I'm sad, to be sure, but relieved that it's over, like finally losing a
loved one to a heartrending disease. Protests (like Bob's) are wonderfully
consoling, but put me on the spot (thought I'd worn that spot out
already!). Still, I'm sure there's not a person on the list who can't
understand that when an endless wrangle consumes the time and energy
you've set aside for your work, you have to choose the work.
Don't anybody leave. Stay and make the list bigger and better. Just don't
anybody else e-mail me to say Terry's really a nice guy and made such a
*sincere* toast to you at Bath, if you haven't read the archive. Someone
else new to the list wrote to say my resignation was "premature." It is in
fact overdue, as the archive and my forthcoming summary under the subject
line "Modest Request Redux" will show.
For listers with no time to read, here's a synopsis: For months, the
dogged, determined, devious stalker pounced on my every word, pronouncing
my methods excessive, unnecessary, inferior, inadequate, or otherwise
wrong-headed. Except, that is, when he bestowed a royal blessing,
approval and permission. Or switched from one to the other:
If I corrected the errors he larded into my messages, he assured me, "I
agree." If I asked, why do you correct me if you agree, he said, "Judy
thinks it's an insult if someone disagrees with her." Newcomers will find
this hard to believe; I, too, find it hard to believe. But see the
archive, from January 27th until the middle of March, this year.
I was, I confess, a bit slow. I reasoned and argued, then pleaded, whined,
raged and threatened. Useless. This isn't what I came for, I decided, and
asked to be excused: "You let me alone, I'll let you alone." No, he said,
he felt a responsiblity to protect beginners. It's OK, I promised, no one
will hold you responsible. (I'm *not* making this up.) No dice. We had
several more dustups, and I went away for a month -- to give him a chance
to think of things to say on his own. Useless. He was almost completely
silent until my return (you could look it up). And now, refreshed after
Bath, he begins again.
Why? I quote the theory of a distinguished psychiatrist below, but
it's also possible I just looked like the one to beat.
A few messages from my recent incoming e-mail may convey the flavor of
this moment to those who've watched it happen. Some are from former
strangers, some from new friends, some from honorable lurkers.
The first is from an E-letter that arrived the day before yesterday:
> I see that Terry is back to his old ways after
> the Bath conference. For Bath he played the ambassador role, but it looks
> like that's behind him now. > I'm sorry that he's started it with you.
> Take heart that there are many of us here who support and love you, and
> who are strengthened by your comments and made wiser by your writings.
The next one arrived a couple of days ago and was rather less polite,
including as it did the suggestion that "someone" ought to be bound up in
gaffer's tape: "Since he does it mentally to himself all the time, he
shouldn't notice the difference." Definitely a point of view.
An E-mail received in March was polite but furious:
> I was enraged to find Terry continuing his antics on the list. I do
believe he wrote his condescending compliment in order to continue the
nastiness and then to say as he usually does at this point, let's stop all
of this..."
There are several in this vein, but this one is different:
> I understand how you are annoyed by Terry, but can't you just ignore him? <
No I can't. Nor could anyone on this list. Nor should I have to. Not only
do I lack the requisite girl-talent for martyrdom, but I've watched big
strong men on this list fall apart or leave after a fraction of the
provocation I've endured. Those guys stalk off and nobody thinks a thing
of it or utters a disparaging word. People say I have to hang in as a
feminist statement. But if I ignore the abuse, the statement is that women
are doormats. If I protest, the statement is that women are shrews and
crybabies. Either way, the struggle drains me. Not what I came for.
Sure, other folks can tune Terry out (some insist they delete before
reading), but it's not so easy when it's your carefully honed and nuanced
thoughts he's tromping on. Now again, I can't write a message or join a
thread without him buzzing in to feed, inserting his own agenda, muddling
my meaning beyond redemption, running roughshod over a complex idea,
haring off on detours, tying me in knots if I try to rescue a point, and
making me into a scold if I object.
Meanwhile he gives new meaning to the word "chutzpah." Imagine someone who
twists your words, dumbs them down, smothers them in platitudes, changes
the subject -- and then calls your protest "a rather unpleasant form of
censorship . . . a deliberate attempt to stifle civilised debate," as
Terry did this week. I heard no protests from the list on that one. Numb
by now, I suppose.
In any event, much as I love a good debate before dinner, there's no
debating a person who changes his tune between eyeblinks. Nor can you
debate self-puffery and blanket assertion without sinking to the level of
sandbox slanging. (But tell me again, the subject for debate was ----?)
As for "censorship," Terry was free as a bird to write a million
freestanding messages of his own, as a lot of us do. He could even make
snide comments about me, which he did during the great S/he-bang (and I
let it pass). Or he could go back one step on a thread I'd joined, or join
another thread: some folks are probably pining for attention. I begged him
for months to do that.
No, it's me and my words he wants, my very own masher. His obsession with
me is, alas, too painful to be flattering. My husband-the-psychiatrist
diagnoses an identification with an early childhood figure, perhaps the
mother. The proverbial "inner child" cannot bear for mummy to have a life
of her own. But the list grows weary of the pursuit and so do I.
No one else in the history of this list, man or woman, has been so beset.
Yet, sadly, some folks who are *very* sensitive to list "unpleasantness"
are indifferent to my distress. Or dare suggest I should just go quietly.
Sadly, also, some who do not share the effort of creating list content
have felt free to scold when it was interrupted by death rattle.
But again, this sort of "debate" is bad for me, the list, the field of
photography or the ozone layer. Not what I came for.
Take the disaster of my last stint as content-provider at this address.
Eric and I were discussing how it might be that under regular, "green"
glass (like the one I'd just broken) a gum print flaked less and exposed
more than under the Starphire glass, supposedly faster because it lets
through more rays. We were considering UV, IR and emulsions. Until Terry
buzzed on to tell us, "find something that works for you and stick to it."
And, "it's best not to over complicate things." (No, he absolutely did
*not * say, "pull up your socks.")
Then he added a homily on flaking, which could actually have been useful,
were it presented in a useful way, ie., to encourage discussion, rather
than as dictat. Observations about this variable phenomenon could have
been shared among printers worldwide; I've made a few interesting ones
myself. Of course the only "difference of opinion" visible was on the
nature of civilized discussion. The formerly civilized discussion on
glass, so rudely interrupted, had to continue in private. Nobody picked up
the thread of flaking.
Somewhere in there I blew my stack and warned: do not "resume garbling,
distorting, misinterpreting and generally dumbing down my words into a
silly mishmash you can then 'fix' with platitudes, shallow generalities,
self-congratulation and error." So he promptly reverted to his crudest
baiting mode of old, taking my comments about gum development, pronouncing
them right, granting his royal approval and imprimatur. And did it again.
Twice. Nothing new to say, just the brutal determination to say it. The
Judy-is-right gambit was exactly the stance of ultimate authority that set
off the last cycle. (Or was it the one before? Can't keep them straight.
Really time to go.)
In a former era of comfortable give and take on the list, disagreement
added spice, we learned from honest differences of opinion and commentary
accrued along the way. This isn't that. Dogging a contributor who asks to
be spared, parroting her words to taunt her by dispensing "approval" is
not give and take. It's pathology. Oops -- I'm repeating myself. Time to
go.
Perhaps one day another smart woman will come along to play a serious part
here, not in the longsuffering Handmaiden role, but as equal. I don't see
any standing in line for the job . . . . but maybe in 20 years or so.
(Photography is so backward in this respect.)
Meanwhile, I draw attention to another E-morsel, Terry's message to the
list earlier this week:
> Many are forced into lurking by Ms Seigel's outbursts. These are often
respected experts in our field. The loss of their contributions is a
loss to us all. >
Perhaps these phantom experts will now step forward to fill the gap. Or
perhaps this preposterous lie, unchallenged and unreproached, shows again
why "here" is no longer where I want to be. I note sadly that a "friend"
on the list, who let that one pass without comment, tonight reproaches
*me.* Peace at any price usually exacts a very high price, but it looks
like a funny lopsided kind of "peace" from here.
I regret that so much of this has played out in public, but "discussion"
with Terry offlist is no more possible than onlist. He has also used it as
pretext to tell lies, some petty, some harrowing, about what I supposedly
said.
But I close with another recent E-mail, this one a bouquet, arrived
recently from a fellow subscriber, forevermore dear to my heart:
>... I just want to say that I appreciate your input to the Alt photo >
group, your down-to-earth wisdom is a real asset to the group. I have >
learned more from your freely shared experience than many years reading >
books and struggling along on my own. >
Thank you kind reader. I've learned a lot too. Unfortunately, "wisdom" can
take you only so far. Still, to quote Jesse Jackson: "The Lord isn't done
with me yet." When S/He is, I'll send word.
Judy