#andrewmblake

[theteablogger]

For what it's worth, in all the current discussion about Andy, I have not seen anyone deadname him or claim that his trans status is not real and part of some "deception". I haven't read every single tweet or reblog, so I suppose it's possible it happened somewhere that I missed, but this feels more like a misdirection on his part--one that he's used many times in the past.

And of course, as usual, he claims that it's all old news and mostly untrue anyway, and he is but a simple man living his life and blah blah blah. It's always the same. Almost boring at this point.

[bebe-benzenheimer]

[adorkablegrrl-blog1]

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I just cannot even. With grandparents who actually ARE from Ireland... having visited Ireland... having Irish friends... I just cannot even. This is beyond offensive. Doesn’t match up with the story L was told (about a famous cult leader grandfather) but geebus flipping christmas... 0.o

[theteablogger]

"Oh no, I'm getting too popular! I don't want to be an internet personality!" says Man Who Has Spent Almost His Entire Life Trying To Be An Internet Personality. (And technically succeeding, in the worst monkey's paw sort of way)

Andy said the same thing years ago on both Tumblr and Instagram...and yet here we are. Like, yes, he's allowed to tweet; there's nothing inherently wrong or unhealthy about that. But nobody tweets publicly over 24,000 times, including multiple cute baby bird pics a day, in hopes that no one will pay attention to them! It's just silly to pretend that he's surprised and chagrined.

[theteablogger]

Apparently Andy is back as "CraftyCatDad" on Twitter. Highlights so far include humblebragging about his follower count, explaining to all of us how best to be an ally to disabled people, and nursing a baby sparrow back to health (that he claims will be eventually rehomed as a pet to someone else, since he and his wife have cats – why it's okay for the sparrow to be there now is a mystery to me).

Andy recently changed his Twitter handle from andrewmblake, as this anon points out. Supposedly this is because he bravely goes toe-to-toe with literal Nazis on a regular basis and doesn't want his full name attached to it...but mostly he's been posting costuming "pro tips" and documenting his latest sparrow son. He got other Twitter users to buy all the supplies he needed for the bird faster than I've ever seen anyone crowdfund anything.

[theteablogger]

obviously how he personally id's is up to him and ofc no one should deadname or misgender him (not that ive seen any of that other than like. old old old sources but certainly nothing recent) but in those tweets him claiming he has 'carefully not claimed to be cis' is frustrating bc he very actively has referred to himself as cis many many times. Maybe he just means like. Lately? But it is patently false for him to claim he has never id'd that way. After your most recent post i looked back thru some old posts of yours on here like yesterday and there is one where he explicitly is like 'no im not coming out as anything other my typical cis and straight' so this was fresh on my mind

sorry same anon who just sent that ask about him id'ing as cis in the past, here is the post i was thinking of which has one of the instances of him explicitly describing himself as cis is on your blog on this post: (regular url stuff)/post/93802896277/stolen-shoes

This is an excellent point! Thanks, Anon.

And yes, many trans people (especially those who have transitioned a long time ago) identify as cis. There's nothing wrong with that. But it's disingenuous for Andy to claim that he hasn't id'd that way, especially since he has a history of making negative and harmful comments about the trans community, for which he has never apologized. (Not to mention his treatment of individual trans people--see the bottom of my "important posts" page for info about his 2018 visit to LA to read about that and more.)

[theteablogger]

This may have been pointed out already, but I think he's using the term "artificer" because it was used in Rings of Power. The Elf Arondir says “There are [healers among Elves]. But we call them artificers. Most wounds to our bodies heal of their own accord, so, it is their labor instead to render hidden truths as works of beauty. For beauty has great power to heal the soul.” Tolkien also uses it to mean "builder, smith, wright". I think he's doing an obscure call back to his LOTR days.

Oh, he does that kind of call back a lot, to the point that I long ago gave up on screenshotting every time he mentioned Gollum or "the Precious". It's not necessarily harmful, just gross.

In the notes to the post by @carriesthewind, though, @wednesdaysky suggested it was a D&D/Critical Role reference, and I think that's more likely the case. Andy played (possibly still plays) D&D and was really into CR for a while. Based on the way he talks about his approach to costuming, especially making new things out of everyday objects, I think Artificer is probably a class with which he identifies strongly. Having "a tool for every job and a solution to every problem" (per RPGBOT's description of the Artificer) is definitely how Andy would like to be perceived.

[theteablogger]

the fact that Andy's Critical Role favorite character is Mollymauk- the sweet amnesiac alter-ego of Lucien, a cult leader who got his entire friend group killed in a desolate wasteland by following voices that only he could hear and turning his back on everything outside his mental illness- is so fucking ironic to me. He stans the cult leader's alter ego, but he's just the manipulative, obsessive cult leader.

Oh, wow. I wasn't aware of Lucien before; thanks, Anon! That's creepy as fuck, especially given that several times, Andy has claimed that all his previous bad acts were committed by "Others" and that he's a completely different person.

For example, he blamed everything that happened with Bit of Earth on the Jordan Wood persona (the "duplicate soul" of Elijah Wood), and then "became" Andy (the "duplicate soul" of Orlando Bloom), who continued to run an abusive cult for several years. After Abbey left him, he kept the name Andy, but took on yet another persona, allegedly believing he was an Irish-American who'd fought on both sides of the Troubles and had a heart condition that would soon kill him. That persona was responsible for the DAYD cult and many of Andy's Tumblr shenanigans. A couple years into his time on Tumblr, he claimed to have realized that all of his memories were false and rediscovered his true identity, which was thereby absolved of blame for anything save (maybe) what he'd done during his earliest days in fandom.

Basically, at the same time that he claims to accept responsibility for his past, Andy wants everyone to see him as the sweet alter ego who did nothing wrong.

Also, the whole "desolate wasteland" thing makes me think of his and Abbey's attempt to walk across the Canadian border, and now I'm sad and creeped out.