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Ragan Fires Off Another Response (but maybe not one you’d expect)
Months ago, I told Britney and Matt that I wouldn’t watch Big Brother 14. I love the show and enjoyed playing the game but, for the last year, I’ve become burned out. A few weeks ago, I posted any entry on Twitter in which I explained I wouldn’t be watching the season. This wasn’t a ruse or ploy for attention. I simply wanted to let my Twitter followers know why I wouldn’t be commenting on the current season. It’s easier to make this sort of proclamation than it is to repeatedly explain to individual users that I won’t be watching.
Big Brother is like The Godfather; each time you think you escape, producers, fellow players, and fans find a way to suck you back in. I, for instance, was surprised CBS’s web team included me in their poll of possible returnees. They never told me I’d be a part of the poll. I was a bit crestfallen when Twitter followers notified me of my inclusion because I knew it foreshadowed drama; I just wasn’t quite sure what form the drama would take. The day I found out, I took a screencap of the poll and tried to make a joke out of it on Twitter. I said, “Hold up! Am I the TRUE author of this tweet or am I REALLY in sequester? Stay tuned.” That’s all I wrote. Nothing more, nothing less.
Here’s how BB fandom works on Twitter. If one HG talks trash about you, fans of the show immediately let you know. Most houseguests rib one another and it’s all in good fun. Over the last week or so, people told me about various disparaging tweets Dick wrote about me. I don’t follow him and, until a few days ago, I haven’t tagged him in a Tweet in roughly a year. On July 5th, a few people told me Dick took to Twitter to lament the high number of votes I got in CBS’s poll. He allegedly claimed it was preposterous that I had more votes than Will. Curiosity got the best of me and I finally went to Dick’s feed to see what all the fuss was about. I tried to find the Tweets lambasting me but all I saw were a bunch of messages where he asked his followers to vote for him in CBS’s poll and re-tweets from people praising him.
Here’s the deal. The CBS poll was stupid. By that point, almost everyone knew the identities of the 4 returning houseguests. I never asked anyone to vote for me in the poll. I didn’t even want to be a part of the poll. And I certainly never claimed that I was better than anyone else in the poll. To me, the poll was an f’ing joke, a promotional device and not a measure of anyone’s BB gameplay or worth as a human being. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the people who voted for me but I was in NO way invested in the poll or its results. After a cursory view of Dick’s Twitter feed, I made the following dig at Dick: “Only thing sadder than looking like a zombie is begging people to vote for you in a poll that has ZERO impact on who actually gets in the house.” Mind you, he had allegedly been talking about me screwing animals and bla, bla, bla, so I assumed my tweet was in the same vein.
On July 6, I realized that I was getting sucked back into Big Brother craziness and decided to take a break from Twitter and work on my summer writing project. On July 10, I got several Google notifications indicating that I was in a “Twitter war” with Dick. I visited a forum where one participant claimed that our alleged battle started after I went on Twitter and claimed I was so much better than Dr. Will and Dick was simply putting me in my place, reminding me that I wasn’t better than Will. See how this stuff works? I then saw a series of pretty horrible things Dick said about me, presumably in response to my zombie tweet. The attacks were, IMHO, vicious, especially when one considers the message to which he was responding.
Growing up in Texas, my peers physically and emotionally abused me each and every day. I was harassed on the school bus, spit on while standing in the lunch line, punched in hallways, and had the word “fag” silently mouthed to me in class. I was conditioned to expect violence each time I heard an anti-gay epithet. I strike back when attacked because I spent my youth silent as boys ripped away at my flesh and dehumanized me. After I saw Dick’s string of Twitter attacks and read a number of his followers’ equally disturbing messages, I responded in kind, hitting below the belt. In 3 tweets, I called him unemployed, mocked his strained family relationships, and took a jab at his appearance. I’m no better or worse than anyone else. We all slip. From time to time, we react, even when we know we shouldn’t take the bait. In all fairness, the brunt of my retaliation is stuff Dick’s heard a million times. His fractured relationship with Daniele, for example, was season 8’s primary storyline.
That night, Dick evidently created and posted a pretty nasty Youtube video about me, in which he purportedly threatens me and says a number of truly awful things about me. I haven’t watched it but the general consensus is that it was unwarranted and excessively cruel, even for Evel Dick.
Here’s where I’m at: I’m human. Believe it or not, I haven’t shed a single tear over this silly situation but my feelings are hurt. I regret taking Dick’s bait. Despite provocation, I regret the comments I made about him. And I don’t want this to escalate. I’m not invested in this drama. For the first time in TEN YEARS, I’m in love with a fantastic, beautiful, kind man. I was recently awarded tenure, so things at work are amazing. My dog makes me laugh every single day. I’m about to spend a month with my mom but not in a Norman Bates way. Life, as they say, is good and all this other ***** isn’t worth my time. Or Dick’s time. Or YOUR time.
To that end, I’ve decided to de-activate my Twitter account sometime in the next couple of days. Twitter is really the only place I get sucked into crap like this. After this post, I’m done. I’ve got too much right in my life to myopically dwell on the wrong. My detractors can say that I’m hiding, or crying in a corner, or moralizing. It won’t matter because I won’t be here to read it. As the saying goes, don’t waste time explaining yourself to people committed to misunderstanding you. I suppose that this message is directed to the people who follow me and may (or may not be) bummed by my absence in the Twitterverse. Note to self: Deactivate Google notifications.
P.S. I reserve the right to return to Twitter whenever I want but, hopefully, that won’t be for a loooong time, after season 14 has come to a close. Big ups to my friend Britney. I’m thrilled that she gets another shot to play in whatever capacity it may be. And enjoy the season. I have a feeling it’s going to be one of the show’s best. Today’s the premiere. This is when the GOOD stuff starts. Peace.
A couple of quick points of clarification:
1) Evidently, the tweet about me screwing animals was a tweeted picture of one animal screwing a duck. He allegedly said I was the duck. This is just an approximation. Like I indicated above, I was overwhelmed by the sheer volume of his updates and re-tweets, so my reference to the alleged animal-porking tweet is a haphazard reconstruction of what other people told me, lest anyone think I’m purposely distorting facts.
2) I’ve got two responses to anyone who thinks I’m “playing an abuse card” to justify my behavior. Nowhere in this blog entry do I try to excuse my behavior. As I explained above, I own and regret my mistake. I reference my history of abuse in this entry to contextualize why I sometimes lash out at people who attack me. This isn’t a “card,” nor a poor attempt at pathos. I survived 7 years of sustained physical and emotional torture. This history is the focal point of my research and a theme explored in much of my creative work. I don’t think mentioning this history is off-topic when somebody threatens me with violence.
Posted 4 hours ago
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Shut the flippin' front door! ~~ Do you think you were born awesome, or just grew up badass? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 
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Ragan Fires Off Another Response (but maybe not one you’d expect)