Creative Juices and Solids

Reflections on taste-ings.

Comments are back.

Posted by John Manzo on November 24, 2008

SO I just sent a “cease and desist” demand to my stalker (to what are probably fake email addresses, but that’s what the cops and Shaw told me to do) and am sending logs of his messages to the police. This might get very messy and I’ll certainly keep everybody up to speed.

But to his insults and threats: I very much LIKE being “hirsute” and Brian likes me furry too, and I can’t imagine how anybody but a tired, self-hating queen would actually think that calling me “hairy” or “hirsute” would hurt my feelings or that I’d read “aging” as an insult. But the bumbling inefficacy of his insults aren’t the point. The point is that somebody is trying to hurt me, to rub my nose in comments that are increasingly profane, aggressive, and (now) threatening. That’s criminal harassment. What makes it worse, and this is from the standpoint of the criminal code and just plain morally, is that I have never been anything close to anonymous on here. My name, my face, my damn HOUSE are all on here, recurrently. That’s how I live my life, and I really do feel- sorry for the self-adoration here but it has to be said- that in living openly, fear-free, as a gay man in supposedly homophobic Calgary (a city that has done nothing but welcome Brian and me with open arms and one in which we have never experienced a speck of bigotry as gay men or as a gay couple), I am trying to be a good role model. And a role model as urbanist, coffee geek, scholar, citizen, person who rose above his background, everything.

I really hate to be using my time and bandwidth for this nonsense.

More coffee, food, and travel updates to come. I promise.

For now, “Brian/Bernard,” this is what gay men who are grown-ups, and sexy grown-ups at that, are supposed to look like. Grey hair and “doughnut faces” and all. Just before Saturday night’s FANTASTIC dinner at Chef’s Table:

img_0418

3 Responses to “Comments are back.”

  1. enkerli said

    Not sure why, but my WordPress dashboard led me to this post. Didn’t realize you were also blogging here…
    (For the record: John and I are both coffee geeks and social scientists. We met on through the coffeegeek.com Facebook group, several months ago.)

    Sorry to hear about commenter troubles. I’ve been incredibly lucky on my own blogs as almost every comment has been thoughtful and considerate. Probably because my posts are either non-controversial, too obscure, or just too long. I occasionally think about cranking up the controversy level to get more comments, but I just don’t want to have to deal with flamewars and inconsiderate comments.

    On the other hand, I’m happy to hear that Calgary is welcoming to Brian and you. Very reassuring.
    There are intolerant individuals everywhere (some people would say we’re all somehow intolerant). It’s a drag on everyone when tensions arise over intolerance.
    I say this as an alleged member of the “dominant” group: university-educated European-Canadian straight man currently living in Montreal. I’ve rarely been discriminated against. I’ve been fighting intolerance and discrimination most of my life.

    Anyhoo… Glad our blogs are somehow connected.
    Looking forward to helping you explore Montreal’s coffee renaissance!

  2. John Manzo said

    I turned them back on, Alex- thanks for the kind words!

  3. bruleeblog said

    Good for you John. I’ve always enjoyed your comments, both here and on Chowhound, and would hate to see that disappear because of one idiot.

    -bruleeblog, aka Anonymoose on Chowhound

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