Man, this was long overdue.
raekenology:
LONG POST AHEAD, WILL NOT BE PUT UNDER A READ MORE.
I wasn’t going to write this post because I figured NOT doing so would make me the better person, but I’ve since realised that if I don’t, more people are going to get hurt, manipulated, & abused. This post is about what I, among many others, have experienced with Shay ( Roman ), stainedclaws.
My personal experience with them isn’t as bad as what they’ve done to other people. Back in the day, when I was writing Ethan ( withoutmybrother ), I met this person named SHAY. Considering this was about, give or take, two & a half to three years ago, I can’t remember exact details of how we became friends. What I do remember is thinking they were one of the nicest people I’d ever met. They were friendly & supportive when I was going through a difficult time, so naturally, we became somewhat close. But after a while, I started noticing the little things. For example: their icons were almost exact replicas of mine ( the same crop, nearly the same colouring, as though they’d taken the icon into PS and reedited it to look different, et cetera ), and so I asked. I remember being told “I would never steal your icons”, & “I swear I didn’t steal them”. Strange, right? It gets worse.
A little while later, I noticed they’d started mimicking a couple of my headcanons. It WASN’T word for word, but a lot of what they had written in her prose on her Ethan blog was eerily similar to the headcanons I posted for him, and what I had written in my own narrative. I’d received a couple of messages at the time asking me about it, all of which I never answered because I didn’t see the need to stir up drama on the dashboard. To make matters worse, one person confused the two of us. I took major offense to that, because my characterization was my own. Having it mimicked raised a big red flag for me. When I finally confronted them, they played the victim card. Acted like I was attacking them whilst telling me that I was inspiring for them & they looked up to me as a writer, & that they believed we both understood Ethan to his core, as though that should explain why our characterization & portrayals were the same. That’s around the time I cut ties with this person.
We had our ups & downs since. We would come back together as friends, then go our separate ways. A big thing that put me off was their constant need for attention –––––––– their need to be talked to, to be reassured that I didn’t “hate” them if I didn’t respond for a while, et cetera. They’d always blame it on their “anxiety & depression”, which should’ve been another red flag for me. I get having anxiety & feeling that way, but having to ask someone every other day and putting that much pressure on their shoulders is too much for anyone to handle.
( NOTE: I am never one to say someone doesn’t have a mental disorder, but most people that do have anxiety & depression do not talk about as often nor do they use it to excuse their behaviour. More on that in a bit. )
We eventually stopped talking all together. A little while later, we crossed paths again when I came across someone writing MICHAEL SCOFIELD of Prison Break, using the same icons I had made for my girlfriend’s blog. Turns out, it was Shay taking icons from a blog they presumed was dead & the writers had moved on to a different fandom & wouldn’t find out. It’s my opinion that Shay KNEW it was my girlfriend’s blog because it had been promoted on my Ethan numerous times. When confronted, this is what was said:
REMINDER THAT PRIOR TO THIS, THEY CLAIMED TO HAVE NEVER STOLEN ICONS FROM ME.
I tried to move past it after that. I, too, had messaged them about the icons & decided I would give them the icons in attempt to move past all of the bullshit & rekindle our friendship, but I couldn’t. I was often being hounded into replying to messages as they demanded my attention, & they would dive into asking me whether I hated them or not and then gave the “I feel like I’m annoying people” excuse to justify why they ask so frequently. This is the only two logs I have currently, but this has been an ongoing thing, even during our first couple of times being “friends”.
Just recently, after a post was made mocking the cultural appropriation of black women’s hairstyles & the mischaracterization of Theo Raeken, Shay sent me a message where they, once again, played victim. They essentially began calling me the manipulative one & claimed I had threatened people if they didn’t stop talking to them, which is untrue. They also talked about my girlfriend, saying they didn’t understand how I could maintain friendships or a relationship.
Those messages can be found HERE, HERE, & HERE.
( Note that they mention me having said I was just “insecure” about their Ethan, which in my response, I said that they were right, I did –––––– because I’m ALWAYS going to be insecure when someone is caught stealing my headcanons & my characterization. )
BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE!
Here’s personal experiences from others. Some have their names / Skype handles blurred per request.
“she’s unutterably fucking possessive over rp partners and rp characters too and then as soon as anyone interprets a character differently than she does, she starts bashing them. i remember an ethan wanted to rp with me one day and i had to turn them down because i had her breathing down my fucking neck.”
“i mean they hit me up every now and then but something always ends up happening and they make me feel reeeeeally shitty about it? and disappear just to pop up a few months later and spew out apologies and explain how their personality is flawed and what medical treatment their receiving for it”
LAST BUT NOT LEAST, their passive aggressive post regarding abuse towards women. ( “glad he hit lydia too”. ) Here’s what sets me off: regardless if this was meant to be character hate, no one should ever say they’re glad a woman has been hit. VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN IS NOT A JOKING MATTER, IT IS NOT SOMETHING TO BE GLAD THAT’S HAPPENED, & IT’S CERTAINLY NOT SOMETHING YOU SHOULD USE AGAINST SOMEONE TO HURT THEIR FEELINGS. Not only does saying something like that make you sound like a fucking asshole, but it’s also unbelievably disrespectful to people you may follow that have been victims of abuse.
ABRIDGED VERSION:
Shay is a manipulative, toxic person. Shay has lied about both their name, lied about their age to smut, tried to guilt two of my close friends ( and probably others ) into cutting off contact with me, tried to force exclusivity on others ( both on their Theo blog, & their Ethan blog ), USED MENTAL ILLNESS ( anxiety, depression, bipolar ) AS AN EXCUSE TO JUSTIFY THEIR BEHAVIOUR / WHY THEY TREAT PEOPLE HORRIBLY, and has given people bad vibes while interacting / talking OOC.
If you’re friends with Shay, I won’t tell you not to be. I’ll just tell you to be EXTREMELY careful because of their track record.
IF ANYONE ELSE HAS HAD BAD EXPERIENCES WITH THIS PERSON, FEEL FREE TO MESSAGE ME EITHER ON ANON OR OFF ANON. I WANT EVERYONE IN THIS COMMUNITY TO BE SAFE, & I DON’T WANT ANYONE ELSE BECOMING A VICTIM OF SHAY’S GUILT TRIPPING & ABUSE.
I’m okay with this being reblogged / signal boosted. I want people to know what they’re getting into when they’re befriending this person.
