Stalking, racisim, and my personal story
It's time I tell my story online and well you may be curious as to why I titled my thread the way I did. You see, I have three things going against me, I'm black, I'm disabled (partially blind) and I'm gay.
I know what it is like growing up black in the south. People are always looking at you with suspicion. They see you coming and right away their guard goes up. They worry that your going to do something to them, that your going to steal something from you. Their heart beat increases. When I see someone white enter, I notice it's never the same reaction.
As a young man, I never paid that any attention. I grew up during the 1980's after all and I lived in a rural area. Totally clueless about how it was like for people in the city. The only thing I was worried about was just trying to get trough the day without getting picked on by the other kids.
For years, I never experienced problems with race at home or with people who hate me because I'm a liberal or democrat until after I got on my own. Now at age 38, the cold hard reality of life is upon me.
You see I enjoy a good debate. I like to watch shows like Ed Schultz, Rachael, Lawrence (when I can stay up past ten) and Bill Mahar on Friday's. It's how I stay informed on the issues. It's how I'm prepared for when my line of sight is interrupted by an extreme conservative. Most of the time I can hold my own except for when it comes to women's issues. It's then when I feel I need to call in back up from my female friends.
Last August, I began to develop a stalker if you would. On facebook, which is where I'm most active, there was this gentleman by the name of Doyle Jefferson some friends of mine and I got into a debate on Ed's facebook page. Of course we have this saying on Ed's page, you can easily spot a conservative. They always say the same talking points, you've most likely seen them here. "I hate Obama" another one, "Obama is a socialist" we've always seen that before.
So anyway, my friends and I jumped on this tea party clown and ripped him a new one. No matter what opinion he would present us, we go right back with a fact with a link backing up what we said. Eventually, he got so ticked off he broke the page rules and the mods banned him. At that point we all moved on.
Then, the oddest thing happened, My picture started appearing on another page. People were telling me that I was posting during the night. My friends know me well enough to know that I rarely stay up past 10:0. Another odd thing we notice, my friends know I'm very liberal in my views. This person who was posing as me, had my picture and everything was insulting my friends, total strangers. I didn't know what was going on.
Lucky for me the mods knew me well enough to know that was not me. At first I brushed it off, but now this has been happening constantly since August of last year. This person who I know is very extreme in his postings has called me the N word flat out has called me a house n word, has attacked me over my sexual orientation, you name it he's done it all. For the longest time, I couldn't figure out who this person was.
Remember the story that was posted here a while back. Karl Rove was forming a group designed to infiltrate progressive people, get to know them and when the time is right, unleashed their right wing views. This person who I thought was my friend had a blow up during the Sandra Fluke situation. After he insulted my female friends, I ended our friendship. That night, the attacks on my character, the cloning of my facebook pages increased.
This man had caused me endless nights where I couldn't sleep. I would see him attack people in my name, using my pictures. There wasn't anything I could do about it until I spoke with a local reporter who put me in touch with the Attorney General's office. They told me I could bypass the police and go directly to the county attorney. I did and as a result, a police report has been filed and the commonwealth attorney is now investigating to confirm if the person I suspect of stalking me is the person I suspect as being behind this.
To this hour, he's still stalking me. Appearing in groups that I'm the most active in. Thankfully he hasn't made his way on to democratic underground yet. But, the reason I posted this is because it's helping me to tell my story out to as many people that I can. For a long time, I thought I was alone, I am happy to report that I'm not. But if it's happening to me, I have a feeling it's happening to other people as well. When you see folks like me commenting on issues regarding race, don't assume that we have motives for posting our concerns. Some of us have been victims of it and we are really tired of seeing others go through it.
Thank you for allowing me to tell my story here. I just feel like I had to get that off of my chest.
= new reply since forum marked as read
feelings of helplessness, pain and worry. The good thing is that this person will eventually do something that will hang him. It's such a shame that this is happening to you but I have every confidence that you will come out on top. Bless you and thank you for telling your story.
