Gawker
Before she was exposed as a well-off suburban girl rather than a hardscrabble gangster, lying memoirist Margaret Seltzer claimed to have set up a "foundation" called International Brother/SisterHood, either to support her backstory, preemptively redeem herself or maybe just somehow swindle more money. (Thanks to commenter Sigerson for spotting the site and Hamud for taking an early crack at it.) The foundation's website appears to have been registered in the name of Seltzer's agent, Faye Bender, and claims the foundation does pretty much whatever you need, from gangland peace negotiations to anti-gang education to mentoring. "Although we were Bloods, we hold no grudges against CRIPS," the site reads. The most outlandish part is easily the biography of Seltzer's alleged "OG" mentor in the Bloods street gang, Madd Ronald, who the site said also goes by the name "Ronald Chatman."
Though ostensibly a South Central Blood, "Chatman" often sounds like he's writing a vulgar, awkwardly-phrased college term paper on power relations within the drug trade.
"Just the same as countries like Colombia and Afghanistan stake the greater benefits of their economy in the drug trade," Chatman wrote, "all these foreign drugs find their way to the streets of Los Angeles, where the impoverished and the gangs stake their economical benefits in the same trade."
"The gangs, the impoverished, the distributors, processors, traffickers, merchants, and consumers work in the streets day to day. Militias protect the interest of poppy fields of Afghanistan and Coca plantations of Colombia just the same as gang members protect their common interest and profits with AK 47’s, small armies and control of enough area to assure that all profitable substances will be sold on time."
Chatman also said he joined the Bloods at age eight, dropped out of high school, learned to make crack from his father and, uh, identifies as part of Generation X.
Also? He's a big fan of Margaret Seltzer! Referring to Seltzer by her pen name Margaret Jones, Chatman wrote:
Margaret Jones is one of those who was fit to survive the 3rd world conditions of Los Angeles. Every moment of trauma and oppression within her life she overcame with successful accomplishments and great.
...Margaret Jones is a product of the hood. She has seen her share of desensitizing events and hardships, enough to be a soldier in the fight against poverty, oppression and ignorance. She continued to fight her way through the University of Oregon where she graduated with a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Ethnic Studies, but she began her fight in South Central LA, below the Hollywood sign.
Since the site is destined to be taken down sooner or later, screenshots of the Chatman biography and "Foundation Information" page follow.
Comments
Oh this is good stuff. OG Madd Ronald. Maybe if she was honest she could have been the next David Simon.
site is gone...early bird aka "Gawker" got the worm; too bad the rest of us were sleeping!
And I think the auther of the Junie B. Jones books should be mad pissed about this hijacking of her name!
xx
Skater
ooh sorry authOR
Has anyone reached out to the Bloods for comment? I hear they've got a terrific press operation.
oh shit. just by looking at that OG pose, i know i'd never wanna make RONALD(are you kidding me?) madd
love the high socks. what is that? shin socks? a new invention? someone call american apparel.
Trying to remember how long it has been since I have given less of a shit about something. I'm certain her fucking follow-up will be a transcription of her hynotically induced recollections of being at the Alamo. The place in Texas, not the car rental joint...
@skater: Fuck that was fast, I'm not even asleep yet.
@skater: Of course did it occur to your that *I* fabricated the whole site as a lame "meta" joke or maybe to get hits?? (For the record I didn't, and for the record I'm giving myself ideas.)
time to start international "copycat foundation with the O.P. "original plagiarizer". Not the Crips- the Rips.
Funny, OG Mad Ronald with his "just the same as countries like Columbia and Afganistan... sounds like...
" I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because, uh, some people out there in our nation don't have maps, and, uh, I believe that our education like such as in South Africa and, uh, the Iraq everywhere like, such as, and … I believe that they should, our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S. err, uh, should help the South Africa and should help the Iraq and the Asian countries, so we will be able to build up our future." Lauren Caitlin Upton
hmmm conspiracy theorists take note.
Google cached version: [www.google.com]
Sorry, no awesome pictures, tho.
All this is an insult to all us white chicks who actually grew up in the 'hood, let alone everyone else who grew up in the 'hood.
Every heard of the FICTION genre, Mags?
I can never understand people who WANT to be ghetto.
watch out for a drive by at the Sherman Oaks Starbuck's. No place is safe, not even Mr. Roger's neighborHOOD..
Okay, what does 'OG' stand for?
@SheLaughs: Original Gangster.
Once watched a fascinating cross examination by a defense attorney that was all about whether the witness considered himself an O.G., mixed with all these insults for why he was really just a wannabe, mostly to get the witness so upset that he would break his calm. And it worked. Like Law and Order, but in real life.
Man, white people are dumb. How did anybody believe this shit?
Yesterday I said "yo no comprende" in perfectly accented Spanish to a Mexican fish-and-chips seller. Does that make me an Original Latino Gangster?
OG Madd Ronald had a farm?
Ronald's essay would have been more believable if she had mixed in some of the messages of the Five Percenters or Nation of Islam or Christianity. Cons who turn good usually do it because they've found a metaphysical system that appeals to them, calms them down, and focuses their minds.
But God, this bitch has no shame, does she?
What does Krazee Eyez Killa have to say about all this?
@kromelizard: People are dumb, period. How she got people to back up her story, that's what I don't get.
Is that the Hollywood sign Ronald's throwing in that pic? I can do the Blood one pretty good, but I have to crack my knuckles afterward.
@TheHonJudgeSmails: He says, "You like to eat pussy?"
@moff: Are you my caucasian?
@jeweltones: ee i ee i o. And on his farm he had a glock.
Has someone sent this to Things White People Like yet?
Also: did they photograph him with the stables in the background? Hardcore!
Wow. I am going to get this guy to write all my references for future job interviews. And, if I don't get the job, he can off the HR person who didn't hire me.
@Michael Jahn: Donde es el bano? or something like that. Tell me quick. Seriously, I need to urinate.
@Ummwhat:
Yo yo yo yo, Bro.
@Sarcastro: It think it's "esta," as in "donde esta Santa Claus." I had the same problem yesterday and simply said "bano." He pointed.
The socks and shoes combo screams "I'm hangin' wit my homie Cliff Claven." Terrifying
The hell with it. I back her. If it wasn't for Maggie I'd probably be reading some crap about The Observer or Tinsley Mortimer right now. This is much better.
@zibby: Indeed. Wait, she hasn't killed any puppies, has she?
Wow. It's one thing to run a scam to get a book deal. It's quite another to delude yourself into thinking your scam is real.
But when you get other people to back up your story -- that's taking it to the 10th power.
So, did she do a Google image search for "thug Black man"?
I'm thinking she majored in "I Fucked A Black Guy" in college. Was given the privilige of smoking some herb with some "homies" and her imagination went crazy.
@BettyCrocker: She's kind of the wigger Laura Albert, isn't she?
I bet she did all of her research DIRECTLY from the movie, Menace II Society. It portrays pretty much everything, almost exactly as she desribes it. also... they wear the shin high socks and house slippers look like there's no tomorrow. it's a look I also appreciate, even though I am the whitest. THE WHITEST.
@valet_of_the_dolls: Srsly!
Can this story be beat into the ground any more? Just like the James Frey book, I believe a good story is a GOOD STORY. If she was crafty enough to sell her work by creating this back-story, good for her. It's the same thing if someone was creative enough to get a resume in front of an employer. Just blame the publisher for labeling it non-fiction. Next up: People who read the book asking for refunds.
@sharpeiboy: if someone were creative enough to get a resume full of lies in front of an employer and then got fired for it, then yes, this is the same thing.
Oy. I'd like to take back my previous comments. This is so fake, it's pathetic.
Sarah, dear Sarah, you should have checked.
Her agent, Faye Bender, still lists her on her Web site under "nonfiction."
[www.fbliterary.com]
@sharpeiboy
This is a story that just keeps on giving.
I knew we were onto something quite sweet when we learned that the NYT reporter found Peggy in her kitchen, making black-eyed peas and cornbread.
Next we were fortunate enough to hear Peggy speaking in her crazed white-chick's imaginary black street dialect.
Since Peggy spoke in this remarkable fashion during radio interviews, it's safe to assume that Peggy also spoke this way to the NYT reporter who followed her around as she walked her pit bulls through her Eugene, Oregon neighborhood.
But it's when Sigerson pointed us to Peggy's web sites that the story left the "I Love Lucy" realm and began to pioneer in what can be described only as epic funkadelic realism.
I've come to love Madd Ronald even more than Peggy's rendering of her imaginary black street dialect.
We've entered a hall of mirrors where "Atomic Dog" plays loudly in the background.
@Hamud: How do you "make" peas?
um, is Chatman real? Did she write his copy & post his photo? Or if the photo & copy are one & the same man, has anyone verified if he's a lying student type at Berkeley or UCLA etc?
@trojanhorse
How do you "make" peas?
Not in the same way that you "make" a joke.
I guess in Southern parlance you might say that Peggy "cooked herself up some black eye peas." At any rate, "make" is more colloquial than "prepare," don't you think?
I imagine that were Peggy true to form, she probably "made" black eye peas by first frying up some fatback or bacon and then maybe sauteeing some chopped onion in the grease. It all depends, really, on how Big Mom taught her to make black eye peas, or on how Madd Ronald preferred them.
Site's gone. Vanished. Cache links barely work. How odd.
@Hamud: Tks for the shout out, homie...
Looks like Madd Ronald is for reals, yo:
[www.streetgangs.com]