Pgh Lesbian Correspondents

I once had a crush on FourSquare – I thought it had potential to help nonprofit organizations and small businesses.

So I’ve detailed in probably far too much painstaking a manner the experience of being cyberstalked. It is a terrible feeling. And most stalkers get quite excited when they get a reaction from their prey – like a cat batting a mouse around before the kill. 

The worst thing for me is the fact that people posit “someone stalking a neighbor online” to equate “neighborhood drama.” It is like a battered wife having “relationship issues” or saying that the kid beating the shit out of another kid is just ” being a kid.”

One of my “cats” is probably quite excited right down because his latest poke resulted in me shutting down an entire Facebook Group. I had previously blocked him and others connected to the stalking per the advice of the police and lawyers. But the activity was visible to me (long techie explanation.)  I had enough of trying to let it roll off my shoulders because frankly it is never going to go away.

So today, I made it go away.

I wrote this at one point:

I’m not going to just let it go. But I don’t want to escalate a potentially volatile situation with someone who I don’t know. I think the players with power need to take a stronger stance and send a message.

Foursquare needs to hold them accountable.

Facebook needs to hold him accountable for posting “Hag Bag Headquarter welcome to whoreville all dyke welcome” on his page. Repeatedly.

The person who leaked the information needs to tell me. And try to fix it.

The other persons I’ll be contacting need to take it seriously.

No one should sell this man a gun.

And the LGBQ community, I hope, will say that gay people bashing other gay people is unacceptable period. Criticize my actions, decisions, beliefs and opinions.  Slamming women as whores and dykes is not okay and reprehensible if connected to other gay people.

In reality, none of this happened. FourSquare and Facebook did nothing. The person who gossiped about me has never admitted it much less tried to undo the harm they unleashed. The people I contact about it? Well, mostly they think it is “neighborhood drama.” Like domestic violence or loud parties.

This started in 2011, possibly earlier. And I am tired of tracking it all – the screenshots, the spreadsheets, the timelines, etc. I’m tired of having to explain over and over. I’m tired of feeling traumatized and batted about by a feral cat. Each new person I approach requires me to relive moment by moment the increasing horror of realizing that someone had targeted my family over a FourSquare venue. And tried to buy an illegal gun.

Because they know damn well that they get to me. They won’t stop because it is fun? amusing? vindictive? Who knows? I’m not going to grow a thicker skin at this point so I’ll just let someone else manage the neighborhood communications and eliminate one more source of exasperation.

I’m not really a very successful social media user because I let the stray cats drive me away, but as a survivor of sexual violence – being alive each day is its own success, right?

The truth is – there are people who believe you, people who reject you and people who don’t want to get involved. Why try to engage either of the last two? As long as people don’t get involved, evil flourishes.