Archive for January 13th, 2013


More Bully Reviews

Filed Under: Bully Crime, Bully Reviews by Johnny Be Good — 21 Comments
January 13, 2013

We were going to move on to the post we published on Ridley on July 6, but we have some urgent news.  On our new posts, we received these comments:

One from Anon:

And then Gen posts Athena’s and Melissa’s addresses and phone numbers and somehow that’s just fine.  Doesn’t put these two women in danger at all, does it?

http://genxpose.blogspot.com/2013/01/stgrb-facts-rumors-speculation.html

It is telling that Gen deleted the comment verifying that Athena and Melissa were neighbors.  I guess she couldn’t handle information that didn’t fit her theory.  I wish I had taken a screenshot of the comment to show you guys.

And one from Observer:

You all remember that loser named GenX you banned from your site a while back? Kudos to you because she just published a douchebag post revealing Melissa Douthit’s private information.
http://genxpose.blogspot.com/2013/01/stgrb-facts-rumors-speculation.html
It was bad enough when Lucy Low Life threatened to do it. This wanker actually did. No wonder you banned her. The hypocrisy of these people never ceases to amaze me. Aren’t they the ones who were complaining about putting “women in danger”!?!?
Does Melissa know about this? Maybe someone should tell her. I mean, the information this asshole posted is nothing we haven’t seen except for the fact that she actually lists Melissa’s address and phone number. Melissa should know. Like the other bullies, Gen drew links between Melissa and Athena, but – get this – someone tried to give her information verifying that Melissa and Athena used to be neighbors in California and Gen removed the poster’s comment! I just thought you should know.

Well, if Melissa didn’t know about this, she does now.  She just contacted us to let us know that she received a threatening phone call and unlike Lucy’s phantom stalker phone call, this one was actually real.  We got her permission to post about this on our blog and are doing everything we can to help her.  We won’t repeat what the person said to her but rest assured, they didn’t call to inquire about her well being.  The caller’s number had a 503 area code.  For those that don’t know, that’s Portland, Oregon.  We’re not at liberty to publish the number here and we don’t want people calling this person.  I think the caller has enough to worry about anyway because Melissa is taking the number along with links and screenshots of Gen’s blog to the police.  All we can say is that this is really serious and it’s a good thing she reported Lucy and Foz to the police back in August.  Now she can refer to the police report that was filed to show them that these people are indeed stalking her.

So today, we decided to postpone Ridley’s profile and post More Bully Reviews.  This is a post we published on August 27, 2012.  We’re doing this to show our new readers the history of Lucy and Foz and the threats they laid against this author.

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I know Athena said that the next post would a fun one on writing reviews, but we’ll get to that next.  We had to do this one first because we have some very interesting things to show you.  Very interesting, indeed.

First, our team has been flagging these reviews brought to our attention by Stop Them, a recent site visitor:

But, there’s a couple we’d like to showcase.

Now, we’ve been told the bullies at Cuddleboogery have never violated GR’s reviewer guidelines.  :

StephanieReview

:

PatrickSeeComments

And here we have one from Ridley.  We can always count on :

RidleyReview

And why is she attacking the author?  Because of this:

JulieLetoTwitter

And here’s the lovely Lucy, as sweet and wonderful as always:

Lucy1

“Fuck her and her career.”  Nice!

Speaking of Lucy, we have something very interesting to show you, but before we do, we want to explain something first.  We want to explain the difference between public information and what the government calls PII or personal identifiable information (you can ask any government official about this – they take it very seriously.)  Now, public information is what you find on public social networking sites like Twitter, GR, Facebook, Yelp, etc.  PII, on the other hand, is what identity thieves look for when they want to empty your bank account or set up a credit account in your name and run off to the Bahamas.  PII includes but is not limited to someone’s physical address, phone number, social security number, date of birth, credit card and bank numbers, etc.  Now, taking public information and publishing it on a blog is not illegal.  Digging up someone’s PII and publishing it (or threatening to publish it) with malicious intent is.  Threatening someone with their PII is a BIG no-no.

Okay, so everybody got that?  Good.

Now, with that said, we want to show you this message we received on our site from Lucy on Thursday.  It is addressed to Melissa.  If you have any popcorn or wine & cheese or whatever in your hand, we suggest you put it down, because this will shock you:

LucysThreat

You see that?  Public Property Records!  Background check sites!  And this is from the woman who claimed that she received threatening phone calls but never actually contacted the police about it and has no one to corroborate her story.

You see the kind of person she is?  You see why we don’t trust or believe her?

But wait!  There’s more!  This is not the only person to send us a threatening message like this addressed to Melissa.  We received this from Foz M. via our Contact Us page last month:

Foz1

To which Athena responded:

Athena1

And then, Foz wrote back:

Foz2a

We cut if off right here because Foz actually lists Melissa’s PII in the email.  Then, the email ends with:

 Foz2b

Then, Athena said:

Athena2

Okay, let’s stop here for a second and take a slow, calm breath.  This is Foz.  A woman who BERATED us on HuffPo for posting public information on our blog – information published on public social networking sites by the bullies themselves.  We never threatened anyone and we never lied about what we did.  And we have NEVER published addresses, phone numbers, dates of birth, etc, on our blog.  Never.  You will not find a single screenshot of us doing that because it NEVER happened.  We never even looked that stuff up.  As far as we’re concerned, that’s off limits.  You don’t even touch that stuff.  But these women, not only did they look it up, they threatened her with it.  You see how vicious these people are?

Lucy, Foz, you’re busted.

We took screenshots of these messages and have sent them to Melissa.  She is taking them to the police, not to press charges, but simply to alert them in case something does happen, the police will know to respond to Melissa’s 911 call immediately.  Melissa has also alerted her neighbors, who are keeping on eye on her house for suspicious activity.  So she is very protected right now.  Also, if something were to happen to Melissa, leaving her incapacitated, we know exactly who to contact in the Utah police department and we know exactly where to point them.

Now, as to the question: did Athena use Melissa’s former address when she started this website?  No.  She used her own address – same street, different house number.  Was Melissa Athena’s neighbor a few years ago?  Yes.  Do they know each other?  Yes.  Is Melissa involved in our website?  No.  She has never been involved in it.  She has stayed out of the whole thing, or at least, she’s tried.  We’ve tried to keep her out of it, too, but the bullies just won’t have it.  They keep dragging her back into this.  Why?  Because they must have a ‘witch’ to hang for what they consider our crimes against them, that is, exposing their behavior and posting our opinions of it on our blog, which is not a crime at all.

Lucy, Foz, you should never have left those messages on our site.  Bad move, girls.  REALLY bad move.

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The GR Bully Culture

Filed Under: GR Bully Culture by Johnny Be Good — 12 Comments
January 13, 2013

Below is a post written by Stitch, his one and only post, published on July 5, 2012, explaining the GR bully culture and how it works.  In the post, Stitch expresses his distaste for the bullies and how they operate.

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 OneLessWriter

Above is a Goodreads post written by an author that will remain anonymous.  In case you’re wondering, the image of the post is cut off abruptly in order to exclude the author’s name (enough damage has been done to her.)  This author was a victim of a GR bully attack.  Actually, several attacks.  In the end, she was so disheartened by what she experienced, she left Goodreads and quit writing altogether.  When she did, the GR bullies rejoiced in her exodus and reveled in her misery.  I would include screencaps of this, but again, I do not want to reveal the identity of the writer.  I just want to use her as an example of what bullying on GR can do and the irreparable damage it can cause.  Sadly, this kind of abuse to writers kills confidence and stifles creativity to the point where the writer cannot even bear to continue.  This is expressed in her words:

“The third and fourth books, I’ve loved… and yet the world seems to hate them. No, not hate them—I’ve seen hateful reviews. These people don’t know how I’ve managed to be published. I’m starting to wonder, myself. Because it’s obvious that my opinion of my books, and the public’s opinion, is so different… I’m scared. There is such a big disconnect there that I am seriously doubting my ability to estimate what a reader will like. I thought I knew… now I realize I have no clue. And I’m tired… so tired. Two young kids, full-time job, writing on the side. I feel like I don’t get a moment to breathe. And during the few times I do, I am reminded of my failures as an author. Each time I try to pull myself up again and get out of this hole, someone comes along and pushes me back in. So, because I am not made for this business, I’ve decided to pull out.  As much as I once loved writing, I honestly don’t anymore. That means no more posts on this blog. No more interaction with other writers and no more groups, no more events. No more books.”

No person, writer or otherwise, should ever be made to feel like this.  What is so sinister about this kind of bullying is that the victims of the attacks are too afraid to stand up against it for fear of what the bullies will do to their books, their reputations, and their careers.  I’ve been watching them for months now and I know that the GR bullies are famous for twisting people’s words around, making them look bad, ruining their reputations with lies, and destroying their careers even before they have begun.  This is why we are here.  To be the voice of those who have been bullied, forced, and otherwise coerced into silence.  We are here to be their advocates and to expose those who are tormenting them.

I don’t usually write posts.  My job is to search the web for any and all related information that goes into our articles.  However, I felt the need to write this post, because in my observance of these bullies, I’ve come to notice several similarities to modern-day urban street gangs.  In a book called, Common Characteristics of Gangs: Examining the Cultures of the New Urban Tribes, G.W. Etter Sr. says:

“Modern urban street gangs have evolved into tribal organizational structures. These new urban tribes have developed into a subculture in the streets of the urban jungle. They claim territory, are self-supporting, have their own language and customs, and establish their own rules and codes of conduct. Their customs are passed to new members by rites of passage from generation to generation, thus ensuring the continuance of the gang. Gang members identify themselves as a people that is separate from the rest of society.” (Etter, 1999, p. 261)

How is this similar to the GR Bully culture?  These bullies have organized themselves into a hierarchical structure that we will reveal on this blog, slowly, with each post.  Each bully falls into one of several categories: ringleader, instigator, stalker, or minion.  As for how they claim territory, here is a clipping to illustrate their mentality:

OURspaces

For the record, we have evidence that Shannon, The Holy Terror has visited author blogs and left rude comments.  So the statement she is making here is false.  But notice how she says “OUR spaces”?  This is claiming territory.  Unfortunately, this is the mentality of the whole group.  They claim certain spaces as their territory and anyone who approaches them has to play by their rules.  Their rules (codes of conduct) are:

1. There is a distinct line between authors and readers (separating themselves.)

2. Reviews are only for readers.

3. Authors must remain silent while the reviewers can behave any way they want toward them.

4. Authors are not allowed to comment on reviews of any kind.

At STGRB, we do not play by these rules, nor do we agree with them.  First of all, there is no distinct line between an author and a reader.  All authors are readers and many readers are want-to-be authors.  As authors are readers, reviews are written for them as well.  As we see it, reviews are publications that are subject to public scrutiny, as are all publications.  All people, authors and readers are therefore allowed to comment on them.  Lastly, reviewers are not allowed to behave any way they want to toward anyone, that includes authors.  On this site, we do not allow author bashing of any kind.

Another aspect of the GR bully culture that I have noticed is that reviewers exercise self-promotion and in doing so, snark has become a status game where reviewers attempt to score points.  Whoever can write the nastiest, most author-bashing, disrespectful review becomes the winner.  Whoever can get the most ‘likes’ and ‘comments’ on their reviews is the winner.  It becomes a status game of getting to the top and staying at the top.  It doesn’t seem to work with 5-star reviews.  It only works with the scathing one-stars.

This bully culture seems to think the problem stems from authors who are behaving badly.  They do not see their actions as the cause of the conflict.  They blame the author-reviewer war on self-publishing, stating that if it wasn’t for the self-publishing revolution, they would never have to tolerate authors talking back because agents or editors would keep them in line:

BlamingSelfPubbing

The only problem with this argument is that the bullies have been known to start flame wars with many traditionally published authors thus disproving their assertion (read at Cuddlebuggery Book Blog.)  No, the conflict does not stem from self-publishing, nor from author behavior.  It stems from the GR bully culture that has evolved on the internet.

Sadly for this group of people, the future does not hold good fortune.  Self-publishing is not going away anytime soon and is only going to get bigger as more and more successful self-publishers come into the spotlight.  In the future, we will see bookstores closing, e-books becoming the dominant form of reading, competitive pricing by Amazon putting many publishers out of business, and a tsunami of self-publishers putting their work out into the marketplace.  Goodreads will more than likely grow, being flooded by waves of self-published authors looking for readers and the bullies will have to make a choice.  They will either have to change their behavior and get along, or they will continue as they are.  If they continue, they will only bring more trouble and heartache onto themselves.  And that’s the truth.

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I just want to add one final thought.  I’m talking about the last bit there where Stitch says:

Goodreads will more than likely grow, being flooded by waves of self-published authors looking for readers and the bullies will have to make a choice.  They will either have to change their behavior and get along, or they will continue as they are.  If they continue, they will only bring more trouble and heartache onto themselves.

Now, considering he wrote this on July 5, 2012, this statement is rather prophetic.  This is exactly the kind of trouble Ashleigh Paige brought onto herself by shelving an anthology on a BBA shelf and then sending the bully squad after the authors who spoke up about it.  For more on that, read our recent post Ashleigh Paige Throws a Hissy Fit.

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Lucy

Filed Under: GR Bully by Johnny Be Good — 4 Comments
January 13, 2013

Below is the second post we published on July 4, 2012.  With this one we wanted to show our readers how the bullies game the system with their reviews, voting up reviews or deleting and re-adding them to assure they are on the top page.  The example of Lucy’s review of illustrated this rather nicely.

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GR Name: Lucy

Real Name: Lucy D.

Category: Instigator, Minion

Toxicity Level: DEFCON 3, Medium Alert, Moderately Toxic

Lucy is what what we here at Stgrb call a DEFCON 3 bully, an instigator and a minion.  At times, she attacks in order to provoke a potential victim into a fight (much like Shannon, The Holy Terror.)  This, in fact, was the reason she was blocked by Goodreads author, Lauren DeStefano – for harassment.  However, most of the time, :

IMissEverything

But she jumps into the fight once she hears about it, in order to help her fellow bullies participate in tearing apart their victim.  In other words, she follows the pack.  This is minion behaviour.

ProfilePics

Above is a screencap of her profile pictures, which include her cartoon ego.  On an interesting note, it is usually the DEFCON 3 bullies who, out of cowardice, will not reveal actual pictures of themselves.

Alright, well, you’re probably wondering why we have chosen a DEFCON 3 GR bully for our second post, and that would certainly be a legitimate concern.  We’ve chosen Lucy to illustrate further how the GR bullies operate on a regular basis.  They do in fact operate under the impression, or I should say the delusion that their reviews are more important than other readers’ reviews and thus should always be on top.  Our sources have provided us with a perfect example of this: Lucy’s review of Jamie Mcguire’s Beautiful Disaster, which by the way is a book that made the NYT list.

But I am getting off topic.  Here is a screen cap of the beginning of the review, just in case it disappears or is changed.

DeletedReview

Notice the bold, all-caps writing that says:

“DELETED AND READDED BECAUSE SOMEONE HAD IT BURIED.”

When her review was buried, she became very unhappy, as most of them do whenever their reviews are flagged for content, and tried to re-add it, getting all of her friends to comment and like it, so that it would reach the top again (read comments on the review for more details.)  Of course, when she did this, it didn’t help.  The review was still buried, so she contacted the Goodreads moderators to have to it placed back to the top:

ContactingGR

ContactGR2

So, are you starting to see this unhealthy obsession with being above everyone else?  One commenter on our blog said that the bullies’ behaviour stems from the need to feel important and gain power over others.  This review is a perfect example of that.

Below is a clipping from her review commenters who just could not understand why the review was buried in the first place.

ReviewDeletedwtf

They assume that it was the author acting out against the reviewer for a bad review and getting her fans to help.  Gosh, I don’t know, it couldn’t have anything to do with language like this, could it?

ReviewClipping

In the comment thread below the review, Lucy is flabbergasted that her review was targeted and wonders why anyone would single her out.  Gee, could it be her insulting behaviour toward others?

Her insults to Jamie Mcguire:

InsultToJamie

TragedyJMmadeNYT

Vomit

Her insult to Rebecca Hamilton:

InsultToRebecca

This is why we chose Lucy, a DEFCON 3 bully, to profile on our blog today.  To show all of our readers the lengths these bullies will go to to place themselves above everyone else.  This is just another example of their bullying behaviour.

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The Holy Terror

Filed Under: Bully Attacks, GR Bully by Johnny Be Good — 3 Comments
January 13, 2013

Below is the very first post we published on our blog July 2, 2012.  We decided to start with The Holy Terror due to her nasty and vicious nature.  Some of our site visitors think she is Minerva, the blog owner behind Stop the STGRB Bullies.  Others just think she’s a witch.  Both are highly plausible.

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GR name:

Real name: Shannon D.

Category: Stalker/Information Fetcher

Level of Toxicity: DEFCON 1, Maximum Alert, Severely Toxic

Here is a link to her .  From this, we can divine that she likes to take pictures of herself.  How nice!

Shannon is what we here at STGRB call a stalker and an information fetcher.  Whenever the bullies are stirring up trouble, she jumps into the fray, terrorizing and stalking the victim/victims being targeted.  Then, she brings back the information she has found to the group.  From what we’ve seen, she appears to take her job very seriously and is dedicated to her stalking duties.

As for her professional life, well, she doesn’t have one.  She doesn’t work for a living or take care of children.  From what we’ve gathered, all she does is stay indoors, at home, and sit in front of her computer ALL DAY LONG!  So if you’re wondering how she has so much time to stalk people online, that’s how.

Out of all of Shannon’s bullying shenanigans, this one in particular stood out in our minds.  This one involves the attack on James Austen.  Our sources spoke with James and from the evidence we have seen, the story goes something like this.  A bully on the Amazon fora accused James of spamming.  Of course, James was innocent of the allegations and responded.  Then, the pack attacked.  A bully named , leaving nasty comments on his author page and on his Twitter account, accusing him of insanity and calling him “a headcase.”  Then, upon hearing of the attack, Shannon jumped in, saying:

wtff

Then, she went after him with insults as well to provoke him, saying to Ridley:

WantToFlag

After this, she wanted to know how Ridley was ruining his career:

RuiningCareer

Huh, so, her chosen GR name is starting to make sense, now.  Befits her behavior, don’t you think?  Such a classy young lady, isn’t she?  If you would like another glimpse into her lovely personality, check out this clipping where she is discussing a book she didn’t like (big surprise!)

Now, our sources know James Austen and have told us that he’s cool.  In the end, he was bullied and chased out of GR for no other reason than Ridley and Shannon wanting to have some fun (please note that it had nothing to do with a negative review, which is usually their claim):

Gone

These bullies relish in bringing misery to others and ruining their reputations and careers.  We believe that this is very, very unhealthy behavior, not to mention complete douchebaggery.

Our advice to Shannon: GET OFF your computer.  GO outside and enjoy the beautiful So. Cal. weather.  You live in California for crying out loud!  You know how many people in the world would give their first born child to live where you live?  Go out and enjoy it!  Quit stalking and terrorizing people online and get a life, girl!

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