John Green slams Tumblr user accusing him of sexual abuse
Best-selling YA author has criticised a Tumblr user who accused him of using his works to "amass some weird cult-like following" of young girls.
On Thursday,December 8, a Tumblr account under the username "virjn" made a post with multiple accusations against the author. The post read, "'I bet [J]ohn [G]reen thinks people don't like him because he's a "dork" or a nerd or whatever. When in reality it's because he's a creep who panders to teenage girls so that he can amass some weird cult-like following. And it's always girls who feel misunderstood, you know, and he goes out of his way to make them feel important and desirable […] Also he has a social media presence that is equivalent to that dad of a kid in your friend group who always volunteers to "supervise" the pool parties and scoots his lawn chair close to all the girls."
For all latest news, follow The Daily Star's Google News channel. While the post has since been deleted, it has been reposted by many users across the platform with Green's response attached more than 46,000 times.
In his response, the author has denied the allegations stating that, "I'm tired of seeing the language of social justice—important language doing important work—misused as a way to dehumanise others and treat them hatefully."
He further elaborated, "So we all seek (and seek to share) the jolt that accompanies outrage and anger. As studies have shown, the complicated dopamine rush that comes with righteous indignation is very powerful, and I'm indulging it simply by responding to the outrageous accusation that my work is somehow evidence of sexual abuse".
He also stated that he will now be using Tumblr differently than he used to, due to the changing nature of the platform. "My life is different (in ways that are both good and bad); this community is different (in ways that are both good and bad); the world is different (in ways that are both good and bad). I'm not angry or anything like that. I just need some distance for my well-being," he added.
John Green later posted about the incident on Twitter stating how it was a good time to leave Twitter now.
This Tumblr incident comes after John Green mocked Elon Musk by tweeting a comparison of Elon Musk buying Twitter to a hypothetical scenario of him buying Tumblr in 2014. The tweet also said how he would start charging users $8 a month to edit reblogs if he were to become the CEO in the hypothetical scenario.
The author had also changed his Twitter account into that of a sock company named Awesome Socks Club and later a coffee company named Awesome Coffee Club from both of which 100% of the profits went to charity. The move probably came as a form of counterstroke against Twitter's ridiculous measure of allowing people to have verified accounts with $8. "Real tired of this free speech platform requiring me to be John Green. I AM A SOCK COMPANY," Green tweeted.
Since he tweeted about the accusative post on Tumblr, multiple Twitter users replied to Green's tweet stating how the Tumblr post was likely made by followers of Elon Musk who disliked his criticisms and mockery of the Twitter CEO.
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