There is an expression in Hebrew, y’mach shemo, which means “may his name be blotted out”. This expression is reserved for particularly heinous enemies of the people, murderous villains like Hitler, Himmler, Haman. People sometimes accompany this expression with a spitting gesture, or an actual huck toward the spittoon, to suggest the casting out of the hateful poison these inhuman types inject into the world.

I’m here to say, you have not truly lived until a group of your closest longtime friends agrees that your name needs to be blotted out, henceforth and until the death.

What crimes have I committed to make me deserving of inclusion in the worst people in history? Don’t ask. I made two people feel bad about themselves, forced them to lie just to defend themselves, was so relentless in my demand for “honesty” that a story equating me with Hitler was the group’s only alternative. After all, just because the oldest son of the couple I so mortally attacked was committed to a locked mental ward two days after he returned to live with his parents is no reason to make any judgments about their ability to be honest, loving, nurturing, supportive or vulnerable. How dare I bring such a viciously unfair idea into the world!

Sure, blame the parents. It’s always the parents’ fault when the adult child suffers from depression, is susceptible to self-doubt, self-sabotage, cannot form lasting friendships, according to the most childish among us. I am among the most childish, according to the hideous story of my irredeemable evil that justifies the blotting out of my name forever.

Every gathering of people who have written me off as deserving of permanent enmity, you know, for being such an unforgiving, smart, formidable fucking enemy, is like another funeral for me. The accursed name of the justly hated corpse will never be spoken aloud in mixed company. No question about me will ever be asked again, nothing I have ever said or done by way of empathy, humor, sensitivity, kindness or generosity will be recalled.

Only the danger I pose to the community of those who must accept the well-established, if slightly twisted, version of my threatening aggressiveness must be kept in mind. After all, if they could blot my name from history, what can they do to yours, fuckface?