Theresa Duncan Unplugged

[chiggerbit]

So's he. Useless pair, says this literalist.

[chiggerbit]

trepp said:

For the record (and I find it fairly ridiculous that I even need to say this): No. I didn't know Theresa Duncan or have anything to do with her, nor did I know anyone who knew Duncan or had anything to do with her. However, she's touched my life, probably indelibly, after her death, through her blog. Using the name "treppenwitz" is just my homage to her spirit.

Ridiculous, trepp? It would appear that her blog was that of a collective hoax (Exquisite Corpse). Why ridiculous, under the circumstances?

[Jeff]

Duncan's "Exquisite Corpse" is her collage-like body of work. At least that's how I understand treppenwitz's use of it. The game is not the Duncan "ARG"; it's a nod to the surrealists, who were Duncan's inspiration. I think literal-thinking researchers can get themselves quickly into error over Duncan by not respecting an artist's entitlement to metaphor.

''

So, let me get this straight, Jeff. You were aware that this whole thing was a metephor, a collage, an artist's "entitlement" all along?

You're misunderstanding, chig, and I don't know how to explain myself better. But no, Duncan's blog was not a "hoax" or a "collective game."

[elfismiles]

So is/was the consensus that the WOTS blog is/was a multiply-authored EC?

[with my respects and apologies to RAW for reverting to my "medieval Aristotelian framework" to ask that question]

This was one of the hypoths that DE and others were considering.

And BZ, DE and others were noting the connections to Situationist performances like the Darko Maver episode, Psychogeographers, and Luther Blissetts as well as other culture jammers like the BLF, etc.

And as with Darko Maver it seemed relevant to consider pseudocide. Or some other types of suspected suicide art / hoaxes involving Dave Eggers, Andy Stephenson, and several artists / art teachers who spoke/wrote of poetically ending it all by swimming or boating out to sea.

I was concerned that, whatever the true nature of these deaths, they could lead to other copycat suicides ...

Quote: "No fact is more readily transmissible by contagion than suicide."
- Emile Durkheim (Le Suicide [1897] 1951:141)
http://pespmc1.vub.ac.be/Conf/MemePap/Marsden.html

... of course the proof of situationism was in the poodin as far back as 1998 ...

From Girl games to glamour
SILICON ALLEY STAR THERESA DUNCAN MOVES NIMBLY BETWEEN WORLDS.
BY MATTHEW DEBORD
http://archive.salon.com/21st/feature/1 ... ature.html

I've been considering a title for my attempt at untangling all this ...
"I _STILL_ Don't Know What I Did Last Summer"

- miles

[Jeff]

Honestly, for fuck's sakes

Or some other types of suspected suicide art / hoaxes involving Dave Eggers, Andy Stephenson, and several artists / art teachers who spoke/wrote of poetically ending it all by swimming or boating out to sea.

my blood boils to see that.

Please, stop desecrating graves.

Andy didn't fake his death, and Theresa and Jeremy are still dead.

[elfismiles]

Honestly, for fuck's sakes

Or some other types of suspected suicide art / hoaxes involving Dave Eggers, Andy Stephenson, and several artists / art teachers who spoke/wrote of poetically ending it all by swimming or boating out to sea.

my blood boils to see that.

Please, stop desecrating graves.

Andy didn't fake his death, and Theresa and Jeremy are still dead.

Sorry for my sloppiness about that Jeff. I'm not suggesting that I believe he faked his death. I'm just pointing out that SOME folks well before Theresa Duncan, were contemplating public online bloggers as capable of faking their own deaths - a phenomenon unto itself apparently. And Andy's name came up in relation to the whole Gosch controversy engendered by "eve" during folks exploration of the life of T and B.

But I guess it's still too touchy an issue around here to discuss. Or I'm just too blundering to attempt it without stepping on peoples toes.

...

[Jeff]

Okay, thanks for the clarification.

To further clarify where I'm coming from, I'm not meaning to imply that Theresa's blog was a collaborative effort, just that it was a collage-like project. (Her project.)

[sunny]

I think treppenwitz is absolutely on to something. But, and maybe I am too much of a literalist, I think it is also possible that T. was "fair gamed" even if the CO$ didn't actually murder her.

[Jeff]

I think it is also possible that T. was "fair gamed" even if the CO$ didn't actually murder her.

I agree.

[chiggerbit]

Did many of you read the source of the quote that trepp used here?

It is clear, both from the link and her blog in toto, that Theresa Duncan was very familiar with these strategies.

Quote:
We have to get beyond the bounds of information, into a realm where it overturns and shatters into pieces... *détourner* and go deep into paranoia, push their game up to an extreme paradox, sell distorted stories off to the press bounty-killers... Turn the very logic of the system into our war strategy: media homoeopathy (Source)

[chiggerbit]

Ok, here's the entire article. This is not an innocent game.

1997: WELL BEGUN IS HALF DONE

A phone prank pulled by Luther Blissett in January 1997



Don Pierino Gelmini is a famous catholic priest. He is the founder and leader of the Incontro communities, i.e. "centres" for the "rehabilitation" of drug addicts (more properly describable as hard-labour brainwashing camps). It goes without saying that Gelmini, as any other "humanitarian" parasitic businessman, is a relentless defender of drug prohibition laws. His Rome-based acolytes even organised anti-legalisation marches.

Oddly enough, Comunità Incontro has a branch office in Thailand.

In December 1996, the Italian police arrested a Cambodian middle-age man, supposedly a child-trader on his way to Belgium, at the international airport of Fiumicino (Rome). He was travelling with 3 Thai children, whom he described as his adoptive sons.

The news media exploited that event in order to increase the instrumental child abuse hysteria which had seized Europe after the arrest of Marc Dutroux in Marcinelle. Reactionary opinion-makers tried hard to instigate Taleban-like mobs to lynch anyone suspected to be a paedophile.

Since the Summer '96, many people adopting the "Luther Blissett" multiple name have played "counterinformation" pranks on the subject of (ritual) child abuse as a mere pretext for repression. This is an excerpt from a sort of "strategic proclamation" on the subject:

"...We have to get beyond the bounds of information, into a realm where it overturns and shatters into pieces... *détourner* and go deep into paranoia, push their game up to an extreme paradox, sell distorted stories off to the press bounty-killers... Turn the very logic of the system into our war strategy: media homoeopathy" (L.B., July 3rd, 1996). "I" myself am writing a book on the inquisitorial spectacle of paedophilia.


On January 4th 1997, Saturday, "I" phoned the Roman office of the ANSA, a major press agency:

L.B.: Hello, this is Aldo Curiotto. As the official spokesman of Comunità Incontro, I feel bound to disavow the latest news on the arrest of don Pierino Gelmini. The Carabinieri did NOT arrest him, they are just interrogating him. Don Gelmini has NOT YET been charged with a traffic of child-abuse videos.

ANSA: ...Sorry? We haven't received any press release about the arrest!

L.B.: I just told you it isn't an arrest. They're temporarily detaining him in custody!

ANSA: That's quite strange, nobody informed us! What charge have you mentioned? Child abuse???

L.B.: Don Gelmini is supposed to have produced paedophiliac porn movies in Thailand, but there's NO charge, they're still examining him. They're simply holding him for the time being.

ANSA: O boy! [turning to his colleagues] Hey! The Carabinieri held don Gelmini! [background voices: "What?"] Yes, they're questioning him about a traffic of paedophiliac videos! [speaking to me:] Do you want to declare something else?

L.B.: Please, keep in mind that I've called to d-i-s-a-v-o-w! There's no proof of a connection between don Gelmini and the Cambodian man arrested in Fiumicino.

ANSA: [to the colleagues] Christ! A connection with that Cambodian guy! [Speaking to me:] Thank you, Mr. Curiotto. Please give us your phone number, this is going to cause a great stir, we need to keep in touch with you!

L.B.: Yes, of course. The number of the press office is 3725580. That's all for now. Please, show respect for the work of don Gelmini. Bye.



"I" gave them the real number of Comunità Incontro in Rome. Likewise, Aldo Curiotto is the real name of their press agent. "I" perfectly knew that they were going to call back that number. The real Curiotto would have denied the whole story. But I suspected that my story was *novel*, a perfect matter for exploitation (South-Eastern Asia, child abuse, the secret life of a notorious benefactor who also happened to be a priest...). Such an odd attempt at slandering don Gelmini deserved to be covered anyway.

The following day, all the newspapers reported the story under headlines such as:

"Don Gelmini Under Arrest"

Slandered In Revenge?

The Priest: I Got Used To Attacks

("L'Avvenire", January 5th, 1997)



Interviews with Curiotto and Gelmini appeared on the press and were broadcasted on TV. Here's an extract from Curiotto's press release: "An attack on the good name of don Pierino Gelmini has been launched by someone who pretended to be the press agent of Comunità Incontro and spread delirious nonsense using my name [...] My duty is to protect both my activity as a press agent and don Gelmini's reputation."

Some columnists noticed that the "child abuse" phenomenon had been so overexposed in the media that it had become a farce, a subject for gratuitous exploitation, hoax and calumny. Better late then never. It is surely a coincidence, yet the national media has stopped raising hell on paedophilia for nearly two weeks. As to "me", although Curiotto and Gelmini couldn't sue a collective phantom, "I" remained anonymous out there, in the big anywhere.



Now imagine that the police, alerted by my prank, interrogate don Gelmini for real about his business in Thailand...



Luther Blissett

January 16th, 1997

[chiggerbit]

elfsmiles said:

I was concerned that, whatever the true nature of these deaths, they could lead to other copycat suicides ...

Is this even beyond copycat, into the realm of death as part of "the game"?

[justdrew]

He might even have tried to survive death, as a paranoia; as a pure conspiracy...

the scilons fair-gaming should be the primary focus of investigations, but it seems like it would take a lot of leg work. Maybe a fund could be established to hire a few professionals to reconstruct everything that went on in LA. The Beck association would be a good place to start, as he's already been caught lying. and that new fucking song with the "try not to drown" lyrics, that's got to be comment on this at least.

[chiggerbit]

"try not to drown"

[Et in Arcadia ego]

Maybe Beck meant that as a way of saying don't let your relationship take you down along with your other, or the relationship itself.