Recent Absence

(This is the same post I've made on my other Patreon)

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 Sorry for the radio silence for the past couple of weeks, but my and my friends' and family's safety was paramount. 

It's been a really trying month so far. 

(CW for potentially triggering topics, please don't read if you're in a delicate state of mind)

Actually, it's been a really trying few years. Every month or two or three, some new awful rumor would come out from people I don't know or don't talk to, and my choice would either be to 1) engage it to debunk and draw more unwanted harassment my way, or 2) ignore it, because I can't put my life on hold every few days in order to address whatever new thing someone has decided would be fun to lie about next.

I tried very hard to ignore most of it, because there was no way I was going to get any work done if I had to pay attention to every person who showed up thinking I was evil over something I didn't do. That's the only way to function when people constantly are trying to bring you down - you can't possibly address every single thing people claim, and if you tried, you'd probably go mad.

I thought that it'd be enough to just focus on making a safe community for people, and to focus on making personal, heartfelt stories. I thought that people would be able to understand where I was coming from, via my works, but I guess that doesn't really work out when you have people stalking your every move and trying to come up with ways to destroy everything you've worked on.

There's no winning here, when people decide that they'll do whatever it takes to destroy what you're doing. I've been fighting for years against harassment and abuse and I finally reached the point where I just can't take it anymore. I can't take random abuse, I can't take random harassment. I only found out what the latest rumors and allegations were against me and my family via hearing about whatever the latest callout floating around was. I have literally no idea what people are saying until a friend tells me about it, by which point I'm already frustrated because I don't even know where to begin with the kind of shit people make up.

I don't know how to handle people treating me like an acceptable target for the worst possible things they can think of to lie about. I really don't. I don't know how to handle people constructing fake logs about despicable things, and I don't know how to handle people lying about living near me or visiting me. I don't know how to deal with people outright lying about me, or people I care about. I don't know how to deal with people doxxing anyone who tries to defend me, especially when it's clear that the people harassing me don't care about what's right or what actually happened, they just care about extracting pain and "drama" from a target.

I don't understand the internet. I thought it would be enough to just do my best for others, to try to be a better person every day, to try to put positivity into the world, to try to encourage people to create, and I hoped that would speak enough to who I am.

I don't know. I really didn't expect to hear the kinds of lies I ended up hearing about and reading about. What do you do in this kind of situation? I've been wondering that for years. What do you do when you're a person who wants to believe victims, but then you're targeted by someone who explicitly goes out of their way to lie about being a victim by you or your family? For years? What do you do when people team up to try to bring you down? When they manipulate a crowd to bring you down, over a heinous crime that never took place? Over something you find despicable? 

It's surreal to end up hearing from your friends some kind of horrid elaborate story you had no idea about, that people are claiming you did, when you literally have no idea what it's about and have to be told what's going on. I don't know how else to describe it other than "a nightmare".

I don't know. I have absolutely no idea what to do. I've spent the past couple of weeks in shock, unable to draw, barely able to look at my computer or phone without panic attacks. I don't know how to describe this situation other than "people are gaslighting me about my life and who I am" and it's not something I know how to deal with. I've tried to defend myself for years, but the final straw is knowing that no matter how much I fight, all it takes is a few lies about something absolutely horrible, and that's it. It's crushing, to say the least. You can only defend yourself against bullshit so many times before you're too worn down to continue - especially when the people abusing and harassing you have nothing else to do with their time. I'm so exhausted.

Even now, I'm not quite sure how to end this, because I can't bring myself to go look up every atrocious lie going around to debunk it. That's the whole reason I had to step away from the computer. I'm too tired to keep doing it. It takes a toll on my soul to have to constantly address things people say. It's worse when people go around faking horrible logs, because what are you even supposed to say to that? 

It doesn't matter that I have evidence to back what I'm saying up, and it doesn't matter that I have a ton of proof about the malicious intentions of the person who originally posted them. If it did matter, it would have ended in 2015 the first time I debunked this person's claims, before they found a bigger platform for them. If it did matter, then people would know that the person who posted the logs is someone who has gone out of their way to try to ruin multiple people by making claims of the same nature. Because this is something I've addressed, before. More than once.

But it doesn't matter, because it's very easy to make a new anonymous name, and to make new sets of claims. And I'm too tired to fight every single time someone shows up to pull this shit, especially when no one pays attention to malicious parties showing up with a slightly different name and claims. I can't keep going.

I'm so sorry to anyone who's reading this and who has no idea what I'm talking about, but the TLDR version is that I've been fighting a harassment campaign for many years, and the climax has been someone forging logs that accuse me and my family of pedophilia and bestiality. What people are doing and saying is absolutely fucking disgusting and I just can't handle it anymore. Try to imagine for a moment that you're a regular person, and now imagine that thousands of people believe something like that because one or two people forged logs and actively lied about you. It's crushing and isolating beyond words.

I have some Flora stories that I'll be posting here before the end of the month. Not sure when comics will continue, or how often they'll update quite yet. I'm really sorry about that. Flora's been my life for years, and all I've wanted to do is bring everyone the best stories I can manage. I've been so grateful to everyone for the support, and I still am grateful to those of you who have stuck around despite how often I've had to fight rumors and bullshit. It means more to me than you can possibly know.

I still want to finish the story of Seeds, but I need a little more recovery time before I can get back to work. This has quite literally been a traumatic event for me, and it took every ounce of my being just to keep surviving.

I don't know where things will end up, but I do know that I'm probably going to just stop using the internet altogether when I do finish Seeds. It's too much heartache for me to exist online when people are so malicious to anyone expressing any vulnerability. I can't handle the anxiety of wondering if some new catastrophe is going to happen the next day. I just wanted to make nice stories for everyone - I never knew I'd have to deal with any of this kind of thing.

If you have any questions, please send me a direct message. Please understand that I might not be able to reply right away due to mental health reasons, but I will try. Also please don't leave a comment below - there are probably going to be people stalking my replies in order to find new targets to harass. Please, please be careful. If you really want to say something to me, just send a direct message here. I won't be able to handle hearing about any more collateral damage from these random and senseless abusive individuals.

Please don't publicly post about this, either - anyone doing so has been targeted. Be careful about who you talk to in private, too. Please, please, please, keep your safety as a priority. Hiding your pledges is probably a good idea. Not commenting on any of my posts in the future is probably a good idea. Please avoid the fate I suffered - you have no idea who could end up a target and over what. People are capable of atrocious lies when they want to be, as I've found out the very hard way. Please be safe. Please.

Thank you everyone who's read through this whole thing. I'm really sorry if it's difficult to follow - my mind's all over the place at the moment, and this is really difficult to type about.