I’ve got reporters in my inbox, folks. That’s never really been my thing, so I’m gonna lay out all my receipts from the last year. Take it for what it’s worth. I’ve only got memory receipts because accounts are suspended, so that will have to be enough.

I’ve “known” the person at the center of the current controversy for ~10 yrs. She got into the thick of it when I had a doxxing issue several years ago. A couple of times I’ve had to tell her to please back off from rehashing or engaging it because I found it hurtful...

But I knew she was in deep pain because of what was happening at her institution so I just set up some boundaries. I invited her here as a rep for MTS last year and in that time her issues with the BIPOC started to surface. I didn’t rescind my invite though. I’m sorry.

I did tell her two things in a phone call. 1) She needed to decide whether she was going to be the face of the pain or the face of the leadership, but she shouldn’t be both because pain clouds your judgment and 2) she had hurt BIPOC and needed

to really think about doing some real, meaningful learning about intersectionality. Too often people shut down the voices of WOC and she shouldn’t shut people down for bringing truth to her power. That’s her whole schtick. Unless that wasn’t her mission and then she should make..

that clear. Intersectionality is important to me, so I couldn’t walk with her, but I always hope for the best in people and hope she’s wise up. Fast forward to the last several months. This Alepo person starts showing up in my timeline.

“Hoped she’s wise up.”

Most of the interactions were superficial but when the account claimed to have COVID, it tagged me and asked if I could help communicate in Spanish. That community is important to me, so I said yes, but I wasn’t sure if it was for her or for her family. I was asking...

because my own family has dealt with needing Spanish translations for medical care and there are some things you’d really want a medical translator for. And I was surprised that there were no Spanish speaking medical folks in her AZ hospital, but I don’t say no to people...

who ask for my help without very good reason. The thread died because Alepo never replied. Fast forward to the new shit. A lot of people are scared to return to teaching and I was upset to think a latinx scientist had died and I felt frustrated. I didn’t have a reason at that

point to question the truthfulness of that account.

And I don’t want to talk to reporters when I can talk to my community that I’ve been with for more than a decade. The person at the center of the controversy tagged me into a thread having a zoom call to “pour one out” for Alepo. I grew up in East Los Angeles. That’s...

a phrase that has meaning. Even if you didn’t know the person well, you still show up and pour one out for a fallen homie. So, I showed up. Then it got weird. See, this is a community. And if this person was part of a community, where was the community? It was me, two other dudes

and the person in this controversy. Then it got weirder.

She said some things that were very unusual and I texted someone else that everything was weird and I felt uncomfortable. She kept going after one person on the call to “do more” and “engage in spaces” and I just kept wondering where

her community was. Why was it me and these guys? I’ve known them for years and figured if they knew her, good enough but it was still weird that there wasn’t more community there. Then somethings were said that made me uncomfortable.

The person kept saying how many similarities me and the other person had. Spanish speakers, scientists, pseudonymous, truth to power, a bi identity, undocumented family. She was talking about these Hopi bandanas. I said, I wasn’t Hopi and my family wasn’t undocumented.

Not that there’s anything wrong with being undocumented, but my family wasn’t. The only connection I have to a native community is through my best friend and that’s a secondary connection. A few times she tried to evoke these similarities between us.

But I didn’t know Alepo. She kept saying how important the people on the call were to this person and all I could think was...

I hope I’ve made a positive impact for someone but...

Then the weirdest shit went down. She kept pushing the one person on the call while also trying to tug on my heart. Saying that when this person was dying, she was reading her old blog posts and tweets because we/I had meant so much to her. Then the weirdest shit of all was said

That this person had revised their will and it was full of swear words and that I was in it. Guys.

I loudly exclaimed, “shut up!” because it was so preposterous. She kept going on about how Alepo was only concerned about giving gifts to people and how this person never received anything back from people. You don’t leave shit to randos from the internet...

when you’re first gen and you’ve got an undocumented family. You do everything for your familia. I’ve had 10 people living in this house for la familia.

I knew something was wrong that night and I knew something was wrong the next morning when I learned that the people I thought knew her didn’t. To use a phrase from my family back home, beyond all of this, I don’t know shit about shit. In the worst case scenario...

a member of our community died and no one knows who she is and can’t verify it. In the other worst case scenario, someone tried to groom me to provide cover for an egregious lie. Either way, I don’t want to talk about it anymore because I’m just trying to do good work and

be truthful. That’s all I know.

I don’t want to be mixed up in what is clearly shenanigans. I have always been here to listen, help, make connections, read manuscripts and grants, and all that stuff. I’ll continue to do that.

Regardless, this is someone who used to greet me with “Hey, friend!” and you don’t put your friends in a position where they can’t answer tough questions and you don’t tag someone into a fight they don’t understand. I don’t have enough credible info to fight this fight.

I just hope Alepo truly wasn’t real because if she was, it’s a tragedy for a community that can’t mourn for her.

It’s so ridiculous. She commented over and over about talking to Alepo’s family but then she asked me to translate tweets into Spanish. Why would I need to translate of her family can communicate in English?? It’s all suspicious.