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When a white man encounters racism and fights back
or, What not to do when crossing the fourth wall.
Amina Abdallah Araf al Omari, the author of the popular activism blog "A Gay Girl in Damascus", has just admitted that she is really Tom MacMaster, a 40-year-old student in Edinburgh.
The blog recently got major media attention when a family member of Amina reported that her cousin had disappeared near the Abbasid bus station, seized by three young men who were probably members of the Baath Party militia. Gay activists in Syria have been investigating her arrest and attempting to contact her at personal risk to themselves.
"Ever since I was a child, I’ve wanted to write fiction but, when my first attempts met with universal rejection, I took a more serious look at my own work and I realized that I could not write conversation in a natural way nor could I convincingly write characters who weren’t me." Tom wrote in his apology today. "I was involved with numerous online science-fiction/alternate-history discussion lists and, as a part of that process, I saw lots of incredibly ignorant and stupid positions repeated on the Middle East. I noticed that when I, a person with a distinctly Anglo name, made comments on the Middle East, the facts I might present were ignored and I found myself accused of hating America, Jews, etc."
When he was unable to improve his writing using conventional exercises, he invented the Amina persona, who began commenting on the same blogs and mailing lists that Tom was already a part of. Almost immediately, he discovered that Amina's posts provoked friendly reactions, where his own had only provoked hostility. The momentum grew - he created a Facebook page for her, found photos online of a woman who looked like her, created her blog. Amina started getting requests to write articles, which she delivered. She exchanged hundreds of emails with a Canadian woman, developing a romantic relationship. She posted a story about her father's love and protection and it went viral. (A timeline of the events)
Now, Tom MacMaster is frantically and humbly backpedaling, while the pageviews of his blog approach 900,000. Sami Hamwi, the editor of GayMiddleEast.com, wrote, "To Mr. MacMaster, I say shame on you!!! We have to deal with too many difficulties than you can imagine. What you have done has harmed many, put us all in danger, and made us worry about our LGBT activism. Add to that, that it might have caused doubts about the authenticity of our blogs, stories, and us. Your apology is not accepted, since I have myself started to investigate Amina’s arrest. I could have put myself in a grave danger inquiring about a fictitious figure."
I am struck by how similar his story might be to the experience of a member of a multiple system who fought for equal treatment and didn't compromise on their own personality, opinions, and background.
What would the media response have been if, instead of saying "I made it all up," Tom had said, "Yes, I am multiple; Amina is a member of my system"?
It also hilights just now pervasive is the new disenfrancisement that white males believe they face in a world where minority groups are rapidly gaining control of social discourse. "I didn’t mean to hurt the causes which I myself believe in," Tom said. "I only wanted to set forth real information through the use of artfully crafted fiction."
Amina Abdallah Araf al Omari, the author of the popular activism blog "A Gay Girl in Damascus", has just admitted that she is really Tom MacMaster, a 40-year-old student in Edinburgh.
The blog recently got major media attention when a family member of Amina reported that her cousin had disappeared near the Abbasid bus station, seized by three young men who were probably members of the Baath Party militia. Gay activists in Syria have been investigating her arrest and attempting to contact her at personal risk to themselves.
"Ever since I was a child, I’ve wanted to write fiction but, when my first attempts met with universal rejection, I took a more serious look at my own work and I realized that I could not write conversation in a natural way nor could I convincingly write characters who weren’t me." Tom wrote in his apology today. "I was involved with numerous online science-fiction/alternate-history discussion lists and, as a part of that process, I saw lots of incredibly ignorant and stupid positions repeated on the Middle East. I noticed that when I, a person with a distinctly Anglo name, made comments on the Middle East, the facts I might present were ignored and I found myself accused of hating America, Jews, etc."
When he was unable to improve his writing using conventional exercises, he invented the Amina persona, who began commenting on the same blogs and mailing lists that Tom was already a part of. Almost immediately, he discovered that Amina's posts provoked friendly reactions, where his own had only provoked hostility. The momentum grew - he created a Facebook page for her, found photos online of a woman who looked like her, created her blog. Amina started getting requests to write articles, which she delivered. She exchanged hundreds of emails with a Canadian woman, developing a romantic relationship. She posted a story about her father's love and protection and it went viral. (A timeline of the events)
Now, Tom MacMaster is frantically and humbly backpedaling, while the pageviews of his blog approach 900,000. Sami Hamwi, the editor of GayMiddleEast.com, wrote, "To Mr. MacMaster, I say shame on you!!! We have to deal with too many difficulties than you can imagine. What you have done has harmed many, put us all in danger, and made us worry about our LGBT activism. Add to that, that it might have caused doubts about the authenticity of our blogs, stories, and us. Your apology is not accepted, since I have myself started to investigate Amina’s arrest. I could have put myself in a grave danger inquiring about a fictitious figure."
I am struck by how similar his story might be to the experience of a member of a multiple system who fought for equal treatment and didn't compromise on their own personality, opinions, and background.
What would the media response have been if, instead of saying "I made it all up," Tom had said, "Yes, I am multiple; Amina is a member of my system"?
It also hilights just now pervasive is the new disenfrancisement that white males believe they face in a world where minority groups are rapidly gaining control of social discourse. "I didn’t mean to hurt the causes which I myself believe in," Tom said. "I only wanted to set forth real information through the use of artfully crafted fiction."
no subject
O.O
Thank you for linking that. It really wasn't what I expected to see when I clicked on the link. This is such a complicated issue--particularly when I went back and read one of Amina's posts and was shocked by how powerful her voice is. There is some very beautiful, insightful writing here... and it is really, utterly different in tone, style, and even in its sense of maturity in how she presents herself, versus how MacMaster presents himself, when he speaks in "his own" voice.
I suppose there are notes also of the value that can be gained from work that turns out to be a "hoax." This personally reminds me in a way of a Holocaust memoir that was lauded by other Holocaust survivors and writers and the wider community as being a profound piece of work, so true to the experiences of the camps...except it was later revealed to be a "hoax"...but at the same time, the situation was complicated because the writer really did seem to believe, sincerely believe, that his accounts were true? Complicated stuff all around.
And with the Amina situation, there's also the perspective of the multiple community, the way that experience may resonate with experiences of multiplicity, but at the same time how hard that can be to argue for should you attempt to do so.
And then there's that business with MacMaster, how he handled the situation.
All this stuff just layered on top of each other.
no subject
But ... he isn't in any records for having been over there. Something quite strange - either he is making it all up, or changed his name or something. Possibly multiple with a personality that believes he was there but wasn't physically. (At which point questions of his authenticity still apply). Or is appropriating someone else's stories, which I have heard of people doing before, because of the attention and sympathy it gives them.
Thinking of people like that, perhaps this dude isn't so strange after all? Just somehow a bit repulsive in its duplicity.
Interesting comment about the different "voices"