 |
| Love the crotch block from Scott and the holding hands almost but basically not. And, as ever, the eye contact. |
was found by the blog. At the time the blog said that, it was no accident that the link to this "private" account got passed around til it reached the blog. Team VM wanted the blog to publish these photos. It was right after Scott had done something "nice". As many have noticed, when he's nice or gracious, he's setting people up. Has he EVER done anything nice on social media EVER that didn't come with a poison pill?
Turns out, this includes charity. Is he giving that money to charity - to men's health? Sure. But why not stick some sham on as a sidecar. Never leave something uncorrupted, that's them.
The fan who was so mortified over her flickr account being "exposed" had no compunction about paying a quick visit to fanforum to share a link that would set fans on the trail to locating a public facebook account that again exposes Scott's private life to the public and to the enemy. OMG! This poor fan must be mortified eleventy times over now! She's all internet thumbs, this fan.
Just remember Jessica had a profile pic up for her birthday with her sibs' significant others tagged, and in two seconds the fandom had located the album of Jessica's birthday party hosted on the facebook of her brother's girlfriend.
Team Virtue Moir are not internet geniuses with the big picture but they know fans can click through an easy trail.
I'm always happy to do their work for them.
So when a fan who had "private" photos stored on her flickr rolls in and drops a link to the m'ovember page, with just a quick "Great stuff!" or similar, slaps down a smiley, and then goes poof, fans click the link right away. There's Captain Scott raising money for m'ovember. Scott's on the web! Talking to friends and family, in public, joking around! Let's look at the list that's right there and see who is donating to his team. Looks like mostly friends. Whose name is at the very top of his donor list with an impressive $50.00? I recognize some of the other names, but hers is new. Wonder if she's on facebook like a lot of his other buddies. Tap tap - let's see. Oh, she is! And look at her profile picture, put up less than 24 hours ago and JUST in time for CoR.*
And now it's gone. Mission accomplished. How they think - or at least, the veneer they're putting up goes like this: if it were b.s., like everything these people do, would it have been hidden right after the blog published the photo? Of course not! Some evil blog published her private photo and it's a private facebook and right away she hid it. I wonder if she's embarrassed! Whatever, this whole incident is proof everything is private and real.
Just ignore that fans were busy dropping links, laying a trail of little arrows and post-its directing fans to the m'ovember site, and Team VM counted on this. In furtherance of keeping m'ovember on fans' minds, Moirwise (hi Charlotte), the m'ovember site is turned into an active chat-and-banter site among Moirs and friends so visitors will stick around awhile, check things out.
With this one, they're shit stirring. They're throwing bait out there, knowing fans will sniff it out in five seconds (which they did) - but as there are a couple of layers of separation, fans can't think this was set up intentionally! There's a layer of deniability. It's their idea of subtle. It's like when Barb dropped Craig Buntin's wedding guest list on icenetwork. This time, the trail ended at facebook but started somewhere else - how could it be them pushing people towards that facebook?
And here it is on the blog - because I aim to please.
I'm not going after these people - they want this stuff here. It's the only place left that justifies what they have done and do. They want to stir fans up, use the blog to do it, so they can point to the agitation and say "See - this is what we need to protect ourselves from!" Things were too quiet, fans too accepting, everybody was focused on Carmen, and the season ahead, which is how you'd think they'd want it. Only a few of the usual suspects on Addicted were analyzing body language, and expressing their thoughts, which is Scott and Tessa's business - how?
So, it was looking like Scott and Tessa have been jerking fans around all this time for nothing and maybe they should just be grateful things were settling down. Maybe leave well enough alone and focus on the skating part of the season ahead.
God fucking forbid.
I have a few thoughts:
How the photo reached fans (and since the blog started, the blog) is exactly how all the Jessica stuff reached fans prior to the post-Olympic sham blasts - via the underground railroad of social media, as that keeps Scott and Tessa's oh so clean hands clean.
The Moir family and some Scott buddies, so reticent on the facebook side of social media of late, are active all over the m'ovember page. Boy - they care a lot about men's health!
The blog went through a whole discussion in a recent post about Tessa versus Jessica and how Tesssa crushes Jessica in most basic appeal departments and now that Scott has pretty much announced Tessa's no innocent, please explain how Jessica could have the upper hand?
Cue the upgrade! A way more conventionally glam and confident gal steps into the recently vacated slot!
Here she is on a bunch of rocks - the location looks familiar.
She's from London. She knows the fam.
Still, while Scott doesn't appear to radiate the same degree of aversion he did with Jessica in the photo with Cassandra, it's still as if they each occupy their separate planes and kind of gingerly line up sideways (are they squatting, sitting, or leaning?) and even the lowered eyes look past each other, and Scott is sporting his weak "sensitive" smile that he has been practicing since the last few months of his sham with Jessica. And look at that upper body body language and Scott's crotch hand.
Scott and Tessa must be innocent in this one. They're minding their business! Is it their fault fans traced this profile pic? Who could have anticipated that? All that happened is a fan notorious for pushing the sham, notorious for boasting what she could see on Scott's personal fan page, a fan Scott "accidentally" kept on his facebook, a fan who caused "private" photos of Scott's "personal life" she was storing on her private, secret flickr account to suddenly and (also accidentally) become public at a very coincidental time, abruptly makes a cameo appearance on the only remaining VM forum with any traffic. She drops a fun link, says nothing more, and disappears, and when fans follow the link and nose around, and start using the search engine as they always do - voila! Private life exposed again!! And just like Cassandra's facebook is suddenly poof! - the flickr account also went bye bye. You'd think this fan would learn. Poor thing. Her face must be so red.
Who could have expected that when fans follow a link leading to something the Moir family has made very clear they're VERY interested in and VERY eager to share with the public, fans find a page crawling with remarks from Scott's family and friends, and some from his buddies. Will they stick around to explore?
Is the sky blue? There's more activity there in a week than on Scott's "fan" facebook in two years.
Oh look at Scott's donee list - who is that? BAM!
CoR is this weekend, btw.
They are so instinctively malicious, I don't think they can even tell when they're doing it. This is just like that other time.
That other time being when Scott's personal facebook, with thousands of fans on its list of friends, reached 5,000 (after weeks of working hard to reach 5,000). Scott announces that he's reached his limit and, as he doesn't want to leave anyone out, he's going to "shut this one down" and open a fan facebook. This blog has talked about that many times.
Then he wholesale deletes fans from his personal facebook, doesn't shut it down, and opens a fan page that he ignores.
The fans he selects to keep on his personal facebook aren't shy about letting others know they can still see everything on his facebook. The fans on his fan page mostly get to enjoy links to public stuff they've already linked themselves - hell, some of them uploaded it themselves! So special.
What Scott did was like cancelling a huge party to which you've invited hundreds of people, pleading that you will have another gathering at another time and place. Come the night of the cancelled party, the lights in Scott's home are blazing, the music is thumping, laughter is ringing, and cars are blocking everyone's driveway. Scott even staggers onto the porch to holler at a friend that it's about time this dude showed up for one of Scott's parties! All the neighbors who were disinvited watch this and are like .... :( - but they rally, swallow their disappointment and try to understand. Maybe it's family and friends and Scott had reasons he can't share.
Meanwhile, from time to time one of the party guests stumbles by accident onto their lawn and belches that there's a hell of a party going on at Scott's house.
The disinvited wait for the consolation gathering and Scott forgets all about it.
That's how he handled his facebook/fan facebook transition.
But then the fan facebook becomes too much to manage as well. Okay, he's busy. He's a champion figure skater. He's "unable" to maintain his fan facebook as we deserve, he announces, so THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU and he's shutting it down.
This is a guy who was unable to keyboard "thank you" all summer - not for CNE, not for jack shit. Not his birthday either.
From appearances, he does shut it down. Cannot his family, his friends - anyone - pitch in to keep it up in even a rudimentary way? Alas, not. They're all busy. However, not to worry: Scott tells us the season is just around the corner so stay tuned to www.virtuemoir.com for updates and new photos.
PICTURE OF THE MONTH
 |
| August |
|
| October |
|
| November |
The funny part is when I "saved as" this photo, it could be seen that the person who uploaded it to www.virtuemoir.com had named it pic-of-week2.
Okay, this just means they have good intentions, but they're busy. Busy, busy busy. Don't like social media, and busy. Can't come out and say they're just not social media people - better to lead people on and stand them up. That's the nicer way.
Go to the public m'ovember page - the Moirs are having a party there. So are their friends! Their virtual presence is lively, they're back-and-forthing and ha-ha-ing. If you followed the link to that page you'd be all - goodness, look at all these folks, haven't seen them in a long time. What are they up to? Let's look around, since it's all public and everything.
Bazoom! Cassandra Hilborn and Scott Moir limply holding hands (or his hand limply on her wrist - or maybe just his fingers, and could actually be read as him trying to get her to keep her hands to herself.)!!!
So it's not even charity they care about, is it? All this m'ovember shit, what is it about? Is it about the whatever money they've raised (Can't remember the exact amount but it would cover about one of Tessa's dresses so - good fund raising there, Scott! Time well spent!)?
No. They're looking for reasons to sham. The tail is totally wagging the dog now. Let's see - they've used charities, xmas, births, the Olympics, marriages, families. What about deaths? Is that next?
I hope we don't one day see "funerals" added to that roster. Could we put it past them to work a funeral? Even a family funeral? Hell no. Especially a family funeral. Scott's fake girlfriends should probably keep some black dresses in their closet in case something happens to Scott so they can sit next to Alma at the service while Tessa hides in the back with their kid. Or maybe she'll pretend she didn't attend.
Is it because they're so busy, and sham is "business" but the other stuff is just stuff and they have no time?
Is it because they are completely "above" fans, and any type of "equal" interaction, even the sort professionals do where you're the celeb and the fan is the fan and the interaction is pretty much confined to a fan/celeb dynamic - they resent? They refuse to put themselves on the same plane as fans? They always have to have the upper hand - not the upper hand built into the freaking celeb/fan dynamic - hello! But the upper hand as in - never let it be said I extended myself to people unless there was profit in it for me, or points I can score in an immature game I'm playing where I'm in the wrong and pissed off to be called out on it.
These points, too:
- Scott and Tessa will get away with this. The media, even when it reads the blog, doesn't have a lot of the source material to look at anymore (the facebooks, the posts). All the skating media knows and will report is these two kids lied about being platonic, what else is new. So, it will be spun and minimized. Which makes the sham even more of a joke, but not the sort they think it is. It's a joke because the media will handle anything the way Scott and Tessa want it handled, so they never needed the sham on facebook in the first place. They only needed their friends, the media. When it comes out - if it ever does, it will be spun as two kids with the celebrity of rock stars in Canada who needed a protective zone in which to compete and shield themselves from well-intended and overzealous fans. The profiteering, the gaslighting, the exploitation - will go ignored.
- As I've said before, unlike the majority of figure skaters competing, Scott and Tessa can afford to treat fans like shit because they can afford to treat fans like shit. So they choose to treat fans like shit. That's interesting to me. Charlie and Meryl can afford it too, so can the Shibs, and they don't. Tessa and Scott may be interested in business, they may be vaguely interested in helping to popularize figure skating in Canada again, but they don't NEED the good will or the money. I think it's telling when, if someone doesn't have to be decent out of self-interest, they're not. That's what they're showing us, Scott and Tessa and their friends and family.
- But, I don't think the internet is going away. I think this will follow Scott and Tessa as they remain in the public eye in any capacity as their careers/lives go on. I think they will be reminded of it a great deal down the line, not only by fans, but by people within the skating "community" who enable it now but may have different thoughts about it once everyone's careers are done. It's not going to be forgotten by the people who were most affected by it. That's not the media and that's not Scott and Tessa's finances, but it is the fans and it is a whole bunch of people at Skate Canada - and their families - who weren't stars.
________________________
Let's once again look at their huge self-involvement. If they'd debuted Carmen at Finlandia, Cassandra's profile picture would have been unveiled some other way in time for Skate Canada. This is like when the dreamy, engagement celebration, Mahler, debuted at Thornhill, Scott and Tessa gave some very couple-sounding interviews, and a few adorable profile videos were released. Once those were out - BAM! Jessica switches out her profile picture to the Dominican and invites us all to gaze at "<3 2009!"
But the Cassandra debut had to wait until after Skate Canada. It's the same pattern. First, fans saw the program. Then Scott and Tessa talking left and right about the progam's essential sexuality. Then Scott saying how Tessa's not too sweet and innocent for Carmen. Let fans get riled up for a good while, then - BAM.
P.S. - as I look at this - just go back and look at the situation vis a vis the behavior, and then look at the gap between their situation and their behavior, I do think they are trying to use the blog as a justification for their b.s. at this point. It's the only place really focused on them. That's why they do things like m'ovember, put Cassandra out there as bait, and as soon as the blog grabs the bait, they disappear and hide the facebook, the donation - IOW - hide the bait, so it appears as if the blog is pro-active, not reactive. Look - this blog is lasered on us! It hunted down Cassandra Holbin's profile shot and it found photos of Scott and Jessica in Mexico!
Well, no. The blog was spoonfed Cassandra, it was spoonfed Scott and Jessica in Mexico, and as soon as the blog grabs it, the source goes and crawls back down the hole. Shut it down! Shut it down! - As if they had nothing to do with the blog grabbing this stuff, as if the entire idea wasn't that the blog grab this stuff.
It's like the blog was a nemesis initially, but now it's like - well, nobody else gives a shit, so let's USE the blog. Let's set it up, funnel things to it, then hide the source! We can always point to an entire BLOG as Exhibit A for why we had to sham!
Happy to help.
Both the fb page and donation are gone. Who knows what that means, I hope we'll never hear of this again.
ReplyDeleteAside from the fact that at this point shamming is ridiculously inappropriate, why in the world wouldn't they do a better job picking the girl this time? I mean, you've discussed on here how Jess causes so much uneasiness with fans because she is so implausible. Well this one is in some ways even less so- "girls gone wild" vs the oh-so-classy, refined, disciplined and intelligent Tessa? I guess this one works even better for the "S can't get sex from the innocent T" thing, but to me this sham fits even less with reality than the first.
Is m'ovember gone or just the donation and Hilborn's name?
DeleteI think the comment below may have a point - this could be an older photo that was yanked out of the photo bank and slapped on Hilborn's profile because of CoR.
What is unquestionable is that the trail to Hilborn's facebook profile was seeded by the Moirs and by helpful fans (by "Moirs" I include Tessa and the whole group).
Why does fucking CoR need it? Don't ask. The sham is driving the train at this point, there's no "need" requiring the sham. It's 100% escalation of committment, or at least, entrenching yourself in position because of your prior investment.
I know a little bit about 2008-2009 and Jessica. She was not a fun person. Why wouldn't it be possible for Team VM to cast about for an alternative, and then deciding to stick it out because the Jessica set up, no matter how aggravating Jessica herself might be, was more convenient for Scott/Tessa.
I was more meaning, why not fix the believability issue? rather than convenience/likability. At least JD, it appears, strives to be more like T. CH, judging by some of the pictures, strives to be more like Paulina Gretsky. But anyways, it's my bad, when have they ever cared if shamming was effective or logical? This girl may well be more pleasant than JD, or it could be an old photo and not really a current project at all, I do agree he looks younger.
DeleteI also agree with so much of the conversation below. I'm tired, soooo tired of this, exhausted to the point it's hard to care. I've been totally convinced of the truth for about a year now, but as much as I have tried to just focus on the skating since then, they find ways of shoving our faces in crap that detracts from what they do on the ice. I hope that the execution is much more driven by the SC/family crowd than by TS themselves...how in the world can you take your sport/art seriously if you're willing to lend it out as fodder for these stupid games. The shamming used to be about their personal lives (life), but increasingly they make it about the program and its promotion too. Maybe us morons are just incapable of appreciating their skating, the same as we will never understand their uber special unexplainable relationship.
Sorry, an anon wrote - "Scott wore that t shirt in an interview in 2008-2009 - that's a long time to have a shirt.".
ReplyDeleteI replied and then deleted my reply and the anon's comment was deleted too. This was all they said, so I'm repeating it.
I deleted my reply because I wanted to add something and even can't edit a comment once it's posted. I'll re-post below.
That T-shirt appeared in a bunch of photos, not just an interview. I'm sure he still has it. However, it's beside the point how old or new the photo is, because Scott was with Tessa in 2008-2009, he's with her now, he's with her always.
ReplyDeleteWhat matters is that it's dragged out of the photo bank and used as the mousetrap at the end of "m'ovember" road prior to CoR.
Cassandra's hair is lighter in the profile photo than in the other photos among her visible profile shots. The relevant aspect is the photo is serving a purpose, not when it was taken, because Scott isn't with either of these women.
Jessica was never a walk in the park. I think anybody looking at Scott can see this photo on Hilborn's fb isn't a natural moment conveniently captured that was close enough, when cropped, to look like a possible bf/gf shot for people inclined to see it like that.
It was, at the time, whatever time it was - set up to look like that, and used now.
When the groundwork for the sham was being laid, there were different possibilites such as, clearly, Tessa/Bryce (see the old clip that was used as a bumper. It was Tessa in red, standing close to Bryce, chatting animatedly, while a stormy-looking Jessica stood slightly in the foreground, staring straight ahead (this was circa 2007). Bumpers are never a spontaneous moment that the camera just grabs.
Scott was in London (not Canton) much of the time in 2008-2009, because of Tessa's shins. Jessica was, simultaneously, not having a good year. They always went back to Jessica, because that was the easiest. They have stocked a lot of photos we don't see.
new semple picture on tumblr too...
ReplyDeleteokay, i believed you until now. he's NOT with virtue. maybe virtue is the unrequited in love one. unless you can say you have seen VM together, your "connect the dots" theory is bordering on libel
ReplyDeleteHe's with Tessa Virtue. It's not a theory. This blog isn't based on connecting the dots. It's based upon facts.
DeleteYour criteria for believing he's with her is your decision, not my responsibility. I'm fine with what you believe or don't, same with everyone.
What a shock they are breaking out a Tessa/Semple photo after he's been MIA since last season's Skate Canada. What a shock it's another rorshach photo - completely dependant on the context fans put on it, which they're counting on. If you don't know about the Skate Canada stagecraft last season, it looks like a group shot. If you do, you go - oh, she's with Semple still! And it's the sort of photo that when it surfaces years from now, looks like one of the jillion of Scott and Tessa with a jillion athletes, personalities, etc. This is again, currently all aimed at fans, trying to get fans to bite, while covering their own asses and future fallout. Isn't it nice how they try to make fools of fans without committing so much they cause damage to anyone they really care about?
Boy they must certainly think a tremendous lot of this Carmen program with the sex in it. It kind of takes away from it for me, to realize they're not only into it for what it means as a breakthrough ice dance, but they're obsessed with what converying outright sexuality is going to impact how the audience thinks, and they want to micro manage that. But before they start micromanaging, they need to get fans worked up and interested first. This is pretty sick - they can't stand it when fans are matter of fact or resigned. They want to get fans going, to justify trying to control them.
As ever, fuck off, Scott and Tessa. You skate. Our thoughts belong to us.
There's no reaction or thought that fans could have to Carmen that will affect Scott or Tessa in any way. They're on thought patrol. Try and think what that means. There's nothing tangible they're trying to manage that actually affects them. Thoughts. That's it. Thoughts.
This is all gratuitous. This is all a dogged adhererance to the asinine template they cooked up for the olympics.
They're all about "Oh it's such a sexy program, sex is so important, Don Jose is so mesmerized by Carmen's sexuality." Marina is all "Oh Tessa was a girl and now she's a woman, she has womanly feelings, blah blah." Wait - are you saying this program is mature, that Tessa has had SEX?
Yeah we get it, Carmen is sexy. But except for fans who apparently think the crotch is located six inches above the knee, who are these games aimed towards?
Grow up you assholes!
OMG, we wanted to do a program that was sexual, and powerful, and dramatic! We wanted to draw upon that power in us and we wanted to challenge our skating and shake up everything! We are going to bang that gong and let people know this was a decision and we're into it! We know sex, by God! Let's say the word a lot - sexuality! Sexuality! Sexuality!
Let's talk it into the ground! In case people miss the point, let's have stooges like Rosie DiManno break into a sweat and fan themselves, we are so fucking hot!!!
At the same time, let's cold cock the fans once we've gotten them worked up, and once again, and because we are more into ourselves than any fan could EVER be, assume the fan obsession with us rivals our obsession with ourselves, and let's try to micromanage fan reactions within an inch of our lives.
That's what's going on. You can't miss it.
They need to back the fuck off and knock off the crap, which, they won't do. They think doing a sex filled program - and of course, all the sex wouldn't matter at all if it weren't unbelieveably good skating - is a fantastic thing for them and their persona, but they don't want fans to get the wrong idea. Or at least, they don't want fans to think they've got the right idea, which fans do - fans have the right idea, and you know, fans can fucking handle it.
Something else: I think that while initially, the blog was seen as a problem, I now think they get off on it. Who else is talking about them? Everywhere else is just a reflection of what they've spun out to whatever reporter and that's got to be boring.
DeleteLast season they tried a few shenanigans - on Scott's facebook, mostly, while Jessica's profile shot just drearily rotated look-alike sham poses, but fans were kind of resigned. There was no drama. There was more drama over the dickish stunts Scott tried to pull on his facebook page then there was over - sob, he's not with Tessa.
I guess they missed the attention. For a couple of people who brag about how private they are, they sure like to get the web going.
This is more like it - they have Carmen, a program with lots of sex in it, and the choreography makes no bones it's sex, so the skaters talk it up, and talk about themselves, and apparently Marina Zoueva is eager to tell us that Tessa isn't a virgin. Ever since her legs healed, her virginity disappeared, that's what I'm getting from Marina. Tessa's a woman now, time for Carmen.
It's all very let's heat this up! Let's say stuff but just duck certain things! Let's heat it up some more. Hey Scott and Tessa - can you say "sexuality" as often as Kaitlyn Weaver says "authenticity?" Let's have a contest.
The relief! They haven't been able to get fans going like this since Mahler! They're supposed to be all charismatic and have fans falling on them like KStew and Rpatz! This is more like it. Wait - did you guys hear? We know this program has sex in it! We're saying the words!
They have an idea of themselves as very important, and yet on the web, this blog is the only place that treats them like that. The facebook has a lot of fans but the participants are always the same 6 people talking to themselves.
I know they tell people - not just fans - people around them who know them and their families - that this sham exercise is for privacy. The denial is for privacy.
However, that rationale requires a whole lot of fans obsessing over them not just on the web, but in a KStew/RPatz type of way, and that's just not happening.
They don't need to protect their privacy. They have all the privacy they need, and not because of the sham. If they want even more, they shouldn't figure skate - they have all the privacy every other figure skater has, and all the lack of privacy every other successful figure skater has.
The privacy rationale falls apart upon examination. The sham isn't required for privacy. That's just grandiosity at this point.
If you want privacy, you don't poke the sleeping dog and draw attention to yourself. You don't stir the shit to see if people still care. You don't fall over yourselves trying to stir up the public just so you can splash cold water on them and convince yourselves you're still a big deal off the ice and seven years of shadiness is justified cause - look! It seems to me they are trying to prove people are obsessed over them, they're trying to use the blog to prove it, and it's to justify a lot of their shady bullshit. It's not to convince fans they're not together. They want to stir fans UP, cause a stir, and then use the stir to justify themselves. When things are quiet it looks foolish.
You don't prime the pump, basically grab people by the collar and say "look at this!" and then duck and cover cause they're looking.
If they were getting all of the attention we're supposed to believe they get from the public, they wouldn't have to go out of their way to stir things up, to lay down bait. They shouldn't be ducking Debbi Wilkes. They're as phony as she is.
A profile picture where Scott looks a lot younger. A group shot at a charity-ball. Everyone is all worked up why?
ReplyDeleteSo all the years of Tessa and Scott behaving like a couple, on and off the ice (where what they say has never matched their behavior) means nothing; fans don't want to believe what's right in front of their eyes. But let two dubious photos make an appearance and everyone is ready to declare it most certainly is evidence of gf/bf, even lacking anything at all to back that up except completely empty speculations.
These photos absolutely follow previous patterns. That in itself cancels out any supposed message they're supposed to send, except the message that VM are as committed as they ever were to lie and screw over the fans.
Your last sentence nails it, except I think they are trying to justify their prior lying and screwing over the fans, by poking the hornets' nest.
DeleteThere is no reality-based need for all this lying. Just stay quiet and talk about your programs for Sochi; people are tired, including fans. You've left a mess behind already - why make more of one? Leave things alone.
Instead they come out and stir things up. Just like when the Mexico kiss photo was posted on the blog, as soon as the Cassandra photo hits the blog, they shut things down and let the blog be the shit stirrer. Which is fine by me. But see what they did there?
I do.
Please, please talk about them. Please please wail that the Semple tumblr and m'ovember sting means they're not together. Please show it matters to you, so they can justify themselves and all the resources they've applied to this bullshit.
That's what I see right now. Everything was calm. Addicted was speculating a little bit, but give me a break. That's not a sham justifier. FSU, even the trash can section, was actually talking about the program itself. The gossip section was skating-related (and of course, as usual, largely devoted to intranicine politics, as all fandoms are, which is why Scott and Tessa thinking fandoms were about them was always ignorant and immature).
And what happens. The Moirs get loud on their m'ovember initiative. Louder and louder. It's not loud enough? Have some reliable and flattered fans sew bait on the very few VM places that get trafic. It worked! People are stirred up!
And now show a group shot including Tessa and Scott on Tumblr!
See what big stars they are! Fans are buzzing! The blog jumped right on it!
And here is where they show their true colors. I've referred many times to Tanith and Evan. Let's look at that. She went all in. She didn't ask fans to buy something she wasn't willing to stand behind. She wasn't playing a suckers game with the lowly fans while covering her ass in the legit media.
Look at the photos Scott and Tessa have put out. Suckers game. A "eh - what?" photo with Scott and Holbin that their kid could see or a media outlet could google and day "Well, that's not much." A benign group photo with Tessa and Semple that is reliant upon the Skate Canada bullshit last season, but out of context is just a group photo.
See? They want us to eat shit, look like tools, make them feel like stars, but they also want to act as if none of this ever happened and just leave us holding the bag. That's the game.
Not just years of behavior and words being a contradiction, also years of lies and contradictions in so many interviews.
DeleteI agree with oy canada that if we accept they've lied about many other things, why not also about their relationship?
If they were not so intent on hiding, spinning, setting up stings, they would have time, and perhaps also goodwill, to maintain sites like an official website. When I consider how other elite athletes/public figures would do things...what would be more natural than saying, "I attended a charity event, here are some pictures". Part of the reason for all the freak-outs anytime these kinds of photos appear is because V/M have been so closed and also so deliberate in wanting to make sure the fans reach certain conclusions, and without V/M actually coming out and confirming anything. The fans have been burned so many times.
So I ask, why believe any implied story now? It's a waste of time.
As I look at this and just sift it, I don't think people believing them is the point. Justifying themselves is.
DeleteBack when that fan's flickr photos were posted on the blog, I posted the photos, but it was clear to me that team Virtue Moir wanted the blog to post the photos. My take at the time was they wanted to use the blog to promote the sham. Sure the blog said it was a sham, but there are plenty of fans who read the blog who don't agree, or are persuaded by photos. In any case, it was clear to me the blog's job was to post those suckers, no matter how the flickr owner pretended to be mortified afterwards.
My working hypothesis was they believed the blog could help disseminate the sham. Scott and Tessa had clean hands - because the blog was the enemy! Why would they try to employ the enemy?
This is the second time they've pretended like - OMG - the blog grabbed and posted private stuff! Quick - let's make it really private now! Who knew the blog would find it! Oh oh.
Yeah.
That's called manipulation. VM want the blog to post this stuff.
But I guess your average VM fan isn't looking at the big picture.
There is very little reason for Scott and Tessa to still be shamming.
And they see that as a problem.
Who or what can be used to prove to themselves or anyone else who might question them that their choices have been justified?
Why, the blog!
My issue with them is they want the fans to be humiliated and they basically want to come through clean. It's your classic right hand doesn't acknowledge what the left hand is doing. When the time comes, they want that rock star spin, where Tessa lowers her eyes and raises her shoulders and looks abashed/guilty because she felt she needed to protect her privacy and her focus despite fans constantly up her and Scott's ass. Scott wants to be earnest/appreciate/reassuring.
So, the photos are enough to bait fans, but not enough to incriminate Scott and Tessa unless the fans have a context, and Scott and Tessa know they do.
I used to think Tessa and Scott were these sweet, innocents kids, as they so lead us to believe. But for a very long time now, my opinion has changed, and I don't think that anymore. Honestly, I don't know what their game is but I sometimes think they are not together. Scott doesn't strike me as a faithful, want to be with one-girl for a while type of guy. I believe that more of his 'best friend' [side note: which by the way I think it is such another misused word (read: lie) by T&S. Do you ever notice that for such best friends, the girls don't really hang out together? Not that I'm trolling but per Meryl's tweets, one of her 'best friends' is not in her friendship pics -- ever. Oh I guess it's that BS privacy thing Tessa runs on about. Maybe Meryl just got sick of the BS. But I digress....] Charlie, who is open and honest about his relationship with Tanith. What makes me think Scott is a womanizing kind of guy is that I don't think he's such a nice guy as he purports himself to be. I'll never forget an interview where he said that Tessa is too perfect even when they're off the ice, and he's not like that. That once he steps off the ice he is not into the perfection thing. Also, there was that now 'oh-so-tender' moment -- that fans gobble up -- when Scott picked out something from Tessa's teeth before they went to accept their gold medal in Vancouver. Seriously watch the video at one point Scott seems irritated because she's so finicky about looking perfect. He body language suggests 'you're fine, stop obsessing'. I ask you: how can you always be with the girl who is nitpicking and has to have things just so ALL THE TIME. I'd think it's too much to deal with frankly. That's what leads me to believe that he plays the field (per the pic posted in your latest posting, and then goes around seeming like he's the all too faithful kind with 'jess' etc. I do think they're wonderful skaters (T&S), but such horrible sham artists. They need to grow up or just be honest. After all the truth would set them free. And everyone else who likes their skating and is sick of the BS.
ReplyDeleteI get the sense that Meryl and Tessa are cordial to each other and that's it. Both are extremely competitive. I think Charlie and Scott are much more laid back and I think after Sochi - they will remain friends. The ladies not so much...As for Scott being a womanizer who knows? But if Tessa is with Ryan Semple...good luck with that...Semple is friends with Paul Bissonnette - a hockey player who is the biggest womanizer and asshole in pro sports...enuf said...
ReplyDeleteJust to add to my comment at 7:59 am - let's just say that Tessa's skating friends such as Jeff Buttle and Stephane Lambiel would not feel comfortable with Semple's crowd...
ReplyDeleteI agree. I remember when Semple was trhowing the gay word around on twitter and someone called him on it,He wouldn't take his comments back. How could Tessa date such a person or hang around these kind of people? I guess she can though. Even a certain someone's family feels the same way as well apparently...:):)
DeleteI don't doubt that the Moirs are homophobic but I wouldn't put Scott in the same category..From what I have seen Scott is respectful of Buttle, Weir, Lambiel, Orser, Wilson etc - he may not be chummy chummy all the time but I don't think that he would create an environment that would be uncomfortable...
DeleteALMA is respectful of Buttle, etc. but she still comes out with trashing the gays.
DeleteAs for Tessa and Semple - Tessa Virtue's need to hide her relationship with Scott Moir is much much more important than the fact that her Semple association enables Semple's homophobia. Priorities, people! Tessa is more important than homophobia!
I think that as figure skaters guys like Jeff Buttle are accustomed, at this point, to hearing gay people belittled in general by their friends, while their friends just adore them in particular. They roll with it.
Scott is with Tessa. He's not playing the field or being a womanizer. Likewise, Tessa is with Scott, she's not with Semple.
But the people they sham with are side issues to them. The two of them are the most important thing and everything comes second to what they perceive as their needs, so they have tunnel vision and of course tunnel vision causes collateral issues, and that's regrettable, but it won't change the hierarchy of their priorities.
Meryl and Tessa are very good friends. Similar in some respects. Just like it's a good idea not to stereotype people romantically, it's smart not to do it personally - oh the guys are buddies but the girls are cordial - the teams are rivals so SOME of these girls must be bitch biting.
Not really. Everyone is super competitive. Everyone is driven to win. And they're still real, actual friends.
The girls are tight.
The MOIRS are respectful of Buttle, Lambiel, Mabee, Orser, Wilson, etc. So are the Virtues.
They are disrespectful and insensitive about gays in the abstract, and their beloved friends who are gay just have to be understanding. Look at Alma's infamous remarks about how Kurt Browning un-gayed the sport after Boitano. What an asshole thing to do. First, let's blame Boitano - he's American. He's not out, but so what - let's steamroll right over that and tell the world!
Let's protect Orser, who is out - I'm sure Orser appreciated not being accused of gaying the sport. This is like saying Robin Szolkowy is making the sport too ethnic and thinking you're protecting Asher Hill when you say it.
It's like - gay is wrong, but we'll make allowances for our friends!
The ignorance - and they wear it aggressively. It's also known as small town values. They're very parochial and homegenous and they're myopic for miles. It's not something to be proud of, and it insults those who actually do have small town values and are not ignorant. The two attributes don't mean the same thing.
Anyway, this is a tangent. I'm going to do another post round-up because I've processed this episode a bit more. I have no problem blogging while assembling a bunch of things and expressing my opinion on them, but after it's processed the through line starts getting clearer and that's what I want to focus on in the new post - it's about how they want fans to obsess over them - or at least they want to have the appearance that fans are obsessing over them.
Scott really does look a lot younger in this picture with Cassandra. Seriously, they thought no one would notice? However, the enthusiastic responses from the group of friends does bring up the question whether now we are to be expecting Scott's childhood friends to be the ones to up the ante this season.
ReplyDeleteWhy not? It's a blast for them. And not only do they get to say they're friends with Scott Moir, they can now add that they helped him fuck over the fans that support him!
Deletejust so you all know, scott and cass are the cutest couple ever and love each other SOOO much. I wish every couple could be as great as them and I can't wait to attend their wedding if they do get married.
ReplyDelete