“Careful of the Rain, Dear…”
Week 20 of 2024 offered a chance to reflect on a Netflix hit, the challenges of public diaries, and the anniversary of my father’s recent death…
To see how Sam Pepys spent this week 364 years ago, follow this link.
It is oh so tempting to tell you all about the people who seriously fff(rustrated and) annoyed me this week. Samuel Pepys didn’t have a problem describing his nemeses, and neither did Richard Gadd – so why should I?
Luckily, though, this was the week in which Ermma and I finally succumbed to the hype, and started to watch Baby Reindeer. Having been told very little about it other than “You must watch it!” from almost all our friends, I did indeed utter an audible “Oh!” when the first episode opened with a title card reading, “This is a true story.”
It wasn’t long before I thought, It can’t be. He must have changed some details, surely?
True, one of the surefire ways to earn an audience’s trust is to reveal your own flaws, and the show was quite self-deprecating throughout. I was sexually abused in my early adult life too, and Gadd gave a discomfortingly accurate portrayal of the conflict you feel over your own responsibility for ‘bringing it on’.
But were I to dramatize what happened to me, I would change far more than just the names, especially when the mental health of the alleged aggressor is in question. What if they were undergoing treatment, and the discovery of their portrayal caused a relapse, resulting in further victims?
Like many of the show’s multi-million-figure audience (about a third, based on the viewing figures), Ermma and I finished the final episode and immediately looked up Piers Morgan’s interview with Gadd’s ‘real’ stalker. What struck me early on was Morgan reporting Gadd’s words from a GQ interview:
“We’ve gone to such great lengths to disguise her to the point that I don’t think she would recognise herself. What’s been borrowed is an emotional truth, not a fact-by-fact profile of someone.”
In a way, this statement was utterly true, as can be seen by the so-called ‘real’ stalker repeatedly denying everything the series claims she did, other than some choice social media ‘banter’ and the reasoning behind the name ‘Baby Reindeer’. So the court scenes at the end of the series could in fact be Gadd’s artistic interpretation of how things finished with his stalker.
Here’s the dilemma: if all those claims aren’t fact, then allowing the stalker’s inspiration to be identified via some direct quotes of her social media means that all Gadd’s poetic licence, intended to disguise, becomes legal defamation, compounded by the seemingly unequivocal statement at the start of the series that, “This is a true story.”
And if they are fact, that same ease of identification makes it ethical defamation, suggesting Gadd is now enjoying mahoosive fame and fortune at the expense of someone mentally unsound, all without cutting them in on the deal.
Of course, Pepys never expected his diary to be public, so he can kinda say whatever he likes about anyone. But as a writer living in the house of the famous diarist being encouraged to diary publicly, the furore around Baby Reindeer was a timely warning that Gadd went about his anonymisation all wrong. His principle should have been,
“We’ve gone to great lengths to disguise her to the point where she may well recognise herself, but there’s absolutely no way she or anyone else could prove it’s her.”
Still, Baby Reindeer also does a great job of highlighting the ripples a life event can have, often without you realising till it’s too late. Yes, some people really ppp(ushed my buttons and switched my empathy) off at the start of this week, and at first I couldn’t quite work out why I was getting so wound up.
But then I remembered: 724 days ago last Monday, Ermma and I returned from our 5-day honeymoon to find my father in substantially worse health than he was when we’d left him. He died exactly one week later, almost to the hour.
We remembered my father fondly on the second anniversary of his death, spending that evening in his most frequented local and enjoying his favourite order: a large glass of merlot and a carvery.
While I couldn’t indulge his taste for meat, I followed the example of his gratuitous love for potato, piling my plate high with every variety they offered: mashed, boiled, and roasted. Afterwards I did worry: What if eating like this is the reason he died so young?!
It was in the days afterward that I almost came to blows with some people – but after a few episodes of Baby Reindeer, I realised the possible connection between the significance of 13 May and the shortening of my temper.
I even contacted a few of my ‘victims’ and apologised. All came back with gratitude and understanding – and apologies of their own.
So there you go. Positive lessons can be drawn from that show. I just hope, for Gadd’s sake, they don’t end up overshadowed…
Oh – and let this piece be a warning to you: cross me, and your idiocy will certainly be exposed and ridiculed in this here public forum. You just won’t be able to prove it’s you… $;-)
In return for the smiles these words gave you, please send them to a friend!
You’ll then get two bonus smiles: one for bringing joy to your friend, and one for my mahoosive gratitude. $:-)