Melanie Nathan – June 13, 2011 – 4.50 pm
Paula Brooks is BILL and Bill may be MacMaster or a member of the military or security professional! I have been a co-owner on LezGetReal and paid for the site LGR for two years. I left the site because I believed that Amina “the Gay Gal from Damascus” was not authentic. When I informed Paula Brooks, that I could not continue with LGR in good faith because of the blatant antisemitism, she set up a complex plot to assassinate my character and get me off the site. She was abusive and threatening and I I resigned just in time before the Amina hoax exploded.
Now two other writers are claiming to be authentic, yet have written a post revealing that they too are using Pseudonyms.
So while doing Paula Brook’s bidding – these two people who may themselves NOT be real are trying to salvage what is left of LezGetReal or hoodwinking you all into allowing them to perpetuate their little game of “lesbian pretend” and lets screw everyone in our wake.
This is an email which Bridgette LaVictoire has sent to writers at LezGetReal:
From: Bridgette LaVictoire
Date: Mon, Jun 13, 2011 at 4:47 PM
Subject: Paula
To: WRITERS…( protecting their contacts) Ok, I have to do this and right now, I am not doing well about it. Apparently “Paula Brooks” is not who she has claimed -to be. ‘She’ is really a man named Bill. He was planning on handing the site off to Linda and myself by 1 August, but the Amina episode cut that short. Right now, I am feeling very devastated given my close bond with this persona. We are going to fight to save the site, and we have a reporter from the Washington Post who is going to back up the fact that the rest of us exist and are who we say we are. We will have to ride this out for the next week.I hope that none of you will decide to leave LGR and what we have built here because of what Bill has done. Right now, I am very hurt by what has happened. I hope that you all will understand that this is going to be difficult, and painful. Please take care. I am not sure what else to say. Bridgette Pauline LaVictoire
2. He may be a straight or gay man – very interested and concerned with DADT
UPDATE
Bill Graber admits to WAPO that he is Paula Brooks.This piece of work has messed with my life for two years and cost me my home.
![speaker mel nathan](http://oblogdeeoblogda.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/africanhrc.png?w=300"%20alt="africanhrc"%20width="300"%20height="300"%20/></a>)
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I don’t know enough about LGR’s history to know whether or not the following is old news to you, but I found this:
http://themagazineofyoga.com/blog/2011/03/09/practices-bridgette-p-lavictoire/
“Bridgette I am in a uniquely difficult situation when it comes to this question. Unlike so many people my age- I am 36, I did not begin to solidify my identity until I was 24, and even then, it was not until I was almost thirty that I even began to work on who ‘I’ am.
Unlike most people, I was born female with a male body. I could not cope with that, so ‘I’ went underground. At home, I was treated as a girl without anyone really understanding that’s what was going on. But in the outside world, I hid myself. This means that I sheltered myself from the activities that often lead people to understand who they are, including socialization.”
Given the context of recent events it’s curious, but with the context of transgendered persons and the sensitivity that real transgendered people deserve I wouldn’t want to make more of it than provide the link for you, effectively “uncommented” upon. – I’ll happily share anything else I can find for you.
wow!
Curiouser and curiouser
I feel you here. I have had a similar experience to you with my site, Lesbiatopia. You can read my story here. http://www.lesbiatopia.com/2011/06/man-who-claimed-to-be-paula-brooks.html
I find the idea of two middle-aged men flirting online, each believing the other to be a lesbian, absolutely delicious …
Having almost become a writer on the site two years ago, I felt compelled to speak my piece. I wrote a blog about the entire scandal so far and leading up to today. Feel free to check it out, http://studwithswag.com/6995/tom-and-bill-and-the-tale-of-the-two-fake-lesbians/
I know that many people were hurt when these revelations came to light, you being one of them. I didn’t know your name at the time so I alluded to a Lez Get Real contributer being forced off of the site due to doubts about Amina. I’m glad to know that the person was you, and that you were correct in your convictions from the start.
I also questioned whether Julie Phineas was honest when she said she had no idea Paula Brooks was really Bill Gather even though she helped him set up the Lez Get Real website in 2009. I managed to locate her website where she denied knowing anything: http://www.lesbianmommy.com/2011/06/paula-brooks-exposed-as-bill-graber.html.
Bridgette is Bill, but dressed in drag. I don’t mean this as a joke. Whatever happened to Julie? Was she aware of this?
Melanie,
How do we know who you are?
If you really are Melanie, and not Melvin, please supply some concrete evidence.
BD – I have been victimized as have many many others. I dont think I owe you any evidence – do your own homework.
Melanie,
You actually paid to contribute to Lez Get Real? How much?
Melanie,
You write: “Bill Graber admits to WAPO that he is Paula Brooks.This piece of work has messed with my life for two years and cost me my home.”
How has Bill Graber cost you your home? Are you going to take legal action re the fraud?
I am amazed that you got yourself financially involved in a website when you hadn’t even met the owner. Please explain what happened since it all seems very weird.
I am sure you are amazed BD because you do not know the whole story; so its easy to be amazed that I may have put time money and energy into it. I am not going to talk about legal action on this site. This is a 2 year blip in my very long career. I resigned from LGR when I confronted Paula Brooks aka bill graber about amina over a four month period. So I had left because eventually I did smell a rat! I am not going to explain anything that relates to finances on this site – i dont owe that to anyone. People are hoaxed out of money all the time whats so weird. Even venture capitalists lose money.
I dunno–what’s George Eliot or Currier Bell? Isn’t a pen-name a pen-name, er pixel name?
Adam Polaski writes: “As Melanie’s level of interest in the site increased, so too did her online interactions with Brooks. Some of these exchanges occurred via telephone, and Brooks, who said she was deaf, needed to communicate through an interpreter – her father, Bill Brooks.”
Mel,
Didn’t you ever smell a male rat?
The story is so ridiculous that it defies belief. Perhaps whilst “drenched in activism and advocacy”, you ended up being dry of commonsense?
@BD _ I have a sense you may well be a journalist yourself; perhaps I m wrong – that said – if you want to interview me over Skype so you can see me please make a formal request via my email and provide your credentials just like others have. It is not my job to prove who I am to anyone. Feel free to face book ffriend me and look at all the comments from those who actually have met me.
Mel,
Thanks for your replies.
Ok. Let’s take it for granted that you really are Melanie Nathan. I get the impression that you are.
But I think that your story reveals that people should be cautious about who they get involved with, particularly on the internet.
Btw, I don’t think that you have been “victimized”. Unfortunately, having become “drenched in activism and advocacy”, you left your common-sense behind. In this regard you became a sitting-duck. Not a victim.
Mel,
When I first read “Lez Get Real”, I gained the impression (obviously wrongly) that you were part of a group of committed politicized lesbians, who personally knew each other, and were blogging together. In this regard, the site misled its readers. Unfortunately, you were part of this deception, even though, ironically enough, you yourself had also been duped.
I think that you owe your readers an apology. It is an inadequate response to just say that you yourself are “a victim”.
Mel,
You should check this out re Amina.
Just for the record, St Andrews is the alma mater of Will and Kate.
http://hurryupharry.org/2011/06/18/st-andrews-syria-and-the-heritage-of-hafez-al-assad/
This is also interesting:
http://hurryupharry.org/2011/06/12/amina-arraf-britta-froelicher-the-university-of-st-andrews/
Mel,
I reckon that the author of the Amina blog was probably not MacMaster, but his wife Britta Froelicher. After all, she is seeped in Syrian politics. Alternatively, it is a combined literary/political effort.
But, it is more likely that the husband is taking the rap on behalf of his wife. I think that she has far more to lose as she is actively involved in Syrian politics, particularly in the UK. She has been meddling far more than him. Whoever it is, it defies belief that Froelicher was not at least behind the blog.
The anti-Israel angle is particularly revolting and seems to be part of their motivation.
Wh wrote “Amina”?
http://hurryupharry.org/2011/06/14/tom-macmaster-and-the-two-faced-bloggers/
Mel,
You know me as a responder to various blogs on LGR, and I have had the pleasure of corresponding with you outside of that medium as well. I have offered you my support before, and will continue to offer it into the future. Why? Because I believe in what you do. I believe you are who you say you are, but if it did turn out that you were really a man, or a two-headed green Martian for that matter, that would not matter to me in the slightest. You know why? Because you were, and still are, the only person on the site to have the ‘balls’ to follow your convictions and to work tirelessly to achieve what we all so desperately are in need of here.
To everyone else:
I am sick and tired of the ramblings on the LGR Website as they lick their wounds over this farce, and continue to fill their posts with uninteresting and useless subjects, while our civil rights are being stomped upon by those in power. I will no longer be contributing as a reader or responder to their posts in future. I have a feeling that they might disappear anyway.
I have said many time before, and will continue to say again and again in the future, we need to get off our butts and demand to be treated equally once and for all. Sitting back and complaining will not get us anywhere, while the same few work tirelessly for our benefit. The LGBT community is, for the most part, content with letting others do it all for us. If we all stood up and fought like we’ve never fought before, then we would get the job done.
To those it may concern:
Wake up people, and take action alongside the likes of Melanie Nathan. You should consider yourselves damn lucky that there are people like her in the world. Oh, and by the way, I have seen videos of Melanie, so she does exist. Perhaps those who are quick to question should do some research before they follow the lead of those whose only aim is to ruin what they are jealous of.
Janice.
Thanks for your very kind support.
“Janice”,
Please authenticate yourself. How do we know that you are a black female lesbian?
As for the videos of “Melanie Nathan”, is their any proof that Melanie Nathan is not a pseudonym?
I know Janice; from activism – she does not need authentication – at least she is providing her real name – not like Pseudonyms as in “Blacklisted…” SO challenge – BLD – please provide your real name so we can authenticate you ??? Is that what you want as a mere comentator?
typo
” is there any proof”
Thank you Melanie.
@BLD – Your other typo is “How do we know that you are a black female lesbian?”
I think you meant to say “How do we know that you are ‘NOT’ a black female lesbian?”
I don’t remember saying that I was!
If only people like you would spend some time making sure that what you’re saying is correct instead on being so intent on picking on others who have the guts to show who they are, and not hide behind ridiculous names.
I too would love for you to ‘come out’ so to speak!