Not That Cat

If you listened to last night’s (6/18/2021) “discussion” of the controversy surrounding MindQuake – which I will say upfront I didn’t, because I long ago decided against going to it ever again – then you probably picked up on a lot of things that made you uneasy about that convention and its new leader, Mr. Taqtiks.  If you didn’t, then you probably need to talk to your peer group about it, because that could mean that you need to have your moral compass checked.

I’ve heard that while he was spinning his false tales of conspiracies against himself (hmm … kind of like that other former world leader who still maintains that an election was stolen despite the total lack of evidence outside his own fantasies), which is boring but nominally allowed.  But then, apparently to bolster his nonexistent case, he started reading verbatim from someone’s private complaint letter against him!

If you’ve never been involved in a complaint case, you may not be aware of certain very relevant things:

1) Complaints are (supposed to be) treated as extremely confidential by the organizations to which they are submitted.  The actual text of a complaint is not to be disclosed to anybody who hasn’t demonstrated an actual need to know – that includes concoms, and it especially includes the person the complaint is against.  The very fact that Taqtiks has seen that person’s complaint against him means something went very wrong with the handling of that complaint.  And the reason the subject of a complaint should never see the written complaint was fully illustrated by Taqtiks last night: it opens up the person who wrote it to retaliations by Taqtiks and others who are sympathetic to Taqtiks.

2) Taqtiks, as a former (fired for cause) member of the Charmed! concom, has a passing familiarity with this basic principal.  He had no objection to it until there was a complaint against him (not to Charmed!, BTW, but to the local BDSM education organization); then, and only then, did it constitute a personal affront against his concept of justice.  It’s tempting to draw a conclusion just from that, but it only scratches the surface.

So knowing that complaints are confidential, and that complaints are not intended to be shared with anyone not directly involved especially the person they are about, Taqtiks proceeded to read aloud on Discord to a public audience from that person’s complaint letter.  He took a situation that was already bad, and made it 1,000 times worse by broadcasting that he had a copy of the complaint and making it public knowledge, down to specific wording.  I’m not sure what his objective was in doing that (other than to torture/punish the person who complained, obviously), but he has made a few things abundantly clear to everyone:

Taqtiks has no interest in preserving the proper handling of any consent complaints about himself, at least, and demonstrably will retaliate against anyone who complains about him in the future.

It follows that if the rules don’t apply to him, they won’t apply to anyone else that he likes or that is associated with him in some way.

Therefore, no event that Taqtiks is part of can be considered a safe environment for anyone who isn’t a personal friend of Taqtiks.

Beginnings are scary. But exhilarating.

Sorry folks, we ran into some hiccups! Gremlins in the system and whatnot. Our next episode of our Charmed Conversation series is with the amazing duo The Secret Subject and Alicin and it’s out now <3

Spotify

https://t.co/hzQBWC16lm?amp=1 

Podcast RSS

Time’s running out! It’s the Holidays! Wait… that’s not what I meant to say… OH YEAH! After 11/30 the price for Charmed!Online 2021 goes from $15 to $25 for the whole weekend. Buy a ticket now and save some of that green before the holidays.

The first interview in the Charmed Conversations series is now live. It’s the Infamous Wiseguy! He’s such a great individual to talk with so if you’ve got an interest come in listen to the interview.

People came to our hypnomeet some time ago, and they asked why we didn’t want to work together with Nimja, who organises the Amsterdam hypno munches, and who has this impressive YouTube channel.

The first and most important reason is that he violated the consent of a dear friend of us. This highly skilled hypnosub, and at the time a vulnerable young woman because of her low self esteem, went on a kinky date with him. She wanted to play with him without hypnosis, to get to know him perhaps. He hypnotised her anyway and the things he suggested to her still make her angry and hurt to this day.

But that is not the only reason. In 2019 a woman came to me for help. She had been playing with him online for a while. She wanted to play with hypnotic denial, and he told her to watch/listen to a file of his. It developed into a pattern where she couldn’t even go to the bathroom without listening to the file. And it was at this point that he broke off contact with her, presumably because he was no longer interested in her, or busy with other things. She was very distressed, seeing as she was dependent on hearing his voice. She contacted me for help, and I was able to help her recover from this ordeal.

But that is not the only reason. I’ve spoken out about this before and the tone of his denial was a clearly orchestrated attempt to deny and shift the blame. When I told the story mentioned above, he tried to make it that she was just a bad ex who used me and told me lies to make him look bad. He has never straight up admitted that one of these stories, and there are more, was his mistake or tried to make amends. On the contrary.

But that is not the only reason. When I spoke out about my friend being violated by him and about the other woman in 2019, women started sending me messages, pms with stories about what this man had done to them. And that they were afraid to speak out against him, afraid of being online lynched by his adoring fans on YouTube. So I can’t tell these stories, because these women are afraid.

But that is not the only reason. All of these stories form a pattern. He seems to seed his files with suggestions to contact him personally. If the person who contacts him is feminine and willing enough, they will start playing online. He will refer them to files or perhaps even make files for them to reinforce the conditioning. But at some point it will go wrong, and he will break off contact, unwilling to admit that he made a mistake and unwilling to remove all of the suggestions he put into place. He’s probably already looking for the next girl. This is why he’s a predator.

But that is not the only reason. Also in 2019, I was approached by the organisers of NEEHU. Someone who was planning to come to the event had told them of a negative experience they had with this man, and NEEHU wanted to hear my perspective seeing as I know a few things about him. I told them all of this and they decided to ban him from NEEHU.

But that’s not the only reason. I have to admit that I have never seen this man teach hypnosis. Guilty has, back in the day when this man’s hypno workshops were the only ones in the country. Guilty felt he needed to break away from this man and start a group where we would actually teach hypnosis properly, to tops and bottoms, people of all genders alike, instead of just installing hypnotic triggers on girls for their Doms to use. Admittedly, that was over a decade ago, so perhaps he’s become a better teacher since. Though my friends from Scotland who have seen him teach at the event in Wales have nothing good to say about it.

Charmed Chats is back! TONIGHT! 

Come join us for some fun fireside chats… you know… without the fire. Because. We all know why. 

Come on over to the Discord (https://discord.gg/uSSdyBS) for more details, and we’ll go apologize to the right people.

AH! Can you believe it’s already almost the end of Spooky Season??? That just means you have a little over a month to get your ideas in for Convention (also to snag your tickets for the low price of $15 through 11/30/20).

We’ve worked out the problems with our event submission software, and are proud to announce class, evening event, and precon submissions are now live.

https://pretalx.charmedhypno.org/charmed2021/cfp .

Submission Deadlines are as follows

10/15/2020 – Deadline for proposing Preconference classes

11/30/2020 – Deadline for proposing classes

12/15/2020 – Deadline for proposing evening activities

Submission Notes:

Preconference will be different than years past (and years future). We want to make these 4 hour, longer block classes, with a goal of going deep and teaching the topic so the students can walk away saying “I can do that” rather than “That looks cool!” We want to take class levels from all across the experience spectrum, from 101’s up to advanced play. We have not decided how many preconference slots we want, so don’t feel intimidated that there are only so many slots.

Get your tickets here! (hotel booking link is in there after you’ve submitted your registration.) (If you are presenting/contributing to the event, you can let us know and we’ll give you hotel booking link.)

Some people have asked (they haven’t, but for purposes of this conversation we’ll pretend they have): What does a volunteer at Charmed do? Well, if we go to the handy website we created for just such a purpose, we see this!

Class monitors/runners keep the classes running smoothly by keeping the presenters running on time, gathering headcounts, and doing general things relating to classes and rooms

Dungeon monitors help to promote safe play by keeping an eye on activity in the dungeon, and are people you can go to for help with any issues that come up during the play parties.  (Dungeon monitors need to be experienced in that role.)

Hospitality volunteers maintain the hospitality room so that it stays inviting

Set-up/Clean-up volunteers get the classrooms, dungeon, and vendor space set up and torn down as needed.  Many hands make light work here.

Security — We need people to check badges and politely redirect people who try to enter con space without one.

Registration — Help people get their badges and con materials when they arrive.  (Registration volunteers will be required to sign a confidentiality agreement, which is kept on file by Black Rose.)

General help — There’s a gazillion miscellaneous things that need to be done; if you’re up for the unpredictable, this job is for you.

You can see just by looking at that list why we keep saying that a good volunteer corps is the lifeblood of a con–take away a single one of these positions, and you have an unpredictable, chaotic mess instead of a smoothly-functioning and enjoyable experience for everyone. Oh, and if you go here:

https://charmedhypno.org/volunteer/

You’re in luck! We take minutes! Just head over to the Charmed Chat channel on our Discord server:

https://discord.gg/PE2ujdP

And scroll back through the text chat channel to see a summary of the discussion. It’s a great way to catch up, and while you’re there, you can use the other channels to meet and talk to people who are going to be attending! Registration is, as always, at:

https://charmedhypno.org/registration/

Get your tickets here! (hotel booking link is in there after you’ve submitted your registration.) (If you are presenting/contributing to the event, you can let us know and we’ll give you hotel booking link.)

Making an awesome con takes a LOT of work, and a lot of people dedicated to making cool stuff happen. For NEEHU 11, you will probably see the word “contributor” thrown about a lot… so I’ma gonna explain what I mean. Contributors contribute their time to making the event more awesome. That might be by teaching a class or two. That might be by spearheading a project, like our Ambassador Program or icebreaker time. It might be by doing something like Seb’s Hypno Scouts. Or making a nerf battle happen. Or doing a hot themed scene for all of us to watch. Or hosting an open room or theme room on the party floor. It might be by Group trance? Hypno-wizard duels? Hive mind brainwashing? Content is only limited by your imagination and what you want to do (and the law and such.)

We have a communication framework set up to help contributors get what they need from the convention (it starts on Discord, or via messages!) We have funds available to help contributors get the stuff they need to make their cunning plans into reality. Contributors will have as much freedom and support as we can give them to make their “thing” the most fun it can be!