Hey, hell, I pay the price

Two big stories going on today (besides Barack and Hillary): David Hernandez's pre-American Idol turn as a gay lapdancer, and Margaret B. Jones' fake memoir Love and Consequences. IMHO, they're the same story -- it's 2008, and everybody knows everything about you. And if they don't, they soon will.

The power of the internets/tubes/highway and the immediate availability of information thereupon/therein makes it pretty much a lock that, if you used to be a gay stripper, someone's got a photo of you starkers. Or that they can at least hunt down a text message or email or blog entry you sent them about how much it chafes when dudes stuff their soggy $1s in your ass crack. Then they forward that to Gawker or TMZ.com, and voila -- your privates are public. Or better yet, in the case of Margaret Jones (real name: Margaret Seltzer), your own family rats you out.

The fake memoir thing is very interesting in and of itself. Beyond just wishing to oneself "I hope they don't find out all my dark dirty secrets!" the huevos involved in promoting a fake memoir/identity seems, well, a tad pathological. You're basically asking for it -- instead of just letting it be, Seltzer did interviews as "Jones" and trotted out fake foster siblings as "proof" of her existence. An L.A. Times article references a similar inner-city fake memoir situation in 1983, and how differently the revelation was handled 16 years ago, but the situations are NOT the same -- as my husband would say, it's like the difference between shooting a bullet and throwing it. There's an inherent deception in Margaret Seltzer going out on the circuit saying "I am Margaret Jones -- these things happened to me" versus simply developing a nom de plume.

The best thing? To just be. The internet found your secrets? Just be. You used to strip? Just be. You're writing a fake memoir? Just be. You already did the thing -- now just be still with it.

Oh, and side note to David Hernandez: Dick's?!? Happy you're a gay stripper, but find a place with more panache, will ya?