Here is Diana sitting in a chair pic.twitter.com/OE5q7j8dhr
— elan gale (@theyearofelan) December 3, 2013
Note: Regarding the tweet above, a later tweet explains that “Diana” was a typo, and that he meant to refer to Diane.
In news that isn’t all that shocking, it appears Elan Gale, a Producer on reality TV shows like The Bachelor and The Bachelorette made up the entire story of his on-board note war with a cantankerous woman named Diane.
The tweet war went massively viral this past Thanksgiving weekend, undoubtably tapping into America’s collective misery over traveling during the holidays. We all know the impossibly needy, complainy, self-obsessed passenger on a flight who seems to believe he or she is the only one who matters. And we all know how much we secretly want to rip into that person. It was cathartic to read about somebody taking that person down… Except his take-down was pretty brutal if you spent any time thinking about it and breaking it down, like Daniel D’ Addario did in his great Salon.com post.
Elan Gale lauded himself as a hero to all people who work in the service industry, and defended himself against critics who said he was, in fact, the bully in the situation. As far as I can tell, he never answered to the many people who tried to get him to see that saying “Eat my d**k” to anyone you don’t already have an established friendship with (and that friendship involves a mutual tendency toward shit-talk), let alone a woman, is a threat of sexual violence. He preferred to bask in the praise of all the folks who thought it was hilarious that he antagonized an allegedly agitated person until she slapped him.
I’m not sure what this news about the fight being fake says about society, about masculinity, about Twitter, or call-out society, but I think it should remind us all of how we don’t want to treat people. Even in our criticisms, it’s probably best to try to start with compassion.
What did you think of Elan Gale’s “Diane” story?
Do you think the public has a right to be upset that the story seems to be a fake?
I conclude by saying hopefully a few people got a few laughs over a slow Thanksgiving weekend
— elan gale (@theyearofelan) December 3, 2013
This Gale character has let being a “producer” go to his head. He needs to understand he’s a worthless windbag who’s earned no more fame than if he just kept a private little blog. If he did, his hope that “a few people got a few laughs” would have come true without his having to expose himself to the well-earned disdain of the wider public. As for Cornelius here, it’s clear he’s never been close to any female survivors of sexual violence. To say “eat my dick” to a stranger (whether or not it turned out he made her up)… Read more »
Your assumptions are wrong on all accounts it appears. I’m both a male survivor of sexual assault and close to female survivors. People aren’t thinking, “I don’t care about your history…” when they say something like that; they’re not thinking about anything except getting a rise out of someone (it must be the rare individual who exhibits care and consideration when choosing the insult they want to hurt you with). Just because you see it as a threat of sexual violence doesn’t make it one. It’s not a sign that someone “hates women” either to use such an insult, given… Read more »
Setting aside the rest of the issues with his fake twitter fatwa, I don’t think “eat my dick” is a threat of sexual violence. How is it different than “kiss my ass” or “suck a bag of dicks” or “eat me” or “bite me” or any of the numerous other permutations of genital-related insults that are used by men and women alike? Is it simply that a man is using he insult and therefore it becomes threatening?
“Eat my dick” is pretty harsh, Corn. It’s no different than “Suck my dick” which I just don’t think people should say to one another without a previous relationship or if they REALLY want to get punched in the face and be incredibly threatening.
If you say it, understand you’re being threatening. And understand that with 1 in 4 women (probably more like 1 in 3) being survivors of sexual violence, you may be saying something that’s beyond offensive.
I always said “Eat shit” would’ve been 100x better. Still horrible. Not really a threat.
Sorry, I don’t buy it. Taken literally, we can both agree that the idea he is going to chop off his penis and force her to ingest it is absurd. So we must take it figuratively. Where is the argument that the more appropriate figurative interpretation is, “I am going to sexually assault you” rather than as a stand-in for “fuck you”? Both are imperative interjections, whereas true threats are usually declarative statements (compare “go get raped!” vs “I’m going to rape you.”). If “eat shit” isn’t a threat to force someone to ingest feces, I don’t see how “eat… Read more »