Fake Lesbians All the Way Down

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

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Blogger in trouble!

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

#FreeAmina

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Timeline

2011

June

6

Aminaabducted

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Amina who?

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Timeline

2011

June

6

Aminaabducted

Feb

Aminablogbegins

April

My fatherthe hero

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Suspicion

No word from family

No one has met her

No confirmation of Amina’s existence in the U.S.

No reason for the cousin to lie

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

The story unfolds

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

The story within the story

Amanda Lynn McClure

Pattern recognition

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Digression!

Plain Layne, “bisexual info-waif”, 2003

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Layne = Odin

Also, Acanit fromThe Sex Pistols Are Alive and Well and

Living in Sohatsenango,Iranian-American-Kenyan TV journalist blogger and impish

bisexual, 2000-2001

The Plain Layne Hoax

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

SXSWi talk on “fictional bloggers” and hoaxes

2007

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Back to Amina!

Mutability of the story

Her identity is the story

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

No, really, Amina WHO?

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Amina’s girlfriend

(Amina’s *Internet* girlfriend)

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Timeline

2011

June

6

Aminaabducted

Feb

Aminablogbegins

April

My fatherthe hero

June

7

* State Dept.inquiry* acarvin’s question* Sanda Bagaria comes forward* I post doubts

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Guilt (mine)

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Text

I declare my skepticism

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Boom!

The Internet explodes. Into my inbox.

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Amina is popular and cute!

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

But wait, those photos are stolen

from a woman in London named Jelena

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Timeline

2011

June

6

Aminaabducted

Feb

Aminablogbegins

April

My fatherthe hero

June

7

* State Dept.inquiry* acarvin’s question* Sanda Bagaria comes forward* I post doubts

June

8

* Jelena photos* Amy Young emails* Amanda McClure* Email lists* Electronic Intifada*Everyone’s brain explodes!

May

Amina goes into hiding

Sandra Bagaria calls Amina’s phone

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Emails from Amy

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Mutant Teenage Lesbian Turtles

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

IRC Married!

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Amina on mailing lists

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Sockpuppet techniques

Argue with yourselfAnd agree with yourself!

Either way, you become more important.

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Suspect #1: Who talks with Amina?

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Role playing gamer!

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Scott’s Xmas card

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Timeline

2011

Amina’s Gay Girl in Damascus blog starts

20102009200820072006

Jennnifer Cheyenne “dies”

20052004

AmyLynn/Cheyenne/Andrea/brother drama Amina

talks about her imaginary life as Amanda Lynn McClure

Amina begins posting to alternate-history list

Jasmine from Pakistan blogs and comments

Paula Brooks emails, chats with Amina

Amina stops postingin alt-history

Various activistsFacebook-friend Amina

Amina posts on queer-jihad

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Internet Sleuths Gather

And a bunch of Actual Lesbian

Bloggers who shall remain nameless

BenAli

AndyEsther

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

The Amina Entity

Amina2007

Amina2011

threefoldaminaaminaarraf

Rania Ismail

Amanda Lynn(e) McClure (Davis)

Jennifer Cheyenne Williams (Davis)Kimberly Dakota (Davis)

Andrea (Brittney Williams)

Bi/Lesbian, bad poetry, endless drama, multilingual, multiple ethnicities

jasmine from pakistan

Andrea’s brother

littleamylynn

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Amy, the Unreliable Narrator

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Theories within theoriesNested stories

Long hypothetical narratives presented as lightly fictionalized dialogues

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Disabled?

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Trans + closeted?

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Long earnest emails

I meant it all, but this is how I felt.

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

LezGetReal: A Gay Girl’s View on the World

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Amina is Tom MacMaster

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

And maybe his wife Britta Froelicher, post doc in Syrian Studies, too

(but probably not, given all the soft core porn Amina wrote)

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

A Terrible Phone Call

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Paula Brooks quoted extensively in WaPoHas Amina’s IP number

Deaf lesbian surfer, mom of twins, 3rd grade teacher

Meanwhile, Paula *who*?

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Queen of the Surf Pirates

Sammy the surf dog, Lots of horrible poetry about surfing, twin babies, local politics

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

The Lesbiatopia drama

Paula writes to:Renee

HeatherLesbianMommy

LezziMomGeekPornGirl

CJEvery other

lesbian blogger around

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Who is real in LezGetReal

Investigating the other associatesLinda

BridgetteMelanie

They all speak to Paula only over IM, email, or through her

dad “Bill” (The Major)

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Timeline

2011

Amina’s Gay Girl in Damascus blog starts

20102009200820072006

Jennnifer Cheyenne “dies”

20052004

AmyLynn/Cheyenne/Andrea/brother drama Amina

talks about her imaginary life as Amanda Lynn McClure

Amina begins posting to alternate-history list

Jasmine from Pakistan blog

Paula Brooks emails, chats with Amina

Amina stops postingin alt-history

Various activistsFacebook-friend Amina

Paula writes for Lesbiatopia, emails every internet lesbian evergives birth to twins

LezGetReal splits from Lesbiatopia

Paula starts Queen of the Surf Pirates

Paula’s wife Debbie dies from breast cancer

Paula moves to DC

Tom MacMaster posts to alternate-history list

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Paula Brooks is Bill Graber from Ohio

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

The Internet Explodes Again

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Fallout

Fauxpologies

Justifications - hoaxes brought attention to “the issues”

Syrian bloggers, news sources went quiet for weeks

GLBT activists in Mid East had to question their own security, who knew who in person

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Why did we listen to Amina?

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

Bad Allies

When someone says they’re speaking for the voiceless, I reach for my gun

Fake Lesbians All the Way Down The Story 2012 - Liz Henry

This is why marginalized people lose their historiesThey’re drowned out by the fake stories

Our real stories are too dangerous to tell in publicso the false stories, so much more palatable, trump them

Our histories are often preserved in baroque eddies, backwaters, hidden pockets, obscure corners

We are struggling to preserve complexityso that difficult stories stay alive