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Stop projecting, fair-weather friends, acquaintances and celebrities

  • Writer: Amanda Riddell
    Amanda Riddell
  • Feb 6, 2024
  • 4 min read

This is why there's no Weeded Out feature movie. I've said no because you had notes that I wasn't willing to adress, and I'm never going to be willing to do so. If you felt I'd wronged you, why was it that you failed to write to me to address that grievance? That's what professionals would have done, so that makes me think that you're a bunch of petty, conceited man-children that can't let me express my truth for fear that it might reveal you to be less noble and pure than you pretend to be. More clarifications that shouldn't have been necessary: - 1. Sean wasn't Jake Church. It was a composite of Jeffery, Eli, Elliot and other dealer buddies that I was much friendlier with re: the cannabis cause. Jeffery was my actual flatmate for several months. To go on, Jake's part-time job was as a bartender, while Eli decided to study nursing. 2. Caliope wasn't Cassandra or Salina. One or two lines were swipes at them, but largely she was someone that I invented. I hope that the Asian girls connected to her, and I think that identifying with her suggests that they all did. However, those two are conceited: I barely know them, and they're not friends. To me, my 'fans' seem like those girls in the Tweek and Craig episode of South Park, and that really, really pisses me off. 3. No, the MDMA scene wasn't about Jake. Ellie was a mix of Ingrid and Briar and Aidan. 4. Sally wasn't Jane or Sally-Jane. Seriously, I don't know where you lot come up with this: those screenplays are very vague regarding characters and their physical appearance, and you all have made projections that were incorrect. You can't blame my rants. Those were also widely misinterpreted because people found my ALL CAPS style confronting. Re: 110 in the Shade, I'm not a moron. Read the play, study that character who has the same name as Jane (Elizabeth is Jane's middle name), and then apologise to me. This is me singing Lizzie's part: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2URbn8txJ3c&ab_channel=AmandaR. 5. If you found my accurate critiques of the inequities of the arts scene in episode 2 confronting, it's probably because you're the dick that has the ear of CNZ. 6. I was appalled at the negative commentary regarding Episode IV and the Jade-Tina relationship. All this suggested to me was that my fantasies of being in a relationship were doomed to failure because everyone found a scene where I used Tina to express a real concern that I have regarding an intimate relationship to be 'too disturbing'. Much as Ethan found the scene with the needle 'too disturbing' -- that's a non-muso reaction, as every guitarist or bass player knows that callouses are super-important. I often feel used by the women in my life, and that's precisely why The Dakumentary dedicates a chunk of the film to me expressing that anger about being the third wheel. So, tell me how telling me that my concern isn't valid is trans-positive?

Let me ask my non-binary 'friends' something: have you read those relationship guideline things that GMA have been publishing for the last several years? I've read some of those, and they're very helpful, but only if people like me are allowed to express concerns about intimate relationships. I couldn't have written that Dirty Creatures story if I wasn't familiar with how it felt to be subservient in an unequal relationship. 7. Tim is more masculine than me. That's just how it came out, but I really hate it when people think that Tim/Tina is exactly like me. I wrote a character sheet for good reasons, and deliberately invented differences so that I'd be able to write that character. She's an archetype; I'm a real person. My life is ten times more complicated, and that deliberate naivete is something that I've cultivated. 8. Dana was based on Adriana from Maccas. That's where a lot of that rest home stuff was drawn from. Sondehim says in his books that he believes in William Faulkner's dictum, which is that one needs 2 out of 3 of imagination, observation, and experience in order to write effectively. Plus I used to visit my Grandma Ruth a lot at her rest home in Spreydon when I was young.

- If people can't let go of shit that I said in 2020 when I was obviously struggling, or that they can't acknowledge that I have a right to express my anger, then there's very little to discuss. If you want the tapes to stop, then fucking well meet me one-on-one. If you'd decided to meet with me several years ago, detractors, it's entirely possible that there wouldn't have been any escalation of my campaign of terror. I'm proud of that escalation, however, and the fruithead sketches were the cherry on top that made the whole thing lift another notch. - I keep on being told to 'explain ed' - as if the explanation somehow absolves me... that's also a load of crap. People haven't forgiven me: they've just grown envious of my sound, and they want to commodify it, while firmly establishing that they're above me in the pecking order of life. As I put it - 'you can run, but you can't hide, from that sorta stigma' Plus I made a brilliant little series of monologue called 'my life story' that is part of the Dakumentary, and covers all the important areas. 👍🏻

 
 

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