Not sure how many people were around four years ago for the original drama, but @storyofrachel@hexbear.net was a banned user from early on the site's history, and I've seen quite a bit of speculation recently that a current frequent poster in c/mutualaid is an alt of hers due to having a similar MO and personal details (such as them both living in the same city)
For context, u/storyofrachel was an unhoused trans woman, who frequently solicited money from the community and had problems with substance abuse. She eventually made a post bragging about scamming money from users here (I myself was one of the users who sent her money) and blowing it on drugs (with a picture of the drugs in question) and a
bunch of homophobic slurs (TW: homophobia, self harm).
She later claimed that her account had been hacked, which frankly I did and do not believe. She was unbanned but later banned for other shit which I don't recall and am unable to reconstruct from the modlog and came back on a bunch of different alts, all of which were banned.
If there's any truth to this, it is deeply fucked that this person is still here, evading her ban and scamming people four years later. As one of the people who was taken advantage of previously (and, possibly, again with this current user!), people should at least be able to make an informed decision with all available context. If we want this community to function, and I say this as someone who has sent hundreds of dollars to people over the years through this community, we should be able to guard against bad actors who are trying to take advantage of the compassion and generosity of our user base.
Edit: There's an Instagram with both usernames on it, publicly available. It's 100% the same person. Not going to post it because I don't want anyone to get doxxed but yeah.
Edit edit: I'm going to go touch grass now. Anyone who is being willfully obtuse about why I made this post can read it again or any of my other comments in this thread
So as the person who apparently pointed this out to people, I have a few things I'd like to say here.
One, after I posted my previous comment, someone responded to me with more information which confirms that, yes, this is the same person. (I'm gonna be honest, I had assumed it was from pretty early on, given all the things that lined up, so that came as no real surprise to me.)
Two, whatever the story was behind Rachel's behavior years ago, I have never observed her saying anything unkind or inappropriate since her return to the site. As far as I can tell, she at least learned her lesson on that. I've been willing to give her the benefit of the doubt, and it looks to me like she's made good on that trust and not been toxic like she was before--in spite of all this drama that has descended on her lately.
Three, and this one is pretty big for me: I have never caught her in a lie on here since she came back. Not once. And as people may have realized by now, I pay pretty close attention.
Seriously, consider her actions in recent weeks, and tell me if this sounds like scammer behavior: First, she voluntarily tells everyone she raised nearly $800 from a single post. There was absolutely zero reason to tell anyone that. Why on Earth would a scammer, whose whole scam depended on making people think they were desperate, tell people they had just received a windfall? And that is of course magnified by the post letting us all know about that $4k. No scammer with half a brain would tell us, and no scammer with even one brain cell would let on that they got so much money and then spent it all inside of a month's time. If anything, that proves to me that she's being honest, even to an arguable fault.
And I want to mention that I have caught at least one recipient of my largess here on Hexbear in a lie (it was an utterly pointless lie, too; I had already made clear I was going to provide this person with money, and they then lied to me to make it sound like they had better means to pay it back than they really did, even though I had not asked to be paid back in any way). I have not given that person any money since, even though they have made posts here requesting funds since then. Another user changed their original ask after someone sent them the amount they requested and said so in a comment, which really rubbed me the wrong way. I reported that to mods but never heard anything back, and the post stayed up, but I never donated to that user again either.
By contrast, Rachel made clear that she was spending the money on food, and honestly, I think the small-time donations really were used that way. But even if not, even if she did sometimes buy drugs with that money, well, you can't give money to a meth addict and expect them not to use it in ways you might not like. And I say that as someone who gave her upwards of $400, all told.
Is it disappointing that she didn't succeed in making her situation permanently better with that four grand? Absolutely, and it seems clear to me that she's more upset about that than we all are. But I don't really agree that her recent behavior makes her a "bad actor."
Actually, misrepresenting herself as a new user and not a new account for someone who was banned quite some time ago is the original lie that you're missing here. I wouldn't have given money to someone who called me a f****t and bragged about scamming me in the past. That's the lie. It's nice you've absolved her, but I absolutely have not.
If it's her, as you say, she should be banned instantaneously from this site.
as a neutral observation i believe mentioning that you are the new account of a previously banned user is a bannable offense
Ban evasion is still a bannable offense even if you don't say you're an alt
In practice, we have lots of people here who are almost certainly alts of banned users, that have managed to avoid repeating the behaviors that got them banned. Some even take variations on the same username.
yeah but like the whole banning process is a complete joke and the rules on what counts as acknowledging an evasion are completely arbitrary on a case by case basis, like almost all of the power users who've been banned just kept / keep posting on the site under a different name that everyone knows is them until they get banned again, wait 48 hours, then just make another account and keep posting
I mean you have to consider that the site mod culture seems to be that ban evading is kind of okay as long as it's not really discussed, but if they were to come back and say "hey this is me evading a ban," well, that's ban evasion
I'm sorry, that's ridiculous. She never said she was a brand-new user, and I don't think it's wrong to come back after years away. I understand if you're not willing to forgive her for using slurs, but I do not at all agree that she was lying by making a new account.
A lie of omission is still a lie. And there's also the bragging about scamming people.
A lie of omission requires context. Otherwise everyone is lying by omission at all times by not telling everyone literally everything about themselves.
Not gonna try to defend the bragging about scamming people, but it was years ago and I don't believe in crucifying people for past sins.
Anyway, I've been touching grass for the last month or so, and have only been interacting with this site in one way: watching this comm for posts asking for money. That's the only reason I'm even here in this thread. If you want to hate Rachel, no one is stopping you, but I don't think that has anything to do with this comm or the rules, and it's really not clear to me what this post is about other than getting mad at Rachel--I don't see any proposed rule changes.
The context in this case is that this person was already banned for various offenses like hurling slurs at other community members, including OP. If she was honest about her identity, he wouldn't have given her money. How is that not a lie by omission?
Do you introduce yourself by telling people about shitty things that you've done in the past? Do you make requests by offering people all the reasons they might want to refuse that request? Rachel was asking for money in a post, not DMing OP specifically asking for it. I really don't see this as a lie by omission.
Do you support the checkbox on job applications about ever having been arrested for or convicted of a crime? This feels like the same thing to me.
No, because such things generally aren't relevant to how I'm interacting with those people. In this case, the user's past conduct is very relevant because people might not want to lend money to someone who was very publicly thrown out of the community for homophobia and abuse.
... No? That's an institutional barrier to employment, and not remotely similar to the situation at hand. I also wouldn't support banning people from the mutual aid comm for being arrested for or convicted of a crime, if you're curious.
My proposed change is that a known scammer who is evading a ban should be banned for the health of this comm, and that allowing someone like this to operate on here makes it less likely for others who need it to get help
This is pretty much where I'm at, if it is the same person they seem to be trying to be better. I'm not mad about them spending all that money, I only posted about it last night because i just sometimes think/wish there could have been better outcomes with that...