The Dark Furie

You there, come closer and listen to my tale. Hurry up, I don't have all day and it's very rare that I'm this open about myself.

On November 12th 1977, the world changed and, for me at least, turned inside out. A storm raged over the Irish sea and a small ferry was rocked by the waves. As thunder crashed around and lightning briefly illuminated the coast, I was born screaming into a world that had long gone mad.

My intellect began to show through early on. By the time I was three years old I'd taught myself to read from newspapers and when I was five I joined the local library, taking the three minute walk up there two or three times a week and spending hours in my bedroom reading anything I could get my hands on. Despite being as intelligent as any adult I met, school was difficult for me as I had more than one confrontation with teachers due to questioning them beyond the bounds of their knowledge or paying little attention in class as I had already found out what they were teaching on my own. Later on a teacher in middle school would take an interest in me and put me through an IQ test during one of my many detentions. The results would show me to have an IQ of 195, almost twice the national average and this teacher approached my family to talk about further opportunities open to someone like me. They laughed in his face and my mind was left to ferment.

As I got older still, the television age slowly ended and the internet age began, progressing slowly to the point we're at now where all the horrors of the world are pulled into the living rooms of young and old alike. I embraced the web early, entering chatrooms to find like-minded individuals that I could have conversations with, about anything but the He Man and Thundercats based ones my own age group predominantly had. The small amount of subject matter on the web in those days meant there wasn't much to talk about, unlike today when you can find anything you're interested in online. This helped me find new interests and hobbies, with me becoming interested in things mostly so I could hold interesting conversations about them, and these hobbies have stuck with me throughout my life as my passion for them grew. I discussed science-fiction television shows with Americans I'd soon learn lived in basements of their parents house and had the same job they got in high school, and had lively debates about the possible realities and impossibilities of comic books with a group of people who would later become briefly famous for proving something actually exists instead of being a theory. Despite being the youngest member of those groups by far, my confidence and strong views caused me to be treated as the patriarch of most groups I was involved in, settling arguments between and giving advice to people who'd scoff at me in real life. The experience bred lifelong interests as well as exposing me to how the human mind works without physical preconceptions getting in the way, and those are lessons I've carried with me my entire life.

I suppose a lot of our early life gets taken with us that way, whether we realise it or not. Like many young boys I always wanted to be a cowboy when I grew up. While most kids who wanted that just wanted to shoot guns and be a hero it was more than that for me. I felt destined to be that straight-talking lone voice in the desert, fighting corruption wherever I found it, and standing for freedom, truth, justice and all that I believe in and hold dear. Even now, as I see in my 32nd year, I still hold onto that ideal as I ride ever onwards into the setting sun.
*whistles a mournful little tune*

It's Haunted Fridge night today folks, the first day of the Halloween celebration. As tacky as this celebration has become, I still love this time of year. Of course, by the time some of you read this it'll actually be Halloween for you. Have some Halloween themed comics from around the web.

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A majority of Americans (hell, lets not single them out when most of the world has such problems) are in trouble. They've built up credit card debts that are barely managable, are just clinging on to their mortgages, and praying that their jobs will remain secure in the coming months. It's a common problem everywhere and I understand the fear. All it takes is for that source of income to be suddenly reduced or taken away and it all starts falling apart. If only there were a way to get rid of money altogether, take away that worry, comfort that fear.

Daniel Shellabarger was thinking about these problems back in 2002 and came to the exact same conclusion - eradicate money. Since that day he hasn't spent any money at all and, for the past three years he has lived in a cave in Utah, in a beautiful canyon lined with waterfalls. He's usually filthy and smells like he has been for a long time. His hair has collected various forms of trash in it. He begs for food and warm clothing on the streets of Moab, a small town about an hours walk from his cave, eats roadkill and takes leftovers from trash cans. Occasionally friends in the town will feed him, something he freely admits while boasting that he's never missed a meal. Basically Daniel is a regular hobo, so why am I writing about him like he's different and how do I even know about this man? Under the name Daniel Suelo he updates his blog using the computers at the public library in Moab, keeping people informed about his quest to live without money, his methods and what led him to this decision.

When I lived with money I was always lacking. Money represents lack. Money represents things in the past (debt) and things in the future (credit), but money never represents what is present.

So he's insane then? Not really, more that he's better educated in the ways of the world and a little bitter (aren't we all?) about how people destroy themselves. You see, Daniel has a degree in anthropology that saw him joining the Peace Corps and monitoring the health of an Ecuadorian village for two years. During that time he saw the people of the village adopt new methods of economy, selling the excess food grown in their fields for cash and using the cash to buy things they hadn't needed until they were offered them - televisions, junk food, etc. As he measured their health he saw that his charts showed their health steadily declining as they spent more money on these things. In his own words, "It looked like money was impoverishing them". It was a turning point in the way he viewed the world. Ten years, a bunch of charity work and one Buddhist monastery later Daniel decided that in order to have a happy life he needed to live a free life and not be involved with money at all - a Sadhu in the most capitalist country in the world, in his mind.

But is money that easy to get rid of? While Daniel sees himself apart from the capitalist world he still lives off of its scraps, taking what others have left behind and wouldn't have had if money wasn't involved. And that's probably the reason I felt compelled to write this post and point out this man. A man who preaches regularly about the good parts of living without money, the character building toughness of it all, how it brings you closer to grace and therefore closer to God. A man who is as much a part of the system he reviles as any of us simply for the way he's chosen to opt out. A man who seems to have missed the point.

"What is life without trust?" he muses in his final blog post. He talks a lot about these intangible things we need in life recently. He has done ever since he found out about the cancer. He tells us how he could always trust his body to do what he wants, how he feels betrayed by it now as it rots from the inside out. He tells us how much we all mean to him, how he's trusted us to keep him strong through the illness, how much all our cards and gifts have meant. He types one final word, and is gone...

A little melodramatic, yes. A little derivative, of course. A load of bullshit, yes it is. What you've seen above is a prime example of Munchausen By Internet. Most people are already aware of Munchausen Syndrome in real life, the strange condition that causes people to fake or induce an illness or injury in themselves in order to gain a medical professionals attention. Related to that is Munchausen By Proxy, where the sufferer induces an illness or injury in a weaker third party (usually a child or other dependent) for the same reasons, and it is that particular form that is usually seen on television or in films making it the most well known. Munchausen By Internet is similar in the actions of the sufferer, but rather than seeking attention from a medical professional the sufferer aims at online communities. Like the fictional Baron who the disorder is named after, Munchausen sufferers tell vivid and fantastic tales of woe to anyone who will listen and, on the internet, the entire world can be your audience with only one click. Just like people who exhibit the symptoms of Munchausen in real life, those who practice this disorder over the internet will tell detailed tales of their descent (or that of someone close to them) into illness. They will have detailed information on the symptoms they say they're suffering from (something that people could only get from medical journals and encyclopedias before but now is available via a simple web search) and give enough of that detail in their postings that most people will believe them.

It starts innocently enough, as someone new joins a community and starts to make friends and you may meet them by yourself or through another common friend. They become popular quickly, seeming in hindsight to have catered their personalities to suit those of the group they've chosen to infiltrate. They may even have a whole supporting cast of characters in their life - family and friends that they talk about on their posts - and some of these people may already be online (the most advanced forms of these create several personalities, build friendships and relationships between them and focus on whichever turns out to be the most popular one while keeping the others going) or may claim to have met each other in real life since becoming friends online or talk every night on the phone. They gain peoples trust, become part of their lives, and become cared about. Sometimes it can be years before the trouble begins.

In most cases it starts slowly with the person posting about a strange recurring pain they've been having, and they eventually and unwillingly cave to peer pressure from their online friends to go see a doctor. They'll anxiously await test results, with their friends so drawn into the drama that they may as well be waiting for their own results. The test results come back and the charade is in full swing as the person tells everyone the terrible news about how long they have left to live. They'll be scared, but put on a brave face. Sometimes their bravery will even be inspiring to others. They'll talk openly about their fears, sharing secrets with other people, slowly coming to accept their illness, fighting the valiant fight (some have had cancer go into remission then repeatedly return) but ultimately losing. The death is a simple affair. The blog goes quiet for a short time then a relative comes on and posts about the death just to inform the friends of the person. Sometimes one of their supporting cast will announce it to others as they've found out from visiting/calling their friend.

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Case Study 1 - The Knitting Monkey
Gigi Silva was part of an online knitting community under the name MommaMonkey and definitely not the sort of person you'd expect to pull this sort of trick. She'd been a helpful member for years, gained many friends and shared thousands of her knitting patterns online.

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