy for Trit on SDM and associating with people known to be sympathisers with her. As you can probably imagine my response to that was somewhat less then civil. It's also worth mentioning at this point that at no time on Trit's list had mslasha or any of her friends been mentioned nor the disagreement that existed between them been alluded to. Anyway, I exchanged various mildly irritated emails with the mods and the owner of SDM and I did think that the situation had been resolved as I heard nothing further from any of them.
At the same time I was less then polite on Trit's list. I basically posted something along the lines of, "what the flying fuck is all this crap and why am I getting dragged into it?" *That* was the first time I actually heard the 'other' side of the story from both Trit, herself and from lastrega. Taking all this on board, I'm afraid my response was pretty much still, "all well and good but frankly I don't *care* what happened or about what someone has or hasn't done and bollocks to the lot of you, leave me out of it!"
Shortly after this, I attempted to access the SDM archive and found I was no longer a member of the list. When I tried to email mslasha to ask why I had been removed from the list, my email was returned because my email address had apparently been blocked.
So I washed my hands of the whole affair and moved on.
Over time I have got to know tritorella better. She is without a shadow of a doubt, an acquired taste. She's opinionated, she's blunt and sometimes she is rude. I have on occasion disagreed vehemently with things she has said on lists. This does not however stop me regarding her as an excellent writer, a great contributor to fandom and someone I have the utmost respect, admiration and friendship for. Of late she has kindly volunteered to host my Kink!Fic Challenge on her webpage and also to update it for me, even though she now has left the Highlander fandom.
I can't comment on what has caused all the animosity between Trit and mslasha and her friends. I wasn't around when it happened. I can however make the following observations:
1. Disagreeing with someone, even hating them is understandable. We are not all going to like each other in fandom and sometimes this will involve frayed tempers all round. I am as guilty as anyone of this. Look at the whole J-Blo mess! That said, posting lists of email addresses, IP addresses and various aliases publically on the web, of people you don't like, is *not* acceptable for *any* reason. It's an infringement of personal privacy and doubly so if you cannot even get these correct and implicate people who have nothing to with your little fight.
2. Squealing constantly on lists and in LJ about how badly the person you disagree with has treated you and how they are 'stalking' you, starts to wear slightly thin after the first year or so. Particularly when the person you disagree with hasn't mentioned your argument at all, anywhere.
3. It's a good idea to have clear proof that someone has done you wrong before you start waging a campaign of hate against them across several fandoms. Funnily enough uninvolved third parties might actually consider behaviour like that as stalking and troll-like.
4. Accusing people you don't know of spying for your enemies is pathetic. It may come as a shock to you but many people could not care less about your dispute, nor do they want to hear about it.
mslasha, wickdzoot, houseofsnark, and xander_spike you have brought all this on yourselves by your ridiculous behaviour. I have no sympathy and I certainly shall be regarding any of your future whines about being stalked and harassed with a very large pinch of salt. I see that now, you have deleted most of the controversial comments from your LJ's. I think that says it all.
Everyone involved in this hideous mess should take a deep breath, get some perspective and back away from the argument before things get seriously nasty. I know it's a hard thing to ask for mature behaviour in fandom but you know, I live in hope! I'll leave it up to whoever reads this to make their own minds up about who is telling the truth. If you want to abuse, shout, comment or talk to me about what I said please do. I have simply stated the facts as I see them. Undoubtably I'm going to be accused of bias in favour of Trit because of my interaction with her. I think however the majority of people who read this will realise I have no axe to grind.
There is one thing I would like to add to this. The comment here made by gabixenafen about Trit is a complete and utter lie. I don't care how 'reliable' the so-called source was. I was at HLDU5 with Trit and present for all her interactions (which were few) with the various guests of honour. I can state categorically that this *never* happened! Spreading lies like this is malicious and nasty and says more about the people who make them then anything about Trit. The organisers of HLDU5 would be equally horrified to see that false accusations such as these are being made. I strongly suggest to the owner of this LJ that this comment is removed.
Now, lets *never* speak of this again.