***This part may be lacking certain comments found at the FFA link, because it's difficult to parse from the conversation who is DAYD!anon and who isn't. I've only included comments that I'm pretty certain are from them.***
Oh god a genuine pre-exposure DAYDian! I have so many questions I don't know where to start! Ok, what kind of things did he claim about himself pre-exposure and once he was exposed how did he try and justify it? Were you inner circle enough to know of the channelling?
AYRT
I'm going to start with a copy/paste of myself from one of the older threads that I just got around to now:
I'd heard about VB in a vague, Whisper Down the Lane way before (the big reveal), but I'd never heard enough to connect the dots even when I was actively interacting with Andy and the DAYDverse. I knew that he was lying about some things from the getgo (vague but fatal heart condition? seen dozens of friends brutally murdered? obviously fake Irish accent? fought on both sides of the Troubles? looked into a little African child's eyes to reassure him that it would be OK as he cauterized a post-field-amputation limb? Suuure...) but thought that he was nice enough until the DAYD character channeling started and everything took a turn for the really fantastically insane and asinine.
As you can see from above, whose examples are all things I absolutely, no doubt in my mind recall Andy saying, the things that Andy claimed about himself in the early DAYD days weren't just implausible. They were so obviously lies that to see people around him openly believing in them could very easily make you feel like either you were the only sober person in a room full of kids tripping out of their minds or that you were the one with tenuous grips on reality. But people did believe him. Some people believed him extremely vocally and went out of their ways to voice their belief in him, particularly when the claims were bogus beyond belief. If you've ever seen the Skype conversation that Turimel somehow got her hands on, you'll see for yourself people totally eating up the story about Amy Player being Andy's mentally ill twin sister.
In the case of the story about cauterizing the amputated limb of that little black baby in an African warzone, you would expect rational, adult people (and though the DAYDverse crew was a high percentage of teens, there were absolutely adults in there also) to call BS immediately, but nobody did. Andy got his asspats and his oohing and aahing from the group, with people wondering how he had the strength to do something like that, reminding him that he was probably that little boy's savior, etc.
Other claims that I know for sure Andy made, in addition to the ones that everyone has heard about the IRA, the bar fight that got him a claymore scar across his chest, the evil twin, the Undead Shaman Wizard, etc. (I'm not going to list anything that I can't say for certain that he claimed.):
* I can perform a field tracheotomy with a drinking straw, and I've had to do it. * I've seen dozens of people murdered before my eyes. * I was the first male born in seven generations of women, so it's really no surprise to my family that I have psychic capabilities. * I traveled the world almost entirely for free, partially by stowing away on cargo ships. You can travel anywhere if you're resourceful enough! * I fucked ((I don't remember the number, but something obscene, high double digits)) women by the time I was 18. (He shared things like this a lot, and back then (before he became ~enlightened~it was always "fucking," not "making love" or even "having sex." Women were dainty damsels and the essence of mother earth on one hand and conquests to be notched on bedposts at the same time. Other details about his sexual exploits include fucking a married women in the kitchen while her little children played in the other room.) * I work at a Starbucks where professors from the nearby university come in and chat with me in Ancient Greek. * When I was at work today, a coloratura soprano with a world-class opera company came into the shop and sang an aria to pay for her drink. * I just know things about people. For instance, when I was little, I blurted out that the pastor of our church was cheating on his wife (I'd just had a feeling about it), and it turned out that I was right. I ruined him. This is part of why my mother hates me. * The reason I can't write or read "Gaelic" is because I was never schooled a day in my life. I learned to speak it because it was the only language my grandfather used with me, but I'm illiterate and really just going by sound. So if the "Gaelic" dialogue in my "novels" isn't totally right, remember that it's because everything I know, I taught myself.
I guess some of those aren't that interesting, but they do illustrate a point: Andy lies (or at least he did) about everything. From the massive (his evil twin sister) to the totally mundane. He can't just work at Starbucks... he has to work at a Starbucks where colorful characters waltz in and out singing arias. He can't just be perceptive... he has to be psychic.
Speaking of psychic: if the character channelling was supposed to be a secret, it was the worst kept secret ever. I was definitely not in the innermost inner circle (which at the time had a military structure: Andy was the "Fearless Leader," and he designated the most loyal DAYDians as explicit military ranks), and I saw the channelling on clear display. In Skype group chats, DAYD characters would "come through" Andy and talk with the group. Colin Creevy was a big one, and so was a character (whose name I now forget) who was a budding chef. Michael Corner and Terry Boot also came in to talk to everyone. It seemed to differ slightly from the channeling that Abbey described, since Andy here was presenting things more like he was a medium. He knew that he was having characters speak through him. People could request that a certain character stopped by. It 100% was not an issue of alters, at least as Andy presented it. It was totally conscious and deliberate.
Andy framed the channeling in terms of belief, almost religious belief. If you didn't believe that he was bringing the voices and spirits of real people (real people. not characters. not fictional people. real people who existed on other planes of reality) out through him, if you dismissed it as nonsense, then you were clearly a small-minded person with no appreciation for all of the mysteries of the universe. How can you know that ghosts don't walk among us? How do you know that there isn't a pantheon of gods who weave themselves into our lives? How do you know that this DAYD Hogwarts student isn't actually typing into Andy's computer, giving you a recipe that he Creole grandmother held dear to her? You can't know. And if you pretend that you can, well then you're arrogant, simple-minded, and dull.
And like I said. People at it up. "Is Colin here tonight?" "Hold on. Let me get him." Etc.
After he was exposed... boy, I barely even remember. I was so shocked by the evil twin sister thing and the fact that people believed it to even register much of what Andy was saying. He made himself kind of scarce and closed ranks, at which point I was not among any kind of inner circle at all, and pretty soon after, I lost touch with everyone from the DAYD days, though I occasionally do look into some of their posts and sigh.
Thank you so much for sharing. I'm curious if he ever got called out for his lies what his response was - i.e., did someone ever challenge him on the fake accent or the IRA connections or the having been to Africa?
You're welcome! I always see people saying that there's this big black hole from the early DAYD days, and I thought maybe I could shed some light.
If people did call Andy out on the whoppers, I never saw it happen. The thing was? He had an answer to everything. I'm sure he could have told you exactly why he'd been in an African warzone, and he did tell the Podcast interviewers why his accent might have been a bit different (short version: he was raised in America, so his accent was 80% Belfast, 20% Virginia. How exotic!). I do vaguely remember someone questioning the Irish language text that he used either in one of his stories or in an LJ icon, and he did have an answer for that, too: short version, as described above, he was illiterate, since he'd grown up speaking the language but not being taught how to read or write it, and there are so many regional dialects of the language that nobody could possibly tell him he was wrong unless they knew every bit of slang from every corner of Ireland.
And if you already believe him, it's not hard at all to believe that.
You say that there was a military hierachy to the inner circle, can you share which of the well known DAYDians were involved in that and what their "rank" was? I'm imagining Cfc would be Andy's second-in-command or something.
Ooh, sorry Nonnie, but I think I'm going to have to let you down on this one. I remember clearly that the ranks were the ones he used for the characters in DAYD (first and second lieutenants for each house based on how people self-identified or how he identified them) and that many people referred to Andy as "Fearless Leader," "Commander," and "Sir" and waited for his permission to do or say things. I think that Ceirdwen existed outside of this military-style ranking system in her role as mod of the LJ, but I could be wrong about that. In terms of who was in what role, that's lost to memory. I could take a few guesses, but TBH, the ones that I might remember aren't well-known DAYDians. In fact, if I'm thinking of the right people, several of them were driven out hard when Andy tired of them. That was later, though.
In terms of Ceirdwen... I worry for her and have for a long time. She probably doesn't remember me, but we talked a few times back in the chat, and watching her blog to make sure that she's OK is pretty much my main link to DAYD and Andy at this point in time. I know that she's a grown woman who can make her own decisions about things, but I also know that her life seems to revolve to a scary degree around Andy and that her moods and state of mind (which she blogs about or vagueblogs about frequently) really do seem to be intimately tied up with how he's treating her at a given time period. (And often... he's not treating her particularly well. Andy is really good at hurting people through ignoring them.)
Wow, what an amazing infodump! Thanks DAYDian nonny! My question is: how many people did he actually hurt and do you know if any of them are doing ok nowadays? Because that's who I always think about the most.
You're welcome! Ha ha ha, it feels good to get some of this out in a weird way.
In terms of who Andy hurt... that's really a question, isn't it? I guess it all depends on what kind of hurt we're talking about. Andy hurt my feelings by not being there for me in something when I thought he'd be there (as he's done to countless people... he has an uncanny habit of losing his phone or getting locked out of his email when he knows that people need him) but I'd like to think that I've gone on with my life without his shadow hanging over me. But people like Abbey know too well that he can do a lot more damage than hurt feelings and making people feel left out. I'm esp. worried about two long-term DAYDians (both have been discussed on FFA) who seem scarily codependent in their relationships with him... I wouldn't be beyond believing that one of them would be honest to goodness suicidal if he ever succeeded in removing himself from their life. I pray that never happens.
There are at least four people (the husbands and wives of two separate DAYDian couples) who used to be very close with Andy and now do not speak with him, afaik. The A's had their names dragged through the mud (by Andy, who'd hardcore glommed onto them) shortly after they were married, though I don't remember enough about what exactly he said to feel comfrotable elaborating. At least one half of the K's wrote about how much Andy messed her up, but she's removed these posts. On a better note, though, I htink that both of these couples are pretty happily married and doing OK for themselves now, several years out.
There was another girl who was desperate for Andy's attention who he doted on for a while and then dumped, and when she didn't take the hint, he vilified her to the group, too, and basically ensured that nobody would make her welcome. I think that a friend was also forced out with her. A boy too, who was let down more slowly by Andy but who was equally desperate for attention from Andy and, iirc, fell really, really depressed when it was withdrawn. I don't know how either of them are doing now, but I do remember thinking that the boy had rebounded. I don't know for sure.
There's another guy (a bit older) who I would have described as outright sycophantic and who was one of the people Andy cut off cold "for his mental health." I thought for sure that this man would go to pieces over it, but recent events seem to say that not only did he manage OK, but he no longer idolizes Andy and even resents Andy's behavior toward him and others during the DAYD years. Very surprising, but some of the best news that I've seen come out of this most recent Andy wank.
So many people bailed after the reveal, and I have no way of knowing how many of them were hurt. It's a lot. Not trying to be dramatic, but it's probably way more than I'm aware of. For now, I don't know... Andy is a human being who should have the privilege of having friends, but I can't help but to worry over the people who get too close to him. He's done significant damage in SPN. He'll do it wherever he moves next too.
Non-Hike DAYDIAN Q&A, part 2
Oh god a genuine pre-exposure DAYDian! I have so many questions I don't know where to start! Ok, what kind of things did he claim about himself pre-exposure and once he was exposed how did he try and justify it? Were you inner circle enough to know of the channelling?
AYRT
I'm going to start with a copy/paste of myself from one of the older threads that I just got around to now:
I'd heard about VB in a vague, Whisper Down the Lane way before (the big reveal), but I'd never heard enough to connect the dots even when I was actively interacting with Andy and the DAYDverse. I knew that he was lying about some things from the getgo (vague but fatal heart condition? seen dozens of friends brutally murdered? obviously fake Irish accent? fought on both sides of the Troubles? looked into a little African child's eyes to reassure him that it would be OK as he cauterized a post-field-amputation limb? Suuure...) but thought that he was nice enough until the DAYD character channeling started and everything took a turn for the really fantastically insane and asinine.
As you can see from above, whose examples are all things I absolutely, no doubt in my mind recall Andy saying, the things that Andy claimed about himself in the early DAYD days weren't just implausible. They were so obviously lies that to see people around him openly believing in them could very easily make you feel like either you were the only sober person in a room full of kids tripping out of their minds or that you were the one with tenuous grips on reality. But people did believe him. Some people believed him extremely vocally and went out of their ways to voice their belief in him, particularly when the claims were bogus beyond belief. If you've ever seen the Skype conversation that Turimel somehow got her hands on, you'll see for yourself people totally eating up the story about Amy Player being Andy's mentally ill twin sister.
In the case of the story about cauterizing the amputated limb of that little black baby in an African warzone, you would expect rational, adult people (and though the DAYDverse crew was a high percentage of teens, there were absolutely adults in there also) to call BS immediately, but nobody did. Andy got his asspats and his oohing and aahing from the group, with people wondering how he had the strength to do something like that, reminding him that he was probably that little boy's savior, etc.
Other claims that I know for sure Andy made, in addition to the ones that everyone has heard about the IRA, the bar fight that got him a claymore scar across his chest, the evil twin, the Undead Shaman Wizard, etc. (I'm not going to list anything that I can't say for certain that he claimed.):
* I can perform a field tracheotomy with a drinking straw, and I've had to do it.
* I've seen dozens of people murdered before my eyes.
* I was the first male born in seven generations of women, so it's really no surprise to my family that I have psychic capabilities.
* I traveled the world almost entirely for free, partially by stowing away on cargo ships. You can travel anywhere if you're resourceful enough!
* I fucked ((I don't remember the number, but something obscene, high double digits)) women by the time I was 18. (He shared things like this a lot, and back then (before he became ~enlightened~it was always "fucking," not "making love" or even "having sex." Women were dainty damsels and the essence of mother earth on one hand and conquests to be notched on bedposts at the same time. Other details about his sexual exploits include fucking a married women in the kitchen while her little children played in the other room.)
* I work at a Starbucks where professors from the nearby university come in and chat with me in Ancient Greek.
* When I was at work today, a coloratura soprano with a world-class opera company came into the shop and sang an aria to pay for her drink.
* I just know things about people. For instance, when I was little, I blurted out that the pastor of our church was cheating on his wife (I'd just had a feeling about it), and it turned out that I was right. I ruined him. This is part of why my mother hates me.
* The reason I can't write or read "Gaelic" is because I was never schooled a day in my life. I learned to speak it because it was the only language my grandfather used with me, but I'm illiterate and really just going by sound. So if the "Gaelic" dialogue in my "novels" isn't totally right, remember that it's because everything I know, I taught myself.
I guess some of those aren't that interesting, but they do illustrate a point: Andy lies (or at least he did) about everything. From the massive (his evil twin sister) to the totally mundane. He can't just work at Starbucks... he has to work at a Starbucks where colorful characters waltz in and out singing arias. He can't just be perceptive... he has to be psychic.
Speaking of psychic: if the character channelling was supposed to be a secret, it was the worst kept secret ever. I was definitely not in the innermost inner circle (which at the time had a military structure: Andy was the "Fearless Leader," and he designated the most loyal DAYDians as explicit military ranks), and I saw the channelling on clear display. In Skype group chats, DAYD characters would "come through" Andy and talk with the group. Colin Creevy was a big one, and so was a character (whose name I now forget) who was a budding chef. Michael Corner and Terry Boot also came in to talk to everyone. It seemed to differ slightly from the channeling that Abbey described, since Andy here was presenting things more like he was a medium. He knew that he was having characters speak through him. People could request that a certain character stopped by. It 100% was not an issue of alters, at least as Andy presented it. It was totally conscious and deliberate.
Andy framed the channeling in terms of belief, almost religious belief. If you didn't believe that he was bringing the voices and spirits of real people (real people. not characters. not fictional people. real people who existed on other planes of reality) out through him, if you dismissed it as nonsense, then you were clearly a small-minded person with no appreciation for all of the mysteries of the universe. How can you know that ghosts don't walk among us? How do you know that there isn't a pantheon of gods who weave themselves into our lives? How do you know that this DAYD Hogwarts student isn't actually typing into Andy's computer, giving you a recipe that he Creole grandmother held dear to her? You can't know. And if you pretend that you can, well then you're arrogant, simple-minded, and dull.
And like I said. People at it up. "Is Colin here tonight?" "Hold on. Let me get him." Etc.
After he was exposed... boy, I barely even remember. I was so shocked by the evil twin sister thing and the fact that people believed it to even register much of what Andy was saying. He made himself kind of scarce and closed ranks, at which point I was not among any kind of inner circle at all, and pretty soon after, I lost touch with everyone from the DAYD days, though I occasionally do look into some of their posts and sigh.
Thank you so much for sharing. I'm curious if he ever got called out for his lies what his response was - i.e., did someone ever challenge him on the fake accent or the IRA connections or the having been to Africa?
You're welcome! I always see people saying that there's this big black hole from the early DAYD days, and I thought maybe I could shed some light.
If people did call Andy out on the whoppers, I never saw it happen. The thing was? He had an answer to everything. I'm sure he could have told you exactly why he'd been in an African warzone, and he did tell the Podcast interviewers why his accent might have been a bit different (short version: he was raised in America, so his accent was 80% Belfast, 20% Virginia. How exotic!). I do vaguely remember someone questioning the Irish language text that he used either in one of his stories or in an LJ icon, and he did have an answer for that, too: short version, as described above, he was illiterate, since he'd grown up speaking the language but not being taught how to read or write it, and there are so many regional dialects of the language that nobody could possibly tell him he was wrong unless they knew every bit of slang from every corner of Ireland.
And if you already believe him, it's not hard at all to believe that.
You say that there was a military hierachy to the inner circle, can you share which of the well known DAYDians were involved in that and what their "rank" was? I'm imagining Cfc would be Andy's second-in-command or something.
Ooh, sorry Nonnie, but I think I'm going to have to let you down on this one. I remember clearly that the ranks were the ones he used for the characters in DAYD (first and second lieutenants for each house based on how people self-identified or how he identified them) and that many people referred to Andy as "Fearless Leader," "Commander," and "Sir" and waited for his permission to do or say things. I think that Ceirdwen existed outside of this military-style ranking system in her role as mod of the LJ, but I could be wrong about that. In terms of who was in what role, that's lost to memory. I could take a few guesses, but TBH, the ones that I might remember aren't well-known DAYDians. In fact, if I'm thinking of the right people, several of them were driven out hard when Andy tired of them. That was later, though.
In terms of Ceirdwen... I worry for her and have for a long time. She probably doesn't remember me, but we talked a few times back in the chat, and watching her blog to make sure that she's OK is pretty much my main link to DAYD and Andy at this point in time. I know that she's a grown woman who can make her own decisions about things, but I also know that her life seems to revolve to a scary degree around Andy and that her moods and state of mind (which she blogs about or vagueblogs about frequently) really do seem to be intimately tied up with how he's treating her at a given time period. (And often... he's not treating her particularly well. Andy is really good at hurting people through ignoring them.)
Wow, what an amazing infodump! Thanks DAYDian nonny! My question is: how many people did he actually hurt and do you know if any of them are doing ok nowadays? Because that's who I always think about the most.
You're welcome! Ha ha ha, it feels good to get some of this out in a weird way.
In terms of who Andy hurt... that's really a question, isn't it? I guess it all depends on what kind of hurt we're talking about. Andy hurt my feelings by not being there for me in something when I thought he'd be there (as he's done to countless people... he has an uncanny habit of losing his phone or getting locked out of his email when he knows that people need him) but I'd like to think that I've gone on with my life without his shadow hanging over me. But people like Abbey know too well that he can do a lot more damage than hurt feelings and making people feel left out. I'm esp. worried about two long-term DAYDians (both have been discussed on FFA) who seem scarily codependent in their relationships with him... I wouldn't be beyond believing that one of them would be honest to goodness suicidal if he ever succeeded in removing himself from their life. I pray that never happens.
There are at least four people (the husbands and wives of two separate DAYDian couples) who used to be very close with Andy and now do not speak with him, afaik. The A's had their names dragged through the mud (by Andy, who'd hardcore glommed onto them) shortly after they were married, though I don't remember enough about what exactly he said to feel comfrotable elaborating. At least one half of the K's wrote about how much Andy messed her up, but she's removed these posts. On a better note, though, I htink that both of these couples are pretty happily married and doing OK for themselves now, several years out.
There was another girl who was desperate for Andy's attention who he doted on for a while and then dumped, and when she didn't take the hint, he vilified her to the group, too, and basically ensured that nobody would make her welcome. I think that a friend was also forced out with her. A boy too, who was let down more slowly by Andy but who was equally desperate for attention from Andy and, iirc, fell really, really depressed when it was withdrawn. I don't know how either of them are doing now, but I do remember thinking that the boy had rebounded. I don't know for sure.
There's another guy (a bit older) who I would have described as outright sycophantic and who was one of the people Andy cut off cold "for his mental health." I thought for sure that this man would go to pieces over it, but recent events seem to say that not only did he manage OK, but he no longer idolizes Andy and even resents Andy's behavior toward him and others during the DAYD years. Very surprising, but some of the best news that I've seen come out of this most recent Andy wank.
So many people bailed after the reveal, and I have no way of knowing how many of them were hurt. It's a lot. Not trying to be dramatic, but it's probably way more than I'm aware of. For now, I don't know... Andy is a human being who should have the privilege of having friends, but I can't help but to worry over the people who get too close to him. He's done significant damage in SPN. He'll do it wherever he moves next too.