Epigraph

“People whom fate and their sin-mistakes have placed in a certain position, however false that position may be, form a view of life in general which makes their position seem good and admissible. . . . This surprises us when the persons concerned are thieves bragging about their dexterity, prostitutes vaunting their depravity, or murders boasting of their cruelty. But it surprises us only because the circle, the atmosphere, in which these people live, is limited, and chiefly because we are outside it. Can we not observe the same phenomenon when the rich boast of their wealth-robbery, when commanders of armies pride themselves on their victories-murder, and when those in high places vaunt their power-violence? That we do not see the perversion in the views of life held by these people, is only because the circle formed by them is larger and we ourselves belong to it.” (Resurrection, Leo Tolstoy, trans. Louise Maude)

New Readers:

Please start reading with my first post "A Cup of Coffee". Originally posted on March 19, the archival date changed when I made corrections on May 13, which is the date under which you can find it now.

I'll learn to manage this all more smoothly someday, but at present I have at most only an hour online each day (that thanks to the San Francisco Public Library system, without which I would be lost).

Wednesday, July 24, 2013

A Luddite's Lament

I am becoming increasingly anxious.  My temporary housing will end in September, and I see no possibility of having enough income by then to qualify for any other housing.  I make $400 a month working as an event coordinator for a company that takes over a month to send me my paycheck.  I earn about $150 a week cleaning houses and doing yard work for a couple of people, work that I got through an ad I posted on Craigslist.

I dreamt last night that someone was teaching me how to sell drugs (marijuana, specifically).  I was terrified the whole time.  We were being followed by two policemen who did not arrest us because we weren't actually carrying any drugs.  It was a training session, after all.  Somehow I just don't think that option would work out well for me.

But then the "Justice" system and the Internet tend to lead people, people who have experienced what I have experienced, toward crime.  I am still awaiting trial -- a year later -- for the charge on which I was arrested the second time: misdemeanor battery.  MRM told the police that I had approached him in a park where he was walking his dog, that I hit him, and that he fell down and injured his wrist.  He made up the entire incident.  Nothing like it ever happened.

What did happen that day was that he approached me as I was having a cup of coffee on my way to work.  I tried to ignore him, but he let the dog, who always liked me, come over to me, and I began petting him.  I always liked him, too.  MRM tried to engage me in conversation, breaking the mutual restraining order that had been in place six months.  I did break down and speak to him.  I said, "Leave me alone.  Never speak to me again."  Those events became his false report:  he always told me that a good liar knows to keep his tale very close to actual events so that the lie will be easy to remember and so that it will be difficult to disprove (for example, I would not be able to prove that I was elsewhere when I was sitting by a cafe within a block of the park where he walked his dog.)

Two weeks later he walked into a police station and filed his false report.  Because he alleged physical violence and because he said that he was afraid of me, the police arrested me at work a few days later.  It was a few days later because he waited until Thursday to tell them where I could be found.  He did that because they hold you three days before charging you before a judge.  They have to do it within three days, but Saturday and Sunday don't count.  So if you are arrested on a Thursday or a Friday, you are guaranteed at least five days in jail, not just three.  MRM is the son of a cop and told me these things many times when he was plotting such actions against other people.

So I have an arrest record and a charge which has not been dismissed and of which I have not been found innocent.

MRM also used the two months during which he refused to give me my computer to tell more lies about me online.  He posted pictures of me using drugs (pictures he had taken secretly with his iPhone when we were getting high together.).  He searched through my private diary and even fictional pieces I had written on my computer and posted them to a blog he had created originally to smear his previous boyfriend and the boyfriend's attorney who were fighting him in court on domestic violence charges.   He was able to do all this because I could not -- as I still cannot -- go to the house in which we lived and get my things due to the restraining order which demands that I stay at least 100 yards from the place.

He also wrote emails to everyone I know repeating his lies about my violent behavior and "out of control" drug use.

WordPress refuses to take his blog down and cheerily advises me that the best way to counter such information on the web is to argue my own case in the same place.  I suppose they mean that I should comment on his blog, but if I do, he can block my comments.  Furthermore any time I go to his site,
any time anyone goes to his site, it moves up in priority on Google and other search engines.  As it is, if you Google my name, it is his lies which come up as the first three results.  MRM worked for Apple for five years and knows how to set up an automated search-and-select so that he could be sure that anything he posts will appear to have been chosen as the best result for a search.

Try looking for housing or for employment in this day and age when the Internet returns such lies to anyone who searches your name.