LynnNChicago Hates Jill Zarin.. And Me

Hypocrisy Run Amok on a Real Housewives Blog

I love irony. To me it's not so much "like rain on your wedding day" as "like realizing you're still in love with the ex-boyfriend you rejected for your new husband on your wedding night." but that's just me. I find irony to be so delicious that it tends to tickle me no matter how serious the circumstances.

I remember years ago I was driving on the freeway listening to the news when a story came on about a man who drowned while spreading his mother's ashes in the ocean. A truly heartbreaking situation. Yet I had to pull off to the side of the road because I was laughing so hard. I'm not a heartless person, the tragedy did not escape me, but in those first moments of hearing the news the irony of the situation is what I reacted to.

As much as I love irony, I hate hypocrisy. Hate it. With a passion. I hate it more than Sam I Am thought he hated Green Eggs & Ham, I hate it more than LynnNChicago hates Jill Zarin, which brings me to the reason for this blog - a circumstance that brings together that which I love and that which I despise - and I am not speaking of despising either Jill Zarin or LynnNChicago although neither of them will be on my Christmas list for the foreseeable future.

For those of you who don't know who Jill Zarin is - and I'm sure she will be devastated to discover just how many people do not know - JZ is a cast member on Bravo's reality series The Real Housewives of New York (aka RHONY.)

For those of you who have never heard of LynnNChicago - and that's several million more people than who have never heard of Zarin - Lynn is a reality TV blogger aka a really big RHONY fan who really hates Jill Zarin. I know that because I Hate Jill Zarin (IHJZ) is the title of her blog. A blog which I will admit here and now that I have both read and commented on, but not regularly.

Now Jill Zarin did not have a very good RHONY year. One might say she had a very bad RHONY year, others may characterize it as a totally shitty RHONY year, or possibly the worst RHONY year ever. Rarely in the annals of human history has one human being fallen so far, so fast. For the first two seasons of RHONY Jill was one of the most popular housewives not only of the show but of the whole Real Wives franchise. Self absorbed women with no self awareness, many of whom live way beyond their means are being filmed by Bravo all over the country, destroying their marriages and screwing up their children all for our entertainment (Go Bravo!)

Anyway, Jill has managed to maintain her popularity despite having horrendous taste in home décor, a materialistic side that is even uglier than her living room, and a tendency to come off as a total prima donna at times. But this year on RHONY Zarin showed herself to be mean, conniving, vindictive, manipulative, immature, dishonest – and that was just in the first episode. And it just went downhill from there for poor Jill, especially since Bethenny, - who in her head Jill had cast in the role of mean girl to her own role as victim – had the audacity to get pregnant, get engaged and lose her father all in the first few months of filming making her the most sympathetic character in the annals of reality tv with the exception of those hardluck families on Extreme Home Makeover and the 400 pound Biggest Loser contestants who had crappy childhoods and have never been kissed.

This was only the beginning of Jill’s misfortunes. She also miscalculated. A lot. Both on and off camera, both during production and while she was trying to do damage control when the show was airing. She made stupid mistakes and really stupid mistakes. I would go so far as to say that she achieved a statistical impossibility by being wrong 100% of the time – even a broken clock is right two times a day. For more on the misadventures of Jill Zarin you can check out the reviews and comments on her amazon book page or read any of the dozens of episode recaps or blogs out there on the web (Richard Lawson at gawker.com is my personal favorite.)

Which brings me back to LynnNChicago and her IHJZ blog. It seems that one day Lynn became so incensed by Jill Zarin that she felt the need to put her hate into words and those words on the web. Meanwhile in another corner of cyberspace Strega an evil moderator at Television Without Pity closed the RHONY discussion forum, ironically due to the vast amount of Jill Zarin hatred being displayed there. I often find these internet forum moderators to be like elementary school hall monitors who let the power go to their heads (like Bobby Brady, or was it Peter?) They seem to really enjoy warning people to behave, and banning them even more. I assume that the power rush that comes from closing a thread is an orgasmic experience for these sad, sad-sack souls.

TWOP’s motto is “spare the snark, spoil the network” but I think they should change it to “spare the network the snark” especially when you realize that Bravo not only airs the Ho-wives shows but owns TWOP as well.

Anyway the TWOP Jill haters needed some place to snark and Lynn’s Jill hating blog had a comments section, and thus a beautiful union was born. Her commenters were thrilled to find an unmoderated home and Lynn promised there would be no post purging or banishment and the only rule was that the commenters respect each another.

Lynn does more than just hate on Jill on her Jill hating blog. She hates on the other ho-wives that she hates and she expresses her love for the ho-wives she loves. She recaps each episode to within an inch of its life, she opines and dissects and speculates.

And then the commenters comment, and hate on Jill and the ho-wives they hate and express love for Lynn, and the ho-wives they love and for each other. There don’t seem to be any Jill supporters on this site although to be fair there don’t seem to be many Jill supporters anywhere on the planet earth at this point in time. Some of the commenters on Lynn’s blog seem to believe that anytime someone shows support for Jill anywhere that it must be Jill herself or a friend of Jill’s or a relative of Jill’s or someone Jill is paying to express support. They don’t just like to attack Jill, they like to go to the other sites and attack these Jill supporters as well. And they also like to attack any writer or blogger who doesn’t share their hatred of Jill. They seem to take their Jill hate very seriously and feel it very deeply. I don’t think I’ve ever felt that level of hatred for anyone even those who have actually harmed or wronged me.

One of the things that Lynn and her minions have repeatedly attacked Jill and some of the other housewives for is deleting the negative comments people leave on their personal websites and facebook pages. Jill does this a lot. She’ll literally delete hundreds of negative posts at a time. A lot of people don’t like Jill Zarin. I don’t like Jill Zarin. Jill and some of the other housewives also have been known to block people who make negative comments to them on Twitter and on their personal websites. Lynn and her commenters have repeatedly bashed and mocked Jill and the other ho-wives for blocking people. They find it outrageous. They say that's it's wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.

On June 8, 2010 Lynn received some critical comments on her blog. Now mind you these were nothing like the nasty, hate-filled messages that the ho-wives receive and nowhere near the volume these women get. There were probably around twenty, there was no cursing or name calling or nastines, in fact all the posts were extremely respectful, although one or two of mine contained a dollop of snark. I’d love for you to be the judge and read them all yourself but unfortunately Lynn deleted many of them. Not all but a lot. The remaining ones can be found here the thread that contains the remaining critical posts begins with the third comment on the page which is by Lynn. I’m not sure how she decided which of the critical posts to keep and which to cut. But I find it ironic, hypocritical and pathetic that a woman who said she would only delete posts that attacked other posters and who has repeatedly chastised and ridiculed Jill Zarin for deleting posts that are critical of Jill, turns around and deletes posts that are critical of herself.

And after repeatedly and relentlessly attacking JZ and the other housewives for blocking people from posting – Lynn is now blocking people from posting (including me.) Ironic, hypocritical, pathetic.

And now for the piece de resistance. Over the weekend Jill Zarin claimed that she had received threatening messages in the mail. On her blog on June 8,2010 Lynn speculated that Jill was lying about the threats and expressed her outrage at Jill for her belief that Jill was feigning being threatened when there were so many real victims of real harassment who received real threats out there. You can see Lynn’s rant in the first few paragraphs of her blog that’s linked to above. Now keep in mind that Lynn is incensed by what she believes is a faux claim of a threat.

On June 8, 2010 Lynn sent an email to one of the other posters that she blocked which included the following sentence:

“Your buddy Cleo’s Mommy (yea me) is foul, vulgar (yea me) and has threatened me”

Yes on the very same day she bashed Jill for falsely claiming she was threatened. Our dear, Lynn is falsely claiming she was threatened.

By June 9th she may have well spent more of her blogging time, deleting posts, blocking posters and falsely claiming harassment than she actually spent blogging.

I did not threaten Lynn in any way shape or form. I did not suggest I would harm her in any way, shape or form. I’d love to show you exactly what I said, but she deleted the post.

The gist of it was that if she continued to delete my comment I would post it elsewhere.

So here it is:

TO LYNN

URGENT TECHNICAL PROBLEM

A handful of posts are missing from the first June 8th thread.

I know how critical you have been of Jill Zarin for deleting posts that she was “Not Happpy” about. In fact you and your minions have ragged on her relentlessly for doing so. Therefore I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt that it is merely a coincidence that the only posts missing appear to be those that are either critical of you and/or supportive of me.

Please alert wordpress immediately of this problem, or if I am being naive and it is not a coincidence then I will assume that the body snatching is close to being complete and you will be blowing your husband for jewelry tonight and shilling your book on the moral and ethical evils of flagrant hypocrisy tomorrow.

If you’ve hung with me this long I thank you.

Feel free to comment I take a non-hypocritical oath that no comment will be deleted and no poster blocked.