I'm not a fan of Reddit. In fact, in all the years I've had a Reddit account, I used it maybe a handful of times, even going years without logging in.
Back in 2012, a subreddit called "r/SexOffenderSupport" was created. I vaguely remember making a few posts over the years but not even at this page. I never liked the idea of having discussions of a personal nature on a public forum that is on the same level of intelligence as 4chan. However, a few other folks who read my articles use this page. I never understood why when for years, SOSEN maintained a PRIVATE and VETTED forums by Persons Forced to Register and yet folks chose to post on Facebook or Reddit instead for the sake of convenience.
The problem with these public sites is that ANYONE can be there including trolls. In the early days of the movement, when even SOSEN's forums were open to the public, vigilantes routinely infiltrated the group and stirred up trouble. One vigilante even got on SOSEN staff at the time then leaked personal info to their viewers (Operation SORoarful, which posted information so private I could not report the info here.) Many of the earliest posts to this page is evidence of that effort.
It appears the same thing has happened at the subreddit r/SexOffenderSupport
I had received a few reports from people who had posted information, including data from my main website, and was taken down. One person reported being approached in a PM claiming to be a PO and wanted more info from them, but balked when that person wanted to know that person's identity to prove the PO was authentic. Another person who merely asked why certain material was being censored, he was banned and even threatened by one of the anonymous moderators (the mod told him they "called the authorities" on them).
9No one misinterpreted anything, by the way. I was given screenshots of the actual conversation.)
They gave me the same treatment but that is not surprising.
They took it a step further by posting a link to a known troll site that personally attacks me:
Over the years, a few people I have posted here on this anti-vigilante blog have been people who have people claiming to be on the side of anti-registry activism. (T-Sand, the SORCOMM community/Metanoid, and Shaun Webb immediately come to mind.) Claiming to be on our side does not make it true.
Also, I've ALWAYS been wary of allowing victim advocates and law enforcement onto a site that ts supposed to be for support for people accused or convicted of sex offenses to seek advice. The other groups tend to disagree. But on this subreddit, they had allowed someone purporting to be a victim on the page and she was encouraging people to leave their boyfriends.
Age 18 is an adult. You're old enough to go to war, vote, live on your own, pay taxes, etc. Anyways, WeightSlow also posted similar bad dating advice on another thread:
In fact, the REAL reason they banned references to my website was because I confronted this self-professed "victim" for posting bad advice and posting data from the SMART Office, the beaurocratic agency designed to promote the Adam Walsh Act:
This is just what they have done on a personal level. It was NEVER about perceived "inaccuraies" of the Once Fallen website, it was a power trip from folks who want to be big fishes in small ponds. In reality, one should ALWAYS be wary of taking advice from randos on the Internet. Once Fallen has a public name attached to the brand, not an anonymous name as you will find on this Subreddit. None of these mods have the guts to use REAL names. There was resistance behind this idea in the early days of the anti-registry movement; I pushed hard for the things many folks take fore granted, like transparency among the staff of anti-registry agencies and bold disclaimers. To NARSOL's credit, they have both. But there was resistance back in the early days of this movement and I was blasted for pushing this. But I believe people should standby their beliefs withe their real names.
I've never understood why so many people prefer a public forum like Reddit or going to social media over a private forum like SOSEN, which closed up shop last year after the PRIVATE and VETTED forums had slowed in membership to a few loyal users. At the least, I always advise getting second opinions. The laws change frequently.
However, r/SexOffenderIssues cannot be trusted. Allow victim advocates and law enforcement agents free reign on this page is not good. Banning people for supporting Once Fallen is worse. Claiming my advice will land people in jail, however, is unforgivable, especially given they've posted lots of other questionable things besides what I've shared above.
My advice is to not patronize this site. Period.
(PS: They also posted a hit piece claiming I harassed them for "two days straight." The exchange took place over maybe 16 hours tops. Are they using Florida's definition of a day where it includes "any part of a day"?)
See also:
