The Worst People in the World, Part 1.5: Rachel Haywire Does Damage Control

Fuck, I didn't want to have to take the time to do this, but it's too funny

I’m not a psychiatrist, and I didn’t think I was qualified to armchair-diagnose anybody as any kind of narcissist, or anything else. Gross. Generally speaking.

On the other hand, you don’t need to be a doctor to diagnose a geyser of arterial bleeding.

That’s a little abstract. Lemme back up.

To catch up with the last pot of tea, here’s the first part in my anti-writer series on exploitative “writers” in the art swamp: The Worst People in the World, Part One: Rachel Haywire, the Cultural Futurist

Ahhhh, this is gonna be more entertaining for you than it is for me. I am as sick of this person as I am fed up with my own recursive, festering anger. But that is why I have to speak. Type faster, type faster… Somebody get Sam Vaknin in here.

Because I’m not going to give a seminar on narcissistic personality disorder. And not merely because I need to get back to my fiction and felt dolls. I try not to be a plagiarist, no matter how easy the climate might make it, and Vaknin—who wrote the book being a self-aware and philanthropic narcissist— can do a far superior job of explaining his oeuvre on the subject himself.

If people who steal, plagiarize, and harm people with impunity and without shame confuse you, listen to his work; if people who think they are better than everyone despite never having done anything for anyone keep coming into your life, I send you to the master:

Very topical. Even if it’s your parents’ fault you’re a narcissist, not everyone with NPD must be destructive. Sam did kind of the same thing I did: Realized his psychological problems were ruining his lief, then tried to figure out how they worked. He did a much better job of it than I did, that’s all. I tried to get Rachel to listen to Sam, who is plagiarized even more often than I, though at least his victimizers had the decency to steal from him after he was well-known.

Shamefully, I naively thought he could help Rachel come out of her shit chrysallis and become a real human being. I don’t know what made me think she could get better, but at least she might have been able to cover her tracks a bit less humorously badly. I mean, Sam learned to be human. Then again, his IQ is probably double hers, but I think it’s also a function of decency. You can pull yourself out of almost any damage. But most people sit back and make excuses, forever.

Me, I’m here to spill and giggle. First, because it’s as funny as it is horrible, and nothing is wasted if you use it. But also—OK fine, I stupidly got my leg ripped off by this animal, as much sadistic gratification as she will receive from hearing that again, but that’s not going to stop me from warning the rest of the capybaras.

I might pass out afterwards, but I’ve made enough good and decent friends lately that I think they’ll probably cart me off before I need too many pints transfused.

It is amazing and heartening, how kicking the awful people out of your life and pulling good ones in forms a cycle that reinforces itself. Just like the reverse. If you have funnel-plagiarizing or otherwise abusive garbage in your life, try kicking one out. Just start with the least important one. Even if you’re addicted to the bantz. (I was addicted to the bantz.)

You know what’s more addictive than anything?

Feeling good.

Decent people.

I promise; try it. It’s more magical than Ozempic. It’s actually more like rehab, except without the expense and stupid slogans.

Bien sewer, you will get more machinations, if not tantrums, in response. But eventually, they will begone.

Rachel has switched her tactics from the tantrums she used on me back in the day: She’s been sending an absolutely hilarious message to my subscribers list.

I think it’s my subscribers list. At any rate, very few of the people who have received her overly friendly message have ever spoken to her. Those who didn’t find it amusing found it confusing.

I have no way of knowing how many of these she sent out, figuring she could make herself look good and continue to warp the truth behind my back.

But I’ve gotten plenty of tips. Thanks, guys.

Decency operates in the sun; this porcine species operates in the dark. Make of that what you must. But I can’t believe she didn’t think I would get my paws on her hilarious damage control:

Hey there, Hope you’ve been well!

Really? How vaguely philanthropîc-ish of you. As far as I can tell, you’re going down my subs list.

I’m messaging you to address the accusations you may have received from Ann Sterzinger who I recently did a podcast with. She made some serious accusations against me in a post in which she discusses her many experiences with sexual assault, along with a false claim that I “stole her life’s work.” I hope she is able to heal from the sexual assaults.

Really? Because her actions indirectly led to one of those alleged assaults. Put me smack in the path of someone I had been trying to avoid.

Oh, that story’s coming down the pike.

Wait… one and a… half? How exactly does one count low-key pimping?

As for the rest, I have never stolen anything from Ann or taken credit for her work.

She’s literally taking credit for it now (see her fake stats, below; she’s tactily claiming to have done hundreds of hours of work I did for her).

I swear to god, if this leech makes me dig through the receipts… If you think I’m annoyed now, wait till I have to waste my time digging through her abusive, rambling “work” emails.

Although, granted, she’s one of those people who tries to insist that you conduct all business via voice, and un-recorded.

One of my biggest tips for young writers: Never trust anyone who insists you need to “avoid text” so you can “avoid misunderstandings” by “hearing my human voice” (even that is debatable).

“Avoid impersonal text messages” translates as “I don’t want to leave a paper trail when I pound you with a six-foot broken-glass dildo.”

This is one of the biggest tells when it comes to NPD cases masquerading as ASD: They think tone of voice is more important than the specific words. If you’re going to pretend to be something in order to mirror your victims, “Rach,” (see below), at least have enough respect to google it.

What am I doing? Why am I giving her advice? Go on being as ignorant and arrogant as you have been, you genius. Can’t wait to see you drive over that cliff.

I have treated her with respect.

How can anyone who calls themselves a writer not even know what the word “respect” means? Passive aggression is still aggression, and a manipulative lie cannot be whitewashed.

She contributed one article to Trigger Warning and edited four submissions during its launch in 2015.

(Gales of mystified laughter)

Those are the fake stats.

You know how they say liars try to use a lot of details to sound specific to create the illusion of truth? I have no idea why she thought these numbers would be plausible, but once again, if I have to dig through the receipts, you’re gonna see cranky.

Over the course of six months, if memory serves, I edited at least three magazines’ worth of writing, much of it unreadable dreck from her cronies. Once again, if you want to see the receipts, you’re going to be sorry.

She was compensated over $1,000 for this.

OK, I know why she chose this particular vague figure for this distortion. There’s always a strategy. There’s always a kernel of truth (the oldest strategy in the world, once Ricky Gervais invented lying). There’s always some AI-style weirdness. Especially when someone blurs the line this way.

After six months of work, I needed to bring on an even worse person than Rachel to wring a single cent of salary out of her.

(I wasn’t on salary or wage, because we were “partners” in a “startup”—or we were till she created an LLC with all the money behind my back. That still shocks me. It should be impossible to shock me.)

But it gets worse: In the end, she gave me around 1300 dollars—I’m saying “around” because I am not entirely certain of my memory, but that is the figure I recall. She may have added or subtracted a petty amount over PayPal fees.

However, this was the trick: She wasn’t even paying me that much, really.

That was my entire payroll, for my entire staff.

She suddenly, after advertising our project as unique in our respect for writers—unique in our ability to truly pay talent what they deserved!—reneged on paying my writers.

Yep. Most of her fund-raising revolved around A. My work (compare our writing styles for proof of that, for starters), and B. That promise to our writers.

But she made a liar out of me.

That 1300 was the only sum she would dispense to me—out of the over-20-grand pot she collected on the strength of my work, mind you;

Therefore, the sneaky weasel forced me to make a decision: Pay my writers or pay myself.

And I was behind on my rent because I had been working for her for unknown 80-plus hour weeks for six months.

But most of the draw of the project, for writers, was that we were doing this crowd-funding precisely so that we could PAY OUR WRITERS.

Instead, she gave hundreds of dollars per hour to a web designer.

She blew my life’s work on a fucking web designer.

None of those writers, and none of our donors, have taken me seriously since the theft. This was decades of ceaseless, tireless work for me—gone in the space of one whore.

But she treated me with respect.

Yeah, I’m an idiot. I’m an honest idiot. The biggest kind.

I later invited her to co-host a podcast with me because she had always been great at banter. It wasn’t a financial success,

AND HERE WE HAVE THE REASON FOR THE REUNION.

Even in damage control, she can’t keep her mind off that un-earned bag, can she? God damn, how did I not see this in time? How does she not hear herself?

Well, profit from my torn-off leg, kids, and stay away from anyone remotely like this.

but it was a fun experience for us.

SPEAK FOR YOURSELF.

(Redacted: Blaming a third party who doesn’t deserve to be dragged into this for the breakup of the podcast) This was outside our control, but Ann reacted by lashing out at me in her recent post. I’m shocked that she has chosen to lash out at me in this way and paint me as a monster.

No, you’re not surprised; I gave you dozens of warnings.

Not being a monster has always been an option. You only have to take it. Go to Vaknin. He’s saved my life. He’s saved me from you, but please don’t interpret this as an excuse to go pester him.

In fact, if you ever go near me or any of the people I care about again, I will (redacted) until you (redacted) (redacted) (redacted) (redacted); (redacted).

(Redacted.)

I wish her nothing but peace. If you have any questions or want to discuss this further, please feel free to reach out. Love, Rach

“Rach”? Isn’t that a bit familiar for people who don’t know you?

I merely painted by the numbers, dear.

A lot of people tried to comfort me in my stupidity by saying she’s clever. I guess because she’s good at funnel plagiarism, and then there’s that old Jewish stereotype.

But averages are not absolutes, and I have known Jewish people who were dumber than rocks who forgot to go to rock school… but sometimes, stereotypes and statistics can feed right into Dunning-Kruger, which is probably why she thought she would get away with it forever.

I once described working with her as “being tied to the tail of a cat that is chasing a hamster.”

To me, now, she looks like a broken Roomba.

Even more hilariously, every single person who has sent me a copy of this has the exact same reaction: “Jeez, she sounds like she needs her narcissistic personality disorder analyzed. This is the dumbest attempt at NPD damage control I’ve ever seen.”

Rachel, listen to Sam. Before you run into someone who has less patience than I do.

(Alas, she has a type, and a hilariously specific type at that, but that is a subject for a joint piece between me and the other waterpark rats. More later.)

Sunlight is the best disinfectant. But it’s always nice to add a little spray of Lysol, right at eye level, just where the shitpile is liable to walk into it.

And it might be none of my business, just as that lady who burned on the subway was none of anyone’s business, but in the interest of the other capybaras: This woman can be very charming, particularly if you are her very specific—naive, creative, undiagnosed Asperger’s—type. But I promised I wasn’t going to write a treatise on NPD.

Go listen to Sam Vaknin, everyone.

Rachel, that includes you. God bless me, I tried to help you. You can’t be helped, unless you help yourself.

(riotous laughter)