#simonalkenmayerisdead

[crypt-id]

Greetings. My name is Monte and my pronouns are they/them. The purpose of this blog is to examine and share my thoughts on Simon Alkenmayer’s “experiment” and the various pieces of drama that surround the character of Simon.

I used to be one of the “gentle readers” and I have become increasingly suspicious that there is more to this story than what the players claim. The release of the second “survey” has convinced me I am right.

I believe there is only one person behind the accounts of @simonalkenmayer, The Fool (aka @simonalkenmayerisdead ) and quite possibly also the rest of the blogs devoted to Simon Alkenmayer and their activity.

Think about it. The original purpose of the “experiment”, before Simon started going on about group dynamics and narcissism, was to examine what people will believe and why. In other words, how critically we, the public, think about information. How does what we already believe affect what we are prepared to believe? What sources do we find reliable? Do we believe facts, or emotive language?

So what do you do? First you create a character that will capture people’s attention. Maybe someone unusual, a bit edgy, a bit dangerous. Who is also older and more knowledgeable than everyone and perfectly positioned to be The Authority Figure. This character builds a presence and a following… Maybe by interacting with viral posts. Making sure he is visible. Says the odd controversial thing. And, crucially, they make sure to repeat that you will believe what they claim, if you are intelligent enough and can think critically.

After this character has matured a bit and become established, you introduce The Antagonist. This would be Simonalkenmayerisdead’s function. The Antagonist doesn’t need to make an effort to create an online presence because he can piggyback on the “fame” of The Authority Figure. His role is to create drama, introduce emotion and to push people to choose a side. Once you have committed to supporting one or the other, you become much more likely to believe what they say and to suppress and doubts and critical thinking. (At least that would have been my hypothesis.)

This explains everything.

Why Simon and The Fool keep mentioning each other and essentially drive readers to each other’s blog.

*Simon could have ignored The Fool but instead they keep mentioning him and making sure all the gentle readers know about him. Why would they do that if The Fool didn’t serve their purpose?

*Unlike pretty much all of the other “critical blogs”, Simonalkenmayerisdead doesn’t seem to have just a few objections to Simon. He moves from “issue” to “issue” and will criticize anything and everything, which makes sure that at any given time he will create at least some outrage. The Fool will also often appear petty, criticizing innocuous things such as recipes, drawings etc. This is a perfect technique to put people in a defensive position, and make Simon look like a victim. If you think about it, this behavior serves Simon much more than it serves The Fool. Why would he do that unless…. they actually share the same goal?

*The doxing incident. Simon has not doxed any of their former friends who have turned against them, even though those were people who supposedly had NDAs and Simon would have had their names and addresses, photos will have been shared in the Discord server, etc. But for some reason… they supposedly spent hours going through The Fool’s Twitter to find the ONLY PHOTOGRAPH in existence and shared that. And The Fool conveniently confirmed that it was him, when it would have been very easy (and make much more sense) to ignore it or deny it. As I see it, the only reason to do that is that the drama serves your purpose. (And if, say, you don’t need to spend hours looking for that photograph because you already have it.)

But the cincher is this question in the survey which ties everything together.

If you pay close attention, both accounts have been dropping clues about their real purpose for a while now. Maybe that’s another way to determine if the readers believe the obvious, stated “facts” or are able to read between the lines. And, I’m not sure yet, but I believe the rest of the critical blogs might also have a role to play in the “experiment”.

I will share more thoughts about these (and post my “evidence”) in follow up posts.

[simonblackquill-rp-blog]

my love, I look forward to our impending nuptials with barely concealed delight

As a human, flirting with a millenia-old human-eating monster is unwise.

As a human-eating monster, for me to flirt back would be disgusting, doubly so if I were to act as if there were any chance such a relationship would be at all fair or feasible, and quadruply so if I were the one initiating.

[feste-the-jester]

So...

If someone came out and said “Simon’s real name is Kristina Meister, and she is the author of Cinderella Boy, and she lives in California, and by the way Simon/Kristina is a horrible person that abuses people and causes them harm” then that would be doxxing, right?

Which clearly was not against the Fool’s principles, since he’s been doing it repeatedly since September/October.

[piggledy-higgledy]

I LOVE it when someone spends months berating the object of their “critique” for supposedly blocking anyone who disagrees with them, and then that same person blocks ME for leaving two, extremely politely phrased, disagreeing comments under their post.

Like, I couldn’t have been politer. I made extra-double-sure. 🤣

Not that I can prove it now, because I’ve been blocked so my comments aren’t visible any more.

But you know... It’s a good thing that Isdead is SO different to Simon. 😂

My God, you couldn’t make it up. After all the rants about how Simon doesn’t tolerate dissent. I am genuinely cackling.

It’s ok mate, you don’t have to worry about anyone accidentally reading anything I say and developing doubts any more. It’s safe.

(I seem to remember something about an echo chamber also mentioned... Not sure who mentioned it though... hmmmmmm...)

Oh my God I needed some cheering up today.

[simonalkenmayer]

I was previously very critical of "the human author", should they exist, because I had been taught growing up that people that believe in "fairytales" (i.e. myths legends religion. Any of that) were somehow less. That their worth was less than the average humans, and at times they had no worth at all.

I also thought that belief was very very widespread. So I not only thought if there was a human author that they were "tricking" people into "giving up their worth", but I thought they were doing it knowingly. I also worried that if you weren't real I was giving up my worth, since I actually find you pretty believable a lot of the time.

I don't know if that worth belief is actually fairly widespread and possibly a reason behind a lot of your hate anons, or if its something particularly uncommon that none of them would relate with, but I'm sharing incase it might help any of them realize why they're so angry, or help anyone else work through those beliefs like I'm trying to now.

And because it feels like some gross dirty secret. I feel guilty about it. I don't think I ever sent you any anons that could be considered hate anons, and I never tried to rile you up, but it still feels like a gross insult to think "if you're a human you should know better and I hate you."

Hopefully you never had any inkling about those thoughts, at least from me, but I still want to say I'm sorry Simon (and, if relevant, to the human author.)

I can't get this all phrased how I'd like it, but I... think it's worth saying anyway? So I'm just going to send it as is, sorry if any parts don't make sense or sound weird, or if it actually wasn't worth bringing up after all.

I can understand that. It’s a good point to make.

See here, that sense of being somehow worth more if you don’t believe...that is arrogant and a fairly modern thing. It’s also a trick. All people make choices about what to believe. All of you, including me. We all decide what is important and has meaning and we pursue it. What right has anyone to say another person’s belief is immaterial.

I know I argue with a great many human beliefs. I do this because I know what i am and which beliefs I directly contradict, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to sit here and say belief isn’t important. It is. That’s why I am studying it.

No one loses that “worth” by believing any one thing. “Worth” is a capitalist and arguably a Catholic sentiment brought down through the eons--the concept of earning love, or undoing original sin through actions and so on. Conceiving of belief as a merit system is destructive and not at all helpful, as you seem to have realized.

This person, and people like them, are interesting to me for this very reason. Ass you have said, they seem to believe that if they can find a flaw in something they’ve been told, that they are somehow stupid or bad or have been shown flawed for believing it. That is so...completely backward. What I am here observing isn’t how broken you are (however often I may mock your human condition for the sake of humor), but to see how your brain uses belief, how it finds meaning, how you express delight. The truth is, nothing in reality changes, based upon your understanding of it. Don’t believe in pangolins? Too bad, they still exist. Reality does not change. You change when you uncover greater truth. Or you refuse to and set about actively ignoring it, bending around it like a black hole bends light, performing Herculean feats to try and ignore it. Why? How?

I am not here to trick anyone. That’s why I don’t tell you what to believe and why I don’t actually care. I tell you to be polite, to be kind, to embrace the thought that I have a purpose here that is righteous, no matter what you believe. I ask you to be courteous. I only block or otherwise berate those who cannot conceive of the fact that I am a person with a purpose, that I am driven and focused, that I will not bend for you simply because you ask. I will not be made to do anything simply because someone wants me to.

You do not have to believe me--I say it hundreds and hundreds of times. Thousands, at this point. You do not have to believe me. It doesn’t anger me. You do however, have to be a decent fucking person if you want to keep asking me questions, taking my time from others, and interacting.

No one harassing me is saving anyone. No one abusing me is proving how benevolent and concerned they are for the benefit of others. No one being an mocking me is doing anything constructive, redeeming anyone, reinstating worth, or any other thing.

Belief is not the enemy. Wrong belief is. Detrimental belief is. Bad reasoning is. Bad meaning is. But how do you tell which is which?

[simonalkenmayer]

That "omg 5 whole dollars" anon sounds like someone I'd see on r/choosingbeggars

I can understand people being upset about the whole cryptid thing. But your book still has value regardless of if you're telling the truth or not. So they are just that one person thats always harrassing artists for free stuff.

I however cannot see the reason for them to be upset about”the cryptid thing” which I presume to refer to “Simon is not real but is pretending to be real to...get something? How dare they not break character or admit they are lying!” idea.

Look...let’s think through this rationally again “for the people in the back”.

If I am human, then this is an experiment. That is the only thing that makes sense. Why? Because no money is made, the content is largely free, I spend a lot of time at it for no returns and so on...We’ve established that, so let’s assume it as an axiom. If Simon is human, he’s a human doing an actual experiment.

A lot of studies have been done on cults, mass hysteria, folklore, memes, and on and on. But I daresay I cannot think of one study that decided to study it by forming a cult. Why? Because that would be morally repugnant. So the only thing I can imagine is that if I am a human, and therefore a person who is studying something, that idea--of seeing the cult from within without it being a cult-- would be perhaps the most intriguing thing to study. It would be something worth the time, the effort, and the abuse.

What I’m saying is...I don’t understand the “cryptid thing”. Of course such a person wouldn’t break character ever. It would destroy the study. Good goo, use some logic here.

But all that sounds terribly tedious. I’m more interested in why humans want to turn my perfectly lovely species into sparkly teenaged heartthrobs, and why they insist on using us to speak about themselves, tracking that conversation of mankind with its own distorted reflection, and trying to quantify precisely where it will evolve to in the future? That is quite enough for me. The above scenario seems not so interesting.

[simonalkenmayer]

oh Simon, I'm so sorry you had to deal with that prick.

You deserve so, so much appreciation.

Whenever I think that my spiralling thoughts are choking me, I come to your blog and it calms me down. I don't know why this is so but I'm very grateful nonetheless.

much love and thanks :)

I am also grateful that is the case.

What’s funny is that to a person like that, who has decided for whatever reason that I am the scum of the earth, no amount of people saying nice things to me will ever change their opinion. They said it themselves. You’re the “impressionable fan base” incapable of being rational, and so your opinions of my actions do not matter. It allows them to be superior and convince themselves they are right, by discounting any opposing belief.

In truth, i think this is simply their strategy for trying to get to me. They want to “win” and prove me false. This isn’t a game. You cannot “win”. I don’t care enough. It’s an experiment. Not an episode of The Price Is Right

[feste-the-jester]

Something, something, “Simon is ableist and does not listen to feedback from marginalised people”

(Screencaps from the Fool’s blog)

Incidentally, the myth of Narcissus obviously predates the disorder, but the term “narcissist” was coined to describe disturbed psychology. It was first used in 1899 by Paul Näcke and by Freud in 1914.

Also:

And let’s not forget this:

Talking about “crazy” and “lame”:

“To be completely clear, lame is a slur. There are countless others out there, but this word in particular seems to be forgiven or forgotten more than any others.”

“Words have meaning. When you say the disappointing things in your life are “lame,” you’re putting them on par with my own ability level. You’re telling me, in so many ways, that I’m disappointing and not good enough. I hear enough from politicians, pundits, and boomer op-ed authors day-in and day-out that my status as a queer, disabled, woman of color is a drain on society. I don’t need to hear it from the people who are supposed to be on my side, from those who otherwise “get it.”

These words are written by a disabled woman who uses a cane to walk, by the way.

Wait… Who was it that reblogged this?

I wonder if we should expect an apology… Or an admission of double standards.

We can but hope.