Do your due diligence. Your life may depend on it.

Hi folks,

Out in the real world bad things happen to good people because there are bad people pretending to be good people.

The permaculture world is no exception.

First let me be crystal clear that I am not aware of any activity on this site by any member that is predatory or deliberately deceptive.

However this case from Alaska is a warning that when any group of trusting, open, and honest people get together, it eventually attracts those who would prey on them.
News Article

If you are actively seeking out a new life with like minded folks, please, please approach it with the amount of careful consideration and diligence that such a potential life changing decision warrants.

Horrific story. There is an excellent book I recommend everyone read called The Gift of Fear by Gavin De Becker

Trust, but verify. My default setting is to assume good intentions unless someone gives me a reason not to. What I've gotten better at over the course of five point <mumble> decades is picking up on the red flags that say "Here There Be Bullshit." Any time I enter into an agreement between parties (even family members) that involves significant amounts of money, assets, or time/labour, I think it's wise to put the main points into writing. My wife is a stickler for this and it's helped us out over the long haul.

James Whitelaw wrote:Horrific story. There is an excellent book I recommend everyone read called The Gift of Fear by Gavin De Becker

Seconded!

This book not only gives you reasons to listen to your gut instead of talking yourself out of it, it also gives you ways to analyze a situation or behavior, so you can better pinpoint exactly what it is you're reacting to, and thus decide whether or not it's really a threat.

While I was still working my way through the book, I had a chance to use it. In the grocery store I walked past somebody who just set off every alarm bell in my head. Normally I would have convinced myself I was being prejudiced and said nothing. But the lessons from the book were fresh in my mind, so I used them to counter my own second-guessing. It took a minute, but by then I was at the registers and could tell someone.

The thing that set off alarms was his hoodie. It was 103F with 90% humidity that day. People were melting, even in the air conditioning. So why was this guy wearing an extra-thick insulated hoodie, with the hood pulled tight around his face?

I told the cashier about it, and when I described him, all the blood drained out of her face. She called over this rather large, burly manager and had me repeat it, and he took off at a run.

It turns out, I had spotted her stalker.

If you are actively seeking out a new life with like minded folks, please, please approach it with the amount of careful consideration and diligence that such a potential life changing decision warrants.

What Nick said.

Due diligence taken on our homestead. Always.

A friend of mine teaches Women's Self Defense classes, and he requires "Gift of Fear" to be read. I hand out copies of that one, probably 30 or so, so far. I HIGHLY recommend it.

My wife has been stalked...

I put rape at the same heinous level as premeditated murder, and wish they would take away the statue of limitations so that guys like that would be more apt to be in prison.

I will stop there. It makes my blood boil.

I've seen many ads where people are encouraged to join someone in a remote location. I doubt that it would usually lead to something as bad as this, but in many cases there is an unhealthy power dynamic. One person owns the home and supplies the food and even the transportation. People of little or no means who take someone up on an offer like this, find themselves in a position of total dependence.

Sometimes, it's understood that it's going to be a personal relationship. I've seen ads where it doesn't say that, but they do say that people in this group are very open to all manner of open relationships. I take that to mean that you can expect regular sexual advances. Maybe they mean something different , but I don't know what.

I have run ads offering employment and accommodation. I have never included anyting about my sexual preferences within those ads. That's because I was only looking for workers or to rent out space. When an ad is run offering for you to live in some sort of community, and then sexual preferences are stated, that seems like a red flag to me.
.......
I assume that young women are the most likely people to be targeted. If a young woman answers a general ad saying that new people are wanted in a remote location, it might be wise for her to get a male friend, and maybe her grandmother to make contact first,  and see if it's an everyone welcome thing. If the other two are told that the space has been filled, and then the young woman makes contact and is told that there's plenty of room, that might give a hint as to the posters intentions.
........
I once called on a room for rent and was told that it was rented. But the ad remained active for several days. I called back to see if he had space for a fictional friend of my wife. He encouraged me to get her to call. So this guy was looking to get a woman living in his house. He didn't want to say that in the ad, so he just put in an ad with a room for rent and then turned down male callers.

My 18 year old sister in law in the Philippines was offered a job by our landlord. He said she would be his assistant. He is a very small player in the landlording business and does not require an assistant. The pay offered was vastly more than her current wage. She told him to call his wife, so she could tell him about this job offer and then she told him she was not a prostitute and sent him on his way. My wife and her sister moved to a better place last month. The old landlord was dragging his feet on returning a security deposit. Isabel called him and told him she would call his wife and tell her about the job offer, if the money wasn't returned soon. He called yesterday and wants to bring a check over at their earliest convenience. So, obviously she was correct in assessing his intentions. He does not want his wife to know that he offers this type of employment.

Tracking this guys activities on the net is interesting to say the least.

For a while I was a substance abuse counselor.  I worked with people who had court orders to receive counseling based upon their driving record.  It was common for me to sit with the arrest record in my hands showing one DWI while the individual discussed their 5 DWIs.  I am willing to assume that few people enter court ordered counseling bragging about DWIs they don't have.  Indeed,  the position of the state was to go with the self report of the client.

My point is, the state (and I think it is safe to generalize) is aware of how inaccurate their background checks are.  I saw one study that found them 25% accurate. By all means,  do background checks.  But never completely trust them.

Oh yes, the reasons for the breakdown.....the FBI has a long history of being selective in what it shares.  State to state reciprocity is questionable.  And, in small town America the local cop may have to choose between dinner and filing out a report.

There are some people I call “conflict based people”. They have gotten into the habit of taking the offensive and often when there is no need for it. Most unpleasant to be around.
Predatory behavior is not always inflicted on women by men. There are many forms of it. Sometimes we don’t see it. Especially when under duress. Predators look for weak and vulnerable. That is the time to be extra vigilant.
They also look for the naive, the inexperienced, the kind hearted, and the gullible. The old saying, “no good deed goes unpunished” is a horrible saying but unfortunately there’s some truth to it. How Shakespearean even contemporary life can be sometimes. Reminds me of another saying I don’t like. “They earned a Darwin Award”. Some people have a lot of them but they keep on going. Sound like anyone you know.

Hi Jeremy,

My experience has been that these "conflict based people" often see themselves as the victims. They interpret their obvious aggressive behavior as being defensive.

I have had some experience with a person whose _only_ joy in life is twisting others. Whose only satisfaction is when people fawn on him. Who is completely impulsive and recognizes no constraints or boundaries except self interest.

The hardest part, for most people, I think, is fully grasping that there are those who simply do NOT operate on the norms we take for granted. NOT. There is no upside, there is no common ground, there is no possibility of "normal" association. The predator remains a predator. That failure to accept realization slows down understanding and response. We say "he didn't mean it that way" ("he" often says that, also). In the sorry situations I have experienced, there is no "off" switch - nothing said can be taken as real. If one tactic doesn't work, the perp tries another, as long as he is around.

It can be very hard to accept that, but at least Pay Attention. Checking is always a good idea but that takes time. Be safe, step back. _Take_ any time needed. Give yourself, your feelings, your intuition, your gut respect. Definitely bring in several others who are quite different, the more diverse the better, into this "loop" and _listen_ to them.  It's hard to accept partly because we know that doing so will require us to act and there will _always_ be a cost. Costs are usually much less the earlier undertaken, but still onerous.


Regards,
Rufus

A difficult thread to read. And a necessary conversation. And I find myself reaching for the antacids.

> difficult... to read

Yes. But  maybe that's because:
It's hard to focus on one concept w/out shorting others. I believe there is as much Good in the world as Bad. And sometimes _we_ are the bad. And the roles switch. And switch again. It's all part of life.

So perhaps it's important to say also that one must look and be alert for the Good as well.

Some guys may be familiar with the experience of seeing a hot babe across the room and going over to chat her up. And it's sorta yeah, ok, ok, ....  And they run down and hem and haw and probably trail off, figuring "later". And then, about 5-10 minutes later the light bulb goes on: Wait! Right _there_ she was _waiting_ for me to ask... SHIT. And they look over and she's laughing with another guy. The poor slob was so entwined in his own nervousness and remembering his script that he never noticed what was _really_ going on. He never noticed his "big chance" and so missed it. So open your mind, be interested in things "out there" the way they are. Be INTERESTED in the world as - it - is. Allow it to be as it is and let yourself take it in.

EXPECT the Good, and the Bad, too. Human beings seem wired to create Good and Bad from whatever we find where ever we are. This is not _just_ a horrible world. It's a great world as well. "... the worst of times, the best of times..." (Dickens).

I think part of "growing up" (reaching enlightenment, yah-di-ya, whatever) involves getting better at just seeing things with as little judgement and categorization as possible. At times we  categorize and define and it can be an amazing creative process. But it's better, I think, if we are aware that's what we're doing. The theory of science is _very_ instructive in the matter. Science struggles mightily to create even handed experiments to test hypothesis. It does not succeed, but the effort is important and worth while. Because we "see" what we're looking for. We cannot get around that. Also, viz science, note "hypothesis". Science _explicitly_ says that "here is a possible way of looking at thing, a categorization, a theory - we don't know if it's _true_ or not...". IOW, science explicitly acknowledges  what we are in the process of creating a world view. AND that that world view can be wrong and will probably evolve or change over time. This idea, that the world is a creation that WE have a hand in and that it is not fixed and will change, depending... That is important. About as important as any idea gets, I think. It's also hard to accept without some humility and some affirmation and commitment to this world.


Cheers,
Rufus