pirate_anon

Confess To Your Crimes: Secretgal
(May 2016-November 2017)

Secretgal frst appears talking to Panopticon in their
Google+ comments around November 5, 2014. At this time, Cass
looks to already be a Time Lord Gallifreyan fctionkin who
believes that Doctor Who is real. They state, "I actually believe
that I am at least part Gallifreyan. [...] the character of the Doctor
kind of produced this weird kind of stirring in the pit of my
stomach. Not that I was attracted to him, but that I /was/ him. His
kind" (2014, November 11).

Secretgal responds that she wants to talk, and the two
become friends, running Doctor Who role-play communities
together. The role-play groups are now mostly deleted or locked,
so I can say nothing of substance about them. During this time,
Cass introduces Secretgal to another person, ihasfandom (2015,
February 15), who'll prove relevant later. November 2, 2015 is the
last time I see Secretgal in Panopticon's Google+ comments,
meaning their friendship lasts roughly a year.

Come May of 2016, Panopticon and ihasfandom are
claiming that Secretgal is a cult leader, and that her role-play
groups are cults intended to persuade followers that Doctor Who
is real (ihasfandom, 2016 May 13). This is how I end up frst
becoming aware of Panopticon; around 6/7/2016, Cass sends me a
series of tumblr messages about their alleged experiences:

"I used to know a girl who claimed to be the Doctor's long
lost daughter from Gallifrey and that everything in DW [Doctor
Who] is physically real in this universe. She also claimed there
was some kind of Secret War going on that only she and her
followers knew about, with the Daleks and shit trying to enslave
humanity. She also has an ongoing multi-book chronicle of her
supposed 'experiences,' that read likes a cross between L. Ron
Hubbard and Tara Gilesbie. For a long time, she was running
online 'classes' in things like combat and telepathy, that we could
supposedly use to 'protect ourselves and defend humanity' in the
coming war. This group of hers is mainly on google+ where she
operates under the name [REDACTED], though she has a tumblr,
[REDACTED]. She's also [REDACTED] on Wattpad, where she
publishes the ongoing Secret Life/Secret War/Secret Journey
book series I mentioned early. In addition to these books, she has
several self-insert fanfctions that often involved graphic
depictions of kidnapping and torture and sometimes feature OCs
based on other members of the group. [...] Onto the creepy stuﬀ:
she's got a talent for learning and exploiting people's weaknesses,
for instance one time she recruited a member into her group
immediately after talking him out of suicide, and she is known to
guilt people into coming back after they leave the group by
leaving them a fuck ton of messages on chat wondering if they've
been captured or killed. She also claims to be multiple, but I'm
fairly certain this is just a manipulation tactic, as she subscribes
more to the 'Jekyll and Hyde' depiction of multiplicity that's
usually seen in pop culture. In addition, she's 18 years old and has
tried to initiate a sexual/romantic relationship with a then 13 year
old girl. Anyway my point is that this is defnitely a person to be
watched out for. She's been known to go by the name Shannon,
Katrina, Crystal, and [REDACTED]."

At frst, I'm credulous of Panopticon's claims, enough so
that I plan a cult write-up of Secretgal. Panopticon never exactly
requests outright that I do so; they just make it very clear how
much they'll like it if I do (2017, February 23). I start gathering
sources.

Or rather, I try to. For two and a half years, I ransack
Secretgal's Internet presence, and I can fnd barely any sources on
her alleged misbehavior.

I should have been suspicious right away. "She's 18 years
old" is written in the present tense; the younger party, on the
other hand, is written as a "then 13 year old," implying that at
least one birthday has passed since then. So from the start, the age
gap is being exaggerated to appear like a child sex crime. But if
this took place during the time of Secretgal and Cass's friendship,
and if Secretgal's age is correct, that would be an attempted
relationship between a thirteen and a sixteen year old. However,
even those basic facts are under dispute.

Once I strip away the myriad screen-names, I discover that
all of the frsthand accusations about Secretgal come from
Panopticon and ihasfandom (2016, May 22). Neither of them
oﬀer any sources except their word, and what claims they do
make contain glaring errors. In ihasfandom's PSA, Secretgal is
seventeen, not eighteen. But it might not have even been
Secretgal who was involved with the thirteen-year-old in the frst
place! According to ihasfandom, "[Secretgal] has a bad side,
named serena [sic]. whenever she does something wrong, she
blames it on serena and says that she cannot be held responsible."
They reiterate Cass's statement about the younger child, but with
one vital diﬀerence: "[Secretgal] has also attempted to engage in
sexual/romantic acts with at least one 13 year old, and when
blocked, said it was actually serena and not her."

Serena's name is Serina, with an I, and she is clearly a
completely diﬀerent person from Secretgal; she uses a spell check
on Wattpad and writes in a completely diﬀerent style.
Panopticon realizes this, come September 2017; Cass refers to her
as "one of Katrina's followers" (citation available upon request),
but not once do they or ihasfandom ever correct their mistake.
So those child sex accusations not only seem to have exaggerated
the age gap, but they may very well be attributed to the wrong
person!

Only once does Panopticon oﬀer anything resembling
substantiation of any of their allegations. Under condition of
anonymity, and at my request, Cass privately sends me "proof" of
Secretgal's abuse on February 24, 2017, explaining that their then-
partner infltrated Secretgal's circle, and that "when
[REDACTED] did this, she did it under an assumed name and
persona--a twelve-year-old girl named Emma [sic]. We're all very
well aware that there are some ethical problems with her
impersonating a young child to speak to Katrina, but it was the
surest way that she could gain access. And besides, it was her
idea." These messages reiterate the idea that "Serina is a
sockpuppet account," despite the obvious diﬀerences in typing
style; Serina is more coherent and formal.

The screen-caps are useless, as anyone checking my
appendices can see; I've included all of them for consistency.
There's no date stamp, for one thing, and Panopticon provides me
with none, so it's impossible to know when the events took place.
There are clearly large gaps in the conversation, losing vital
context; did these conversations take place over hours, days,
weeks? And the whole conversation is strange. There's no
grooming, no bait, no careful easing in; Secretgal seems to go
straight to, "Hello, stranger, I'm the Doctor's daughter and Doctor
Who is real and you're a Gallifreyan/human hybrid!"

The whole point of cult recruitment is false pretenses; a
follower thinks they're joining a health group, a business seminar,
a fandom role-play, when really they're providing free labor,
adoration, money, or sex to a leader. But Secretgal does none of
that. She seems to come clean nigh-instantly about who she is and
what she's doing. Or, if there is a grooming process, it's impossible
to tell because there's no date stamp or context to make sense of
it! So the screen-caps don't prove anything of substance; what
little material there is looks more like an online role-play than a
cult recruitment.

The chat log itself is now lost, due to deleting my account,
but I remember expressing my confusion to Panopticon over
tumblr chat, perplexed as to how this girl could hook anyone.
Her writing seems to be that of a young girl having fun; she
misspells her old screen name (Unknown Date C), and the titles
of her fcs (Unknown Date D). Where is the charisma, the power?

If a cult leader uses writing as part of their magnetism,
then it's imperative for the writing to have a certain level of
technical polish and allure to be attractive. Secretgal's has none of
that, and presumably her role-playing isn't much better. And if
her writing or role-play doesn't recruit people, how does she do
it?

Panopticon never answered with specifc details, and
never has, far as I can tell. At best, Cass only uses generalisms,
vagueness like "she manipulates your perception of reality. she
makes you think that anything out of the ordinary is the result of
an overarching conspiracy" (ihasfandom, 2016 May 22) or
"fandom is the method by which she convinces people to listen to
her, and to believe her story" (Panopticon, 2016 December 31,
paragraph 28). But how? What are examples? Panopticon never
says. It seems you just had to be there.

It's been over two years since ihasfandom and
Panopticon's original call-out posts, and the ONLY evidence
Panopticon or ihasfandom have provided is that useless chatlog
and another from ihasfandom (2016, October 23). That one also
lacks context and clear time-stamp; it's unclear what's even going
on. The original post has no context or explanation; in a deleted
one in the reblog chain, ihasfandom says only that "katrina is
once again being transphobic, homophobic, and (indirectly)
showcasing her p-shifting [physical transformation into a time
lord]" (thatonekrazychick, 2016 October 23) but it's unclear what
they mean by that; Secretgal never says she's transforming, or
implies anything of that nature. All it proves is that Secretgal is a
homophobic and transphobic teenager, which is not the same as
being a cult leading child sex criminal.

Out of desperation for some kind of context or
explanation, I start reading Secretgal's fanfction (Unknown Date
A), but it doesn't bring to light any hidden villainy on her part.
With the lack of spell-check and the odd formatting, the writing
reminds me of that of a child having fun writing about her
friends in an imaginary world. The more I read, the more
convinced I become that she isn't a cult leader at all, just a girl
with her Doctor Who goggles screwed on too tight, at worst a
private homophobe who believes a lot of unusual things.

Then I fnd the troll comments on Secretgal's stories, left
by Panopticon and Isa, another member of the Gallifreyan
Tradition Society. The comments have long since been deleted,
but Wattpad keeps ghosts of them on the commenters' activity
pages, buried under an eternity of scrolling. It turns out that
Panopticon is a liar. They weren't stalked and trolled by
Secretgal; she was the one stalked and trolled by them
(Panopticon, 2016 October 9, 25, and 30; Isa, 2016 October 9, 25,
and 30; 2017 July 4 and September 4). Among the comments:

"This is... Absolutely hilarious, honestly. A modern-day
Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way. [...] Tell us again how
these words manipulate so many?" (Panopticon, 2016 October
9d).

"Being sent oﬀ of Gallifrey and hidden as a human isn't
done for safety. This isn't Superman. Being sent to any other
planet is an exile, a punishment, and it sucks. [...] I would have
hoped that one who claims to be a Time Lord (and the proper
term is Time Lady) would have more sense than to write about
her adventures and tell every human she comes across about
herself. [...] Or, at least if said Time Lady had to tell her story, she
would endeavor to be more accurate in the portrayal of the
Doctor's family and home life, not to mention Gallifreyan
customs" (Isa, 2016 October 9).

"Speaking of Gods, where and how does the Christian
God ft into all this? I think this is the frst you have mentioned of
Him. [...] Torchwood and FEMA working together? If it's the
human FEMA [...], not only would they not have anything to do
with Torchwood, they wouldn't even know about Torchwood,
because Torchwood's whole M.O. is staying out of sight." (Isa,
2016 October 25)

And when Secretgal responds about her religion: "Our
people do not even believe in a creator god. Rather, we believe in
a multifaceted Universal Consciousness. If you want to claim to
be one of us, please do your research." (Panopticon, 2016 October
25c).

"Disgusting" (Panopticon, 2016 October 30).

"Is there ANY Time Lord other than the Doctor whose
name you won't cheerfully drag through the mud? [...] Do you
realize the harm you are doing? To the Time Lords? Their History
[sic], and to those who follow you? And to your readers' ideas of
how Time Lords get their 'powers' as you call them?" (Isa, 2016
October 30 #1).

"If the barriers between the multiverse are breaking down
that badly and it's all coming here, we have a LOT more to worry
about than a single war. And I think most people would notice it.
Stuﬀ like that doesn't happen quietly. [...] how can you claim
parallel universes, while claiming at the same time that our TV
show Doctor Who is real, especially when virtually NONE of
these characters are behaving in any way, shape, or form near
canon?" (Isa, 2016 October 30, #2-3)

"You do realized that the Doctor and the Master weren't
even from the same House, right? One is an Oakdown and the
other a Lungbarrow." (Isa, 2017 July 4).

Panopticon and Isa aren't treating Secretgal like a cult
leader. Cult leaders are dangerous, scary people who are
infamous for carpet-bombing anyone who criticizes them, but
not once do Panopticon or Isa seem afraid. Isa is so not afraid that
she even links her legal last name and her Facebook to the
account she trolls Secretgal with (Isa, Unknown Date), though at
least she locks it at some point. Panopticon is not much better;
their Wattpad handle, ourSanctuary, is a reference to the
Sanctuary role-play group and fanfction that crossed over with
Secretgal's Legacy Academy in 2015 (Panopticon, 2015 November
4, paragraph 186; Taurus, 2015 August 21). Its premise,
appropriately, was child Gallifreyans being hidden on Earth as
humans for their safety--the very premise Isa excoriates Secretgal
for, and a premise which Panopticon is still writing today (2018,
September 16). It's all so blatant that Serina clocks Cass's identity
in one comment (2017, September 4b), but Panopticon never
shows any concern for their safety.

Instead, they and Isa treat Secretgal like a stupid child,
sneering at her and picking at her spelling mistakes, her religion,
her interpretation of Gallifreyan lore. Rassilon goes so far as to
post a vaguely threatening excoriation of her publicly on
Panopticon's Wattpad, on what appears to be roughly the one-
year anniversary of the dissolution of Cass and Secretgal's
friendship (2016, November 2):

"We have thought, on several occasions, to extend an olive
branch of peace to you and yours. But you have proven yourself
unworthy of it. You have continued to manipulate others as you
manipulated [Cass]. As you manipulated those close to her.

"Confess to the crimes that you have committed. Be prepared to
face judgement [sic] for them.

"For your bigotry. For your lies. For your manipulation.

"Because our People do not take these oﬀenses likely."

Secretgal comments there, but she clearly doesn't
understand; all she says is, "I'm confused on what's going on here
in this book." (Cass's response is deleted, but the activity page
coughs it up: "It's a diary kept by the members of our system.")

Secretgal's responses to the trolling comments are also
saved by her activity page, though it requires a lot of scrolling;
she expresses confusion, mostly. She tries to defend herself,
saying, "What I write is truth. [...] I have my reasons for
everything I do. Including calling everyone the same gender as
far as the timelord [sic] rank goes. I don't care much for pride
because I always thought it was silly and I'm more lakes [sic]
back. Now if you have anymore things you want to yell at me
about just ask yourself is you yelling at me prideful in any least?
And so froth [sic] I think you should check before you accuse me
of not knowing what I'm doing." (2017, September 5). It's all very
tame, and not once does she lash out or say anything cruel,
homophobic, or nasty.

Mostly, though she doesn't respond at all; she just silently
deletes and moves on, which Cass taunts her for: "Nice job
deleting all your criticism, friendo" (2016, October 25a). Secretgal
deletes that one as well.

Only one person comes to defend Secretgal: Serina, the
person who got mistaken for Secretgal the year prior (2017,
September 4a and b). Seeing her typing style and impeccable
spelling, it's boggling that she could ever have been mistaken for
Secretgal, but regardless, Serina isn't cruel or nasty either, only
frm: "Can we all please stop fghting? Why yell at someone you
hardly know?" She also pegs Isa for why she's there: "One of Cass's
acquaintances? If so, why do you insist on harassing her? What
has she done to you? Has she harmed you in any way?"

If Secretgal IS a cult leader, why isn't she acting like one?
Where is the torrents of abuse on multiple platforms, the tidal
wave of followers, the desperate attempts to shut Isa and
Panopticon up? But she does none of these things. Panopticon
does.

Panopticon's harassment campaign of Secretgal lasts
signifcantly longer than their friendship. There is the call-out
post in May of 2016, the PMs with me in June, the blitzes of
Wattpad comments plus another ihasfandom call-out post in
October (ihasfandom, October 23), followed by more public posts
in November... there's basically at least one public monthly post
about Secretgal's odious cultish ways all the way up until
November of 2017. (And that only changes because Panopticon
fnds a new primary target in HIY, who will have their own
chapter. Secretgal still gets sporadic posts in 2018.)

This isn't just individual trolling either; it's a group aﬀair.
Isa takes part, as does ihasfandom. Panopticon tries to get me to
attack Secretgal as a cult leader, sends Cass's now-ex-partner to
infltrate her, and gets at least two diﬀerent groups to ridicule her
fanfction (Andiliteman and Ceseigh, 2016 December 20;
Anonymous, 2017 May 29). That's at least half a dozen people
being sicced on someone over the course of a year and a half, and
there's likely more I just never hear about.

Why does this happen? For the same reasons that most
people like bullying in groups. Not only is it easier to pick on
someone who's outnumbered, but it becomes a form of social
bonding, a way to reify in-group solidarity. Panopticon is
validated as the brave survivor and Secretgal as the repellent
abuser, and by taking part in what appears to be a brave, virtuous
fght against a monster, Panopticon's friends are able to show how
much they care, how enlightened they are. They can justify each
other's behavior and pretend that they're taking concrete steps to
make the world a happier, more abuse-free place, instead of
mocking a stranger's fanfction. In the topsy-turvy reverse reality
Panopticon creates, they aren't the bullies; they're fghting them.

Panopticon is happy to do some of their own dirty work,
though. It's not enough to have their friends laugh at Secretgal's
fanfction; Cass makes a blog for the same purpose (Panopticon,
2017 March 12). On top of all this, Panopticon attempts to write a
book as a "TAKE THAT, KATRINA, YOU LITTLE BITCH" (2017,
November 14) and makes post (2018 February 20) after post
about her (who-is-page, 2016 May 13).

Now, tell me: who acts like the creepy cult leader here?
Secretgal, or Panopticon?

And just for the sake of argument, say I'm wrong. Say
Secretgal is a cult leader and somehow keeps all of it hidden and
private, even though she doesn't hide the fact that she thinks the
moon is hollow (2018, May 3) and that Doctor Who is all real life
(2017, August 21). Say she is in fact dangerous, even though
neither Panopticon nor their attack dogs seem worried for their
own safety or in danger.

How is any of this harassment going to help?

How does mocking Secretgal's spelling protect potential
victims? How does ridiculing her understanding of Gallifreyan
lore keep anyone safe? How does pointing and laughing at her
fanfction do anything at all of substance?

It doesn't. Because the point isn't helping people or
keeping them safe. It's all about propping up Panopticon as a
brave survivor and degrading Secretgal, making her hurt. Think
of that ominous vaguepost diary Rassilon wrote, the one
exhorting Secretgal to confess her sins. What use could it possibly
serve, asides from scaring her? If a hypothetical future victim
found the diary, they wouldn't even know who it was about, or
how to defend themselves! It serves no practical purpose for
victims, past, present, or future!

But it does serve a purpose for Panopticon, especially Cass.
They use their "Secretgal cult experience" as a sort of passport to
survivor spaces. They get to triumph over evil again and again as
they rehash the story, get to have other people defend them,
protect them, comfort them. It transforms ordinary schoolyard
bullying into triumph over abuse, and lets other people play
noble supporting heroic roles in the grand legend. They get access
to survivors in the guise of being a peer, when in fact they want
prey.

And it works. Which leads us to toast.