The Remarkable Tales of Saint Lauren Southern

Regular readers will know ending up on this page as a "curious case" never bodes well. Following in the footsteps of humble martyrs everywhere, agent provocateur Lauren Southern recently produced a feature film-length (!) mea culpa / apologia / auto-ethanography - detailing the conspiracy against her by a raving hive of narcissistic adult children masquerading as political influencers.

Why on earth would anyone do something so grossly self-adsorbed?

There's no doubt whatsoever most of these characters on both extremes - as entertaining as they tend to be - have serious problems with malignant narcissism, substance use, paranoia, and more. Clearly, she's been through a lot, and deserves an opportunity to address the court of public opinion. Where she is always, very, very pleased with herself.

However, hell hath no passive aggression like a Canadian woman scorned. Has Southern managed to score the worst of Pyrrhic victories? Are her enemies pointing towards nothing at all? Is hers merely an attempt at scoring the award for the best-produced calumny?

We need good filmmakers on the right; and we need firebrands. We do not need idiots.

If you can suffer the self-glorification, watch for yourself:

It's never the partial truth, is it?

Mirror, Mirror, Who Is The Haughtiest Of Them All?

It's indisputable Southern is physically beautiful, with all the natural architecture of a model. You know it's the case when women opine over how nature blessed her in that way. You can get away with a lot if you possess facial symmetry.

But there is something to do this person which is self-evidently an extremely ugly trait: haughtiness. It's impossible to listen to this character without also simultaneously detecting the foul smell of superciliousness and self-congratulation. She doesn't seem to be able to manage a full sentence without pompous intonation, or the vocal equivalent of posing.

haughty, adj

: blatantly and disdainfully proud : having or showing an attitude of superiority and contempt for people or things perceived to be inferior.

Pride and idealism are traits of youth, and immaturity. They wither with age.

Julian Assange has this quality, as does Tim Pool.

Given the unabandoned glee with which Southern dishes out her threats and revenge towards another figure at the end of this magnum opus, it sadly makes another trait tragically clear: the "shallow affect". Again, what you can't fail to notice is her lack of emotional response (affect) during speech, when it is not clearly feigned for the camera.

Shallow affect has a similar meaning to blunted affect. A person with shallow affect will feel little emotion about situations that would expect to elicit specific feelings.

Affect is physical expression of emotion, typically in the face. It's tricky to fake it, and noticeable when one does. Hence being "affected", or fake. You can try it - as two girls meeting for the first time do - but it takes a professional to do it well. Dumbing down an affect is much easier then enhancing it. Sincerity is not something Southern could ever be accused of, like humility.

And if you're really forensic, you'll be aware of a phenomenon psychiatrists look for: "Duper's Delight", coined by Paul Ekman in his book "Telling Lies" (1992). Some people just can't help but let everyone know.

"the near irresistible thrill some people feel in taking a risk and getting away with it. Sometimes it includes contempt for the target who is being so ruthlessly and successfully exploited. It is hard to contain duping delight; those who feel it want to share their accomplishments with others, seeking admiration for their exploits."
https://www.paulekman.com/blog/duping-delight/

It may not be the delight of duping people; rather the good-old-fashioned fun of giving some a good public bashing for your own vindication. But Southern is always so very, very pleased with herself.

The astute might already have discerned what these symptoms are indicative of as a generalised pathology. Robert Hare assembled a list of 22 descriptors: https://psychology-tools.com/test/pcl-22 .

Something interesting emerges if we put aside the grotesque chicanery of her accusers, who are villainous in and of themselves. Even without Southern's grandiosity, her complainants seem to inadvertently cite other elements from Hare's list:

Pathological deception
Parasitism
Promiscuity
etc

They might all be sociopaths projecting onto each other. That may well be true, and repugnant. However, the question is, is Southern merely a more glossy kind, as opposed to her new virginal posturing? Can these enemies simultaneously be right about this person whilst being reprehensible themselves? Does it take one to know one?

What exactly does the mere presence of these visually-observable behaviours imply? In their most charitable reading, immaturity. The trouble is time often betrays you. A decade later when you're a mother, it's not as forgivable as it once was.

Southern's "documentary" in itself is worthy on its testimony to dysfunction alone. Psychiatrists will be studying it for years. She is obviously a talented filmmaker with a keen eye for aesthetics, as well as a flare for the dramatic.

She describes one particular event which is exceptionally awful and rapaciously present in the narcissist community.

When a perpetrator of an offence is exposed or vulnerable, they immediately act to vilify the perceived "threat" as a "fraud" and scapegoat them for the offence instead in order to save face.

This is revolting, cowardly behaviour.

"Fraud" seems to be the word they choose most often. You can also see this pattern in abusive romantic relationships. It's an interesting choice of word, when what they imply (duplicity) seem to be more accurately expressed as:

perfidy, n

1. deliberate breach of faith or trust; faithlessness; treachery perfidy that goes unpunished
2. an act or instance of faithlessness or treachery

The narcissist or bad actor is deeply injured by this perceived unfaithfulness to their messianic cause, and enraged as a result. Or, paranoia over"infiltration" reaches unfathomable levels. The patsy is sacrificed to maintain their pride.

Southern provides several alleged instances of this, which, if substantiated, need to be deal with in the courts. And many alleged acts of blackmail, which are criminal offences in every country these individuals have operated. Among them:

Milo Yiannopoulos, in about every incidence of his life so far;
Tommy Robinson blaming assistant Lucy Brown for the collapse of a public event;
etc etc

Sadly for many of these characters - including many on the left - facts are stubborn things and documentation exists. Milo, specifically, has potential charges of embezzlement hanging over his head which he's extremely lucky not to have received yet. They are warranted.

Accusing people of criminal offences (e.g. blackmail) is a serious affair. It should not be done lightly, and it needs to be processed by law enforcement. Not YouTube videos. It's indicative of the sincerity in which the complaint is made, i.e. none.

What's worse, there is a clear allegation from some of these activists the intelligence services have provided private information to left-wing pressure groups such as Searchlight Digital ("Hope Not Hate'). If so, it needs to be investigated.

Many of these nasty individuals are clearly in need of sunlight to disinfect the mess. And a significant amount will be found guilty. But, the appropriate place for such things is a court.

Only one problem with all of this self-important testimony over-sharing: Southern's engaging in the same behaviour. What is billed as a truth-telling exercise, clearly degrades into mud-slinging quicker than you'd imagine. It goes without saying she clearly thought it all so important - Wikileaks-style - she didn't have time to ensure the personal messages she'd be publishing (another red flag) would be certified by an impartial third party as authentic.

Southern seems enraged, mostly, by a vindictive article written by Yiannopoulos which she - somewhat haughtily (!) - assumed would have little circulation or impact. It would have been trivial to prove injury in a defamation case. Those she seems less concerned about are portrayed as "less-than".

At two hours (!) in, it's alarmingly obvious the entire purpose of this grandiose apologia is to elevate Southern rather than mount her defense. Self-canonisation, if you will. It's nauseatingly predictable. She tries so hard to appear reasonable, it's impossible not to conclude she isn't.

The Tale of Echo & Narcissus

Southern's choice of backdrop is ironic. The forest is the setting for the story of Narcissus himself. It's as if she cast herself and the camera is the water.

This is the story of Echo and Narcissus. When Liriope gave birth to the handsome child Narcissus, she consulted the seer Tiresias, who predicted that the boy would live a long life only if he never discovered himself. One day Narcissus was walking in the woods when Echo, an Oread (mountain nymph) saw him, fell deeply in love, and followed him. Narcissus sensed he was being followed and shouted "Who's there?". Echo repeated "Who's there?" She eventually revealed her identity and attempted to embrace him. He stepped away and told her to leave him alone. She was heartbroken and spent the rest of her life in lonely glens until nothing but an echo sound remained of her. Nemesis (as an aspect of Aphrodite), the goddess of revenge, noticed this behaviour after learning the story and decided to punish Narcissus. Once, during the summer, he was getting thirsty after hunting, and the goddess lured him to a pool where he leaned upon the water and saw himself in the bloom of youth. Narcissus did not realize it was merely his own reflection and fell deeply in love with it, as if it were somebody else. Unable to leave the allure of his image, he eventually realized that his love could not be reciprocated and he melted away from the fire of passion burning inside him, eventually turning into a gold and white flower.

When you set your last chapter to "Maneater", it's a little on the nose.

Fog = Dishonesty or Embellishment

Truth is simple. Sharp. Plain. Often painful.

When a person lies, they cloud the details over to hide them in a haze of fog. So although life is complex, it's generally safe to say, where there's smoke, there's fire. And where there is confusion, there are lies. If things are unclear, strange, or don't make sense, it's because the truth is getting the smoke machine treatment.

Southern's intended audience is clearly other women who will be sympathetic to her claims. If you can believe it, the author of this auto-ethanography actually gives herself a throne in a forest, like an innocent nymph. It's a strange choice.

Let's take a look at some of the most dubious claims made by Southern. All of which are posited in such an unfalsifiable and ambiguous way as to be perfectly difficult brush for anyone to try to wade though.

#MeToo: shocked by a LA contact

Southern explains a "anti-feminist" mens' rights contact paid for her to fly to LA and be put up in an AirBnb; but when she arrived, she was expected to sleep in the same bed as him. She blames this on her naivete as a 19 year-old.

His gmail address had a fake name.

No.

This is a story as old as Hollywood itself and you'll recognise it if you live and work here. It happens hundreds of times a month, and it's always the same character casting: not naivete, but hubris. It's the porn star's story. The AirBnb is usually in the San Fernando valley.

The wannabe star gets sold goods too good-to-be-true via flattery, and thinks she is the one doing the exploitation. Which she, the wannabe, finds out very quickly isn't the case, once she is thrown out on the streets and learns what an LA hotel costs. 50% of them crawl back and "do their duty" so to speak. It's called sexual trafficking and in this context it always involves duping the mark into thinking they are in control. If Hollywood knows how to do one thing, it's bait other narcissistic people in a cannibalistic way.

It's unlikely this happened though. It was more likely, as the email shows, a simp with $500.

Southern goes on to conveniently meet Yiannopoulos - seemingly at The Peninsula (?), aka Weinstein's rape lair - on exactly the same trip at the same time for the same reason (the LA "Slutwalk"), despite both of them being from different countries.

What we see here are some ambitious moves masked by a dubious sob story. What seems most likely is Southern, who is quite bright, knew all too well what the situation was with her LA simp, but used it to her advantage in a hypergamous-style maneuver into Yiannopoulos' inner circle.

After all, a significant proportion of the rest of her testimony seems to revolve around sexual denials to sycophants, while being keenly aware of her own attractiveness. She claims she didn't have the money to pay for the flight or hotel.

If you know where and how, it's trivial to find historical casting profiles on talent databases. Any with many others' you wouldn't believe. But it's not a sin of some kind.

Who knows? Maybe the guy was innocent. Does it matter? This terrible incident conveniently gave her a huge career bump. This person is not named, yet the accusation is extremely serious. Conversely, if baseless, it's defamation at a pernicious level and utterly cynical.

It's all a bit too good of a story. And if you're a storyteller yourself, listening to it...

Are all of these sexually-spurned men imagining things?

One thing, as you get older, is you learn things are rarely one-sided. And girls, over time, figure out the power feminine mystique has over men. As they get older, they realise the danger it can put them in.

Men don't randomly fly into violent rages because they are sexually frustrated. It's not out of the bounds of possibility, but between these two options, which is the most likely?

a) Something has been suggested or implied which has later been withdrawn, or
b) Violence and intimidation spontaneously occurred despite there being no cause.

This seems to be a consistent and repetitive theme for Southern. She makes men quite angry, supposedly out of nowhere at all, and entirely without justification for this "crazy" behaviour which results. Not just once, but over a long period of time. And it spurs behaviour in them where they claim to feel led on, used, and injured intensely enough to warrant severe repudiation.

In the course of almost three hours, Southern claims she has been the victim of malevolent, vindictive campaigns from men close to her career-wise, she ends up "dating":

An LA "anti-feminist" who tried to put her up in an Airbnb;
An Instagram follower who turned up at a cafe she was in;
Yiannopoulos' assistant and ghostwriter, Allum Bokhari;
Paul Watson, a cocaine-driven broadcaster whose apartment she went back to after a date late at night;
and so on;
and on;
and on;

If everyone is crazy, apart from you, maybe - just maybe - they're not the ones needing to answer questions.

Southern always does the dumping. She ends things. Nobody has apparently ever dumped her.

Is it too much of a stretch to speculate an individual who takes pleasure in provoking Muslim strangers with "Allah is Gay" imagery in public would enjoy provoking personal contacts in private? Why complain about the the latter when the former might well get you murdered?

VACCU: Do governments tell visa applicants they are on political watch lists?

Southern's pranks have pissed a lot of people off. She's been denied entry to the UK, and claims she was banned from the US for two years (which sounds like an immigration overstay ban). It's not fun and it's all a bit party-pooping, but it comes to some amazement to her governments often don't want the towns and cities being rallied. It's expensive, and it's annoying.

The British Home Secretary can ban anyone he or she likes on account of them not being "conducive to the public good", whether or not they are pressured by absurd groups like "Hope Not Hate".

It's not out of the ordinary to get banned from a country you've caused trouble in as a foreigner. You are not entitled to walk through their borders and provoke people. According to the AU police, her previous visit cost $68,000 in security and she refused to pay.

Firstly, why did Southern need a visa for travel to Australia? To see her in-laws, or to immigrate? She seems confused as to her own intentions. According to a later interview, she had to start with a visitor visa and adjust it after a year. This isn't how immigration law works; it's how immigration fraud is done.

For those who aren't familiar with it, Australia has an admission requirement for good character which is done via a Character Test. She was either denied or a visa or actually granted extra appeal time because she has a criminal record. None of this is unusual. By contrast, no-one with a criminal record may enter her home country of Canada without a Certificate of Rehabilitation or special waiver.

Southern's FA (visitor) visa application was referred to the Visa Applicant Character Consideration Unit (VACCU) for having a substantial criminal record. This is NOT a "list". It's a background-checking department, like Secondary Screening (SS) at the airport.

Southern claims it was "because of all the activism i had done..." etc. To say this is grandiose is an understatement. Here's the law:

Character test (6) For the purposes of this section, a person does not pass the character test if:
(a) the person has a substantial criminal record (as defined by subsection (7)); or

[snip]

(7) For the purposes of the character test, a person has a substantial criminal record if: (a) the person has been sentenced to death; or (b) the person has been sentenced to imprisonment for life; or (c) the person has been sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 12 months or more; or (d) the person has been sentenced to 2 or more terms of imprisonment, where the total of those terms is 12 months or more; or (e) the person has been acquitted of an offence on the grounds of unsoundness of mind or insanity, and as a result the person has been detained in a facility or institution; or (f) the person has: (i) been found by a court to not be fit to plead, in relation to an offence; and (ii) the court has nonetheless found that on the evidence available the person committed the offence; and (iii) as a result, the person has been detained in a facility or institution.

She failed the character test, and to get out of it - while they were processing her background check - she concocted a story for the Australian authorities which showed she'd given up and rehabilitated herself.

It sounds as though she was also intending to deceive the Australian authorities as to her intentions, due to the huge emotionally manipulate emphasis on visits to family. The dishonesty here is overwhelming and the narcissism on full display: "I couldn't possibly discuss these secretive government issues". They might want to take another look at her US immigration record.

Her visa wasn't denied, and her referral clearly wasn't on account of her political views (rather, actions). The unit makes clear the further check was for inciting discord in the country. So the Aussies actually helped her meet the conditions for a visa. With it she got the standard warning, and additional info.

On the bottom of her form it denotes a warning for declaring criminal convictions, which implies she may not have.

Southern was very, very lucky. Canada wouldn't have allowed that. God knows the US wouldn't. It was a tale well told, but slightly too fanciful.

Robinson has a problem with this: mortgage fraud, immigration fraud, and contempt of court are not political oppression. You cannot commit criminality and demand you be exempt from the consequences of it.

None of these things are fatal, because, screw the government. However, they are indicating a pattern of manipulative and dishonest behaviour. It's inescapable this character is deceitful when it serves her own ends, and she's prepared to double down on the whole thing, hard.

It's not theft, they just preferred me

What's to be said about these two "support staff" at the centre of these groups? It seems everyone needed a film crew they couldn't get. Everyone wants a film crew for their agitprop. For some reason everyone wanted these two.

Southern's critics seem to have a consistent complaint, which is she mimicks them and "borrows" their ideas:

Southern meets Yiannopoulos and ends up as his female version on Rebel News...
...where she meets colleague Faith Goldy - aka Nazi Babe (TM) - who is about to do a documentary in South Africa. Mysteriously....
Southern becomes a documentary filmmaker on the same subject... who, then...
... has a promotional tour pf the result at the same time as Yiannopoulos, so ends up ...
...spending time with Tommy Robinson and his film crew buddies... who....
...are persuaded to make Southern's films instead, as she meets Brittany Pettibone of Generation Identity... who is getting married in the midst of some immigration problems...
...whereupon Southern is then an agitator who is getting married, before having some immigration problems...
etc etc

It doesn't take a genius to spot a path of action here. Southern, as mentioned, is clearly a talented filmmaker who needed an experienced crew to beef up that IMDB page. Nothing suspicious or strange there. She obviously did some poaching on her way up and exploited the malfeasance of previous employers.

A disparate group of spurned people all alleging the same thing: counterfeiting and/or bad faith. However, a lack of creativity, and mimickry, is straight off Hare's checklist. It's a highly distinctive feature.

The issue here, again, is bad faith. Southern protests endlessly she merely providing the good and nourishment these starved artists so desperately needed, and in fairness, they can work for whomever they like. There's no need to massage this: i paid better. There's no need for apology unless you're proud of it.

Bad faith isn't illegal. Spending three hours to canonise yourself in the public eye is the morally proximal though.

How natural is it to take such apparent joy in counter-allegations?

Who really conducts a violation of other people's privacy on this scale by publishing their messages? Assuming they are not photoshopped and placed in truthful context?

Perhaps the strangest moment of all this high school WhatsApp screenshotting is the last chapter of this mea culpa which obviously has a strong emotional tie for Southern.

I don't like to talk about these things publicly. I don't think it is good manners in any regard. But my father always told me, lauren, don't start a fight but finish one.

Really, after two hours of talking about them publicly so far in the same video file? It's a wildly grandiose statement, and frankly, cringeworthy.

She really, really seems to enjoy humiliating right-wing commentator Paul Joseph Watson, of Infowars. Now, Watson sounds like a nut in almost everything he does, and definitely comes off as a nut in Southern's hitjob-closing statement. Clearly most of Reddit thinks he's a nut. It may or may not be deserved; what's in question is why his alleged victim seems to enjoy it so much.

But here we go again. A male who is enraged and "disappointed" at Southern for no reason at all other than she is such a prize (!), but it self-evidently rattles her on this occasion.

Southern apparently went on a date which was so bad, she decided to continue it in the more intimate setting of Watson's apartment "for a few hours" where they "chatted" and "smoked cigars" (as girls so often do). This man being infamous for his "cocaine-fueled rants". He took photos.

From the worst dinner ever, back to his place, and then being interrogated upon leaving. Because Southern's intentions and character were too pure.

Come off it. Pull the other one.

Watson claims they had sex, and she has been hard at work deleting her entire social media timeline to rewrite history. He theorises she is some kind of infiltrator: which they always do, on either side. Who cares?

She concludes, in a remarkably vicious and spiteful change of tone, sporting a wide smile as she issues an ominous threat:

"You know what Paul, if you want to deny any of this; if you want to pretend that you truly were on some moral crusade against the frauds and the inauthentic people in the movement; as if you don't have a few things to say about that! You can deny all of this, and i'd be happy, - more than happy - to provide more evidence for it. But i don't think you want me to do that. So we'll just leave that there."

Once again, Southern is very, very pleased with herself for publicly blackmailing another political figure, on camera, in the vein of a Mafiosa.

An Oddly Favourable Reaction To Someone So Criticised

Southern is a divisive figure. Which means it comes as no surprise YouTubers are complaining the comments under her video are being "curated", leaving only a universally-sympathetic chorus of admiration.

An example:

"This is what happens within 20 seconds, commenting on her video. Comment Deleted."
https://twitter.com/WillontheRadio/status/1274190864978493440

370,000 views. 29K likes. Which means about 9% of viewers - who could be bothered - hit the "like" button. The comments tell a different story: consistent praise.

A Note On Milo Yiannopoulos

One thing which becomes clear is the malice of Yiannopoulos' narcissistic personality disorder, rather than its supposed playfulness. It's an extreme case. He graduated from Cambridge and seemingly wretchedly wasted family money on attempting to be a male Kardashian.

Now, you can say a lot about Milo. He's got a ridiculously high IQ with excellent verbal reasoning skills, he's hilarious, and he's one hell of a writer who doesn't need anyone ghosting him for prose. He also claims he was sexually abused by a priest (?) in younger years. There are fewer people you want as a blood enemy than that. His life is a real waste.

Why does that matter?

Yiannopoulos has done his own Mea Culpa and claims to now be a fundamentalist Catholic who has given up homosexuality for chastity and "conversion therapy". Given the extent, depth, and virulence of his paste behaviour, there is a low probability he has changed at all considering the pathology and treatment options for NPD, which is a lifelong, incurable condition.

It's possible, yes. But likely? No. NPD sufferers don't get treatment because they don't accept anything is wrong with them in the first place. And even if they did, there's nothing to offer them. NPD is character disorder, and character doesn't change.

If makes you wonder if Southern is "borrowing" again from her former mentor. Where do you go and do while Trump is quietly golfing, you've pissed a lot of people off, and there's not much to run on?

If you're a kind-hearted, optimistic Christian who gets to hear this testimony, bring a whole bucket of salt to listen to it with.

What do we know for sure?

As always, we can point to some factual data to get some perspective on someone's honesty quotient. For something "rewritten hundreds of times", it's bizarre to need three hours for speculative, meandering monologue.

Southern - if that is her real name, as Yiannopoulos claims it is Simonsen -

Has numerous visually-observable traits which indicate sociopathy;
Has not (to date) pursued any civil or criminal allegation through legal or official means;
Was judged to have a "substantial" criminal record by the Australian government;
Blatantly misrepresented the circumstances of her "false retirement" at 26, and subsequent immigration to Australia;
Has adjunct complainants with eerily-similar accusations;
Has released private messages into the public domain without remorse;
Has a proven track record of editing social media history (presumably to keep that AU visa);
Has openly threatened/blackmailed someone on camera;
Is intent on elevating herself through highly theatrical apologia;

Every single one of these characters, with the possible exclusion of Pettibone and Goldy, is odious, vexatious, and vulgar at their essence.

The equally-odious "Right Wing Watch" didn't seem to find much of it plausible either:

"Alt-right activist Lauren Southern once accepted a complete stranger's offer to fly her to California only to find out he expected to sleep with her. She blamed "radical feminists," saying that if they had been more "reasonable," she might have listened to their warnings." (Twitter, July 18)

Southern's at an impasse it's hard not to sympathise with, unless you're a nut on the opposite side to her. She's misspent her youth and grown up; the prettiness isn't as effective when it comes to grabbing attention. Not to mention, baby's going to be on the internet soon and see what mummy's been up to.

You can't edit the past as you can edit YouTube comments. Even if you get out there ahead of threats, and manage to smear those who would threaten you, you're always going to have people who are slightly more willing to do what you aren't.

But if you are going to organise a PR stunt like this, you have to call in people who are smarter than you - which is impossible if you're narcissistic as they don't exist. She should have listened more to the poisonous creatures of Hollywood in the early years who deal with these people all the time. We'd tell you:

Make police reports for the criminal offences;
Sue people for libel and defamation in the courts;
When you have a paper trail, do a proper investigation which doesn't have you on a "throne" like Echo from the Narcissus tale, and use the receipts as the goods rather than your own sense of personal majesty.

Remember the 11th Commandment: Thou Shalt Not Get Caught.

If you want to be a wolf, learn to dress as a sheep.

What we do know is: no matter what, when a camera is on, Southern will always be very, very pleased with herself.