At around mid-June of this year, people from around the world -- despite everything else going on within it -- found themselves swept up in a story of petty persecution and a woman’s desire to counter it with a kind of whimsical resilience by some unheard of.

Many would be taken by the story immediately, inspired by its message to those too affected by such blatant displays of bigotry to live relentlessly -- to be relentlessly themselves, relentlessly gay should that be the case. Some, however, would look at the story -- perhaps jaded by those such as that of Dayna Morales, the gay New Jersey waitress who would allege to have received an anti-gay message instead of a service tip who would subsequently be found to be somewhat of a chronic liar -- with some degree of skepticism, so much so, in fact, that they would go on to lambast the woman for her GoFundMe campaign, which sought to raise funds to make her home even more "relentlessly gay" so as to further irritate the purported author of the mean note. Bringing up such issues as the absolutely uncanny similarities between both her and the anonymous note’s curious way of emphasizing certain words (See here and here also.), and the peculiar timing of the campaign, many seemed to make the argument that something here just was not right. Unwilling to remain silent, these same individuals would then (rather ironically) find themselves victims of persecution, absurdly called bigots and trolls simply for asking questions. Some would even see their comments on the GoFundMe page deleted, or even find themselves blocked from commenting outright, leading them to buckle down all the more intently in their belief that something, indeed, was very wrong. If you've nothing to hide, why remove comments?

So many other issues would arise throughout the campaign apart from the persecution of those who sought to verify that it was indeed a legitimate one, including the eventual admission that excess donations (over the original requested $5k) would not, in fact, be going towards charity as had been previously claimed by the woman herself, but would instead go towards a series of completely irrelevant personal purchases for the family itself -- purchases which the family had “wanted … for ages but didn’t have the resources" for. Shortly after this revelation, when more and more individuals would begin to question the veracity of the story, and the whole ordeal would seemingly come to a head, one of the woman’s own daughters -- in a frustrated rant on her mother’s GoFundMe page -- would effectively go on to admit that they had always wanted to make the purchases in mind and set up campaigns for this very reason, but there had “never [been] a good time or enough inspiration until [then]” -- that is, not until the world would be swept up in the fervor of what appeared to be an alleged slight against the LGBT community. We would then see a fairly damning inconsistency unfold, where the woman would claim that detectives had seemingly vetted the authenticity of her story when, in fact, it appeared far more likely that she had actually avoided seeing them altogether even when requested. At this time, it was understood that the note was not in her possession, however, this has since changed, with the note now in the possession of the authorities. It should be noted that several other quite curious things would happen in addition to that which has already been described here. This would include the fact that this individual allegedly shared her Etsy store website address, wherein she had up for sale the very same lights for which she had received the alleged hate note, on her GoFundMe page in the early days of the campaign. While it is as yet not known if this has been verified, the fact that -- as soon as 2 days after the alleged hate note was received and the GoFundMe campaign created -- this individual was preparing to sell “relentlessly gay” t-shirts on the Relentlessly Gay website (which has since rather conveniently been altered) has very much been so. It is very important to note also that the term “relentlessly gay” is one which is derived from a pro-gay piece of literature called “The Pink and the Black: Homosexuals in France Since 1968,” by Michel Foucault. For information not listed here, please go here. Snopes has also addressed this campaign.

The individual of which I speak is of course Julie Baker of Baltimore, Maryland who, at this point in time, is still understood to be waiting to see her claims verified by the appropriate authorities. Her Relentlessly Gay GoFundMe campaign, which amassed over an absurd $43 thousand dollars when she initially requested $5 thousand (which is in itself questionable given the scope of the campaign) is thus in limbo. Many of us, however -- regardless as to whether or not detectives should indeed find the alleged hate note legitimate, and not entirely fabricated -- feel that Julie Baker has no legitimate reason to keep this excess money given that it was initially claimed that it would be used to help others combat bullying, but is instead now intended for use to make personal purchases which, as mentioned previously, they had wanted but were not able to buy for themselves. As a woman -- an adult -- asking complete strangers to contribute thousands of dollars to her cause of annoying a neighbour which may or may not exist, Julie Baker had the responsibility to ensure that she was at least aware of how to go about stopping the influx of donations -- an act which is in reality not all too difficult to figure out, even on one’s own. Indeed, it makes one wonder if, if no-one had said anything at all, that perhaps she may not have stopped accepting donations at all.

Although the amount of individuals that have since implied otherwise is simply grotesque, it goes absolutely without saying just how very despicable the act of lying to garner fame and fortune for oneself is -- no matter the message. Such acts take away needed help from truly desperate, deserving people; even worse, they breed suspicion, making those capable of helping their fellow man question, or even cease entirely to be that small beacon of hope.

Questions? Feel free to contact me on Facebook. Fair warning, I will not be bullied into taking this down. Not a chance.

Please note (and I am quite upset at myself for not having addressed this days ago) that Baker's friends have also acted oddly here. Specifically, I'd like to point out her good friend Eleanor Justice who, from the very beginning, took it upon herself to get the campaign a lot of the attention that it came to receive. On the very same day that Baker allegedly received the note [16 June], Justice went on to contact celebrities on Twitter. It would also be Justice who would share the campaign's link on celebrity George Takei's Facebook page very early the next morning, who would soon make it go viral.

Now, consider the fact that it was Justice who created and ran the Relentlessly Gay website (at the very least), which she would come eventually to alter in a massive way (Get a basic idea of what it used to look like here.), presumably to hide things inconvenient to their narrative (such as their thoughts on donating to charity and that they had intended, on top of asking for $5,000, to sell t-shirts also). Next, consider Justice's LinkedIn profile during the campaign (which has since been altered yet again). Look also at how comfortable she seems to be with setting up fundraisers herself. Finally, look at the way Justice acts here and here. Both instances are pretty interesting indeed, but the second instance really takes the cake, with Justice shutting down what could not have been a more reasonable, and actually expected, suggestion -- especially to help avoid scandal. And she wants to hide a post simply because it calls into question whether or not Baker is the real deal because it has the potential to be "negative"? Really? Other questionable persons involved include Christian Elowsky (who treated the Snopes reporter deplorably even while she strove to be (and quite possibly even was at one point) neutral, and Paula Lee Andrese, who actually tried to get the Snopes reporter in trouble and even jeopardise her job, simply for writing about the campaign without having spoken to Baker herself first. Baker's friends have been caught several times using the phrase WWND -- a play on WWJD (or What Would Jesus Do) with the N designated for Nixy, Baker's nickname.