AS282: How Not To Hit On Tracey Moody

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:29 Thomas: Hello and welcome to Atheistically Speaking. This is episode 282 and I'm your host Thomas Smith. Want to make a very quick announcement before I get to today's episode, uh, Thomas and the Bible, my original podcast, the first one I ever started in which I'm reading through the entire Bible, um, one reading at a time, but I'm literally reading it and making commentary and making jokes, a lot of you are familiar, it's finishing now, like as this episode is coming out, I'm making the last episode of it. This started in 2010, and I'm finally finishing the entire Bible. And I've got mixed feelings about it. I don't know. I just wanted to tell you guys because it's pretty incredible to do something for six years like that. I'm going to be moving on to another book.

0:01:15 Thomas: I'm gonna announce it soon. I'm also gonna do a wrap-up show and stuff. But I just want to tell I'm finishing it. It's crazy. It's incredible. So if you want to ever check that one out, feel free to. Okay, this episode is a little bit of a departure, to be honest with you, but it's something I really care quite a bit about. I've been friends with Tracey Moody in an online form ever since she came on the show way back when. It's been quite a while. But like three years ago, she messaged me saying she was trying to, she had listened to the show, she said she was trying to start a female atheist group. She had a really funny story about how it just was not working where she was. And we've always kept in touch. We've always been friends since then. And she's been on the show a few times. And she told me a story about some online harassment she had received.

0:02:03 Thomas: It was pretty incredible, to be honest with you. I was blown away by it. And I really wanted to talk about it. Here's the thing about Tracey. Now, I know it might be a typical kind of MRA point of view, not to insult anybody, but it might typical to think, okay, people, women are sensitive to things online that should just be taken as flattery or whatever.

I just want to say, and you'll see as Tracey describes this, that Tracey is not at all anything close to what you could consider oversensitive. She's highly under sensitive to this kind of thing. And that's why it's even more, I think, important to have her tell the story.

Frankly, my view is that being online for women can be terrifying at times, can be horrible at times and I honestly believe that most men are oblivious to it and it's sad to me and it is something that no matter where you might fall on various social justice issues or whatever, This seems like a no-brainer to me, trying to make the internet better for women in any way we can seems like no-bringer and being conscious of what goes on is important to me. So for that reason, I'm really glad Tracey came on and was willing to tell her story and talk about her experience. And I sincerely hope this makes some difference. I don't know, maybe I, because I can think back to a time when this just wasn't something I was aware of.

It wasn't something, you know, I think men and women have vastly, for the most part, vastly different experiences online. And I think it's important to see what's going on. So with that said, I suppose I'll issue a couple warnings. One, Tracey, Tracey lets the profanity fly a little bit in this recording. So just giving you a heads up if that's something you're sensitive to.

0:03:47 Thomas: And also in looking back and editing it, I realized I was on some cold medication and I sounded pretty drowsy for most of this, but it's okay. I still powered through, but I just, I noticed that. Apologies if I sound a little kind of drowsy, but, uh, I promise it wasn't anything but the, uh... the cold I had. So with that said, let's get to Tracey Moody. Fascinating story. Here you go.

0:04:23 Thomas: Joining me right now is someone who hasn't been on the show in, I don't know, a million years. Tracey Moody, how you doing?

0:04:29 Tracey: A year and a half. Very well. Hello, atheist world.

0:04:34 Thomas: Yeah, I like to, I would like to feel like, and you can, just don't tell me if it's not true, I feel like you got your start here. Like, I feel that this show was like the springboard. We always knew you were going on to bigger and better things, like, but I feel this is what really launched you.

0:04:53 Tracey: I've always been wondering why in the hell do you keep having me on your show? I sound like a fool every time. But I think I finally got my shit together.

0:04:59 Thomas: Oh. Okay, good. Well, I mean, I gave you that year and a half breather to to Collect Your Thoughts Well,

0:05:04 Tracey: Yeah, you were the first podcast I was ever on, actually. You were like, hey, you want to come on my podcast? I was like, wait, I'm going to be on a podcast? That's a big deal, right?

0:05:13 Thomas: Back in the day, a million years ago, I have no concept of time at all. You just messaged me and said like, hey, I'm trying to start like atheist, a group or something thing, right? And then, yeah, and then you're like, oh, I can't do it. It's not working. You know, you're telling me all this stuff. I was like, this is an interesting topic. Let's talk about it. And then yeah, it just progressed from there. And dann you like kept doing more and more atheist stuff and getting involved with different things. And now, why don't you tell everybody some of the things you do?

0:05:22 Tracey: Yeah, that was it.

0:05:40 Tracey: Oh, okay. Let's see. That was, was three years ago, I think, the first time I was on the show, uh, now I, well, I've worked for Hemant Mehta for two and a half years I think. I do the Friendly Atheist social media and I write for Friendly Atheist and he's got me doing a lot of things on the road. Sometimes I also do PR and social media for Pitchstone Publishing. If you don't know, Pitchtone is like, we publish a bunch of atheist books. Like one of the biggest ones we have is Peter Boghossian's Manual for Creating Atheists, but we have lots of books coming out this autumn, I'm just gonna ramble them off real fast. So Chris Matheson, he's he's the screenwriter for Bill and Ted's, the Bill and Ted movies, he's got a paperback version of his, uh, fictional story, The Story of God, coming out. Yeah, the hardback came out last year, it's really

0:05:43 Thomas: Man, sure.

0:06:26 Tracey: Funny.

0:06:26 Thomas: That's The one that everybody, whenever they hear about Thomas and the Bible, are like, hey, oh, you, you know who's doing a better thing than you're doing, this guy. And I'm like, thank you, thank you. I appreciate that.

0:06:34 Tracey: Funny. Yeah, well, he's really funny. And you're, you're funny.

0:06:37 Thomas: Yeah. That's, no, that's usually how it goes. Oh yeah, no, your thing's good, but anyway, you should check out this book. Like, what do they want me to do, like, read it and then be like, oh yeah, you're right, I shouldn't be doing this show.

0:06:51 Tracey: You. Know, actually, there was another guy, I tried to get him on his podcast and he was like, well, I'm doing the same thing, but, and it's really hard to sell, so I'm not gonna have somebody on the show who's doing the same thing but better. Okay. Okay, uh, let's see what else we have, uh, this, these are all coming out October 1st. We have Chris Matheson, Story of God paperback. Dan Riehl, he's got the Secular Activist book coming out, it's kind of just a small little, like, how to get involved locally on your, with your secular groups. Richard Carrier's new book, Science Education in the Early Roman Empire, is coming out. And Karen Elgar, she's doing like, a she's curated stories from different women who have left religion, so there are just a bunch of short non-fiction stories about women in religion leaving religion. And then November we have John Loftus's, he's John loft has writes like a bazillion books, his next book, Unapologetic, Why Philosophy of Religion Must End, uh, he likes to write those sort of contrarian books.

0:07:02 Thomas: Oh.

0:07:47 Tracey: R and Raw, he's been working on this book I guess forever and it's super thick, we've got, I've got some of the, um, the early copies of it, it's called Foundational Falsehoods of Creationism. So he's like knocking down creationism. He gets pretty fired up about that stuff.

0:07:57 Thomas: Right. I've seen that one. Well, That should Yeah, that should solve it. I mean, we'll

0:08:02 Tracey: Yeah. And those are the books we have coming out this autumn. Super busy with pitch time and then, and in addition to Pitchstone, I actually started doing the Bill Nye Film social media. And that's been a lot of fun. I was doing a little bit of, what do you call it, production assistance for them. And now I've just moved on to doing social media, so I would just show up. Wherever they were filming, I would be there because I'm hanging out with them. And they'd be like, hey, since you're going to be with us, do some release forms or ask some people if they have interviews or hold this.

0:08:35 Thomas: They didn't Have you like hold a boom mic, did they, like, here, well,

0:08:36 Tracey: No. Like yeah, I would hold them, they call them dead cats and dead wombats, I'm just learning this stuff, I don't really know much about filmmaking, but, uh, they're just like these big furry things that go on the mics. Anyway, it's been kind of fun learning about filmmaking through these guys because they're geniuses, this is, uh, Jason Sussberg and David Alvarado, they, I actually met them because I was, I'm friends with Bill, and, uh, Bill said, hey, you should interview Tracey in the movie, and they interviewed me in the movie and we hit it off. So I started running around.

0:09:11 Thomas: Are you going to be Tracey Moody film star now, are you gonna be in the movie?

0:09:17 Tracey: I'm in the movies. Yeah. I'm like, I'm in the music. I was in the movie. They interviewed me in the movie, but I'm also just randomly in shots and that's kind of an incident. There's a lot of me just kind of lurking in the background trying to stay out of shots looking awkward. The funny thing is that you have this idea of how you look, but then you see yourself through the lens of somebody else's camera and it's so awkward.

0:09:40 Thomas: Something tells me it's fine, but that's okay, all right, well, the reason you're here today, among one of the reasons I want to talk to you, is because we were talking about a certain situation and, um, it reminded me how, something that I don't know that, that I think I've learned over the years of kind of doing this and talking to people, mainly women and all that, is that I feel like there's a lot of harassment of women that goes on online. I feel it's worse for women and a lot men don't know about it. That is kind of how I feel, and I feel a lot man might be missing that, and when you told me the story that I think you're going to tell on here, I was like, geez, here's another example, and then I was, like, do you want to talk about that, and then it's now and then, then we're in the space ball scene where we get to now on the television. So what do you think?

0:10:31 Tracey: I mean, I get harassed a lot. But for me, I'm only saying this as I'm imagining from your perspective, you get harassing not at all. So I'm trying to imagine what it's like for guys to hear what I'm about to say. Yeah, I get a lot of messages from guys and a lot of them go to my other box. They don't mostly know that I'm seeing them but it's just stupid stuff. It's like, oh, you're hot or one guy said, you are the real fantasy not Christ.

0:10:59 Thomas: All right. Well, he gets a pass. That's a good, that's a big one. That's

0:11:01 Tracey: Then he said, I'll be your groupie one day. Watch. So gorgeous. Just really stupid stuff like that. That stuff doesn't I know it bothers some women when they get messages like that. Me, I just brush it off. I can deal with it. It's kind of cute. You need to cut it off there. This particular guy that I got these messages from, I actually messaged him back because I felt like he wasn't getting too vulgar, but he wasn't really sure of how he sounded. So I messaged him back and I said, I'm not sure if you're aware of how awkward and creepy these messages are coming off. So, I'll let you know they are. And he's like, yeah, I know. I fucked up.

0:11:13 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

0:11:43 Tracey: But like that's really kind of the common sentiment. It's just like guys, I don't know. It almost seems like they think that that's what women want is to message them and just say, oh, you're so beautiful. Like we're putting ourselves out there to hoping that they'll send us these messages or something. I don't know. So sometimes I message guys back and I'm just like, hey, by the way, this is not attractive or whatever you're doing is kind of weird. So maybe you shouldn't do it. Usually guys respond well and they say, oh, yeah, sorry. That was, yeah. Whoops.

0:12:14 Thomas: I wonder if they just, if, if they do this all the time to a million women and just don't expect to get a response or something. Cause that's not, I I've seen that in blog posts and stuff too. And Pete, when women talk about this, like, oh yeah, when I just confronted them, they're like, Oh yeah, sorry. You know, it's weird or, or they'll go or they're lash out. But like, I do think, yeah, maybe guys don't get that. I don't know. I can't relate to it at all. I don't understand it.

0:12:15 Tracey: Yeah.

0:12:38 Tracey: I think they might be socially awkward. I guess the internet gives them sort of this barrier that they don't have in real life. So they would never just go up to a woman in a bar and say those kinds of things but maybe they're sitting at home and they've had a couple drinks and they're feeling like It's safe to approach a woman online and I don't know, this is maybe what she wants, I don't know, because I don't really interact with women very much.

0:12:54 Thomas: Yeah.

0:13:03 Thomas: But I think it's interesting with, With your situation, because you could be the target of any number of men who are, you know, have had a couple of drinks. You know, it's one thing in real life, like you're saying, like, you could go to a bar and then you kind of expect like, okay, maybe a guy will hit on me or whatever, and that's kind of the situation we're in or something, but like you're just as a woman online, is isn't that like kind of always the situation, you know? Like, isn't it go from, this is a one-time kind of situation, to, this is just constant, like it's just non-stop pretty much.

0:13:03 Tracey: Right. With Yeah, well, it is, especially when I've recently done something, like I've recently made a friendly, a really popular Friendly Atheist post, or probably the biggest flare-up I've had of harassment was after doing the Arc Encounter videos, because we, we did live videos for Friendly Atheists, I broadcast live from Arc Encounter on Facebook, and so a lot of people were seeing my face talking, and even in the stream of, of comments that were live that we were getting, occasionally there would be some that, oh, this Tracey is really hot, or, you know, people would say things like that, but also my private messages and friend requests were blowing up with men, I mean I was getting like marriage proposals.

0:14:18 Thomas: Jeez.

0:14:19 Tracey: And stuff. Like that, yeah, it was really over the top, but I get It, like, I think that to some extent I expected this would happen because I'm putting myself out there and I'm getting my, my face is getting familiar to people. For the most part, my social media is very transparent. People feel like they know me, and they feel like, she has a really good sense of humor, she's really open, I don't think she's going to be mad if I send this message.

0:14:20 Thomas: Yeah. Right. Hmm.

0:14:44 Tracey: I feel like I'm putting myself out there, not to say that I'm excusing any of it, but I understand that people somewhat think that they know me and feel comfortable making these advances at me.

0:14:53 Thomas: Yeah, that makes sense. I guess it is important to say, because I do think a lot of what, what I say, a lot men say online is like, oh, it's not harassment, it's someone just being nice, or like someone, you know, and I would say that, I would say my perception of you is that you're, as you've kind of indicated, you're far more, you're not somebody who just calls anything harassment, harassment. Like, it seems like you're pretty open to it, and you don't mind it maybe as much as other women might. But, like, I don't know that people know that, you know? So, like, I don't—you know what I mean? So I still don't get why men do that. Like, I don't get why—why the need to send a bunch of comments. But even if that's okay, even if like that's one story, the, thing you're—the the main story that was so mind-boggling to me is like far beyond any of that.

0:15:42 Tracey: How people respond to it is how I end up judging these people that send me the messages. So if I say back to them like, hey, this is ridiculous. Please don't do this. Oftentimes they're like, oh, okay, I feel stupid. That's great. Please learn from the situation. What you don't doing is continue to antagonize the woman after she said that.

0:15:47 Thomas: Okay, right, right. Let me ask you this. How many of them did you marry, though, is the thing? So like how many where they sent that and then it was a success? Like you're like, wow, okay, I'll run away with you.

0:16:12 Tracey: I think a couple of them were like U.S. citizens, but the majority of the men who want to marry me seemed to be Middle Eastern. Isn't that weird? They have very broken English. One guy was just sending me photos of roses and a hand with an engagement ring on it. I don't think he even spoke enough English to ask me to marry him.

0:16:33 Thomas: Like whose hand was that?

0:16:37 Tracey: It's just like a stock photo. I was wondering, is it a situation where they want to marry me and move away from their country? Or I don't know. It's so weird. But consistently, the people who want to marry me are the Middle Eastern men.

0:16:39 Thomas: Oh, okay. So, He doesn't have a hand, it's just, okay, good, never mind.

0:16:55 Thomas: That's interesting.

0:16:56 Tracey: Yeah. And so actually, I know this sounds terrible, but I've mostly started declining friend requests. I accept most friend requests that I get. I check people out, make sure they're not too terrible. But a lot of Middle Eastern men, I've been hesitant to friend because most of the ones that I friend, I immediately start getting messages from after after I friend them because they're no longer in the, the filtered message folder.

0:16:56 Thomas: Uh, So God knows how many of these you're getting in your other folder that you're not even seeing, right?

0:17:25 Tracey: I, I look, I probably shouldn't admit that, but I do look, but they don't see that. I see them. And some of them are just so outrageous. Uh, but usually people just, the, the most annoying messages I get say, hello, that's it. I get so many of those.

0:17:25 Thomas: Oh, okay. Okay. Oh.

0:17:40 Thomas: Yeah, you know, actually, okay, I don't think it's the same thing, but I do get a couple of those because just because I'm, you know, have friending people from the show. Those are the most annoying. I got to say, just don't just have anything.

0:17:53 Tracey: Like what, what do you want? Okay.

0:17:54 Thomas: Yeah. Have anything other than hello. Cause like I, I, we're, I'm not going to know if you're like a bot or like, you know? I'm just, I would have no idea. I would never respond to those. So just so you know anybody, not that this, but anyway, go on.

0:18:04 Tracey: Yeah. I Actually foolishly responded to a couple of them one time and it was just, how are you today? Why are you messaging me? What do you want? You don't want to message with me? No, I don't know you. Do you know anybody in your Facebook friends list? What's going on? Okay, don't message, don't respond to any of these guys in the future. Okay, so there is one particular fellow who recently disturbed me quite a bit and it takes a lot to really get to me, uh, so this person is, he's a Christian apologist, he's actually a Catholic apologist, and I had messaged him because we needed a blurb on a book from a Christians, so I was thinking like here's a guy who plays nice with the atheist philosophy people, I think he would be willing to do this book, it's, it's written by an atheist.

0:19:02 Tracey: It's about life after death. So I asked this guy, would you be willing to blurb this book? I'll send you an advanced copy, and he said yes, and so from that point on, you know, I asked him his email address from that. He was already one of my friends on Facebook, by the way, but I'd never really interacted with him at all. From that point, on it just got so obscure. I didn't even know what he was talking about. He was just sending incessant messages. And it started about him talking about an attractive waitress that he had at this restaurant he was at. And he was,

0:19:33 Thomas: Apropos of nothing, right? I mean, you just, you just needed a blurb for a book, yeah.

0:19:38 Tracey: No, it literally left off with, I sent him a message saying, hey, can you, I have a question for you, can you do this blurb for this book? And he goes, yeah, let's do it. And so I said, what's your email?

And then that's when he started, he gave me his email, but then he just started going off and it, and it was like incoherent, talking about this waitress, talking about the music that was playing, I stopped reading his messages, and then I would wake up in the morning and see I had 20 some messages from him again and I couldn't really follow what he was talking about, uh, I think eventually I chimed in, like the next 24 hours I chimed in and I was, was like, I don't really, I'm not picking up what you're putting down. So he continued and continued with like complete incoherency.

And then I told him, then again, a couple days later, I said, I am out to dinner right now. I can't really read these messages. I am trying to be cordial. I'm trying to, right, because I still wanted the blurb from the guy, but I didn't want want to hear whatever he has to, he had to say. And so it got more personal. He started talking about me, like as if he knew me and talking about like my intelligence and talking about, um, me sending him messages, like, as if, like for instance, he said, your silence is my non silence.

0:20:33 Thomas: You Were Trying To, Maintain, like the Professional transaction you Needed Yeah Right Oh Man

0:21:03 Tracey: So he was like, he He was saying that in many ways, and he made other comments that said, by me not talking, I was sending him, quote, heart waves. So like me not responding was sending Him like telepathic messages or something that I was like interested in Him. And he just continued to talk about me as if he knew me. And it was like, it became apparent to me that he was obviously delusional or something.

0:21:30 Tracey: So I was getting worried. Like, so I actually sent him a message. I was, like, I don't follow you. And also I was on road trip at the time. I was in Chattanooga at an aquarium and he was just blowing my phone up. And what was really weird is at one point I picked up my phone because I saw I had so many messages. And you know how on Facebook Messenger, when you check your messages, it actually says read. The person who's sending you messages gets a read receipt.

0:21:03 Thomas: Right Jeez Right Right, well

0:21:55 Tracey: So as soon as I opened it, which was probably 10, 15 minutes after his last message, he saw, immediately he saw that but I read it, and he said, oh, hey. Like I hadn't even responded yet, and he was just sitting there looking at the fact that I was, that I read it.

0:22:11 Thomas: Because clearly that's a, a heartwave, I mean, if you read something, clearly you've sent a severe Heartwave

0:22:17 Tracey: Yes, me reading it, my mere existence and acknowledging that he exists was me sending him love through the phone. So then he started telling me that he wanted to meet me, that he needed to meet with me, and that wanted to have a conversation with me and that, But he was just talking about me so over the top, like I was just this really amazing, intelligent person. It was really bizarre because he didn't know anything about me. And then a couple more days go by and I asked him, can I ask you a serious question? And he said, I'd like that very much. And I said, do you see that you're having a one-sided conversation here? Because a few times I've checked in, I found this to be, you know, incomprehensive and And, um, the, the messages are just piling up. Like I have like 20 some messages at a time from you and I'm not responding.

0:22:18 Thomas: Yeah

0:23:05 Tracey: And he's like, oh, I'm really surprised, like this is my perception of the situation. And he is like, it's just that I really want, I really want to know you, I really wanna talk to you and know you, and I was like, I don't have time for everybody who wants to know me to get to know me. I'm not a library book who's just on loan. You know, I have a busy life. So he went on to just continue with using like really alarming language, like, um, I'm not going to survive this, and continued with the part about wanting to meet me, wanting to spend a few days with me, I don't even know what that means, that means like against my I will. So I was getting, I know.

0:23:46 Thomas: And The Amazing Thing is all you did was ask for a book blurb, that's it, like So clearly there's something wrong with this Guy, yeah.

0:23:54 Tracey: So, right. Well, okay. So after the part where I said, I asked him like, are you aware you're having a one-sided conversation? He went on a tangent like he was doing. And he ended that stream of messages with, don't forget, it's you who started this with a smiley face. I started this entire interaction of harassment just by saying, hey, would you blurb a book from a professional standpoint? That made me so mad. Well, he sent like the winky face emoji. And so, you know, he said a couple more messages the next morning. And I finally said, this was going on for three weeks. And the entire interaction, there were probably, I think Facebook tells me there were like 250 messages sent.

0:24:19 Thomas: Oh

0:24:43 Tracey: I sent probably six of these messages from that entire block. I finally said, please do not message me anymore. You've ignored my boundaries and you're dismissive of this bombardment.

0:24:43 Thomas: My God, and This is what I meant when I, I said you're far more tolerant of this than I think other people might be, like you really tried hard to to just give him the message and it, like, it's amazing how he wasn't getting it.

0:25:08 Tracey: Yeah, because I really sense that maybe this guy is Mentally ill and things you just don't want to poke at. I was Just like let's see if he tames himself or if this You know, see how this Plays out. I definitely didn't want to feed the fire, so some people were telling me, just block him, just block them from Facebook. Blocking people from Facebook doesn't do anything but send an insult to that person, because all they have to do, especially with me, because my, my social media is very transparent, like everything I do is public. Yeah.

0:25:11 Thomas: Yeah Yeah, yeah And It Kind of has to be, you know, for your job, right? I mean, that's kind of what You're doing now, so yeah.

0:25:42 Tracey: So If I, if I were to, uh, block him, he could go, just log out of Facebook and see everything that I'm doing. So, my social media is very transparent and everything that is public, all you have to do is log out of Facebook to see it. And so, me saying, oh, you're blocked, all I'm doing is saying, in your face, bitch. I'm not protecting myself at all. Like, I'm not making this person disappear from the planet. It doesn't really do me any good just to block them. So, I was holding off on doing it.

0:25:50 Thomas: Okay Are They Just saying that so that, you know, you won't get the messages? Is that the, is that the key?

0:26:15 Tracey: I guess, but that doesn't satisfy me. If somebody's sending me alarming messages, I'd rather see them than not see them because he could still send me messages, but like, I'm just not getting them. I would rather, if the truth is there to be known, I'd Rather know it. If he's sending me messages that are scary, I want to see them rather than not see Them. And if I block him, then I won't be seeing the weird shit he's seeing. And you know, I may need to alert the police at some point.

0:26:22 Thomas: Hmm. Okay. Okay, sure.

0:26:43 Tracey: So I'm like, no, blocking people is not a good idea. I'm not going to block him. I'm going to just stop. I've just going to continue to ignore him like I've been doing. So I finally sent him a message. I said, please stop messaging me. And then he responded immediately. And he's like, that's all you had to say. I was like, okay, right. Well, I mean, he sent like three messages after that that said, oh, I'm very glad just to know you exist. And that's All It Matters, as little as you say. It's like okay. Of course, it didn't last long. So within the next five days or so, he sent me another message that said someday, and this is my bucket list, which only has one item on it. So the only thing on his bucket list is that, that we can hang out for like a three day run.

0:26:43 Thomas: What a terrible bucket list.

0:27:35 Tracey: I've told this fucking guy that I don't want you to message me anymore. And then he sends me a message five days later saying saying on my bucket list, the only thing on my bucket list is that I want to hang out with you for three fucking days. Are you insane? You're going to have to drag me to a cabin in the woods, you maniac. It's not going to happen. I told you to stop sending messages. I'm not going be like, oh, three days. Whatever. I have nothing to do with my life. Here, you can fucking have me for three days, you fucking maniac. I was so irritated at this point that he was sending me a message. I was furious. What I did was I was in New York. I bounce around a lot. I sent his, I, okay. So I have a friend who did the favor of looking up the guy a little further. It wasn't apparent on his social media that he had a wife and four children, four young children.

0:27:35 Thomas: Oh my god.

0:28:27 Tracey: Yeah. So, I looked his wife up after my friend had looked his wife up. I looked her name up and I saw that they had a wedding photo posted and on the wedding photo was her father had commented and said she looked beautiful. So I sent her father, his father-in-law, a message and said, hey, if you would be interested, I could tell you some things about this person that is your son-in law. Would you want to know them? He messaged me back immediately. He's like, hey Tracey, sure. Yes. I would like to know these things. Him and I had an ongoing conversation. I sent him screen grabs of the insanity that was taking place in my message box and he was very interested to know them. And he was very grateful that I was telling him these things.

0:28:27 Thomas: How did he take that?

0:29:12 Tracey: You could tell he was upset and disturbed and he was like, I'm going to have to talk to my wife and some of our family members about this because apparently they don't have a good relationship with him but they love their daughter very much. So they're concerned about her.

0:29:28 Tracey: The reason I reached out to him wasn't just to get this guy in trouble But I also wanted to know, because I don't know anybody who knows this, this person personally, I need to know is this person dangerous? Can you assure me that this person doesn't have some mental instabilities and he won't come after me? So I needed to know somebody who knew him in real life.

And so, you know, after I gave him everything that I, you you know, like I said in the transcripts of our conversations and stuff. He said, unfortunately, Tracey, I can't assure you that he's not unsafe. And he advised me that filing a police report would be a good idea. Because I told him I was thinking about doing that. So I was like, well, I guess that solidifies it. This is the only Person I know who knows him in real life, his own father-in-law. So, I'm going to file a police rapport. So. I, you know. Know, continue to ignore the guy. I didn't jump on the police report right away because I was really busy and I was running around and stuff. And I was also thinking like, maybe he'll just stop messaging me. I kept thinking, maybe he'll stop. So a couple of days later, after he sent me the thing about the bucket list, wanting to meet me a couple days later. He sent me lyrics to a song. He didn't say what song it was. Of course I Googled it to look it up and it's a Pearl Jam song and

0:30:07 Thomas: Yeah.

0:30:40 Tracey: Don't Know he Has fucking terrible taste in music and I never want to meet this guy uh It was

0:30:40 Thomas: That's when you knew. No, wait. Oh man. I can't have you alienating my Pearl Jam listening audience. Sorry.

0:30:54 Tracey: Like Vitalogy isn't that kind of a bad Pearl Jam era

0:30:57 Thomas: You're right. We need to specify what album. Yeah, Vitalogy Wasn't great. Well,

0:30:58 Tracey: Yeah. I don't T know, it's just the lyrics were really weird, like the waiting drove me mad, you're finally here and I'm a mess, I take your entrance back. I'm not gonna read the whole thing but it's just like what I was reading, reading it, not knowing it was song lyrics at first, like thinking he wrote me a poem and it was really disturbing. But then at the very end of it, he said the song that was playing when we started, nothing more, now take care. So, uh, what? Like, so the first time I sent you a message saying, hey, would you want to blurb this book? This song was playing and you like assigned some significance to me with this song. I ignored it. I sent those lyrics to his father-in-law who I was was communicating with. And then a couple more days go by and I still haven't filed a police report because I'm still like, maybe I'm really naive, but I'm like, okay, I really think that nobody's this crazy. Is that really naive of me?

0:31:53 Thomas: I, I don't know, it's hard because I, I do, I think there's a part of all of us that like just keeps wanting to make it normal, like, no, it's okay, it'll be fine, no, you know, like I Think That does happen a lot with people, gosh.

0:32:03 Tracey: Like he couldn't possibly push this any further. I've stated still at this point, he's still sending me messages. And the last thing I said was stop stop sending me messages. So a couple more days go by and then I get, I'm like out with some friends and it's like 11 o'clock at night. And I get another message that says, wicked miss you sick as it is. Trust me. I know. And then he said, quick draw. I nonetheless. So like, I think that he's seeing that I'm seeing his message and yeah, I am seeing his message is at a table full of people are like, call the police.

0:32:41 Tracey: And he said, Let it be known, crystal clear. I waited for you to see each of these message, these many messaged messages before adding to the cash. So I was finally like, okay, I'm taking everyone's advice and blocking his messages from here. Uh, so I blocked his messages. Immediately I start getting emails from him. I got an email that was, it didn't even make sense, like most of the things he said didn't, the subject was notoriety and he said, I absolutely understand, talk about risk analysis, believe me, this whole thing is beyond my pay grade too, forgive me if you can, a few months ago I resolved to say what I think, no filter, and it's the one resolution in life I've followed, it wasn't easy, this is that, chica, honestly, nothing else, I don't know what he, what he meant by that.

0:32:42 Thomas: That Explains it, I Guess it's all fine and

0:33:34 Tracey: But Then he sent me another email and it was just the like creepiest shit I've ever seen. He sentme a screen grab of his messages, you know, like, like his messenger on Facebook where he tried to send me a message but but he was blocked from sending me a message so he took a screen grab of the next message he was going to send me and it says miss you period hard period and he drew a strike like, like the pen thing you can draw on your computer screen with, he like drew a spike through the other messages and he just emailed me that so I was thinking this guy's fucking crazy at this and I don't feel safe anymore. I feel like, like he's already, he's already, okay, thinks that he's communicating with me even though I'm not communicating with him.

0:34:22 Tracey: He thinks that he knows me. He's already violated my boundaries. I've blocked him. I told him to stop messaging me. He messaged me anyway. I blocked him and he's gone around, he circumvented that and he is now sending me emails. He will stop at nothing to get messages to me.

0:34:41 Thomas: I feel like probably everyone else is way ahead of you on this, like I still think you, like you said, I mean you were kind of maybe you're busy and you're whatever but like I feel like most people and I'm guessing most people you asked were like, you need to call the police right away. You Really were trying to like kind of make it okay, um, and I think everybody was probably was way ahead of you, this guy, I don't think this represents like most internet harassers, I would hope, but but he really just can't even, like, like, he cannot understand what's happening, which means he's...

0:34:55 Tracey: Yeah. Or he just doesn't respect. He doesn't expect my boundaries. He doesn't care about the fact that I don't. That's what's worrying me. And throughout this whole thing, he's never objectified me. He's never talked to me sexually. He'S never done anything that people that send me harassing messages would do. I'm used to people who send me dick pics. I'M USED TO PEOPLE WHO TALK ABOUT

0:35:15 Thomas: Yeah, yeah. Hmm. That's a good point. I was going to say, how many dick pic... Do you have, like a dick pic per minute rate? Like, are you up to, like 60 DPMs? Is that a standard parlance for women online? Oh, yeah, I get, like 40, 45 DPM, yeah?

0:35:44 Tracey: DICK Pics I get, I don't think they're from peoples who follow me for atheism. I think they're people who just randomly send women dick pics. Because they don't seem their messages don't seem personal enough, like they know me, but you know I do get at least

0:35:51 Thomas: Yeah, Yeah. Yeah, but once again, how many of those work, like, you probably have sex with, what, 25 percent of them, or what are we at, 20 percent, just

0:36:02 Tracey: Half at least half, yeah, I mean usually they're not the dick that's pictured when I show up, it's really disappointing.

0:36:04 Thomas: Instantly, you're just like, and you could, you brought the photo, too, you like, well, you have it printed out, you are like, wait a minute, this is not, this is now what I was promised, well

0:36:16 Tracey: I'd say about 90 of the 50 are disappointments, I

0:36:20 Thomas: Then, there is a good little percentage there, that is a success, so that is good, no, but seriously, I do not get it, like what, I don't get it. That is what I don't get about it, like why don't people, yeah, I guess, yeah, I don't understand, anyway, sorry, sorry to interrupt, back to you, right,

0:36:29 Tracey: Think it's a, it's an exhibitionist thrill. Well, aside from the dick pics, like, I, I mean, I get a lot of messages, not just private messages, but a lot of comments on the posts that I make that are sexual in nature, like if there's even a half of an inch of cleavage showing in a photo of me, that's all the picture is about, suddenly men are talking about, you know, jokingly masturbating, it's just stupid shit. I actually delete a lot those photos because I don't want my page to be overrun by that kind of stuff. But I'm used to that. That's the kind of thing that it's just like sad to say, that's just normal. It's just whatever. I overlook it. It doesn't really – it doesn't bother me. It doesn't wear me down. I'm just like whatever. It's kind of just how men are. I'm not excusing it. I'm not necessarily okay with it. But I just know, like, men are just kind of dumb and don't know how to behave.

0:37:27 Tracey: But to tell you the truth, I have a lot of good guys on my page. A lot of times I will ignore that. I always ignore it or delete it. But a lot of times the good guys come and they're like, dude, what the fuck? So I have a lot of good guys who show up and, you know, of course the person who posts the original post is like, whatever, you just kiss an ass or whatever. No, but I'm glad those guys are there because that's the only thing men will listen to is other men. They won't listen to women. Men need to keep other men in check. So I I appreciate those guys.

0:37:49 Thomas: Nighting bro yeah, that's true, I'm just so unoriginal is the thing. Like, I don't get why they don't get that you have seen this a million times a day. You know? Like, ah, I dunno.

0:38:00 Tracey: Yeah, I know. All I want to know is what do they expect? Do they expect me to be like, oh, let me check your photos out, homie. Maybe I want a get with this. What do you think is going to happen? I don't know. I'm much more charmed by guys who don't turn me into a sexual object. That's the truth. I am sure most women are that way.

0:38:11 Thomas: Yeah. But

0:38:29 Tracey: Am not using this creep's name. I am going to go ahead and refer to him as a creep. I am not using his name because as, as of late, he hasn't been messaging me. And as long as he doesn't, I won't out him any further. But if he does, I will happily post this shit everywhere because I'm so sick of it. I don't want to deal with it anymore. No.

0:38:29 Thomas: But That's so interesting. I didn't even think of that when you first told me this. Like, oh yeah, he isn't, he wasn't, he hasn't been sexual at all. It's kind of a weird, I didn't even think about it. It yeah what kind of weirdo wouldn't be sexual with you. Well,

0:38:57 Tracey: That's that's what tips me off as something that's notable because, you know, he thinks I'm talking to him telepathically or whatever. You know, he believes in the supernatural, so I don't think that's too far-fetched to assume when, when he says I'm sending him heart waves and that my silence is his non-silence, I think it's fair to say that he means that in kind of supernatural, like, brainwaves way. He believes in Catholicism, for fuck's sake. So he's thinking I'm send him messages. And yeah.

0:39:29 Thomas: That doesn't stop him from carrying this on while he has a wife and four kids. But anyway, yeah, okay, go on. But he's in Catholicism.

0:39:35 Tracey: So he acts like he knows me and he's putting me on a pedestal. He said a lot of very flattering things to the extent of like how I know what I'm doing. And I'm like super intelligent. Unintelligent and he seems like blown away by meanness. I mean, who can blame him?

0:39:35 Thomas: Yeah yeah

0:39:53 Tracey: No, seriously. He's creeping me out because he's not sexualizing me and that's very unusual. So it makes me think that the people who kill, who just show up and shoot people randomly, like the girl who was on The Voice who just randomly was murdered at some event, was she, the guy who was obsessed with her, was he sending her messages saying he'd kill her or was he just thinking that he had some relationship with her? I think about like fans who show up and stalk people. Are they literally threatening people's lives or are they just like psychotically obsessed and thinking they have a relationship with this person? That's why this guy is notable because I think he's mentally ill. So I thought, okay, this is finally time to call the police because I didn't know exactly where he was.

0:40:41 Tracey: Um, you know, I'm in New York City and his father-in-law tells me he's in New England. That's very vague. I mean, it's a very large area, the New England area. It could be like an hour, an hour north of me. So I don't know. And I'm very transparent on my social media. I dunno, can he look me up? And see

0:40:59 Thomas: That's scary I mean, he might just all of a sudden, he's there. Yeah.

0:41:03 Tracey: I've already told him stop messaging me and he's, he's like, I want to spend three days with you. This seems to me like people who get shot and killed because people are obsessed with them. So I'm like, oh, this guy, he might come looking for me. I tag myself when I'm out places. It's always notable where I am. I was going to go to the Women in Secularism Conference in DC. I didn't end up going. But anyway, that's a place where where you could track me down very easily. So I was worried. Also, I was doing a Bill Nye film scavenger hunt. And the final clue on the hunt was where I was. I was with the prize. It was like this huge prize package with all the signed stuff. So, I wasn't sure what I was going to do. I was worried that, you know, the Saturday clue was going give away where I was. He was going to show up and just murder me. I

0:41:05 Thomas: Yeah I'd

0:41:52 Tracey: Mean, it's

0:41:52 Thomas: Be like man, I'm so glad I'm good at scavenger hunt, so I was able to, he went through the whole thing. Yeah.

0:41:58 Tracey: So silly to talk about this stuff as if, like, somebody's just gonna show up and murder me. But um, yeah.

0:42:01 Thomas: It's it's silly until, like, it just happens and then you're dead. Like, I mean, I'm not saying it happens, like, it's, I doubt the odds are like super high, but it's, I mean, it, it's sort of terrorizing that you have to think about that all the time, you know?

0:42:16 Tracey: And you know what, it was upsetting me and nothing really upsets me. I, I can deal with some crazy shit you wouldn't believe the stuff I've dealt with my life so this guy was like, he was mentally tormenting me because he was sending me messages all, all hours of all days. He was sitting me messages and he was getting obsessive and it was like, I, you know, I was trying to decide what do I do about this. And so, like, it was always in the back of my mind. Or it was always literally on my phone. Yeah, um, it was tormenting. So I was like, I was really upset by the time I finally called the police because I'm like, he won't fucking go away. And I've done everything I know to do to calm people down. So finally, the day after, cause he was sending me these emails, the really bizarre email where he said he missed me hard, the next morning I, I sent his, um, his father-in-law the most recent messages I got from him because I was keeping him updated. And I finally decided to just call the NYPD.

0:42:16 Thomas: Yeah I can vouch for that you nothing upsets you. No,

0:43:16 Tracey: I mean, I know they're busy. I was researching online, like, what's, where do you file harassment reports? And nothing's really obvious. They really haven't gotten up to speed on this kind of stuff. So I, I called the non-emergency number, which is the 311 number. And, and I told the lady, there's a man who's been harassing me online for the last three weeks and it's getting progressively scarier.

Like, he, he seems to think he knows me and he wants to hang out with me and I'm fearing at this point that he's going to try to find me. And she goes, well, if you feel like somebody is threatening, or I don't remember exactly her words, but she said, like, if you feel like this is an urgent situation where you need help, I have to transfer you to 9-1-1. Before I even said anything, she just transferred me. And then you get the whole, like, I've only heard this recording on the, on, on the TV before, but they were like, 9-1-1, please stay here, emergency. I was like, God, this feels so over the top. I mean, the whole time I'm thinking this feels ridiculous. I'm like, this is too much. But, like, I know it's not. I

0:44:21 Tracey: Feel like it's what I need to do. But at the, the same time, I'm such a mellow person that I'm I'm like, I'm doing 9-1-1, this is insane. So I tell the lady, um, the same thing I told 3-1 one lady. I said there's a man harassing me online. I don't know his mental stability. I don't know him at all. But I feel like he might come to find me. And so the lady said, well, do you, we'll have some NYPD officers out to visit you, where, you know, where, where do you live? So I gave her the address to the apartment and I waited. I, like, went down to the lobby because there's door guys. So I just went down there, just wait so I could meet them and bring them up. And I waited and waited and I went back up to the department and I waited for two hours and the NYPD never showed up. And so finally I

0:44:21 Thomas: It's not yeah it really isn't yeah two hours

0:45:08 Tracey: Got up two fucking hours. I mean, like I knew the guy, I didn't think he was going to show up in the next couple of hours and just kill me. But still, that was, I would have been happy to do that.

0:45:08 Thomas: Wow, why couldn't they do this over the phone? Like, why do they have to do you know yeah okay

0:45:21 Tracey: I would have been happy to do that. But I don't know. They were just treating it like an emergency situation, which I felt was really over the top. I ate tiramisu, I ate a mud pie, I eat a lemon tart. I was feeling like nauseous. That's all I had in the apartment. I didn't think I had time to go out and get some food.

0:45:39 Thomas: Yeah you can't go anywhere because you're waiting for him it's like the cable guy is coming to fix your. Yeah.

0:45:42 Tracey: Right, yeah. It was so, it was so cruel of them to just leave me in the department with just nothing but sugary shit to eat. And then finally, my phone rings and I answer it and it's an NYPD officer. Hi, this is so-and-so. You called 9-1-1? Well, you know, not exactly. I didn't call 9-1-1 if you remember, right? But anyway, I was like, yeah. So, well, somebody harassing you on Facebook? Well. Okay. So. You know, I'm thinking this guy wants to take a report. Let me start, start from the beginning. I was like, okay, well, a gentleman that I messaged on Facebook, who is a mutual Facebook friend with many of my friends. I sent him a message because I do PR for a book publishing company. And I wanted to see if he would do a blurb because he's an apologist. And I'm just talking way too much to this guy.

And he's like, so what did he say? Did he say he was threatening you? And I was, like, OK, let me lay out the situation here, OK? Because there's more to it than just that. And so I started going on like, I think the man might be delusional because he's thinking that he knows me and that I'm sending him like telepathic messages that I am interested in him. And it's escalated.

0:46:01 Thomas: Right

0:46:59 Tracey: So what? So like he said he's going to hurt you or did he threaten you? I'm like, let me get there. Okay. So let me just tell the story. He has no patience for the situation, so he's now, um, sending me messages even though I've blocked him and he wants to meet me and, uh, it's becoming kind of alarming. And so, what do you say, that was threatening?

And I was like, he didn't necessarily say he was going to come kill me if that's what you're asking, but he's, he's demonstrating all the symptoms of a crazy person who might come hurt me. And so the cop was just like, well, look, you blocked him on Facebook, just block his email. He sounds a little kooky, maybe he'll go away. And I was like, I hung up on the cop. He was like mid-sentence and I just fucking hung up on him. I couldn't fucking believe how he wouldn't even listen to my story. I didn't say that somebody was threatening me. I called because I wanted to file a harassment complaint. I thought it was worth somebody listening to. I thought that they would be interested in taking his name. They didn't even ask what his name was. You think they would want to run his name in the system and say, oh, yeah, actually, this guy's a sex offender.

He's raped three women. Yeah, good thing we know that he's harassing another woman. You know, wouldn't they be interested in typing his name? And they didn't ask that. They didn't even have my full name. They knew nothing but my phone number and that I called 911, which I didn't. So I was so furious at the NYPD for not taking me seriously.

0:47:45 Thomas: Yeah yeah

0:48:30 Tracey: Feeling, And

0:48:30 Thomas: And that's, that's the, that's what really killed me about this story, is that, one thing, if you know, yeah, okay, a lot of harmless guys sending you dick pics, or, you know, sending stuff that in general is, I think, is really stupid and annoying and people should not do. But whatever, you can say, hey, stop doing this. You know, you realize how bad this is and, or how stupid this is. And they go, oh, shit, you're right, I'm sorry. You know, that's one thing. But when you've got someone who clearly there's something wrong with them and very clearly, like, you've even, I think, way underestimated the danger in my mind. Like, I, I would have been maybe even more scared than you. Like, it seems like, not to say you weren't scared, but like you gave it so much time. You know, like you give it so, you gave him so many more chances.

0:49:15 Tracey: It was almost a month of him sending me messages.

0:49:17 Thomas: Yeah, you give him so much more time. And then When you finally are like, okay, this is getting too weird. I need to do something about it. That you can't even get anything done. It just, it, that really pissed me off. And I just wish that part of it separate from, can't we at least agree on that? I don't know what the breakdown of who listens to the show is, but I got to think that even the most MRA kind of guy could at least grant that cop should have at least done a little more due diligence, right? Right. I mean, can we at least all agree on that? Can we at last all agree if you fucking want to call and talk about how someone is really seeming off and might come find you and there's any and you make a case for it and you can show the posts and whatever they want you to do to demonstrate it,

0:49:20 Tracey: I

0:50:05 Thomas: That they at least, like, take it somewhat seriously, file a damn report, like do some paperwork, do something.

0:50:12 Tracey: I was very disappointed they didn't want to come because I wanted them to see the messages. I didn't want to just verbalize my concern. I know if anybody were to see this string of messages, they would be as alarmed as I was. And also, no, not at all. They didn't even say, hey, okay, send him to this email address.

0:50:16 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah. But he didn't even give you the chance. Yeah. Yeah.

0:50:29 Tracey: He's just like, whatever, lady. If he's not there with a knife.

0:50:31 Thomas: He's like, we have a, he's like send it to dick pics at nypd.gov or whatever. Like,

0:50:37 Tracey: I even told the cop when I was trying to tell him, wait, I think I have a reason to be concerned. I even said, I even him that I've been in contact with this man's father-in-law, and he tells me that he cannot assure me this man is not unsafe, and he has advised me to file a police report. That wasn't even enough for this cop to give a Shit. Yeah.

0:50:53 Thomas: Yeah. Oh my God. Really? You told him that and he didn't care.

0:50:57 Tracey: I fucking told him that he didn't care, that's why I hung up on him, because there was like four interruptions where he was like, what do you say, that was threatening, like I know you're in the NYPD and you're so fucking cool with your, I don't know what the hell's going on around New York, it's scary, but I just wanted to make note of the fact that if I turn up dead, here's the name you need to fucking look up it

0:50:58 Thomas: Oh yeah. Yeah.

0:51:21 Thomas: You know, just in case we should know this was before the bomb went off in NYC, right? Just in case anyone is like, well, maybe they were a little busy with this was Before that.

0:51:27 Tracey: Was it was yeah. Not yet, this is like two days before that bomb went off in Chelsea and I was like, I was like 20 blocks north of that bomb, by the way. It was, I didn't even hear it, I don't know anything about that. Um, I just wanted to make a note of it. Wasn't even that you could necessarily stop him from coming to find me, but if something were to happen to me, the first person you need to, to be suspicious of is this particular person. And I've already, like, so I was running a, a very limited, uh, post on Facebook. I have a, I make posts that are to very close friends on Facebook where only close friends could see it, and they've seen the ongoing transcript of this guy. So everybody I know close knows this guy's name and knows, you know, they knew to like look out for this guy, whatever. But I just wanted the police to know, and they weren't even interested in knowing his name, which blew my mind.

0:51:33 Thomas: Yeah, well yeah. And And think about, I mean, I women's ex boyfriends are the ones who, you know, if a woman dies, check the ex boyfriend, like it's, it's one of the highest rates of things that happen. I can Only imagine if maybe that's going on with this, like maybe a woman calls and is like, Hey, my ex boyfriend is really saying some shit, you Know? And it's like, well, what, what did he say? What do you read? You know? And like the burden of proof for them is apparently so high. I mean, I don't want to just generalize based on this one cop, but I do really think it's a problem. Like people are, law enforcement is not taking these things very seriously, I do not think.

0:52:54 Tracey: And, and I try, and I, you know, I try to be as modest as possible, but I'm like, I am a very minor internet figure, so, you know, like it's understandable that people believe that they know me when they don't really know me. And so I was trying to explain that part to him. So I thought maybe he would take me more seriously if he understood that, like, I have like a persona online that I don't know. But nothing mattered to this guy, he's just like, I need to get back. He had like a check to do on his paperwork, call this person back and get it over with. That was his deal. So I hung up with that guy feeling very off with the system. At this point I was thinking, you know what, I think I'm a danger to this guy because I'm fucking furious that he has disregarded

0:53:38 Thomas: So then you reported yourself, is what you are saying. You are like, I am a danger to this guy. No, I'm just kidding.

0:53:42 Tracey: I'm not making any threats, but I'm just saying I was so furious the fact that somebody could have so much control over me, my, you know, my Facebook post, because at this point I was no longer post tagging where I was. I was going places and then I was tagging myself later, I was trying to be more careful. I had told the door guys that, you know, because there's like the apartment I was staying at, there's door guys downstairs. I told them, you know, I gave them his photo. I said, this man is not to come up to our floor at all. And they were very understanding. And so like I'd done all the things like to protect myself. And I was still really furious that he was having this control over my, you know, because it was taking my time. Like I have a lot of shit to do. And here I am waiting around for the police for some odd hours, and having to talk to the door guys and having to try to make sure everybody, everything's in place. And then I'm not tagging myself, place.

I felt like I was being so displaced from my normal life that I was furious that somebody could have this kind of control over me. So I was mad. And I know there's another guy that he does a website with. They do a Christian apologist website. And I saw that they were in some photos together. So I'm thinking, this guy is a friend of his. He knows him in real life. So I sent him a message. And

0:54:14 Thomas: Well, that is nice.

0:54:55 Tracey: I said, oh, this is still the next morning. This is the morning after he was sending me emails.

0:54:55 Thomas: Well, wait, had he bothered you more or are you just still, are you being proactive now? Oh,

0:55:03 Tracey: So not much time has passed.

0:55:03 Thomas: Okay, okay. Gotcha.

0:55:06 Tracey: Sent his friend a message. Because as far as I know, he's still going to message me again. So far, since I told him to stop, he'd still sent me messages every couple days. He's still gonna send me messages. I know this already. So I messaged one of his close friends. And I said, uh, if you could call me, I gave him my phone number. If you could call me and not tell so-and-so that you're contacting me, that'd be great. Thank you. I don't know this guy at all. And so he called me within like an hour And I said let me ask you about your friend. And, um, I need to know like, is he mentally unstable? Stable. Here's what he's been doing to me. According to his friend, he said that, yeah, he told me he was talking to you, but he told Me it was like a mutual thing.

0:55:13 Thomas: Yeah. Yeah.

0:55:51 Tracey: Like I was interested in him too. I'm like, are you fucking kidding me? Of 250 messages he sent me, I've sent him six. I'm not interested. I started professionally. I tried to keep it professional. And then I told him to stop messaging me. And I told him that I'd already contacted his father-in-law. I contacted and talk to the police and it seriously needed to fucking stop and if he didn't keep his friend on a leash he's gonna get himself in a lot of trouble because he's fucking with the wrong person Right now I was so mad because his friend was, you know, I mean, he was being understanding. I think he really understood that, like, yeah, I know this guy's kind of weird, but at the same time he's like kind of making excuses for him, like I think that he Just like really cares about you and, you know, he doesn't fucking know me. You know, I'm like really punctuating my fucks

0:55:51 Thomas: Oh. Yeah. Yeah. Well.

0:56:36 Tracey: Right now, uh, but he was, it seemed like he was being a little bit apologetic of his friends

0:56:42 Thomas: It might take him a while to wrap his mind around, like, what, what level of, you know, because he Thought.

0:56:46 Tracey: Know. Yeah.

0:56:46 Thomas: It was mutual. I'm sure to, I'm sure there was some catching up of Like his brain of to what was Actually going On. Oh.

0:56:49 Tracey: Well. Yeah. That's True. So I think from what is what I was gathering from his friend is that he's not like calmly with this, with like this, with women, so I think I seem to be like an exception. Like, I don't think he is harassing A lot of other women, it's just me. But uh, he told me that, so apparently he thought that we were like into each other and that, um, he's, he told me he has a weird relationship with his wife and like, apparently, and when I told him that I'm concerned that I am concerned about my well-being at this point, he sort of laughed it off like, oh, like you think he's gonna come find you, you know, he said it in this joking way and that really, that's what really kind of pissed me off. Like, like, excuse me? Why would I not think that?

0:57:01 Thomas: Cool. Cool. Yeah.

0:57:33 Tracey: I don't fucking know this guy. You don't know this guys. That's what happens when people go out and they randomly kill people is everybody who's close to them goes, oh, no, he was a good guy. No, like, I knew him so well. Or, you know, people say that even about their own children. Like, no. He was a great guy. He was good kid. You wouldn't do that. You don't know your friend. Don't vouch for your friend. Don't vouch for men who are harassing women. It makes me sick. So I, you know, I got a little defensive at that point. And that was when I kind of chimed in, like, you need to keep your friend on a leash because he's about to get his ass in trouble because the police know his name. His father-in-law knows what he's up to. Everybody knows. So I was like, I want him to stop messaging me. It's getting out of hand. It's bothering me. It's affecting my life at this point. And so he said, OK, well, I'll talk to him and I won't tell him we had this conversation. I was, like. No, you tell

0:57:40 Thomas: He seems so quiet. Yeah, yeah,

0:58:22 Tracey: Him. You tell him that I talked to you and that I contacted his father-in-law and the police. You tell them everything. I don't fucking care at this point, I'm so ready to do this. At this point, I was still so pissed off that NYPD officer that I didn't even care to provoke anything. I wanted him to threaten me at thispoint I wanted himto threaten me so I could take something that officer and be like, here you go, is this what you wanted? You know, I wanted to escalate to the next level because I felt like he was capable of being in completely insane to the point where the police would care about it.

0:58:30 Thomas: Yeah.

0:58:52 Thomas: So is that where it left off?

0:58:54 Tracey: Then I sent his, his stepfather, I'm sorry, his, his father-in-law a message and I said I contacted the police. And his father-in-law, you know, he was, he was, he's a really great guy. He was very concerned the whole time. He was very clear, it was very clear to me that he was concerned about his son-in-law being maybe a bad person.

0:59:14 Thomas: Yeah.

0:59:14 Tracey: He didn't have a good relationship with him. He's protective of his daughter. He wanted to to talk to his daughter about this, but he wanted to like wait till everything was in about the situation. And so after I told him I contacted the police, he said, okay, do you mind if we share this information with our daughter? Because he had already told his wife, one of his other children, and some family friends. So he said, do you, do you care if we show this information with her daughter now that you know the police have been contacted so we she can find out that about this before, before the police get to her? And I was like, yes, please. So, I, yeah, best of luck. No.

0:59:49 Thomas: Yeah well so you don't know how that went or anything?

0:59:52 Tracey: I don't.

0:59:53 Thomas: Yeah well

0:59:53 Tracey: That was the last thing we spoke about. And uh, he was a really nice guy. I knew. Yeah.

0:59:56 Thomas: I'm glad you haven't heard anything. It's probably a good sign I guess. It sounds like he didn't lash out on you or yet.

1:00:03 Tracey: And. Then, okay, so the next day I was at the Louis CK concert, or uh, not a concert, when it's comedian, whatever it is, at Madison Square Garden, which was awesome. I was sending, I was getting messages from the friend who I talked to the day before, and he was telling me that he talked to him and that, um, he thought it was going to stop now. And that he, he said, thought he was more concerned about my well-being, like the crazy guy was concerned about my well-being. And that was why he was incessantly sending me messages. I sent nothing to indicate I am, I have a problem with my well-being. It was just as

1:00:10 Thomas: Yes, whatever. Whatever.

1:00:35 Thomas: Yeah. Well, you, it was, it must've been something in the heart waves you were sending him. He's like, Hmm, these are unhealthy heart waves. Do you have a, do you have arrhythmia or whatever?

1:00:44 Tracey: Far I know, he was the only one who gets the word suicide at any point. Yeah. Uh, so he was sending me messages saying that, and that he thought it was going to be done for. And uh, yeah, that was actually the end of it. So I haven't got any more messages, it's been a week now.

1:00:51 Thomas: Yeah. Oh, that's positive. I guess at least it seems like hopefully.

1:01:06 Tracey: It's fucking ridiculous, I can't believe I had to deal with that for an entire

1:01:10 Thomas: Well that's, that'S where we should be in our society. We should be, you have to take the law into your own hands. That's That's where we definitely want to be as a society. Pretty sure.

1:01:11 Tracey: Yeah. That's how I felt. I felt like I was having to take care of all of this by myself and I brought none of it on myself. It was just entirely my burden, and it shouldn't have been. And I still think there should be, um, I still think the police need to keep up with this guy. I don't think he's right. He's not right. Also, his friend told me that, oh, is his wife's aware, of his wife knows about the messages already. Oh, yeah. Right.

1:01:42 Thomas: Yeah. I'm glad you haven't heard anything back because hopefully, well, I think I am. I don't know. Oh, you never know. But yeah, really, I mean, you ever know. It's like it's like Bush saying mission accomplished or something like it could be that or it could it could be that it's fine. I don't know. Yeah, it's just sucks.

1:01:49 Tracey: He couldn't be in root. No, I told him.

1:02:03 Thomas: But it sucks that you get no help from anybody on it.

1:02:03 Tracey: Well, the day I know. So the day, the next morning when I, when I contacted his friend and his father-in-law and the police, I noticed suddenly his Facebook profile changed and now his Facebook photo is of him and his wife and he's made some posts about him and his children and his life. Whereas before, there was no existence of his wife on his Facebook profile. So I don't know if he's trying to cover his tracks or what. It seems like he realizes he's in trouble.

1:02:34 Thomas: All right. Well, I'm really glad. Thank you for coming on and telling that story, because I just I don't know. This is a sensitive issue for me. I don't have any particular reason why, other than it just seems like complete bullshit. And it's, it's frustrating that, I don't know. I just think these things need to be taken more seriously. Like the, the, law enforcement needs to catch up with where things are in this day and age, you know?

1:02:56 Tracey: Yeah, on the internet where most people seem to reside side these days. We don't even live real lives. Everything is on Facebook or Twitter or wherever else. I'm happy to talk about it.

1:02:58 Thomas: Yeah. Live. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. All right. Well, we're plum out of time. Thanks for sharing that. I'd appreciate it. I really hope everything's okay. Yeah.

1:03:15 Tracey: No, I'm totally fine. I am a very resilient human being. He wore me down for a few weeks, but I'm fine. And also I've been drinking this entire time. So I'm just kind of sleepy.

1:03:20 Thomas: Yeah. Well, thanks for being drunk on the show and spilling your story.

1:03:29 Tracey: You know how I do. Thanks, Thomas.

1:03:32 Thomas: All right. Tracey Moody, anything you need to point people to

1:03:36 Tracey: My Facebook friend, but don't send me any dirty messages. That's all I can say. Just hang out and be cool.

1:03:39 Thomas: Yes, please. All right, Yeah, everybody. That should solve the online problems. Just everybody hang Out be

1:03:47 Tracey: Just know it front. No, I seriously think that if more men listen to this story and listen to maybe some of the other messages I've gotten, really, just consider what you're sending to women. Consider how well you know them. Consider how it's going to come off. Stop. Just fucking stop, okay?

1:03:48 Thomas: Cool. Yeah.

1:03:57 Thomas: I I don't think you can say it much better than that, so thanks, Tracey.

1:04:06 Tracey: Feel it out. Feel it first. See if she wants to see your dick before you send it. No, Okay, bye, guys.

1:04:07 Thomas: Yeah. Okay, okay. Yeah. Bye.

1:04:38 Thomas: All right, there you have it. I do want to note that later on, Tracey was able to file a report with the Nashville police. I think they had a little more time on their hands, but nonetheless, the response from the NYPD was disappointing, to say the least. Now's the time where I do that thing where I thank my very very very kind new patrons at patreon.com slash atheists and they are Kirk Mudle or something, Adam Brenton, Caleb Lackey, Aimée Terese, Alice Ashton, Kim Bojkovsky, Chad Farrow, Ondrej Sramek, Sakashite Fukasumi, Jose A Sanchez, Gerard Clarke, Lyon Davis, Beth Swope, Emily, Matt Bunker, Matthew to you, Kennedy.

1:05:25 Thomas: Thank you guys so much for your kind support. I really appreciate it. And oh, I believe next week you should get nice early access to part two, if all goes according to plan. Sometimes schedules get mixed up, but I'm planning on having a nice science-y episode that I think you're going to like. And I'm hoping it'll be two parts because there's so much to it. And whenever there's two parts on this show, you guys get part two early if you're a patron. So So, thanks for pledging at patreon.com slash atheist, and I think that's all I have to say for this week. I really appreciate your listenership and your comments and everything you guys do to participate in the show. It's much appreciated, and And with that said, I just want to thank production assistant Haley for being awesome, and you guys once again for listening. See you next week.