I exposed another author for sabotaging their peers...
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- Опубліковано 5 вер 2024
- A compilation of my 3 TikToks about the Cait Corrain fiasco, as requested by people who do not want to watch these on TikTok.
The receipts: docs.google.co...
Please support the books most affected:
- Voyage of the Damned by Frances White
- So Let Them Burn by Kamilah Cole
- The Poisons We Drink by Bethany Baptiste
- To Gaze Upon Wicked Gods by Molly X Chang
- Mistress of Lies by KM Enright
- The Hurricane Wars by Thea Guanzon
- The Empire Wars by Akana Phenix
- Knives, Seasoning, and a Dash of Love by Katrina Kwan
- The Gods of Hunger series by RM Virtues
Last time I checked racism wasn’t a symptom of ADHD or Autism
True, but last time I checked an adult human female is a woman and a male is a man, but objective reality doesnt live here either so... everyone can act as delusiuonal as they want based on their crazy claims. She does, so can others.
@@calistafalcontail Sweetie are you lost? Trying to understand your own gender issues by taking out your frustrations on others? I remember being like that, but that's no way to conduct yourself socially. What would your family think of your habit of attacking strangers on the internet? I recommend having a glass of water and stepping outside into the wide diverse world of people that can and will challenge your worldviews. I know it's scary, but I believe in you. I hope the weather is nice! .)
@@calistafalcontailhoney just say you want to keep being racist so nobody has to waste their time on you ❤
@@calistafalcontailYou mean, the same sort of delusional thinking that causes you to believe that you understand sex and gender despite every doctor in existence telling you just how wrong you are? Because, you know, nevermind what medical science actually states! It's all about what you personally want reality to be! Congratulations on proving you're guilty of the very delusional thinking you point fingers at others for having! I would say the hypocrisy is fucking hilarious, but the reality is that it's far too dehumanizing to be. Go talk to a doctor or two about the realities of sex and gender, and then come back when you've actually educated yourself! You know, all of those doctors you've avoided speaking to because you don't want to face the reality of just how wrong you are! Only then will we really be able to have an intelligent conversation about the topic!
@Frosty6845 Speaking as a Latina woman with ADHD, I can tell you without question, it isn't!
man i hate when i start on my ADHD meds again and accidentally become Mr. Goddamn Hyde but only on Goodreads
I've seen jealousy and insecurity do some next level psychotic breaks. Nothing to do with AuDHD
Same, I hate it when my autism accidentally make me burn an orphanage and run over the elderly :(
I soooo totally relate to Cait’s struggle of accidentally being racist whenever she took her meds
Happens to the best of us...
yeah, whenever i take my ritalin it's really hard to resist being bigoted. you can't spell "ritalin" without "racism" 😔 but it helps me finish my homework, so
wahhhh, this four-year-long mental breakdown is causing me to compulsively make and use fake goodreads accounts! I cant remember it very well, but i still managed to build 37 lists and switch accounts multiple times! Im heartbroken, and im taking full ownership of this! starting...now. *deletes account* ok, now!
You have no idea how loud I yelled "OH FUCK YOU" when Cait's new excuse was her ADHD and Autism. I have both and that is NOT an excuse for what you did Cait.
I am also Autistic and ADHD and I did the same!😂
Audhd never made me racist 😂 if anything it helped me leave
Sad thing is this isn't the first time I've seen someone weaponize autism to justify being racist, with one reel I saw saying they dislike Black people bc they have autism. Nevermind that neither of those things have anything to do with each other.
AutDHD here, too, and my need to still unpack racist biases has nothing to do with my neurodivergences and everything to do with being a white boomer who grew up with self-identified Good White People (TM) as my parents = I had zero role models for constructive self-analysis until I started to listen to and make friends with Millennials.
Cait also blamed her multiple drug addictions, not just the ADHD meds, to be fair. Impulse control can be lost due to several dopaminergic drugs, leading to the expression in public of things we would normally hide away because of our awareness of their being shameful or committing acts regardless of possible consequences. Things can be a reason while not being an excuse.
If I had a dollar for every time someone blamed autism for their/someone else's deplorable behavior, I would probably be able to afford, well, a really nice lunch.
I’d be able to afford a professional autism diagnosis and more sensory aids
@@sawyer6264 THIS as well 👆🏻
@@sawyer6264 no really why is a diagnosis so expensive 🥲
Especially incels. So, so many incels claiming it's their autism, real or fabricated, that makes them act that way. Compete BS, of course, but they think it's a justification or excuse when really it's just demonizing people with mental illness related struggles.
It just frustrates me because I know *most* autistic people aren't like that, but because the ones who are get spotlighted the most when things like this happen, it gives neurotypical people the impression that most autistic people are just making excuses when really it's a very small percentage of us.
I'm autistic and I fucking hate it when people blame autism for shitty behavior.
Same. I'm Autistic and ADHD. 😅
Same! I am Autistic and ADHD! Like your racist behavior can't be excused with that you are Autistic! Being Autistic doesn't make you racist. Your racist biases do! Your shitty behavior is on you! Agreed with everything!
Same.
Me too. It's infuriating.
we already have to deal with being isolated or infantilised: we don't need people making it harder for us. I have autism too;
My ADHD meds (Ritalin) never made me act out of character. They did, however, unleash a Cleaning Beast for the first three months, where I would go absolutely bonkers and clean obsessively at like 9 am. That did taper off as my body stabilised, but y'know, that Cleaning Beast has always been a part of me, and is still tucked away in my chest. I just got the energy to finally unleash that creature, to my whole household's dismay.
It says more about Cait that their meds made them write those racist reviews, rather than saying anything about the meds. Most ADHD meds enable you to do things you couldn't do before, which is why they often come with a warning to watch out for certain self-destructive habits. Not because they cause them, but because they can give somebody the energy to actually commit to them. Cait just finally decided to show their true colours on meds, something that they cannot own up to.
Damn, and all Ritalin did for me was make me short.
This is possibly the best read whether they’re lying about their meds or not.
I want that energy to clean my whole house. It spring cleaning time, and my mind does not care.
Impulse control can be compromised by ADHD medication and similar things like Parkinson's meds. Those meds can cause people to express their bad characteristics, which normally they would keep chained in the dungeons of their mind palace.
@@Lucifersfursona If you mean me, then no, I am not lying. I do wish the Cleaning Beast had stayed with me for longer, but alas, instead it descends upon me at the most inopportune time nowadays. Usually at night when everybody in my household wishes to sleep, so that has stayed consistent. But my meds made me a chaotic gremlin in the early months, giving me the energy to unleash it upon everybody within my vicinity. I miss that time :( Now my meds just makes sure I'm actually awake, and not falling asleep at any chance I get. Oh well, at least I can be productive-ish most of the time :)
Watching this drama unfold was like those old infomercials, "But wait, there's more!"
You’re not just getting the steak knives, you’re going to get the butter knives, the fish knives AND the dessert knives AB-SO-LUTELY free!
Except the knives aren’t knives, they are terrible decisions and behaviours.
Now I'm imagining that person behind this BS as one of those exaggerated clumsy folks that fumble something basic with a black & white filter over the footage.
I'm guessing this is accurate.
i'd seen most of this saga through shorts/tiktok and was like "oh, well i'll just watch this as a summary" AND THEN THEY BEGAN THE LAST PART
But if you call RIGHT NOW, not only you get racism and a one-star review, you ALSO get some EXCLUSIVE autism blaming!
Rest in Peace to Billy Mays 😔(he never actually said 'But wait, there's more!' in a commercial, but he's the only major commercial personality I remember from that era)
I heard someone say "you are not responsible for your first thought, but you are responsible for your subsequent thoughts and actions" and that has helped me to unpack so much of my subconscious bias. It's important to understand that we have these systems drilled into us and, while it's difficult to face that part of yourself, the only way to be rid of it is to get to the root of it and understand it so that you can deprogram the pathways that system has created.
Highly disagree with you're not responsible for your first thought. All thoughts are brain juice from your brain mixer. Doesn't matter if it's first second or third thoughts, it says absolutely nothing about you. No what matters is your actions and what you say and your intentions behind those.
I heard this too once... was it Robin DiAngelo? Looking it up though, I see a lot of references from different sources, including a fitness and workout Xwitter account, hehe.
An excellent point. And if someone feels they can’t control what those subsequent thoughts are/ struggle to misdirect their thoughts away from it then that is a sign they need therapy or some kind of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
don't let the intrusive thoughts win lol
Thank you for sharing that. Really, really.
We desperately need a Xiran Jay Zhao video run again, not just shorts or TikTok’s , but some long form stuff. The community is starving for a video about every YuGiOh card that has some actual Chinese history / accurate reference and a video for the worst ones
Honestly, same. I understand they are also working on their books as well, but I want to see more content about Chinese history and do some analysis videos on YuGiOh. They're a massive fan of that franchise, but yet they've never made anything about it other than that one book series.
To be clear, I’m happy to support Xiran with any / everything they do, at their own pace and when / how / if they want to. I don’t think it’s your intention but want to be conscious my words could be interpreted too aggressively. And yeah, I think a YuGiOh Chinese history vid feels perfect for her - again, happy to see whatever she does, whenever and however she does it
@@realexiscastro7213 Oh, yeah, no. I totally agree with you. It's their choice at the end of the day. Just kinda wish they would do more of those things. Sorry if I came across that way as well.
I don't watch shorts, tiktoks, or reels. Instead of watching Xiran's content I just watch it in long form on youtube being covered by other people. Turns out, 100s of thousands of people do the same. If Xiran doesn't want to make money, that's up to them.
tbh I'm still hoping the video, about how you can easily spot the period in dramas by clothing they jokingly mentioned could happen in the future in one of their longer videos, will come out eventually 🙈
"this is an unmoderated space" = WAH I CAN'T CONTROL THE NARRATIVE.
It's amazing how people claim "I was depressed, I had a breakdown!" miraculously suffer NOTHING themselves during their breakdown, but magically turn into monsters that hurt others. I had a mental breakdown awhile ago. I ended up in bed for 3 months, unable to do anything but sleep, even eating and bathing were immense hurdles. I subsisted on foods I could microwave and even then I would only eat once a day and try and get enough calories in me not to need more, and I'd wipe myself down with a wet cloth at the sink in the washroom because the concept of showering made me want to lie back down again immediately. It's weird, it never occurred to me to go out and hurt other people. How the hell could I possibly when I couldn't even care for myself? And it CERTAINLY never made me think "golly, what I want to do now is find people of color to harm while boosting myself up at their expense."
"Mental health" my ass.
THIS👆Right Here. As someone with real psychotic episodes, this is so obvious fake and is driving us actual crazy people farther away from society, because society care about less and less. I was so mad at those ableist comments. You are not making yourself look better, your just making other people look worse.
I hope you're doing better now! I have had a similar experience. What you said is correct: the use of mental illness to excuse behaviour is just wrong and gross.
So true@@rooplespooples
exactly
@bettrhalf8006 -- For real. And well said. Been there, lived that, and also did not once harm others.
.
It sounds less like there was an actual breakdown (for the other person -- Cait?? iirc spelling -- not for you), and more of a narcissistic need for attention / bs excuse for bad behaviour.
It is absolutely disgusting how Cait tried to shift the blame for her racist actions off of herself and onto the autistic & ADHD communities. We're already stigmatized enough, we don't need someone saying that autism or ADHD meds make you racist.
Oh 100%, as someone who has autism and is related to/best friends with two people who take meds for their ADHD, this kind of stuff REALLY PISSES ME OFF
So how does she explain the racist people who lack ADHD meds?
@@jeffreygao3956 that’s what I was wondering as well
Y'ALL I NEVER LEFT UA-cam LMAOOO I'VE BEEN UPLOADING SHORTS THIS WHOLE TIME
(*Insert "Quit telling everyone I'm dead!" meme*)
It's good not being dead 👍.
(but I still miss the long videos 🥺)
I know I know, and I loved the Robspiere vs Antoinette Yugioh duel, but I do miss the longer videos. Rewatching/listening to the old videos can only go so far! Wanna hear your breakdowns of shiz. I would love to hear your thoughts on the Apothecary Diaries or something.
Good on ya for still uploading, however, shorts are shorts, which not everyone watches/likes. Hell, I honestly thought ya left, just cause I didn't even think about the shorts, that and they weren't advertised by ya.
“Sometimes I can still hear a notification from XiranJayZhao’s UA-cam channel 😭” (the other half of the meme lol”
I really just want one of these people who end up in scandals like this to be truthful- "Yes, I targeted POC authors to review bomb because my book was written to appeal to people looking for diverse representation in what they read and I viewed sales of those kinds of books as a zero sum game. I allowed my anxiety to push me into thinking every sale for someone else's book was a lost sale for my own and, because of who I regarded my primary readership as, it led me to seeing POC authors as my main competition. I did not consciously choose them for racist reasons but my actions remain nevertheless racist in execution."
They can't because their ego cannot let that happen. Instead they are looking for an excuse to appear as the "suffering victim" in all of this, to STILL get the attention they need and get away with all their BS.
YOU'RE SO RIGHT bc thats probably exactly what happenned and I wish Cait would just own up to it. Best comment here.
It would actually not make them actively look worse. They actually could regain actual support from such a statement. Because such a statement leads people believe there is actual real hope for betterment in the not so distant future.
But their fear of getting rejected for who they really are(because that would hit deeper) likely lead to their counterproductive mitigation efforts
Did she actually target POC authors or was it just any author who could compete with the sales of her book? The former is racist, but the latter is not.
If she downvoted any author she thought was competing with her then it wasn't racist.
My depression is extremely severe and sometimes keeps me in bed for days to weeks while letting all my responsibilities slide away other than like, taking my dog on walks. It does not drive me to make attempts to ruin the careers of random people online, that takes _way_ too much effort.
same... I fell into a deep depressive state when I wrote my BA dissertation during the first Covid quarantine, stress from family members and 2 years of not finding a single job after writing application after application. I have no idea how this person even takes the energy for being this hateful and petty (IF she has depressions at all.) 8 full hours of uninterrupted sleep, actually standing up and going to an appointment or reading a full chapter of a book was a win for me.
Yeah, that's the closest a medication (and/or condition) has come to changing my personality, by making me too exhausted even to have one. And I still cracked a few jokes at work, because my personality still found a way.
100% relatable
Is it so hard to admit genuine character flaws? "I'm sorry. I was jealous - irrationally so. Jealous and insecure, and I took those feelings and turned them into cruelty. Worse than that, it was _pointless_ cruelty. It did nothing but hurt me _and_ others. I can only hope that by recognizing and admitting, with brutal honesty, what I've done, I can demonstrate that I have learned something from this. That I am willing to engage with the truth of what I have done, and address the deeply flawed beliefs about myself and others that have led me to this place. I can only hope this is the first step on the long road towards earning back some measure of trust."
A statement like that, while brutal, would lead me to believe that this is a person who is capable of and willing to change. That this is someone who can look inward, take responsibility for what they find, and do the work needed to better themselves. Blaming things like autism, ADHD, medication, and the like just screams to the world that you aren't willing to take any responsibility or do any real reflection, even if you say that's what you're doing. You're just deflecting. You're saying "I'm not _really_ like this" when you demonstrably are, and by doing so, you are showing the world that you will not change.
You would think if she felt any remorse on her actions, she would’ve said those things in the first place. 😒
This woman stabs her own friends in the back. Don't hold your breath waiting for her to change.
Uh, yes? It *is* hard to admit genuine character flaws?
That's why people like this double-down on their garbage instead of taking responsibility. No-one likes admitting that they have flaws.
To say that in her place would actually be difficult. This is why you don't see it happening so often.
The medication bit really had me rolling. It’s giving; the people who said nothing while their friend was hurling homophobic abuse at me only to step in afterwards to assure me that he was just on drugs, he truly wasn’t homophobic 🙃
The attempt at gaslighting was honestly worse than the initial abuse.
Exactly.
This isn't an apology, it's not really even an attempt at one. It's just another attack, on different people.
I don't think it's gaslighting, so much as dreadfully misunderstanding what people were mad about. They think POC care more about whether someone is racist in their heart of hearts than whether someone hurts people in marginalized racial groups. (That, or they know the only people they're worried about care like that.)
THIS
I thought it was so weird and also damaging to their case when they started listing out the medications and dosages they take. They are all extremely common mental health meds. I take MOST of the same ones they do. And I don't go around review bombing BIPOC authors/businesses or anything. You made a great point that meds are already stigmatized and they are making it worse.
Large, uncontrolled doses of alcohol, cannabis and ketamine are not mental health meds, whatever self-medicaters might think.
But what about the racist people that were around before ADHD meds existed?
"a major scandal on book Twitter that i broke" but not the Hugo awards one, right? that one was later. like Now later
I've had a very eventful past few months
@@XiranJayZhao *HUGS*
@@XiranJayZhao❤
@@XiranJayZhaothat thing in detective stories where the detective keeps stumbling into mysteries even when they're not at work
@@QueenZelda64It’s like Murder She Wrote, but instead it’s “Literary Scandal They Wrote”
Also the "losing grip on reality" sort of bent is extremely harmful to people (like me) who also have schizoid disorders and behaviors. Now the experiences are trivialized and will be seen as "excuses."
I really hate when people blame their neurodivergency for their actions.
As someone autistic, it just makes me hate how I know this will just translate to some people that autistic and ADHD people are mentally unstable and should be treated with more fear.
Thank you Xiran for calling it out like it is and not letting this person be excused for their actions.
We all have the capacity to be bigoted no matter what hand we were dealt in life and deserve to be called out on it when we've done so whether it's racism, ableism transphobia or whatever.
Seeing this drama in the wild and recognizing your name was truly something.
Also, I hate how many people, especially those with very public careers, still cling to the notion that any apology, no matter how insincere, should automatically absolve them of the consequences of their actions, like a giant Reset button.
This, I feel, is why Cait keeps doubling down because they can't understand why everyone isn't falling over themselves to give them back their book deal and all their lost privileges because they apologized. They can't understand why they should have to live with the consequences of their actions.
Look around these days....consequences are rare, especially in the public space. It has become something they can expect. Some don´t even apologize, politicians for example.
@@2nd_Directorate But some of them has actions that do catch up to them. Some actions at least. In the form of hundreds of millions of dollars LOL.
"Privilege" is the operative word. Someone like that just expects things because they're always had them.
I think it's safe to say Xiran was the Dragon Warrior of this whole saga
The image in my head of reylos assembling to uncover "lilly" is so funny to me. United nerds are a terrifying power.
Another video where Xiran works tirelessly for justice. We love to see it! 👏👏👏
It turns out that she was the Iron Empress all along 😂
Hopefully she's not actually a widow 😮
She's good at exposing. She will clean house and swamp
The CCP thinks Winnie the Pooh is the threat but it’s actually Xiran Jay Zhao and they are ruthless in the pursuit of human rights. Racists will beg for mercy and receive none.
Xiran: drops this vid
Me casually expecting their next video to be about France: 👁️👄👁️
Lawful country.
As someone who has dealt with psychosis when I was younger, it made me paranoid, see/hear things that weren’t there, and withdrawn. Writing bad reviews targeting ‘anyone’ else would’ve been about the last thing on my mind during those times.
I deal with psychosis a lot and it's impossible to form coherent sentences or execute calculated tasks lmao.
Good on you for exposing them. I just can’t understand why someone with such a guaranteed success and promising career would throw it all away out of jealousy and entailment. I also suffer from ADHD and autism, but never have I ever used that as an excuse for such gross and racist behavior.
I agree. Like how is using your neurodivergence/disability and/or medication a valid excuse for racist behaviour?
News flash......it NEVER works like that. Unless you learn from this and accept the onus of your actions, it'll just come across as someone who seems unwilling to handle the truth and admit when they messed up.
Even being harmful during a breakdown doesn’t have this much calculation in it. That’s not how a breakdown works, or a split, or afaik a psychotic episode. It’s not erratic enough. Their cruelty is too consistent and she won’t take any accountability of it when they’re “no longer breaking down” either.
Calculated repeated abuse works like that though.
When one of our system alts posts something the rest of us and potentially they later regret, we fuckin delete it-
So true. Pulling off a thing this complicated requires way too much mental clarity for it to just be a brief chemical inbalance. Snapping and saying things you don't mean in a moment of mania is not the same as consitantly targeting and sabotaging your career competition for years at a time.
Yup yup.
Thank you!!
I have a friend who used to have splits often and her behaviour doesn't make any sense with how usually people act in those moments. It was too calculated.
I remember when my friend had those breakouts and it was out of nowhere, completely irrational and full of emotion. What she did was too organised, even if thought out poorly.
@@lordarthur2165exactly. Splitting has an internal logic but it’s pretty consistent internally from everyone with bpd I’ve spoken to and from what my own splits feel like.
Never became “racist? Always has been” to drive people away from me in wounded animal mode. An internal mechanism part of trying to jumpstart an irrational assumption everyone close to you is itching to abandon you but feel bad abt ripping the bandaid off, so you try to do it for them, and only realize after the split’s over you’ve ripped up both of your skin. It’s attacking from a place of perceived defense when you didn’t need to defend against anything. Especially with chosen communities, part of that is also often that the other people would be better off without you, because they are Good.
Dehumanizing someone is like, the platonic opposite of your brain trying to mutually protect them(Good) from you(Bad,) and for proving a point to both you and them that you are both only ever Bad and will only ever be abandoned, so stop trying to make friends because the act of trying to connect with other people, as a Bad person, is abusive. That’s what splitting brain is like.
Pretty damn sure they weren’t a racist creep to all those authors because she was in a hysteric state where she believed they were Good People that needed to be rapidly separated and therefore protected from herself as a Bad person.
Absolute clownery. Just because she can’t and won’t comprehend herself doesn’t mean that has anything to do with her innate qualities. My Ogd.
Ironically, some of the medications she talked about do legit have some nasty side effects. I took Vyvanse for a few months in 2018 and it basically sent me into this insane depressive episode that really fucked up my academics for some time before I got the Hell off it and switched back to Adderall (it's all good now), but that just made me incapable of doing things like going to class or studying, not expending months of my life harassing strangers for daring to be successful POC in the same profession as me.
Yeah I had a similar experience with adderall which is why I take ritalin now. It made me weirdly obsessive about stuff.
I know someone who took either Vyvanse or Concerta for a couple days (can't remember which since it was a decade ago) and it completely messed up their impulse control, making it impossible to control what they were doing. Wanna know what they did instead of a months long harassment campaign?
Stop taking that medication after a day or two and switched back to their old medication that wasn't letting them focus as well as they wanted to (instead of this new med that was supposed to make them focus but backfired).
Vyvanse has helped me incredibly. Paxil turned me into a raging b... and Ritalin gave me too many hair-trigger adrenalin rushes. Hooray for meds and how they treat everyone differently! 😂
bro i hate when a psychotic episode makes me methodically create dozens of fake accounts over the course of multiple months with the precise goal of ruining my peers' career. that happens so often 😩
"What list was this, 2024 POC debuts?" took me entirely out. Thank you for sticking up for these authors and always calling out bullshit so eloquently.
Choosing to send fake evidence implicating yourself when things were still vague is a crazy strategy to use.
Yeah the smart thing would've been to deny, deny, deny, but if Cait were smart they wouldn't have done the review bombing to begin with
I want to say that I really appreciate you giving the amount of sympathy and grace you did to Cait. Not just in holding off on making the receipts public but in how you showed empathy for her mental health struggles and criticized her actions and not her as a person. Often, we want to have a villain, someone intrinsically evil that we can hate on without feeling guilt, but you didn't contribute to that. You acknowledged Cait as a person, a person who did a lot of harm and who failed to adequately address and make up for it, but to you, she is still a person.
This didn't feel like drama farming (to borrow a term from council of geeks) but it felt like someone explaining what happened and also explaining what people need to do in future to avoid this kind of behavior.
Even when I was young and conservative (cause I was an ignorant teen) Concerta never made me do anything other than my homework and starve myself. If I was ever racist back then it was cause I was being racist.
Actually terribly harmful to conflate that with autism and ADHD
Neurotypicals have a responsibility not to blame other neurodivergents for this, just as 9/11 didn’t make it OK for the Christchurch terrorist to shoot up two mosques.
Besides, I’m sure Mobutu Sese Seko was racist too and he had neither of those conditions.
"My memories on this are extremely fuzzy" lol ok Cait. As my grandma would say, "you don't need a good memory if you tell the truth"
They weren't even willing to look at the receipt doc to jog their memories 😭
perfect!
Your grandma is a bit of a ditz if that's the case. I can't remember whether or not the first thing I cooked in an air fryer was duck or not, doesn't mean I'm lying if I say it wasn't.
I first heard this story on Swoop Too's channel, and I'll repeat what I said there here:
As someone with mental health issues who used to self-medicate with booze...creating a bunch of sock puppet accounts to leave a bunch of bad reviews on fellow authors' (mainly POC ones, too) books to make my own book be more successful sounds more like a calculated plan than something done spur-of-the-moment during a bad episode. Like if I did something like that during a bad episode, the next day I would wake up thinking, "What have I done?"
I love Swoop 🩵💜 If Xiran and Swoop did a collab, the insanelly clever, petty retorts would be immaculate 🤌🏾
it's alleged that cait was premeditating this months before, too. kinda funny how they supposidely are on another plane of existence in a psychotic episode for months on end and they are only able to ground themselves when they lose their book deal... not when like everyone already clearly knew it was cait, or when the targeted authors reached out to her privately. what a coincidence!
ive had psychotic episodes end only when i had concrete proof that could reach my brain myself, but i dont know seems way too lucky in this case... not to say drepression adhd or autism dont give you psychosis smh.
The fact that Alana Phoenix's book got bombed so hard that she actually removed it from Goodreads and had to start over entirely hit me especially hard. Definitely gonna check out The Empire Wars
I feel so bad for the artist who's artwork is being used to represent Cait in all of these scandal articles just because they drew the cover art for Cait's book. It especially bothers me because it gives people unfamiliar with the situation the impression that Cait is black. I wish they'd just use a picture of her face instead.
Oh sh*t, the artist is black? Or the MC of their book is black? Oh boy, sounds like Rowling 2.0 Electric Boogaloo.
That’s a good point about the character being used instead of their face. Very sus of the newspapers.
PR based blackwashing? That's new.
I don't have Autism or ADHD but I take medication for chronic depressions for 2 years now. I really HATE IT when racists use mental health issues as an excuse! So tired of it....
I agree. I think that we also need to look at the language we use to describe people who are hateful or evil. Using the suffix -phobia to describe certain types of hateful behaviors or referring to evil individuals as “sick” (or “insane”) unconsciously links hatred and evilness to mental illness. I just wish we could also admit as a society that evil exists and that all forms of hatred are a form of evil and are not any type of mental illness. Even individuals who have mental illnesses that correlate with behaviors that cause harm to others rarely have the mental illness itself as the causal factor in those behaviors but instead these individuals were predisposed to evilness or hatred even without the mental illness. Correlation is not causation and simple causality is rarely found in human behavior patterns, which tend to be the result of multiple factors. Mental illnesses can be controlled with medications and other medical interventions, but hatred and evilness can only be fixed by a conscious change in attitude that comes from self-reflection. Finally, I wish that we would stop as a society with the automatic labeling of POC with criminality or terrorism, blaming the group itself for the evil actions of individuals within the group. At the same time, we must stop excusing the evil actions of white people by automatically labeling them as the product of mental illness. When a person goes on a shooting rampage, their religion or race is not to blame, instead that individual is to blame. Moving the blame to the wider group or to a mental illness diminishes the absolute and sole responsibility that individuals have for their own actions while stigmatizing the wider group, making people apprehensive of others in that group, whether they are of a particular religion or race or whether they suffer from mental illness.
As someone who has called out autistic men for being sexist and couching it as their autism, I do want to make it known that just because I’m calling out a ND for being bigoted doesn’t mean I’m making a statement about all NDs, any more than I’m making a statement about all airline employees when I say that the behaviour of bad passengers didn’t justify United Airlines beating up that guy who was just trying to explain why he couldn’t give up his seat.
@@drmadjdsadjadiYou can’t MAKE NTs judge all NDs for the action of one ND, even when they try to invoke their NDness. Neurotypicals who do that are being bigoted in their own right, just as it’s bigoted to hate all Muslims for 9/11.
@@kiwimusume I suggest you read up on implicit association bias to understand that the words we use to categorize individuals have wider repercussions that cause EVERYONE, including those who are members of the group being discriminated against, to exhibit negative associations towards those same groups. Language doesn’t just affect conscious bigotry, it also reinforces, extends, and creates unconscious bias in EVERYONE. This is only going to get worse as AI becomes more prevalent. Sorry, but we really need to change how we talk about evil and stop mislabeling it of sanitizing it or excusing it because we cannot come to terms with it and because we cannot understand that acting in an evil manner is always and everywhere an individual choice and never the result of something that is inherently not an action, such as your gender preference, religion; race, mental illness, or other characteristic that is not inherently evil. This isn’t about changing others. It is about acknowledging that we ourselves have fallen victim to the same exact issues, albeit on an unconscious level, as manifested by our own choice of words.
If you got paid every time that excuse can up, you’d be richer than Warren Buffet.
Could not agree more with the things you said about racism. The way people commonly think of racism is very skewed from how it actually works and that just makes fighting it even harder.
All racial animus aside, Cait's actions were fundamentally fraudulent in a way that must be called out. The targeted authors would be well within their rights to file civil claims against them. Cait's continued public comments are only likely to result in one or more of them pursuing litigation.
as a note, i have adhd and have been taking stimulants for it for 8 years now, and i also work in a pharmacy and am currently studying the meds i work with along with their uses, side effects, etc... and i just have to say what everyone already knows: the meds causing her to have psychotic breaks is completely nonsense, EVEN in the offchance that she is taking adhd medications without actually having adhd (which is a possibility, and ill explain why but i also need to emphasize that i am NOT a doctor or a psychologist, i am not making genuine claims about cait's mental health, and i do not advocate for armchair psychology). there are no meds for adhd that would have side effects anywhere near to what she described, as the whole point of adhd meds is to allow people with adhd to actually begin to focus, and when people with adhd take adhd meds, they tend to see the exact opposite effect. in fact, some of the side effects of taking adhd meds without having adhd are symptoms that can be seen as similar to the warning signs of psychotic breaks, which is what leads me to think cait is possibly taking medication for the wrong diagnosis (which is not uncommon btw! adhd and autism have HUGEEEE symptom overlaps with many other mental health conditions, but they also have lots of symptoms that people without mental health conditions also display because sometimes humans take actions and have personalities that arent indicitive of any mental health problem but alongside many other symptoms are what makes things into symptoms of conditions. so cait might be taking adhd medication without having adhd because she could have been diagnosed incorrectly). some of the symptoms of someone without adhd taking adhd medication are nervousness, paranoia, erraticness (in both attitude and choice making), and an increase in motivation but decline in efficacy. meanwhile the warning signs of a psychotic break are suspiciousness, paranoia, and a difficulty in thinking clearly and/or logically. i do want to choose to believe cait is telling the truth about her struggles and that she has experienced multiple psychotic breaks, but i absolutely cannot believe that her medication had anything to do with it unless she is taking the wrong medication, and i also cant believe that her actions are entirely outside of her control because these things simply dont just make people commit racist actions alongside sabotaging your peers and then falsifying evidence for it because you know it was wrong. i hope cait get the help she needs and much later comes back (hopefully in private) to give more meaningful apologies to the people shes directly hurt and prove shes changed her ways. and i also really hope everyone affected continues to have blossoming writing careers and see lots of love and support for their books in the upcoming months and years
God, if I had a dollar for every person who blamed racism on mental illness I would be able to buy a car.
Make that a whole cavalry force of armored cars!
My sister has undiagnosed mental health issues wich caused her to bully me fo the entirety of my childhood and continued into my adult life. Parents would always tell me that my sister is just ill and thus is not fully responsible for her actions. And for years I struggled with this relationship and tried to understand: which part of her actions is her disorder and wich part is just her natural personality? That was until I heard the words that "People are not defined by the illnes/disorder but rather by the way they handle it". And it opened my eyes so much. The cruelty, the envy, the egoism and complete refusal to listen to anyone, the lack of resposibility and self-awareness - that is all just her character that gets amplified by the mental health issues.
Since then I refuse to accept mental health as an excuse to shitty, egoistic or malicious behavior. I know it can be hard or painfull, we all have struggles. But when u choose to harm others instead of working on yourself and trying to keep innocent people out of it, you can't weasel ur way out of responsibility by playing the depression card. You just continew to show everyone your racist and envious personality, wich sadly can't be cured by medication.
Thanks for the video, Xiran! Your passion for protecting and helping other authors truly warms my heart. (Also the white feather winged top is gorgeous.)
I grew up in a somewhat racist household and didnt realize i was making racist remarks growing up until someone pointed it out to me and helped me to think twice on my actions. I may not be perfect now but you can grow as a person to be better.
I only knew the surface of this disaster until seeing this video. Cait had the chance to grow but then started digging a deeper hole. I really hope she gets help but doesnt have the opportunity to have her new books published (Which what she did basically guaranteed that) medications dont make someone racist. medications dont make someone transphobic or homophobic. Its the hard truth and i hate when as a person with a few mental disorders someone tries to act like because they have a mental disorder it exscuses themselves from any action when it doesnt. I agree when you say the best thing she couldve done was either not do it at all or at least apologize and own up to it when people gave her the option to do it privately.
Let me guess, the household head was a Lost Causer.
Oh nice Xiran is back to youtube and talking about the Corrain drama- OH SHIT THEY'RE COMING IN WITH THE STEEL CHAIR
I'm autistic and have adhd without a job for the last 4 years and never resorted to all this. I really lament how mental health is being used to try to paper over these things when what we really need is more understanding on other real symptoms and their consequences. I happen to be Black and adhd has not been helpful in undoing the perception that we're dumb or less intelligent than whites, and this sort of thing does nothing to help us be seen with the same humanity as whites.
As a fellow haver of ADHD and autism, few things make me more infuriated than when someone uses the mental health struggles that frequently come with neurodivergency as an excuse for harmful behavior. It is a tempting trap to fall in, for sure, I've done it in the past as well, but it needs to be resisted.
IVE MISSED UR VIDEOS SMM
I'VE BEEN UPLOADING SHORTS THIS WHOLE TIME 😭
Yeah but long videos just hit different 😭
@@XiranJayZhao i was literally binge watching you're chinese history videos before this so good
#gurl people like the meat, potatoes and veg... not just the starter @@XiranJayZhao
@@XiranJayZhao WE ARE TALKING ABOUT YOUR LONG FORMAT VIDEOS (love you either way but I miss your long format videos)
I tend to take too much of my own ADHD medication from time to time after feeling like I don't do enough on my given dose alone. (Yes, I know, it's bad, I've been fighting it)
But when I do that, I tend to... over-focus on one particular insignificant detail until the meds wear off. Usually, I've drawn too much detail on one area of my drawing, or I've placed too much time and care into playing a certain aspect of a video game with no rewards whatsoever. I get irritated, snappy, and hate being distracted. Never - in all my life - do I end up dedicating an entire two years to making sure POC don't get good reviews.
Psychosis and psychotic delusions are scary, I've experienced it before and it can be caused by a myriad of things including medicine/drug use, even if normally it's from harsher stuff. I've known multiple people who've gone through psychosis due to crystal meth addiction. I've even known people who went down alt-right rabbit holes due to their conspiracy theories, thus becoming a lot more bigoted though most of the time it's people who already were racist/transphobic/etc that just got worse. On top of that, psychotic people are way more likely to be victims then they are to be aggressors. Aggressors do still exist (see people who become extremists) but oftentimes when out of the delusion people tend to genuinely apologize and not make shit up, even in cases where there's no aggressors and there's people that aren't being antagonistic but just fearful they tend to do better. This explanation not lining and having a very clear occam's razor answer is just bad for everyone. It's bad for the authors they targeted with their racist campaign, it's bad for people who might fear medication they need due to thinking it might turn them racist, and it's bad for psychotic people.
Omg I was literally just watching a video about this! Oh the tea was STEAMING!
also thank you for standing up for all these 2024 debut authors✨
Because I've been following this story on your twitter, I thought when I read "another author" in the title, you meant there was a SECOND author who had been doing what Cait did, and you exposed them too. And I was like "Damn, now I have two nickels"
It's so sad that a side effect of increased mental health awareness in society is people using mental illnesses/conditions or being neurodivergent as an excuse for poor behaviour because they're sure people will feel bad and nobody would question it
If it wasn’t that, it’d be something else. As someone with a mental condition, I accept no responsibility for it and when I call out bigots with other mental conditions, I recognise my own responsibility not to hold other people with that condition responsible.
Never thought I'd say I'm glad the Reylo fandom exists. Big respect.
Also, I hope everything is going well with your publisher regarding Heavenly Tyrant 🍉
If you ever feel bad about this author just remember the abysmal amount of opportunities they had to not screw up so badly.
Even forgiving the review bombing, there's the racism. Even ignoring that the majority of authors targeted were POC, there's the fact that they pretended they were one of the victims, even if we forget that, there's the poorly written and photoshopped "friend" with a villain plot twist. Even if we forget all that, there's the poorly made apology, the pity party and using mental health as a shield.
I'm writing all of this to say, these things didn't occur in a vaccum. Some things can be explained by a lack of judgement, but not all of it. There was maliciousness all throughout this saga.
Someone also said this might count as fraud. Even without mentioning racism she can receive legal action.
My anxiety, adhd, and depression have never made me racist and create dozens of sock accounts to complete one of the most elaborate but poorly executed sabotaging of other authors. And none of my meds for these issues have either.
OK I wasn't really involved in any of this, I don't really know any of the parties involved but all I will say is, I'm noticing when creators get called out for their actions, no matter what community they're in, they all seem to follow the same formula when they "apologize."
They're intentionally vague about the harm they caused, they think simply saying sorry is enough without much active effort to better themselves and they focus more on how the situation affected them instead of how it hurt their victims.
Whether it be authors, youtubers, streamers or artists. Whether it be the anime community, the writing community or any creative community. some things just never change I guess...
Thank you for helping poc authors through this needlessly cruel, insecure and racist rampage. She desperately needs to reflect and work on treating people around her, esp poc with empathy and human respect. So many ADHD and Autism havers do not manipulate and harm others because of medication. No neurodivergence or meds create racism, entitled and selfish value systems do.
Your impact to the literature community is the stuff of legends. It will go down in history.
AMEN!!!!!!! Thanks for breaking it down in a way that folk can understand! Racism has soooo many levels... you nailed it!
I just wanted to come out and say something. I'm a white person who has always been extremely unconfrontational and will do practically anything to avoid getting into an argument, and what you said about not defending POC when white people are bombarding them reinforcing the power structure where white people are better off really made me realize that I was guilty of this, so I wanted to thank you. My parents have always been fighting my entire life, so whenever I even witness people get into a disagreement, I feel extreme anxiety and usually do everything I can to get away from that situation. I always knew this was a shortcoming of mine, and aside from standing up for myself, I even more wanted to defend my friends whenever someone was being mean to them(It's not like I never do it but I should definitely do it more. Heck, I'm even more willing to get into physical fights for some people than I am verbal ones. One time I saw a kid fighting on top of my friend punching him and without hesitation I went straight in to pin that guy down). I now also realize that it's even worse when it's happening to my friends of color. I am already trying to overcome this flaw of mine, but thinking of this point as well I think will give me more courage to stand up to when a POC is being verbally abused by a white person, so thanks for helping me :)
I’ve been following this on your TikTok and holy shit! Cate just keeps digging their hole deeper and deeper. I’m hoping the article or interviewer at least questioned them on the timelines? “New meds in June” “but it started in April and you even said yourself that you’ve had fake accounts since 2022.”
When I face a mental breakdown due to being an aspiring author with AUDHD, I usually just order some pizza and play some games for a whole day while I rot and recharge my productive juices, not try to ruin the careers of POC authors before they’ve even kicked off.
Every time I think about how the Reylo fanfic writers put on the sleuth caps to provide evidence makes me cackle cause this whole situation was a collective group jumping. Everyone came in to help. Or at least people with a backbone did.
I love that you listed the authors affected, ive been looking for a complete list so i can check them out when they release
The thing I've always found the most baffling about trying to use a medication as an excuse is that we are supposed to believe that the meds made them do this "wildly out of character thing" but not any other stuff. Everything else in their life was continuing on pretty much normally, it just made them hyperfocus on doing this one thing that is so weird.
I also find it baffling that they seem to be trying to claim that the meds/illness put them in some kind of extended fugue state that they have no or very little recollection of, but also that they're not using that as an excuse. First of all, like Xiran said, yeah they are. But secondly - if you genuinely believed that you weren't responsible for your behaviour, why *wouldn't* you use that as an excuse? It would be a pretty legit excuse, if only it *was* actually legit. This 'I take full responsibility, but also I wasn't responsible for my actions' nonsense is pure, unabashed hedging that makes a lie out of both statements.
As someone with autism and a handful of mental health diagnoses this is wild to see - I've had just about every weird drug reaction one can have - never did it make me suddenly target POC. Using autism and mental health conditions as an out sucks, if you do damage even if you don't mean it you should take responsibility and not try to weasel your way out.
Their actions were far too calculated and meticulous for any of that to be blamed on the things they were using for excuses.
Has Cait tried the ol' "I'm actually an incredible ally by bringing so much more awareness to these POC books because of this, YOU'RE WELCOME" card yet?
As a mental health professional, it may not be our fault we have an illness. It is our responsibility to hold ourselves accountable for our terrible behavior. This is further compounded if we benefit from systems of power.
Glad to have a longer video again.
Fucked up what this Cait person did, even more fucked up how they handled it and the no-pology they went with.
Hope all the authors affected rise from this bullshit better than ever.
what's infuriating to hear is the relevant parties (i.e. her publisher/agent/etc i'm sure) refused to do anything when handed evidence until it was made into a public thing. I wish they would've caught some slack for failing the poc authors as well
I am really proud and happy that you did it. As a hopeful author myself, I can't imagine someone wanting to destroy a career before it even takes off. You really
helped these authors out. Thank you!
You know what the worst thing I've ever heard someone do genuinely because they were on medication? Buy unnecessary stuff because the little voice in their head had a good reason why they needed that thing and the sleep medication made them not question that reason hard enough to leave the basket instead of going through the purchase. That's it.
I have so many friends who are Neurodivergent (I am pretty sure I am as well) and even went to a school where over half the students were on medication for one reason or another (mostly ADHD) and not a single one of those people blamed their medication for shitty behaviour. Sure, sometimes someone changed medication and it made them more unstable for some time because it was the wrong medication for them, but that meant outburst of yelling in anger in the dining room or crying because they got a worse grade than they expected, not being two faced for months and only coming forward when there's no way of escaping the truth...
I hate it that her recourse is to frame Mental health(and Medicine) as her new scapegoat for ALL of her actions. Medicine has seen an erosion in trust in recent years and Mental health is stigmatized enough as it is.
I don't have TikTok so really happy to see this compilation!!!
BRO I DID NOT KNOW BOOK DRAMA WAS A THING...
😂😂 Lately, 10 minutes doesn't pass without new Book Drama.
How’s that rock you’re living under, sedimentary? Metamorphic? Igneous?
@@jeffreygao3956 All I do is watch abandoned media, lord knows I never keep up with anything current
Please don't put yourself down by worrying that you're a drama channel. Like you said, your friends were not protected by the industry and they would not have been defended if you hadn't come forward. I'm sure your friends are glad that they have you. I respect you a lot for bringing these issues to light.
It's insane to me that someone would go through SO MUCH trouble to rate a bunch of other author's books 1 star
Like, use that time to learn to write better books so you'll be on top even if everybody else has high ratings too?????
And surely her career is over now, right? No one will want to read her shit
Here's hoping. That thing probably wouldn't have been all that popular anyway, though, if early reviews of it were anything to go by.
@@ilikecookies9796Yeah, I can’t tell whether I’ve been influenced by Yellowface by Rebecca F Kuang or whether Cait’s book really is weaker.
@@kiwimusume Probably both.
Omg Cait blaming their behavior on ADHD and autism is so so so harmful for the neurodivergent community. It just perpetuates harmful stereotypes about those disabilities and generates even more hate for us
This removes agency from neurotypical people. We all heard about 9/11 but us non-Muslims had a choice about whether to blame all Muslims for it. Same with this.
Thank you for defending mental healthcare and meds. Having ADHD and taking meds for it has NEVER made me want to sabotage my co-workers, and it NEVER made me want to single out my co-workers of color. She was reaching for excuses, rather than just owning up to it and working to make amends. EDIT: I also just noticed you are wearing the legendary guillotine earrings for this, lol. Slay!
I hate that cait blamed it on mental illness. Now, I don't have ADHD or Autism but I struggle with other mental illnesses one of them being BPD which majorly affect a person's mood and behavior however mental illness of any kind does not excuse wrongdoings done to others. Yes we can make bad choices because we're unwell at the time but it's important to take accountability for said choices. Medication does not completely alter a person's personality it only helps improve your illness. Side effects do exist but none that I know have you being possessed for months. Mental illness and Medication have been heavily stigmatised as you said and only in the recent years has become more acceptable and things like that set it back.
Well done for raising your voice and calling out someone on their behavior because its true that if someone had not said anything it would have continued.
I love how the first instinct of everyone who gots in the spotlight for being shitty is to be "ohh but I have depression :(((((" like it is some sort of shield
Even if you have, depression does not turn you into that much of an abhorrent human being if you are conscious of it and make sure to be conscious of what you act. You may act irrational and nonsensical sometimes but it does NOT turn you into an asshole or vile person
That irritates me so much, mental illness is NOT an excuse
THE EMPRESS HAS RETURNED
Yas
Now why would you think it's smart to call a nonbinary author such a heavily gendered term 😐 Do you think before you post.
**CITIZEN, do not summon Robespierre on my ass
@@XiranJayZhaoLOL😂
@@VestaBlackclaw I suspect most viewers do not know they are nonbinary due to their primarily femme presentation on this channel. Sure, they cosplay as men at times, but crossdressing cosplay is a thing. I didn't know for until last year.
And even if they do know, it's not all that uncommon for femme-presenting nonbinary folk to accept and even use female gendered nouns. They may not realize that it could potentially bother them.
Has Xiran actually said they don't like these? I actually don't know.
Cait Corrain's Career: I made you tea of gold leaves. And you spat in it.
you know I was just thinking to myself "huh, I haven't seen anything by Xiran Jay Zhao, I'll swing by their channel and have a look", now I'm mad at an obscure author and have drunk a glass of raspberry vodka.
It makes me angry that they blame a "break from reality." Friend, no one disassociates hard enough to have zero control, knowledge, or memory of their actions AND remains coherent enough to juggle a dozen logins and reviews
She said I have the Tyler Durden
No u don’t ma’am. Nobody has that version it’s a movie 😂
I, for some reason, cannot look away from Jay Zhao rage. It's mesmerizing. There's something special when someone or something makes Jay Zhao really angry. Like when Disney, Mulan or Cait does something really stupid.
Now, I want someone else to annoy Jay Zhao again.
I'm an Asian girl with ADHD, does that mean I would occasionally be racist and hate myself?
LMAOO
Eh...maybe. Depends on if you deny the existence of the Rape of Nanking.
I have been on ADHD and mental health medication for most of my life. I'm ADHD and autistic. I have had medically-induced psychotic breaks. I developed paranoia that lasted for at least a year, feeding my anxiety issues, while in my teens. From my own experience with being in these states, they use insecurities and biases that are already there, not create new ones. The delusion is how extreme the thinking gets.
So I can believe that Cait, at some point, experienced something like that, but I sincerely doubt it happened in the way they said it did. And I absolutely do not believe their narrative and apology. It sounds like crocodile tears to me.
Thank you so much for naming the authors who were victimized and who we should all support! I will make sure to read those books
Same! They look great.
This is such a crazy situation, I feel sad that you and other other authors had to go through that! 😢
You did great work exposing this. I do hope Cait reaches a place where they can accept that they are a (possibly unconscious) racist. You can’t fix a problem you don’t acknowledge. Their recent second attempt to excuse themselves and paint themselves a victim in this was appalling. Such a bad case of main character syndrome.
The amount of planning and organisation that went into their actions and cover-ups required conscious effort. A lot of conscious effort. It’s not drunk dialling an ex level of impaired decision making.
I hate it when people hide behind a condition as their excuse for bad behavior....
So Cait had no confidence in their own writing. Shame. I would have read it.
"the excuses strike back" man do I feel bad for laughing at that, but it was a good one and sometimes humor is a good coping mechanism so ya.
Also I am autistic (and on meds) and those statements made me so mad!!! So thanks for the laugh, it did help lessen the anger. Even if the situation is unfunny.
"We are all capable of racist actions, because we were all born and raised in a world built on racism."
It somehow irks me more that their excuses are that bad they actually make them look worse than what they actually did