Why did David Sedaris' sister kill herself?

She was P-O-ed she couldn't even get a laundry product commercial!

I've always found his focus on his family creepy, not funny or cute.

Suicide? That's HILARIOUS!

He described her place in one of his books. It was clear something was off.

I hope he's not exploiting this.

She lived in Somerville, MA. Here's an article about her.

I get the feeling he knows more than he is letting on.

[quote]The family also discovered that she’d been a regular drug user, when she was young, at least. A classmate had drawn a marijuana leaf beside her name in an old school year book. And someone had written: ‘Call me sometime this summer and we’ll go out and get blitzed.’

Addiction and desperation lead people to commit suicide. Duh!

Only after her death the family dicovers the addiction? Sedaris has described his own alcoholism (though he doesn't call it that) and addictions. His brother is the guy who never got it together, still lives around town sustaining himself and his addictions with odd jobs. Their mother had a scotch and cigarette habit and died from lung cancer. Yeah, I'd say there's a genetic predisposition.

Who fucked her, her father or her brother(s)?

[quote]His brother is the guy who never got it together, still lives around town sustaining himself and his addictions with odd jobs.

I thought "The Rooster" made a decent living refinishing wood floors, and was raising a daughter.

I remember a short story he wrote about Tiffany, I guess when the mother came into some money she used much of it to put Tiffany into some sort of private school/institution.

[quote]Only after her death the family dicovers the addiction?

I don't think so, r8. The Daily Mail quote you included is a really bizarre and stupid interpretation of what David wrote in the New Yorker. Yes, he describes looking through Tiffany's 9th-grade yearbook and seeing lots of notes from her friends about getting drunk and high, but he says nothing to suggest that this was news to him and his family. He actually included that anecdote as a preface to the story of how Tiffany ran away from home during the summer after 9th grade and was subsequently sent to some sort of reform school for two years. Apparently, she never forgave her parents for this, or her siblings, either—she thought her brothers and sister somehow should have gotten her out of the institution.

If you read the New Yorker piece and David's previous essays about or referencing Tiffany, it's pretty clear that she had a long history of mental health and substance-abuse issues, and that her family was well aware of this.

Was she mental or just artistic?

I, too, remember reading about her in one of David's books. She must have been pretty artistic and free-spirited but never found the success that Amy and David have. Approaching 50 and having nothing isn't easy. The other non-David and Amy siblings have apparently more stable lives.

[quote]Tiffany remembers David playing tricks on her as a kid. He'd stick slugs to matchbooks and hang them over her bed, rouse her from sleep to stand for the national anthem, or tie rocks to her and toss her in the lake. 'He'd do that to me and Paul, especially," she says, ' and we would say, hey, that was fun, let's do it again! Then you spend the rest of your adult life looking for a rock and a rope."

She was pretty insightful, too.

I haven't read Sedaris in a long time so maybe the Rooster has gotten it together, R10. What I read made it sound like his brother was slumming about. Sedaris does tend to exaggerates about his family...

I didn't even notice the OP's article is from the Daily Mail. "Discovered" would be the entirely wrong description then.

The "melodramatic gesture" comment seems such a dickish thing to write/say about a close relative you admit to not knowing very well. It reminds me of that English teacher in Up the Down Staircase who marked up the pathetic love letter from an obviously troubled female student in his class--then returned it to her.

love you, r5.

r2, I agree. No wonder she was fucked up. I get that people have to exploit others sometimes to escape their families, but this is bullshit.

What a fucking vulture.

David Rakoff was funnier, too. RIP

A lot of Boston area lesbians live in Somerville.

She was molested as a child.

R15, Paul even has a company website.

I noticed that, too, R16 and felt the same way

R20, looks like nice work.

We call it Slummerville.

Is Tiffany the one who lived in a very messy house and walked around barefoot?

Yes.

Read the profile at r6.

When she heard that cute Jonathan Groff was playing her fugly brother in a movie, it was the final betrayal. She was outta there after that.

He's not that cute.

There's no profile at R6's link.

She probably never got over the hurt and embarrassment at being named Tiffany.

Yes, there is, r29.

I was David's bf for several years in the 80's. That Boston Globe interview is extremely, heartbreakingly, insightful. Tiffany was troubled, very funny, and very angry that her parents tricked her by leaving her at a very brutal reform school when they said they were only taking her there to look at it. She deserved a better life. I've had my own issues with David writing about me and our breakup in the NYer. He can be a mean little prick.

the article at R6 is very good - can you not see it, R29?

Why would they dump their daughter in a reform school? Those places are awful. What did the Sedaris parents do for a living?

She also deserved not having her asshole brother exploit her tragedy for fame and fortune. I think that's beyond douchey, even for a memoirist.

You deserved better, too, if you're not trolling.

Sorry for my cynicism; there are a lot of fantasists here.

R34, I think Mr. Sedaris worked at IBM.

His mother was a drinking, smoking, wisecracking housewife.

Not trolling r35. They did play a lot of tricks on each other and everyone else. When I first met the entire family, oddly enough at Emereld Isle in 86, the girls went through my luggage and came to dinner wearing my clothes. It was a hoot, but very violating. My therapist told me to run.

They had a pretty fucked up childhood. Few people are strong enough to overcome a that, at least not without years and years of help.

Sounds like a very dysfunctional family. My family helps each other out.

It sounds odd but sadly, distancing from the family can happen.

We were fairly close as kids, and had a pretty normal family - a little dysfunction but no deep ugliness.

My sister got married and her husband became incredibly abusive/controlling, and she ended up withdrawing from us.

Like Tiffany, she took her life - it was a little over two years ago.

I do think David's comment was tacky, but families are in some ways kind of like marriages - only the people in them can really understand the relationships and dynamics of that particular one.

Smart therapist, r38.

So basically, they sound like a malevolent, hyper-narcissist version of Salinger's Glass family.

His reaction is revealingly narcissistic. Instead of wondering why she killed herself, he dotes on the fact that she 'ripped up the family pictures' and that this was 'melodramatic' (pot meet kettle!). Then he wonders how she could have 'left' such wonderful people (including himself!). No wonder she killed herself...it sounds like a family of people with narcissistic personality disorder.

If he was my brother, I'd "distance" myself too.

Based on R32/38 and the Boston Globe profile, it sounds like the family as a whole maybe willfully) confuses humor with playing tricks on people, picking on people, and violating them in some physical or emotional way that's supposed to be "funny." Occasional light practical jokes are fine, but the humor repertoire should't be solely dependent on causing discomfort, or worse, humiliation to the people closest to you.

Funny, hah, hah, but after numerous bouts of this sort of thing, one has to wonder if humor was the sole intent. I imagine it would become alienating if one is more on the sensitive side. And then top it off with getting tricked into a reform school, the sole person in the family with the distinction when the others are hostile or aggressive in other ways.

His youngest sister, Tiffany, was immortalized in the “Corduroy and Denim” essay “Put a Lid on It.” She spent some time in a juvenile detention facility, tried to become a gourmet cook but now scavenges through trash to sell or trade found treasures. The essay is bittersweet — ending with neat-freak David trying to bridge an emotional distance by literally rolling up his sleeves and scrubbing Tiffany’s squalid wine-stained floor. But last year, Tiffany auctioned off a coffee date on E-bay to tell her side of the story. “Years ago, she said I could never write about her. Then she called me up and said, ‘Everybody thinks you don’t like me. You have to write a story about me.’ And so I did,” Sedaris recalls. He sent the essay to Tiffany — twice, both times asking if there was anything that she wanted him to change. “She said no — that she loved it. But then the book came out, and then she freaked out. I don’t know what’s going on with her,” Sedaris says. “I think she saw this perfectly good outrage going to waste. No one in my family was outraged at all. But then ‘Wham!’ when the book came out, she just changed.” He says any stories about Tiffany are now officially off-limits.

It's not OK to write about whatever misery your sister suffered in the 9th grade.

While I enjoy some of his writing, I find that Sedaris is an exploitative narcissist who has abused his family memories for self-enrichment.

Good writers can create fiction from personal experiences. Doesn't have to directly hurt anyone. David Sedaris is a cheap, unintelligent writer. His tacky comment about his dead sister illustrates his lack of compassion as well as his creativity failure.

I think Amy told him to knock it off as well, although I think it was more motivated by the fact that she wanted to save her life stories to write about herself.

His schtick is starting to wear thin. The whole family just seems a little mean.

He's an egomaniac so of course he'd exploit the death of a sister he admits to not knowing. What a creep.

He's fucking boring.

[quote]When I first met the entire family, oddly enough at Emereld Isle in 86, the girls went through my luggage and came to dinner wearing my clothes. It was a hoot, but very violating. My therapist told me to run.

Wow! Okay, yeah, that would freak me the fuck out.

There's lots of commentary about her on local Somerville message boards...I think she was a bit off. She used to ride around in a rickshaw collecting trash.

More reason not to share her life stories with the world, 53

David is the Jean Kerr of the 21t Century. Nothing more. Nothing less. His fairly strong success as an essayist bemuses me.

Never found him true, but cautious, withholding. Sorry for her; so many women destroy themselves at 50. Doubt she mattered to him much, as he is self-absorbed on paper.

He'll use this, but it will be smelly no matter his finish.

Family members should always be taught to respect and support others' opinions, especially if they differ. Jokes are cruel if the recipient is in anyway hurt or offended.

Because she was crazy as a shithouse rat.

The suicide of a his sister is hardly an appropriate time to pick apart David Sedaris.

When I go to the link at R6 to read about her, it says "Article not found"

At first it seemed like a cruel joke, but I think boston.com just has a broken mobile redirect.

Tiffany was sent to the Élan School, which apparently has a history of taking fucked up kids and making them even more fucked up.

What did Tiffany do to get sent to Elan? That was a terrible, fucked-up school.

What an outrageous thing to say, even for David Sedaris: That he didn't really know his sister. Has anything been written about possible family sexual abuse against the Sedaris children?

[quote]The family also discovered that she’d been a regular drug user, when she was young, at least. A classmate had drawn a marijuana leaf beside her name in an old school year book. And someone had written: ‘Call me sometime this summer and we’ll go out and get blitzed.’

I could believe she had drug problems only from the stories that David has told about his life over the years and his own addiction issues— Not from this silly anecdote.

Seriously, a marijuana leaf- drawn in the late 70s- is as indicative of someone becoming an addict as a peace sign from the 60s was indicative of someone becoming a preist.

Sounds as if Tiffany was family scapegoat.

She was clearly angry with her siblings and wanted to hurt them after her death.

[all posts by tedious, racist idiot removed.]

This is sad though. She was sick. She was clearly isolated.

Aside from the obvious illness of severe depression, no one can know why some people go this route and some don't. It's not the fault of the family — or anyone else. It sucks for everyone.

Sometime Depressed people isolate themselves. The worse off they are the more difficult they make for others to help them until they've alienated everyone who does care. Sometimes the illness just wins.

A friend of mine had a lover who killed herself a couple years ago. After a couple of serious breakdowns and hospitalizations, drugs, shock therapy, she still took her own life.

This woman had a lover who was all out in love with her and saw her on a regular basis. She had two parents that watched over her. They just couldn't win. The illness simply made it impossible for her to feel anything but her own misery. Even with all that love, she still took her own life.

I saw David Sedaris in May in SF. She might have died by then. I had 2 suicides in my family and no matter what people are saying about David's reaction, it's a horrible thing to deal with. I'm sure he loved his sister, even though he may not have been the ideal brother.

This is a reluctant W&W for R65.

Oh my. Surprise, surprise. Yet another thread on Datalounge where an out gay man is pilloried.

This place never changes.

Amy remains my favorite Sedaris. She has the inspired lunatic humor without the malice or narcissism of her brother.

[quote] It's not the fault of the family — or anyone else. It sucks for everyone.

It does not help to have a brother whose commercial viability depends on laying out every family member and his/her presumed defects with exaggerated glee and sense of superiority and irony. Sedaris seems to try to do it with a sense of kindly wit in his "comic" essays, with or without exaggeration, without much reflection other than an "how did this affect me?" attitude.

R71, what part of BITCHY gay GOSSIP site did you not understand when you started posting here?

ALL celebs get their balls busted here. Should we tip-toe around the gay ones so as not to offend your delicate sensibilities?

Get over yourself, Mary. This is a bitchy place. Don't like it? Go somewhere else, TROLL.

R73...BINGO.

R64, I laughed at that myself. Ooooh, a pot plant drawing!

But the truth is that they sent her to Elan, where kids were virtually tortured. So cover up the family's complicity by making her out to be a drug addict. He's an evil person, clearly.

Obviously he did know her well, but lying serves some sort of purpose to him.

I'm thinking economics. Somerville Mass is way too expensive a town for artists. She should have been living in a trailer in Buttfuck, Arizona.

It does sound like early on, Tiff may have been targeted as the garbage receptacle in the family...that can make anyone turn to drugs and worse.

I believe the story of the kids going through the suitcase and showing up at dinner with the clothes on. Amy was on Watch What Happens Live tonight. A Real Housewife was the other guest, and she just so happened to have her clutch in the seat next to her. Amy grabbed the clutch and started going thru it, showing all of the viewers all of the contents, putting in the jewelry, and almost read the housewives real age from her drivers license before it was snatched out if her hands. It was funny, but it had a mean streak buried in it, and although the housewife was laughing, you could tell she was also shocked and embarrassed.

Its very lazy to demonize Sedaris. He's no Dan Savage. He's aware and self-critical of his own narcissism and superiority complex, its part of his voice and character as a writer. His essay on her is quite moving. He's clearly quite angry and hurt by the situation as well as his own behaviour (for not speaking to her for 8 years).

The drugs bit is taken out of context by the right wing Daily Mail obviously. In the original essay, he wasn't saying that her smoking weed was the stepping stone to suicide at all, just including it when discussing her life. David and Amy are notorious pot smokers (or at least David was).

Clearly, she was driven to distraction because she couldn't get tickets for Janet Jackson's last tour and she had to see Madonna instead. That would make any pop music lover want to inflict harm on themselves, or at the very least cut off their ears.

Damn, I'd trade the Sedaris family for my family any day!. My family is way more fucked up, way more isolated and way more poor. And nobody in my family has killed themselves—at least not yet.

[quote]The suicide of a his sister is hardly an appropriate time to pick apart David Sedaris.

No, it's a time for him to mock her for being laughably melodramatic.

“Writers are always selling somebody out.”

PS: But at least I didn't reveal the true cause of my daughter's death...

r59, what the heck does DS care? He wrote a stupid article about it. If he doesn't want to be picked apart now, he shouldn't have pissed on her suicide like he did on her life.

[quote]ts very lazy to demonize Sedaris.

I disagree.

It's lazy for a writer to use his dysfunctional family as entertainment. Tiffany said she was basically his cartoon character, which she resented.

He made a career exploiting his relatives. They should all get a percentage of his royalties. They are his material.

[quote]He's aware and self-critical of his own narcissism and superiority complex,

Brutality is never acceptable. Even if he knows he's brutal, it's still not acceptable.

[quote]He's clearly quite angry and hurt by the situation

He's angry? HE'S angry??

What a dick.

How about some compassion? His sister suffered horribly, so much so, she killed herself.

Will he wear golf shoes when he dances on her grave? I'm sure it will make a fabulous story!!

I thought it was a beautiful piece. What's wrong with you people? All this nonsense about exaggerating and exploiting his family. Don't you understand how writers write?

So we can agree that her death is David's fault? Good. DL resolves another issue.

R84, Quintana died of pancreatitis. Are you implying it was alcoholism?

Most people here did not, obviously, read the piece in The New Yorker.

Sedaris has said he gives his family drafts of everything before they are published. How resentful can they be--these people spend every holiday together. David and Hugh bought a beach house in North Carolina (not an easy commute from London) just for family events.

I think Tiffany gave permission for the one story and then had seller's remorse. He never wrote about her again. She didn't comes off badly (a little crazy, yes); he comes off as a weirdo control freak.

Tiffany killed herself, and her brother ridiculed her posthumously. The family isn't all that great, 90.

So, did his lawyer drop of his manuscripts with five pages of release legalese? Now, she's just material for a book by an author I once read.

For some reason, I stopped reading his work after " Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim". That was the book that made me think he'd lost his way.

I think money destroyed his source material. A worker drone who sees absurdity is the person I remember. Then I remember, he's used his family for material from the start.

He's joining Augusten Burroughs(had to look that up) and Elizabeth Wurtzel (ditto).

Blech

Just think if she had used a spellcaster instead of killing herself. We might be grieving over David instead.

R89: Yes indeed. That's why 'Blue Nights' turns out to be such an unsatisfying read, as Joan wasn't up to her usual brutally honest self. I guess being a mother does that to you...

So he found a way to profit from my suicide by writing about it in a magazine?

Damn, I didn't think this all the way through....

OK I want more details about her. She seems so interesting and talented. She was last working in Somerville. How did she support herself?

[quote] How did she support herself?

You didn't read the links? She was on disability.

She must have had additional financial support. How can you live in Somerville on disability?

She saved on furniture etc.

What was her disability?

"Sedaris" apparently.

Parts of Somerville are still relatively cheap. There are plenty of long-termers who are still paying pretty cheap rent. Many landlords are older and don't know they could be charging much more.

I never thought Sedaris' family essays were realistic. I find it hard to believe anyone did. They were clearly embellished or outright made up for comic effect.

R102, is the area changing to a less than white shade? In Chicago, racist landlords discount rent to keep pale tenants.

I don't really know what you're asking r103.

Somerville is a true melting pot of all races/ages/ethnicities. For the most part everyone gets along. Probably the most tensions are between the old white ethnics and the new white hipsters.

They are extending the subway into Somerville now which will make some of the 'deeper' areas more accessible for people without cars, which pretty much ensures prices will climb for newcomers.

If she was mentally unwell, it would likely have been better to leave her out of the books, no?

Fascinating to see some folks here defending him.

Mocking her after her suicide is absolutely the lowest that a person could go. It's despicable.

Mocking her, R106? Did you and I read the same article?

He found the gesture melodramatic. I see nothing wrong with writing that.

Suicide is tragic, for those left behind. It also causes a lot of anger and resentment in those left behind. I think that's present in the story, and it's understandable.

[quote]What was her disability?

She was mentally ill and a drug addict.

Did you even read the fucking article?

She was a drug addict because friends drew pot leaves and talked about getting wasted, when they were teenagers?

She obviously had issues but calling her a drug addict is unfounded.

Those left behind, R108?

Sounds like most of the family left that girl behind decades ago.

r111

Did you even read the story? She kept cancelling on them. When she was on good terms with one, she was not in contact with the others etc.

R112, when I wrote decades ago, that is what I meant. Tiffany at 50 was the youngest. Nobody's talking about her isolating from family reunions ;or holiday dinners when everybody was grown. I am wondering where all this brotherly love and care were when baby sister was sent to a freaking reform school. And the years immediately after.

Oh that's right. David had to leave the Sedarises to figure out how to be his own special Sedaris.

Do you fucking flyover morons realize we would have no Fitzgerald or Wiliams or Updike or any number of great literature if the writers didn't mine their fucked up families.

114...MARY!! Those comparisons are ridiculous!

108= also has no soul.

[quote]Oh that's right. David had to leave the Sedarises to figure out how to be his own special Sedaris.

Isn't this the point of adulthood?

R114, Drank yer juice, Shelby! Drank yer juice!

You can "mine your fucked up family" without being an asshole to them.

Moreover, you can at least "mine your fucked up family" under fictional names.

Furthermore, most really good writers bring a little bit more to the table than just "mining their fucked up families."

Yes, that is the problem - he is seen as a memoirist, humorist, not for the most part, as a fiction writer.

Since it was known she was the sister of David Sedaris, townspeople described her using words like "free, eccentric, a collector of things others might not see beauty in" and someone who looked in all sorts of places for "things to recycle in her art."

If she hadn't been Sedaris's sister she'd have been called a bag lady.

How did she kill herself?

mirrors

The sad part is that anyone considers him worth discussing. Talk about a 'one trick pony'.

She was a 50 year old woman. She was responsible for her own life and for the ending of it.

Freemason blood sacrifice.

I've read the whole article now, and honestly it's a well done story. It's him trying to cope with the aftereffects of his sister's death.

The line about melodramatic seems nasty when out of context, but in the greater context of the article, it really fits with him reaching for an explanation of something that, quite frankly, cannot be explained.

PS, the entire piece is here:

[quote]He found the gesture melodramatic.

I fixed your typos:

He [bold]dismissed her suicide[/bold] as melodramatic.

Committing suicide is not a "gesture" for him or you to judge as "melodramatic."

You have no clue, so you should just. stop.

124 is correct.

125 is Dick Cheney.

r86 / r129 sounds like a high-strung loon who doesn't understand people very well. It's ridiculously normal for family members and friends of a suicide to experience and express some anger over it. To act like this is somehow beyond the pale is to reveal that you have very little experience with the world.

You know what, I am really tired of people looking for 'factual truth' and 'factual acccuracy' in memoirs. For god's sake, it's a fucking Memoir! Human Memory is by definition UNreliable!

The fact that New Yorker is now applying its usual fact-checking procedure to memoirs really strikes me as the absurd height of ridiculous earnestness and lack of wit/humour/irony.

32, this thread is entitled, "Why did David Sedaris' sister kill herself?"

You're off-topic.

[quote] Committing suicide is not a "gesture" for him or you to judge as "melodramatic."

He referred to the tearing up of the family pictures as melodramatic. Did you even read the piece?

r133 "corrects typos," in other people's posts, orders them to stop posting, and informs them when they're off-topic.

We all hate her, right?

DS probably started this thread thinking DLers would just crow over his oh so clever commentary of his insane sister.

But that didn't happen, did it? Throwing shade on the dead is not well received by the masses.

135, you don't really hate me. How could you -- you don't even know me.

You just hate that DS has totally been called out as being a dick. He disrespected his dead sister, and you defend that? "Hate" me all you want...I'm totally fine with it.

I'm also fine that Ted Cruz hates me. Enjoy your company.

r136

As if.

DL always piles on the known quantity (e.g. Sedaris, D.), unless that know quantity is someone they want to fuck.

We call out every successful gay man as being a dick here, R136. It's not exactly new.

R137 is piling on. R136 was for R135:

[quote]We all hate her, right?

You were bullied as a child, weren't you?

No, r136. I really hate you. You're melodramatic, naive, attention-seeking and think you can tell other people how to behave.

[quote]You were bullied as a child, weren't you?

Repeatedly raped. Thanks for making me remember that.

He was disrespectful in a Dutch interview that took place one month after Tiffany died. The interviewer asked if David had any regrets about Tiffany, and he replied that he regretted the money he had given her, because she had promised to return it "in her lifetime" and now obviously there was no chance of that.

His tone was really nasty, and I was chilled.

Wasn't the Elan School where Michael Skakel was sent as a teenager, and where he confessed something about Martha Moxley to a schoolmate?

R141, I have a mentally ill roommate who was repeatedly raped, too. By her own father...he also broke her fingers so she couldn't play the violin anymore.

Her coping method is opposite of yours. Instead of hating others, she's helpful and kind.

For some people, surviving trauma increases their compassion. Are you male...? Women are men are different...just saying. But my guess is that your hatred has more to do with general misogyny -- of the sister, of those here who disagree with you -- than anything else.

Now I hate you, r143.

Oh, wait. I didn't realize you were the same ridiculous queen I already declared my hatred for, r143.

Whew! I feel better. That means of everyone in this thread, it's still only you I hate.

You ridiculous thing.

Yay! Misogynists hate me! Even though I am a perfect gentleman.

Fine. I "hate" uncivilized barbarians like you, too.

Actually I don't. But I really want to!!!

I am truly delighted to NOT be accepted by misogynists. I feel really good about it. I am right, and you are wrong. Hating women is insane.

It was the lesbians who first helped us during the AIDs crisis of the 80s & 90s. Who else would even touch us back then? Women, women, women. Everybody else turned their backs on our community.

You are the Westboro Church of DL!! You hate women just like they hate us!!

You are freaks.

Thank you, r146. Thank you for that utterly delicious meltdown with accompanying glossolalia. You did not fail to disappoint.

I love how you've cast me as a misogynist, even though I haven't said a thing about women in this entire thread.

The Westboro Church bit was the cherry on the sundae, though. Bravo.

Give my regards to your rape victim room mate with a heart of gold, some mangled fingers and a dusty violin in the corner, darling. We're all puling for her.

[quote]We're all puling for her.

giggle

You morons don't understand human nature any more than you do writing.

People don't always behave "appropriately" or do or say the right thing. Sometimes they treat each other well, sometimes not. Sometimes we have the power to do what needs to be done, sometimes we don't. Sometimes it's not always clear what the right thing is. Sometimes people are responsible for their own behaviour. That's what makes us human.

People grieve for their dead loved ones in strange and complicated ways. Any of you who have experienced grief will understand this. It ain't pretty and it certainly doesn't make sense. It's also not always appropriate. A lot of complicated and conflicting emotions come to the surface and it doesn't always result in good, Oprah-esque behaviour and feel-good quips.

That's what I love about Sedaris and his writing. He's unashamedly human. He writes about his own warts as well as the warts of his family. He finds humour in the most difficult and terrible situations. Sometimes that's all you can do if you have any hope of surviving. That doesn't mean he's cold or opportunistic or finds his sister's death funny. That doesn't mean he's disrepecting her. He's just doing what he does. He writes and tries to find some art and humanity in it all.

So either you idiots are too stupid to get that. Or you DO get that and you're just being the same, sad old cunts you always are. Trashing the successful non-hot gay man. Either way you're pathetic and I'm done with you.

r147, I see you got over your RAPE issues at r141.

I'm glad you're "puling" for my traumatized roommate. At least you're not "puling" wings off butterflies.

[quote]giggle

How very DARE you make light of your rape-victim former-violinist room mate with the mangled fingers and the heart of gold! You are a misogynist! WHY AREN'T YOU KIND TO LESBIANS, WHO STOOD BY US DURING THE HOLOCAUST? WHY?

You are clearly a member of the Nazi party and probably a pedophile too.

Congratulations to all of you who have never experienced the suicide of someone close to you. Who've never dealt with someone mentally ill and who react to someone's grief by instantly judging them. Maybe you don't know anyone ill b/c you're too ill to see it.

Prayer circle for r152 - she's so tender to the touch!

If I killed myself, I expect my family to be pretty pissed at me. It would be a selfish act and hurt them beyond anything else I could imagine doing. At the very least they should think I was being melodramatic. (And clearly David was talking about ripping up the pictures.)

David Sedaris has British teeth, huh?

Publishing a story about her suicide is exactly what she would NOT have wanted.

He humiliated her when she was alive so it's no surprise that he is humiliating her now.

I agree with others who wrote here that she was likely the family scapegoat...and that David's self-absorbed essay only underscores his own narcissism.

Poor kid. My heart goes out to her.

Seriously. I wonder what it's like to be totally unloved. Apparently not good...she ended up taking her life because nobody helped her.

Her successful and wealthy brother only made things worse for her. Fame really is a bitch. He sold out his family for it. And now, everybody knows it.

I hope he never suffers like she did. And if he ever does, I hope he is surrounded by kinder people than himself.

[quote]He humiliated her when she was alive so it's no surprise that he is humiliating her now.

She had pre-approval of the essay. If she didn't want to have it published, she should have told him.

[quote]she ended up taking her life because nobody helped her.

He loaned/gave her money. You don't know what the rest of their relationship was like.

It sounds like her parents didn't do right by her. They shouldn't have sent her off to that terrible shit hole. But why would David be to blame? What was David supposed to do about it? How was he supposed to know? He was just a few years older than her.

She was mentally ill and she took her life. She made that choice. That choice affected other people. They have the right to talk about it.

Funny no one has thought to judge Amy. She, after all, is the one with money out of all of them. Plus, she is famous for her cuntiness.

If you holier-than-thou finger wavers were any good you'd do some digging and find out exactly what was wrong with her and what exactly led to her death. And you'd do the same for Dorothy Kilgallen while you were at it.

157, he wrote about her after she killed herself. How could she "pre-approve" it?

She was mentally ill and she took her life...yes.

But he didn't have to share it with the world. It hurt her hen she was alive. And yet he continued even after she died.

Why are you defending him? Do you think the mentally ill have no rights to privacy? Should thy not have feelings, either?

Is respect for the dead s hard? I hope someone hangs out his dirty laundry. See how he likes it.

Post her shitty essay about her dead sister 158 and we will

R160 (that's how you refer to previous poster's so that they appear correctly), he appeared to do nothing intentionally to harm her during her life. She's dead. She has no feelings. He's alive. He has a right to heal and if writing about it makes him feel better than he should do it.

Does this story tarnish her memory? From reading the links, I don't think other people's opinion of her mattered a hell of a lot to her.

"157, he wrote about her after she killed herself."

And she could not care less. Because she is dead. If she doesn't care, why should you?

You're deluded if you think he wrote about her suicide "to heal."

Someone posted up thread that he was sorry she didn't live to pay him back the money she owed.

Face it, your hero is a total ass. I guess you're pissed because you identify with him. Are you a total ass, too?

She was a user, a boozer, and a loser.

Not being snarky...but I could totally picture Amy as 166.

R165, even if just lashing out I think it's fair for him to do it. As I posted at R154, I would expect my family to be pretty pissed at me if I killed myself. Her leaving behind a box of shredded family photos was an added final "fuck you" to the family from her.

You're all horrifying cunts.

168, enough with the narcissism.

Hello?

She was mentally ill.

She picked things out of trash for herself and other people.

She lived in squalor.

She put herself out of her own misery.

And you're pissed about torn photos?

Really...?

Heck, for all we know, David is embellishing. What are the odds? And who would know otherwise?

There's a lot of really psychotic trolls in this thread. Self-appointed experts of how people should react or feel in a situation they really know nothing about. Probably taking the story personally because they too have mentally ill or struggling relatives they ignore or throw in homes or cut off when they can't deal with them. You guys are exhausting, shrill and creepy obsessive. We get your point. You won't be happy til David himself commits suicide.

If David DIDN'T write about this, these same people would condemn him for ignoring his sister's memory and whitewashing over her death. He's a memoirist. This is what he does.

I am r32. The ex of David S. I deeply regret posting any kind of inside information to you nest of vipers. Tiffany didn't deserve her death, but David didn't deserve my betrayal. This will probably be the last time I come here, and yes I will let the door hit me on my ass on the way out.

r172

You should find out how much money Tiffany owed David, and send him the amount.

[quote]David didn't deserve my betrayal.

How is writing about someone else's life choices, events, experiences and personality to an international audience a betrayal?

Isn't that what David does for a living? And how he got famous?

She didn't like him writing about her. He did so, in a cunty fashion, after her death. Who the fuck does that...?

Somebody with serious guilt. He needs to come clean. But he can't. He'd have no career if he did.

It'd be like Amy Winehouse going to rehab.

You are so invested in this fantasy, R174. What's your damage?

[quote] Somebody with serious guilt. He needs to come clean. But he can't. He'd have no career if he did.

In one of his stories he wrote that he and Amy spent a good half hour re-watching a clip of a guy getting kicked in the balls (by a dominatrix, I think).

David Sedaris does not try to portray himself as a "good guy".

[quote]You won't be happy til David himself commits suicide.

Now, why do you have to go THERE? Nobody here has expressed ill will toward David Sedaris.

Indeed:

[quote]I hope he never suffers like she did. And if he ever does, I hope he is surrounded by kinder people than himself.

What a mess this thread is.

A lot of smugness and arrogance here, beyond pointless bitchery.

It's hard to understand the effect that a suicide has on those who are left behind unless you've experienced it. It rips you in half to the point where you don't know yourself anymore.

At first you need to talk and talk about it. But you find people say really shockingly insensitive things or they get nervous and change the subject. Everything you say or don't say yourself seems wrong and you quickly stop talking about it and walk around crippled with silent pain.

And yes, the anger goes on for years because you feel like they put you through such pain so unnecessarily. It takes a long while to really come to the point of view that maybe they couldn't help it.

Whatever one might feel about David Sedaris as a writer and the ethics involved in him writing about his family, you should have compassion because I'm sure he is in howling pain. It's a long road back.

[quote]Whatever one might feel about David Sedaris as a writer and the ethics involved in him writing about his family, you should have compassion because I'm sure he is in howling pain.

Maybe that's why I find this so odd and am slightly judging him - he seems indifferent or focused on himself exclusively and not very sympathetic about her. Something's off.

[quote] It's hard to understand the effect that a suicide has on those who are left behind unless you've experienced it. It rips you in half to the point where you don't know yourself anymore

This, this, a thousand times this.

The DL experts who weigh in with their penny-deep, Wikipedia understandings of things they don't know desperately need to SHUT THE FUCKING FUCK UP on this one.

(R181) have you had much experience with grief?

People appear all sorts of ways, usually because they feel pressure to appear in that particular way.

Also you DO focus on yourself and you generally are not sympathetic to the person who committed suicide (or not for a long time after) You are furious at them for leaving that way. It's also a way of staving off the final acceptance that they are really gone.

R181, I find it hard to believe you've read much Sedaris. Everything he's written has been focused on himself. And he's not terribly sympathetic to anyone, especially himself.

Umm, yes I've read Sedaris and yes what he writes is focused on himself...sorta like a writer!

Anyway, he's tried to bust out of the memoir racket and write some fables. They are really nice actually. But I think most people want the dry wit, wacky family stuff and people really want him to write about himself. And I'm sure he's got bills to pay, like everyone else.

Somerville is a very hip suburb these days, and not cheap. I'm wondering how she afforded to live there, and where?

Freemason blood sacrifice

She was on disability. She might have lived with roommates. Some of the big multifamily homes in somerville have many bedrooms. Maybe her brother and other siblings sent her cash to help her out. Who knows

Why the weird speculation on 'how could she afford Somerville? '

r188, why the weird speculation on other people's posts??

What was her disability?

She had a bad case of CRAZY BITCH, R190.

Their mother was an alcoholic, so it's a possibility that she drank while pregnant with Tiffany. That could have been the cause of her mental issues.

R172, you can't possibly feel guilty for sharing a story about someone who makes their living sharing stories about the same people. Why is it okay for David Sedaris but not you?

I don't see anything particularly venomous here, anyway. This is a tame thread compared to plenty of other sites online, and with the exception of the person having the "you're all like Westboro" meltdown no one seems to have been THAT out of line.

I am obviously in the minority, but I have never enjoyed Sedaris's family tales. I loved his stories about his own experiences and exploits. And I very much enjoyed his foray into fable-writing, which reminded me of my beloved Fractured Fairy Tales from the Bullwinkle series.

Maybe it's a result of being the baby of my family, and sometime brunt of sibling "humor," but I always felt a nasty streak of cruelty as well as humor in his family stories.

At the very least he is disrespecting her wishes by writing about her. At the worst he is using her suicide to get his name in the papers.

It's helpful that we let him know that he's crossed some kind of line...like basic humanity...common courtesy.

If he did this to his own little sister, then he's capable of doing it to anyone.

If I were close to him, I wouldn't want him to outlive me.

POOR,POOR, TIFFANY.WHAT A COLD CREEP OF A BROTHER.SEDARIS HAS STOPPED BEING FUNNY AGES AGO, BUT I NEVER EXPECTED SUCH A SHALLOW CRUEL PIECE ABOUT HIS DEAD BABY SISTER. THE CLASSIC DIALOGUE ABOUT HER WHOLE LIFE FITTING INTO 1 BOX...NO IT WAS 2 BOXES,PRICELESS.

Will nobody give me the gory details of her death and how she was discovered?

No one remembers that Sedaris wrote fiction at the start of his career and continues to do so, even in his latest book? Or that he co-wrote a play with Amy? He's famous for his memoirs but it's certainly not all he does. At any rate, Sedaris is always far worse about himself than anyone else and is honest about his faults (the story about visiting the taxidermist, for example). I love his work so I'm surprised to see the vitriol on this thread.

[quote]At the very least he is disrespecting her wishes by writing about her. At the worst he is using her suicide to get his name in the papers.

He's a world famous author who doesn't need to "get his name in the papers," you loon.

[quote] And yes, the anger goes on for years because you feel like they put you through such pain so unnecessarily. It takes a long while to really come to the point of view that maybe they couldn't help it.

This may be true of your experience, but it's certainly not universal.

I love Amy, but I'm intrigued by the "cuntiness" referred to here. Where is this coming from? I sort of suspect that's true. She's one of those celebrities I like but wouldn't want to meet because I think she might be a bitch.

[quote]Fascinating to see some folks here defending him. Mocking her after her suicide is absolutely the lowest that a person could go. It's despicable.

I agree absolutely. As soon as I read his shocking comment about how "melodramatic" her final act was, I knew for certain that he had complete disdain for her. What a cruel, condescending insult. It says WAY more about him than it does about her. He'll never be able to recover from it, because it's reveals the truth about who he is, much more so than his (fiction) writing.

He might as well have rolled his eyes and said "Mary!" upon hearing the news of her suicide.

Here's the Dutch interview, where near the end he discusses his sister's suicide. He does mention money (as mentioned upthread), but it seems as a joke to take the edge of a serious subject.

Why is that (R200)? Have you been through it?

[quote]you should have compassion because I'm sure he is in howling pain.

Talk about melodrama {{snort}}. Yes, yes and this quote (below) is proof of his "howling pain."

[quote]He was disrespectful in a Dutch interview that took place one month after Tiffany died. The interviewer asked if David had any regrets about Tiffany, and he replied that he regretted the money he had given her, because she had promised to return it "in her lifetime" and now obviously there was no chance of that.

Love all the dopey apologists here waxing on and on about how "we all grieve in our own way." Bullshit. DS is not grieving AT ALL. Well.....he's grieving that he won't get his money back.

Listen up people, sometimes a cigar really IS just a cigar. What you see is what you get. If you THINK someone is an asshole because of their callous actions, it's very likely they ARE an asshole. I trust what my gut tells me about a person's character, not some psycho-babble, Dr. Phi horse shit.

Do you have any personal experience of suicide, "former fan"?

[quote]I'm surprised to see the vitriol on this thread.

Vitriol, thy name is Data Lounge.

[quote]Listen up people, sometimes a cigar really IS just a cigar. What you see is what you get. If you THINK someone is an asshole because of their callous actions, it's very likely they ARE an asshole. I trust what my gut tells me about a person's character, not some psycho-babble, Dr. Phi horse shit.

Listen up, freakshow. You can stamp your feet all you want but people are more complicated than your simplistic delusions allow and you're naive and stupid if you think you can berate anyone into believing that.

Fuck off, you emotionally stunted, narrow-minded twit.

... If you think you can berate anyone into thinking OTHERWISE, that is.

It's hysterical that R208 can't see the IRONY!

You MUST be straight, 208!

Actually, I'm as gay as a pink Christmas tree, r210. And if you think I'm guilty of trying to berate people into having the kinds of emotional reactions I feel are the most appropriate, then you're stupider than you sound.

211 has anger issues. Ignore it.

r211 has emotional issues. Poke it with a stick and watch it flop around.

My family has experienced a fair share of tragedies, including 2 suicides in the family. One way we cope with it is through gallows humor. I know Sedaris sounds like a jerk to many of you, but I get it. Not everyone copes with tragedy the same way.

214, I hope you and your family are getting help...and that future relatives don't suicide as well.

Do you write entertaining stories about your suffering relatives?

DS needs to sleep in the bed he made. His schtick is lazy, mean and obviously hurtful if his ill sister felt compelled to, supposedly, tear up family photos. Up thread it was suggested that may be a lie, and I think it is indeed possible if not likely.

DS wanted to be famous...and he got what he wanted at the expense of his soul. Because if he really cared, then he wouldn't be able to produce anymore. See? Integrity blocks his creative drive. Selling people out...as comical caricatures... that suit his own ego...is all he knows.

Who dos that? Someone who publicly shits on his ill sister who took her own life.

Actions have consequences. Sell books on your hurt family and bury your baby sister. Of course he's going to mock her. He has to justify his actions. He can't man up to them.

He has lost fans over this. I read one collection of essays years ago...when he was hot. Not impressed. I also have an Amy book in my library. It's not even interesting enough for a coffee table.

They had a nice run of it...but they need to update their schtick. All they have to do is reinvent themselves. They'd have to "sober" up first...or even just grow up.

Let's say something awful happened to the sister - perhaps something happened at the school mentioned, or more likely, before. Does anyone seriously hold David Sedaris responsible for that? I don't think so, therefore it's understandable that he would be hurt by finding family photos torn up by Tiffany.

Her gesture with the photos basically said: "you're all dead to me".

If I were writing a bout a sibling who did the same thing, I would have blasted her for it. She got off lightly at "melodramatic".

R215, you need to take a deep breath and take a break. You're all over this thread and you come off unbalanced.

Mary at 217, yes, I had too much coffee and free time the other day. But I'm over it now.

Please refrain from personally attacking me, and instead focus on the subject at hand: David Sedaris' outrageous comments about his mentally ill sister's suicide.

Upon reading the profile about her, she came off as a sweet and perceptive misfit... who suffered from her family experiences being documented and sold from his perspective and into his bank account.

He should have just left it alone...let her rest in peace. But, no, he had to talk smack about her. Sorry you cannot accept that makes him look very bad. If he were stock, his worth just dropped.

Also, I find it hypocritical to attack me for writing about him when he did the same thing about his sister. He exposed her privacy...counter to her wishes. Yet he is defended and I am attacked. He's a public figure, I'm an anonymous poster expressing his opinion.

I keep seeing some of his apologists lamely offering the excuse that Sedaris did ask her permission to print his story about her.....and she gave it. Did it ever occur to you that someone who is mentally ill really can't give informed consent? Maybe he offered her a financial bribe to let it go to print? She could have been mortified (I know I would be) but was so desperate for her bother's love and/or for money, that she allowed herself to be exploited for a few pieces of silver.

He should have been a better brother and not taken advantage of someone so fragile. He's the one who has to live with himself though.

I killed her. Nobody knows and you'll never prove it. But I killed her. Stop blaming her brother.

I'm assuming the apologists are just fans with the same sorts of mental health issues that he apparently suffers from.

This isn't 'gallows humor' being expressed within a family to ease tension...he said it publicly, and in response to a serious question about whether or not he had regrets. He's either quite mentally ill in thinking that's a response the public would fins 'funny', or he's a despicable person. Take your pick. And my observation goes to the apologists as well.

The fascinating thing is how narcissistic he is; that he wouldn't have considered the pain he might be inflicting on his own family members, with his vicious remark, or on members of the public who might have lost loved ones to suicide. But let's face it, funny or no, sedaris has always come across as a smug little prick.

I think her suicide and what they found in her place hurt the family more than any comment he has made. I'm surprised you think otherwise.

Then why can't he just say/write that, R222? Instead of the snark? Or say nothing at all about it? He wasn't. *forced* to talk about her, after all.

What makes you think he is so wounded, R222? You're projecting your own normal feelings onto someone who is not normal. He gave no indication that he cared about her--said he didn't even know her well. He seemed more amused and disgusted by her final "melodramatic" act than "hurt".

r224

Perhaps you're projecting. Neither of us really know his feelings. It's not as if his writing is, or has ever been, straight-forward diary writing.

225, bottom line: she didn't like him writing about her. Yet he wrote about her suicide.

My aunt doesn't like to talk about her polio. So I don't ask her about her limp. I certainly wouldn't sell a story about it.

It's wrong to do the opposite of your dead sister's wishes.

Flannery O'Connor wrote painfully honest short stories about her community. But it was fiction. No personal identified were traceable. No intimate information was disclosed.

Tiffany didn't want to be under a spotlight. If she ever consented, it was probably due to familial pressure...to support her big brother.

Some thanks she got.

[quote] If she ever consented, it was probably due to familial pressure...to support her big brother.

Do you really believe that?

227, she loved her brother. She probably wanted to finally be accepted by the family that sent her away during her adolescence. But...no dice. So she tore up the photos, and abandoned them.

Turnabout is fair play, I guess.

He should have just said "no comment" or something along those lines...if he's unable to express sympathy.

"It's a family matter."

[quote]It's wrong to do the opposite of your dead sister's wishes.

How is it wrong? Its not like she knows what he did or anything, what with that whole being dead and everything.

Does anyone know how she did it? That can sometimes give additional insight into someone's psyche.

The [italic]New Yorker[/italic] piece says she OD'd on pills of some sort.

[quote]The New Yorker piece says she OD'd on pills of some sort.

It was so Douglas Sirk, it made me giggle a great deal.

[quote] How is it wrong? Its not like she knows what he did or anything.

Please let all the pickpockets in your neighborhood know that as long as you never find out about it, it's okay to steal from you.

R204

Yes, I have.

David sedaris And his sibling grew up in such a dysfunctional family, you don't even knownthe half of it.

I don't know, 230. But for some reason people feel its not ok to betray people like that.

Even an ex of DS felt badly soon after posting about him here.

His fans are upset we're criticizing him here. Buy he criticized his sis openly and to a larger audience...yet they are ok with that.

They're bullies.

r236, oh?

R234 False equivalencies such as yours are the work of lazy people.

The false equivalency troll is back!

I know R240. I cant imagine what would bring that out.

Oh, wait a second. I do know. Something about stealing from a living person is not the same things as talking about a dead person.

Drug issue because she smoked pot in high school? Who didn't?

At this point, I'm thinking David and Amy are both assholes.

I feel like that family had a sick sick secret. And if the kids ever actually addressed the secret sickness, they would have lost not only the love of their mother, but also her favour.

Their alcoholic mother was a cult of personality, capricious and cruel masked as hilarity. Tiffany didn't find any of it funny and became an outsider. She probably had more than a tinge of the mother's same "off" mental aspects and it lead to her early death.

Knowing that Tiffany had a completely different POV about the Sedaris family history...it's a shame we'll never get to read her memoir. It probably would have put a name to all the shadowy half-references to the mysterious "thing" that David will never ever write about.

This reminds me of Dave Eggers. His sister committed suicide. She felt like Dave's best selling memoir told a completely inaccurate tale and didn't even acknowledge her existence. That, coupled with extreme mental anguish and an identity crisis led to her suicide as well.

A few articles about the notorious Elan School reveal a lot. It's worth googling.

She was effectively sent to a torturous prison for two years of her childhood.

That she would become resentful and estranged from her family comes as no surprise.

God, some of you people are so fucking extreme about everything; you are surely far crazier than anyone in the Sedaris family. Sure, for somebody like Tiffany Sedaris—an obviously fragile person who had understandable resentments toward her family dating back to her youth—it wasn't ideal to have a famous brother who achieved his fame writing about the foibles and eccentricities of the family. But good lord—you can acknowledge that David's career probably didn't serve Tiffany's best interests without totally demonizing him and carrying on as though his writing was the root cause of all her problems and the thing that drove her to suicide. I kinda doubt she would have been happy as a well-adjusted little clam even if her brother had never put pen to paper.

Depressing post...

I managed to read about 86 responses.

No one seemed to see the obvious reason: She was named Tiffany.

All girls named that need to be strippers, and if they haven't the talent, figure or inclination to live up to that ideal, suicide seems a normal conclusion.

R247

Zak, what's it like to be known as the village idiot?

If I was the youngest in that family I'd kill myself too.

[quote] agree absolutely. As soon as I read his shocking comment about how "melodramatic" her final act was, I knew for certain that he had complete disdain for her. What a cruel, condescending insult. It says WAY more about him than it does about her. He'll never be able to recover from it, because it's reveals the truth about who he is, much more so than his (fiction) writing.

He says that her act of tearing up the family photos seemed melodramatic, not her death. It's his way of saying he doesn't understand why she was so angry at the family.

But he doesn't say her suicide itself was melodramatic. I wish people would read things instead of forming a reaction to what they've heard was said.

R246...MARY!! Before accusing others of being OTT, dear, you might want to eviscerate that quality in yourself. And yes, he's a smug asshole. Thread closed.

R250...we heard you the first 12 times, moron. She wasn't being 'melodramatic'...what part of 'she struggled with mental illness' can't YOU understand? He's an asshole. You're also leaving out the part about the money. Read the WHOLE thread, dear, THEN comment.

How old is David if she was just about 50 AND the youngest?

Isn't it hard to believe David is not thirty-something?

She wasn't the youngest, I think that's the brother Hugh, born in 1968.

I'VE GOT SOMETHING TO SAY!!!!

r251 is off her meds again.

Hugh is the boyfriend (of David). Paul is the youngest.

(R251) is coming across as borderline as Tiffany probably was.

247 must have missed r230.

Tiffany isn't such a horrible name. Louis Tiffany was a fine glassmaker. And I love Tiffany jewels.

R30...not r230

If he's a comedy writer, I guess he can't write about family drama?

She was a Sedaris. Of course she left a note, which they've suppressed.

I didn't like Sedaris's NEW YORKER piece. I thought it was cold, but not in a fun way. Sedaris has no emotional subtext.

This needs to be a DL thread. Entitled Twink. Gentleman of a certain age delivering smackdown.

Hmm, on one hand artists who include their family and friends in their work (in other words, all artists-- even if they change people's names and call it "fiction") are entitled to tell (or show) their side of the story. On the other hand, Tiffany was an artist too, (photos of her mosaics are online and are beautiful) which Sedaris barely mentions in his "eulogy". She seems like she probably had mental health issues and also that she had legitimate reasons to be estranged from her family. Sedaris seems to want to get the last word in, which, especially so soon after her death is kind of disrespectful.

Methodically ripping up every photo of your family IS melodramatic.

Some might even say it warrants a "MARY!"

266: again...Tiffany was mentally ill.

Read this very slowly and absorb its relevancy: Tiffany was mentally ill.

She knowingly swallowed an overdose of pills with the intent of killing her body, and unaware of the physical pain she would suffer as well as psychological terror.

Why? Because it beat trying to make it in this crazy world.

She tore the photos because her family hurt her. She was pissed. She acted out. End of story.

Condemning her for it is...I don't know. I guess the word would be "Sedaristic."

She suffered terribly from a disease. Enough with the photos. If it's even true.

Are people who kill themselves always mentally ill?

No. Tiffany had history of mental health issues.

R268. Not always. I knew three people who killed themselves because they had a terminal illness and just wanted to end their own suffering.

[quote]Please let all the pickpockets in your neighborhood know that as long as you never find out about it, it's okay to steal from you.

Okay, dude; I will let them know that if they pick my pockets after I am dead, it won't matter to me. Which it won't.

David sedaris, although he writes very frankly and even brutally honestly, about his family life growing up, never speaks of its emotional consequences to him and his siblings. His emotional disconnect is a defense mechanism for pain that became too much to tolerate in his dysfunctional family. Pain from his verbally abusive father and alcoholic mother and the horrible scenes in their family.

Tiffany, couldn't handle the pain and the unresolved family issues. She went batshit crazy because in their family, real feelings were denied and construed as being stupid and weak. t's a pity that it is euphemistically swept under the umbrella of "mental ilness".

So there's a lot more pain in Jeri Blank than Amy lets on?

If the family situation is that bad, how come they all not only meet on holidays, but stay in the same house? They're all middle-aged...

David suffers from depression, too. Most funny people do.

bump. has anyone outside of datalounge remarked on this creepy new yorker article.

[quote]t's a pity that it is euphemistically swept under the umbrella of "mental ilness".

It's been suggested here (repeatedly) that Tiffany was the family scapegoat. Is obvious the whole family is nuts.

Technically, 274, they are all seniors now. Perhaps just stuck in their ways.

275, thanks for the reminder. I forget David is funny.

Christ! I was just reading about the Elan School. No wonder poor Tiffany had mental problems.

R261, I bet you're right.

I knew Tiffany when I was a teenager and we worked together. She was always sweet to me but you could tell that she had some issues. She talked about her family but she never mentioned that her brother was David Sedaris or her sister was Amy Sedaris. The last time I had spoken to her was about six years ago and she was telling me that she had been doing glass blowing and making a business out of it. She was kind and friendly and I enjoyed working with her and was sad when she quit.

[quote]Tiffany was an artist too, (photos of her mosaics are online and are beautiful) which Sedaris barely mentions in his "eulogy".

good point

Good point, R281? It wasn't a eulogy. It wasn't meant to be a profile of his sister. So why is that a good point?

R282= marginally retarded.

The point is that he was cruel, and omitted anything that might make her seem more sympathetic and embracingly familial. He's a creep.

Y'all are a hoot!

In the story Put a Lid On It, Sedaris spends the afternoon with younger sister Tiffany, an artist who gleans both her meals and her materials from the stuff she finds in rubbish bins. Tiffany is the family black sheep, the one who was sent to reform school, the one who tells the family, early in the story: "Don't you get it? I don't like you people."

"Tiffany's proud of what she does," says Sedaris. "She's proud that she goes through other people's garbage and makes a living that way . . . I knew there was nothing in there that she would object to." He looks sideways for a minute. "I didn't put anything in there about her drug use. It's the same with my brother. My brother gets a lot of work out of the stories I write about him. People call and hire him to refinish their floors. If they knew he was stoned 18 hours of the day, they probably wouldn't do that, so that's sort of his secret. It's not my place to write the amount of drugs my brother takes. For some reason it's OK for me to say it to a reporter, but it's not OK to write it."

Wow, R285. Wow.

That was positively reptilian.

The more I learn about this vile, hissing queen, the more I feel like he would be right at home on DL. Ha, maybe he's here, commenting on this very thread.

[quote]"Tiffany's proud of what she does," says Sedaris. "She's proud that she goes through other people's garbage and makes a living that way."

I wonder if he has ever considered the irony of that statement.

[quote]For some reason it's OK for me to say it to a reporter, but it's not OK to write it."

Why is it ok for him to say it to a reporter?

Why is it not ok for DLers to speculate about him?

Where is the master list of rules about these things? The hierarchy is intricate...the details confusing...

He's such a back stabber. He knows exactly what he's doing. This is what happens when a psycho gets what he wants.

It's so exhausting when the obvious mental health cases overrun the site.

R274, my partner's siblings kept taking their father in well into their 30s, even though he had beaten them, molested them and even drew guns on them a couple of times. Those who have been abused have complicated feelings towards their parents and it rarely manifests as logic; abusive parents often make their kids feel like they can't even live without them, let alone succeed, and they prey on these children who have guilt issues well into their adult lives.

Not saying that's what happened here, just that you can't equate someone hanging around with their parents as a sign that no abuse occurred.

R290, "Cheap Psychology 101" is the other name for DL.

R281, he'd already written a piece praising her mosaics in a previous book. He followed up by ripping himself for only being concerned about how much money they were worth rather than how beautiful they were.

[quote]“I don’t know that it had anything to do with us,” my father said. But how could it have not? Doesn’t the blood of every suicide splash back on our faces?

From the New Yorker article. That doesn't like someone who couldn't care lesss about the suicide of his sister.

Tiffany was obviously suffering from a lifetime of mental illness. Anyone who has a family member, partner or close friend who is persistently mentally ill would understand the Sedaris' families dismay at her suicide. Tiffany spent years arguing with some of them while constantly shifting allegiance amongst them and detaching herself from those she was angry with. It's a difficult thing to endure for a family with someone with severed mental illness and addiction issues. It's understandable if there are mixed feelings when someone who has suffered so miserably and shared their misery so often with their family chooses to die.

[quote] It's understandable if there are mixed feelings when someone who has suffered so miserably and shared their misery so often with their family chooses to die.

Shhhh! you with your reason. We're trying to bash David Sedaris.

[quote]“I don’t know that it had anything to do with us,” my father said. But how could it have not? Doesn’t the blood of every suicide splash back on our faces?

Of course it had somthing to do with them. They abandoned her; she abandoned them.

The dead one is the victim.

The survivors are the survivors.

Tiffany is the victim. Her family the survivors. Lots of pain all around, natch. But don't try to play victim to her suicide if you're still alive.

[quote] But don't try to play victim to her suicide if you're still alive.

I know. It's not like she killed THEM or anything. Lol.

What R288 said: I'm positive he did see the irony. I think it's why he wrote it.

He's written too much about the nature of his 'memoirist' books and the stories about living people not to consider that statement.

Some people act as if writers aren't aware of the words they use, when in fact most writers reread their work again and again to make certain each word is the one they intend to use. There's some unintentional revelation possible, but not careless use of words.

Exactly, 297. Lol.

Obviously, she didn't suicide just to hurt them.

But I suspect the mainstream will lose interest in him. It's not as fun to read his pithy observations about his crazy family after his baby sis offed herself.

Tragedy ruins comedy. It's hard to laugh at this clown after he mocked her suffering in public like he did.

Fortunately for David Sedaris, the mainstream is not as crazy as you are, R299.

Bump for Tiffany

Well I guess what's so shocking to everyone is to learn that you can't save people - even from themselves.

And more importantly you can't expect someone else, even family, to save you either.

Every body has to find their own road and sometimes that road leads to suicide.

She stole the TV.

R300 is so quick to personally attack others. All to defend his hero / a total stranger.

Without attack, you are pointless. Just like your hero stranger.

But now she's burning in hell. And while the faces may have changed, the hassles are just the same.

I would personally like to tongue-kiss r298 for their last paragraph.

He describes himself and his siblings all pulling away from their family, then insists they are club that he always wanted to be a part of. They wern't and aren't close, and probably don't know each other any better than they knew the one who just killed herself. This is typical for bourgeois white American "families"--there is no there there, and they slowly disengage as soon as the children are over 18, with even the parents leaving each other if they haven't already. Then they act "shocked, just shocked" when one of their utterly alone and detached non-members crashes and burns, as any human being who is alone in this world will do eventually. What a sick society America is.

good post, R307

Interesting observation R307. True of many families I know, including my own---with certain members, not all.

All you have to do is visit the depressing (and hilarious) annual holiday threads here on DL to realize that alienation is a common theme in modern families.

It's sad. Her mosaics are beautiful.

Nice memoriam for Tiffany in the Somerville Times. A friend of hers, as well as Amy Sedaris posted in the comments section.

R311 - that's a lovely piece. Thank you for sharing.

NPR hires PR folks for some of their writers. Ira Glass has firms come on as trolls to call any detractor of say David Sedaris.... "loons." He does this if he feels money will be lost due to these storytellers bad press or just bad actions. He recently has come on board for a lesbian comedian who cannot be named.

take your meds is another popular refrain. Calling critical posters "borderline," is a favorite. This derives from the more widespread persona management used by the government in relation to Bank of America and the Chamber of Commerce. In short: When there is no defense just hurl insults. Make sure it appears as if the insults are coming from a lot of posters.

David Sedaris has no soul if he thinks his article in the New Yorker is justified. Anyone who thinks its fine to degrade the suffering of anyone(much less a sister) needs to grow a soul or at least accept the fact that they are bad people. Sedaris invaded the privacy of his sister, and then wrote a cold and ugly article following her tragic death. He will lose readers due to this. Damage control is being witnessed on this very board.

Now, the article might lose Ira and David some money -- enter the trolls.

There is a belief in the biz that gay support is essential for some careers. Datalounge is seen as a site that should be monitored.

R300 is basic compassion the new crazy? Most people do not accept such callous disregard for life, as displayed by Sedaris in this recent piece. Or, maybe they do... Whatever the case, his people are scrambling.

I agree with r299. After seeing him mock her I won't be able to enjoy his stories in the same way.

David Sedaris is a bully, plain-and-simple. He felt he had no control over his life so felt he had to pick on and trivialize the choices of his siblings in order to soothe his perma-injured ego.

It's nearly impossible to save someone but it's not impossible to show basic decency. What is this all or nothing equation?

He abused her sense of privacy and then he wrote a piece where he made her look like a weirdo. He wrote the second one after she could not defend herself. If she sufferred from depression there is a world of help David could have oferred her.

Suicide is preventable. She struggled till 49 . Who is to say that a helping hand wouldn't have kept her going to the finish line? The New Yorker article presents none of the qualities that endeared others to Tiffany. It is defamatory and cruel.

[quote]take your meds is another popular refrain.

Yes, I'm quite sure that's something you hear often, r313.

[quote]There is a belief in the biz that gay support is essential for some careers. Datalounge is seen as a site that should be monitored.

Sweetie? Take your meds.

R311, Interesting that a friend of Tiffany's posted a heartfelt remembrance of her friend and included the line about her brother refusing to help her. Later in the day, Amy Sedaris posted again asking that poster how she can reach her.

R317...you first, cunt. And I'm not the poster you're referring to.

Celebrity apologists are the worse kind of garbage. Particularly when it involves some minor celeb who's a smug prick. But as others have pointed out, you have no argument, so it's easy to resort to nonsense.

'Joking' that you'll never get back the money you gave a sister who just committed suicide, in a public forum, is sick behavior AT BEST. At worse, it suggests someone who's pathological.

I'm surprised no one considered this about the torn photos Tiffany left behind: she was an artist known for tearing stuff up and making mosaics out of the pieces. Perhaps she didn't do it as a "fuck you" to the family but for artistic purposes. For this reason, David's "melodramatic" comment is dishonest and offensive. Also, knowing how she felt about the family, I find it hard to believe he didn't understand that she might have taken her anger out on the family pictures. He sounds kind of ignorant about human behavior.

From the tone of David's essay, it seems he never grasped the seriousness of Tiffany's situation, nor did he ever accept the tremendous pain she experienced in childhood. Wrap your head around this, people. She was sent to the most abusive reform school in the nation after running away from what was undoubtedly an abusive family home. David was 21 when she was sent away, an adult who could have spoken out or helped his sister. From all accounts. His response was Sedaris-like; he chose to gloss over it and go about his own life.

Seems some bad shit happened to Tiffany as a kid and none of her family members ever acknowledged that or apologized for it. Of course, such declarations can never repair damage done by abusive behavior but it can help.

People find his writing so funny. I find it depressing and narcissistic. He writes about how funny his fucked up family and life are but he's never touched on the reasons behind it all. And for that, I find him a limited, misleading "memoirist."

The ex, who posted above, shared an illuminating anecdote about the family rifling through his luggage and wearing his clothes. What an aggressive, mean action. It speaks of a tremendous lack of boundaries and a mean-spirited environment.

Damn ipad, I typed a period in place of a comma. Sentence in R320 should say "by all accounts, his response was Sedaris-like..."

Let me clarify why I dislike Sedaris's writing. I understand having a dysfunctional family and finding the humor in horrible circumstances. My siblings and I do this (and we lost our mother to suicide). But that is all he shows in his writing, the humor of bizarre, dysfunctional behavior. At some point, to grow as a writer, one must show why that dysfunction exists. Otherwise, you become a one-note wonder writing stories that hint again and again at something a bit more sinister beneath them.

Of course, we are all products of our childhoods and Sedaris seems as stunted as any narcissist. He is probably incapable of exploring the truth behind what made them all so fucked up. And so his essay about his dead sister reads hollow and unfeeling.

I do feel better after reading many of these posts. I read Naked because so many people told me how funny and fantastic it was. When I was done, I could not understand what was the big deal. It wasn't terrible, but it certainly didn't live up to the expectations.

Growing up, I observed, in the families of some of my friends, a cruel culture of mocking, practical jokes, and "taking the piss" out of each other--usually in large, working class clans. You could call it bullying. It always shocked me because my family is not that way at all. But, if you grow up in that kind of environment, it can be hard to understand why an outsider might be bothered by it. I've even had friends say things to me like, "oh, my brother wouldn't bust your balls if he didn't like you." To them hazing behavior is just a way of saying, "you're one of us, you've made the cut and you should be flattered."

Just speculating here, but I think the Sedaris family raiding the bf's suitcase was on that order. To an outsider it would seem wildly inappropriate, invasive, and aggressively nasty. But they probably didn't see it that way at all.

The Kennedy's hazed people the same way. You had to be able to "hang" to be included in their circle.

PR trolls have been taught if they just call people crazy it is effective. Normal non paid individuals would not be so hostile. Keep that in mind when you are attacked.

The PR conspiracy theorists are hilarious.

Isn't NPR a non-profit, government/listener funded agency? If so, they'd have to release their budgets. It would be possible to check if there were money allocated for PR & how much.

Also: non-profit=no profits. Anything that comes in stays in the organization. Ira Glass isn't making Jon Stewart money, that's for sure.

R323, it's not "you're one of us, you've made the cut and you should be flattered." so much as it's "I can do anything I want to you and there's nothing you can do about it." It's a power trip.

Aside from the fact you're growing up with people who are physically much bigger than you, you're growing up with people who do not have your best interests at heart.

Your important stuff vanishes from where you placed it and nobody knows what happened. You're told you're careless or forgetful.

You walk in on somebody snorting coke at the age of twelve. They give you a line so you're implicated if they're found out.

They offer you a ride, but they kick you out of the car in the middle of nowhere just to be funny.

When they get older, they wonder why you don't visit or answer your phone.

Family's are sick in their own special ways.

Is no one going to acknowledge the fact that they would be completely creeped the fuck out by someone going through their trash on a regular basis, or is that not what she did?

[R326]

This American Life is not produced by NPR. It is a PRI show.

Government funded or not, non-profits to have to make their budgets available.

That given, PR is a reasonable thing for a radio producing organization to be spending money on. In fact, if they did not spend on PR it would be irresponsible of them since they need to attract listeners and donors.

[quote]I'm surprised no one considered this about the torn photos Tiffany left behind: she was an artist known for tearing stuff up and making mosaics out of the pieces.

What a little thief.

My feelings exactly, r322. His "ability" to write the bare-naked truth about what he's thinking and feeling doesn't impress me. I know some people find his humor shocking and irreverent. I feel the bitterness and envy behind it. It all rings hollow to me because he just presents these situations that are supposed to be entertaining. Never does he delve deep into the hidden meaning.

And the idea that people show their respect and acceptance of you through their mean, hazing behavior is bullshit. I know the truth, people "bust my balls" because they are trying to put me in my place so that they can feel superior. It's got nothing to do with coming from a large family full of boisterous kids.

I never realized how big a business David Sedaris, Inc. is. He's touring right now to support his new book. He'll be doing a reading in Pasadena in a couple weeks at the Pasadena Civic Center, which has a capacity of about 3,000. It's almost sold out! The most expensive orchestra seats are long gone and being scalped at $250 per ticket. He's like a rock star. Do other authors sell tickets to readings like that?

Glass is no idealist. Much PR for those he has chosen to promote. Off the record PR and on the record PR.

[quote]Never does he delve deep into the hidden meaning.

A good author doesn't need to do that. A good author would lay enough bread crumbs around so the reader could figure it out, or at least have a few motivations to contemplate. That kind of reading is fun, because it actually makes you think. I did not encounter that in Naked.

Indeed. I think it's a very well written piece.

R332, I went to one of his readings a few years ago and I was PISSED. I think the tickets were $50-$60 (can't remember exactly) and the reading itself was shockingly short. Maybe 35 mins. The rest of the time he answered stupid questions from his rabid fraufans. I came away feeling ripped off.

r336

What were you expecting?

Doesn't he read on the radio? Why pay anything to seem him?

R337, I had never been to a reading before. I guess, for that price, I was expecting something more along the lines of a typical stand up comedy show in length and with new material. The material was new, but very different from his books and not of interest to me. If memory serves, it was basically a political rant.

[quote]All of us would be disappointed, though for different reasons. Even if you weren’t getting along with Tiffany at the time, you couldn’t deny the show she put on—the dramatic entrances, the non-stop, professional-grade insults, the chaos she’d inevitably leave in her wake. One day she’d throw a dish at you and the next she’d create a stunning mosaic made of the shards. When allegiances with one brother or sister flamed out, she’d take up with someone else. At no time did she get along with everybody, but there was always someone she was in contact with. Toward the end, it was Lisa, but before that we’d all had our turn.

This is the calling card of a BPD individual. Borderlines always have it in for someone in their families and at the workplace. There's at least one hospitalization for suicidal ideation. They always have to focus on hating at least one person at all times and everyone gets their turn in the hot seat. It's better that she's gone.

If she was a BPD, that means she was probably severely sexually and emotionally abused.

I wonder what went on in her childhood. Poor woman.

R332

[quote] He'll be doing a reading in Pasadena in a couple weeks at the Pasadena Civic Center

Are you in the Pasadena area? Are you cute? Single? Want to hook up?

Sounds like MichFest lost a regular.

Are you cute R341? Are you human?

This is NOT Craiglist!!!!! Still, post your cock pics.

Two borderline persons I knew weren't sexually abused. It's based on abandonment, I thought.

I can totally understand why she did it. I've had a totally dreadful last couple of years - moved to a new city, went through a breakup and a medical crisis at the same time. I've had to do that alone. As r307 said, this is a sick culture and nobody can do it alone.

At the moment I don't expect to see 2014, and the only thing I have left to figure out is who I can get my dog to who will give her a good life. If she wasn't around, I'd be gone already.

Shitty families breed this. And mine isn't even mean like the Sedarises. My siblings won't mock me.

R346,

Sorry about your troubles.

What kind of medical crisis is it?

Aw, hang in there, 346. It's always darkest before the dawn.

The most interesting people are the ones who have gone through tough times and lived to tell.

Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.

I have hardly any family; my roommate has none. That's true for a lot of people. But you can form your own family...you already have a pet that loves and needs you.

I'm rooting for you, 346.

[quote]This is the calling card of a BPD individual. Borderlines always have it in for someone in their families and at the workplace. There's at least one hospitalization for suicidal ideation. They always have to focus on hating at least one person at all times and everyone gets their turn in the hot seat. It's better that she's gone.

Exactly. And if most of the people here attempting to tear David Sedaris (as if he cares, or needs your approval) to shreds had to tolerate someone like Tiffany in their lives, they would be on here ranting 24/7 about how unfair it is for them to have like this in their lives.

[quote]Two borderline persons I knew weren't sexually abused. It's based on abandonment, I thought.

Often it's simply the perception of abandonment or abuse - even when the truth is very different from the perception.

If anyone actually read the New Yorker piece, and paid atttention, I think you'd realize that there's lot more subtly in the article than most would realize. Sedaris' purchase of the vacation home that looks nice from the outside, even with the vents that smell like mildew and the probability that there are hidden problems, just might be an allegory about a family(and an individual within that family)that may be coming to an understanding of their own inability, like many of us, to process pain and loss in a healthy way but instead use humor and denial to muddle through. It seems to me that between the NYer piece and the Dutch interview that Sedaris might just be beginning to become much more self-aware. His last book,[italic] Let's Discuss Diabetes With Owls [/italic] is much more poignant and revelatory than much of his previous work in my humble opinion.

r350

You're not helping the witchhunt. Shhhh!

It was a blood disorder that's mostly past now, r347. Now it's just a medical bill crisis. But thanks for asking.

R346, I know how you feel. I absolutely do. Hang in there. You mean something to someone, you just don't know it yet.

Medical bills are no reason to give up on life, R346. Hang in there, if not for yourself at least for your dog. I hope life gets better for you.

Thanks - I was just trying to say I totally get it why should would have done what she did. Everyone needs to feel some safety net beneath them. It sounds like she lost hers as a child, and then had to deal with a famous last name without any of the perks.

Plus her siblings seem like sociopaths. I think Amy Sedaris in particular is hilariously funny, but she also comes off as really disordered. I remember watching her on Letterman years ago right before New Years when the other guest was Dick Clark, and she was just savage and crazy toward him. I laughed because it was Dick Clark, because he was a deserving target, but I wouldn't want it turned on me if I were her troubled baby sister, who was basically thrown away by that fucked up family.

I love how DL'ers have now concluded that David has committed career suicide, so to speak, with this article. They have pronounced his career OVAH as if anyone outside of DL cares.

You do realize that "DLers" also exist outside DL, right r356? If 100s of people conclude here that your're a selfish, twisted little opportunist who did less than nothing while your sibling's life circled the drain, it's not as if that opinion will be left behind and archived at DL, never to see the light of day.

Oh, yes, the hundreds of people who read DL - who, of course, all believe the same thing - will have a disastrous effect on his career!! Watch out David!

This whole thread makes me sad. It seems like quite a few of us on here have been affected by suicide. The very personal and seemingly irrational reactions attest to this.

Tiffany sounds like my partner was, brilliant and impossible Like my partner she probably was borderline, due to trauma. And yes, something is or was fucked up in the Sedaris family. But it is also nigh impossible to deal with someone with borderline behavior.

I don't think it's fair to call David or Amy sociopaths for not understanding how to deal mental illness. And David's New Yorker piece is a pretty accurate portrayal of living in the immediate aftermath of a suicide. He's not trying to pretend that he has some close or good relationship with Tiffany. He comes across as sad and bewildered and I'm sure that is what he is.

I hope everyone on here is taking care of themselves and I mean it even without the snootful of gin

[quote] I don't think it's fair to call David or Amy sociopaths for not understanding how to deal mental illness.

They don't come off as sociopaths for not knowing how to deal with mental illness. Amy, at least, comes off as a sociopath independent of her family interactions. David's story "Fat Suit" (I think that's the title) probably explains why.

Who is Amy harming?

[quote] David's story "Fat Suit" (I think that's the title) probably explains why.

R360, do you mean "A Shiner Like a Diamond?"

That's the story in which David comments that he and his brothers could have slouched around the house drinking raw pancake batter and nobody would say a word, yet his growing sisters' food intake and figures were scrutinized/insulted mercilessly by Mr. Sedaris. It seems he was phobic about his daughters gaining weight and freely verbalized his fear.

To test his reaction, Amy once came home from New York wearing a disfiguring fat suit.

I think it's hilarious that DL has decided that the root of all the Sedaris family's problems (that the DL have collectively also decided upon) lies with the only two famous members, absent any real information on the other 6 people in the family.

Hi David!

Hi, delusional DLer who thinks I'm David Sedaris because I pointed out the absurdity of this thread and who also hilariously thinks this thread is full of hundreds of people who've turned against David Sedaris and will now do damage to his career!

Just how is your delusional little self this morning?

R365 never denies being David Sedaris. In fact, his reply raises more questions than it answers.

A 2004 article, in which Tiffany talks about David's writing. Oh boy.

A letter to the editor:

In addition to being an exceptionally talented visual artist, hilarious raconteur, gifted pastry chef, and actively empathetic individual, Tiffany Sedaris struggled with a mental illness that rendered her incapable of successfully supporting herself as an independent adult. This is why, at the end of her life, she was found dead "in a room, in a beat up house on the hard side of Somerville, MA." She squeaked by with the scanty assistance of various social services, afraid of earning enough money to cancel the seven-hundred odd dollars - I believe some form of disability payment - that she relied on each month for shelter, food and sundries.

I was introduced to her two years ago, ostensibly to help galvanize her artistic career. But, as she was extremely protective of her artwork, as well as her family's privacy, this was a goal I never achieved. My husband and I were able, however, to employ her occasionally as caregiver for our infant son. We also housed her occasionally - a favor that she always repaid in babysitting or artwork. I also connected her to a homeschooled teenager in Cambridge, an art student of mine, whom she took on as a baking student. Both my son and the baking student greatly enjoyed the time they spent in Tiffany's loving and lively presence.

I believe nearly everyone in Tiffany's Somerville family circle would agree that she could sometimes be adversarial, if not exasperating, at times. But these times, I suspect, coincided with whenever her internal turmoil was rising: beyond her control, beyond the control of the various psychiatric drugs and health supplements that Tiffany occasionally relied on.

She is greatly missed, turmoil and all.

LOL at r366. Whatever you say, dear. Because clearly, whatever I say is simply going to be re-tooled to fit your delusions.

Just to address the many negative posts. To my knowledge ds breakout story was Santaland, which did not mention his family. A large number of TAL stories did not talk of family. Let's stop accusing him of exploiting his "fucked up" family for money. Its not accurate. Two pieces "Cyclops" and "let it snow" were where he first speaks of her. In Cyclops she stabs him in the eye with a sharpened pencil, "the blood was copious" his father berates the child to the point where he feels sorry for her. In let it snow, he describes her as willing to do anything anyone says if they just give her a little attention. "put a lid on it" came later and spike of the horrible reform school her misguided parents put her in. They apologized later and ds wrote to her every month till she asked him to stop. Whatever mistakes the family made, she never came to terms with it and the resentments followed her to her end. Clearly many people are not fans of ds but so much of the bile spit at him comes from people who did not or will not get the facts.

[quote]Let's stop accusing him of exploiting his "fucked up" family for money.

Who died and left you Hall Monitor?

[quote]In let it snow, he describes her as willing to do anything anyone says if they just give her a little attention.

That's horrible. Here she was...starving to be loved...and the only time they gave her attention is when she did anything for them. SICK.

[quote]Whatever mistakes the family made, she never came to terms with it

How could anyone ever expect a mentally ill person to come to terms with being abandoned by her family?

You're missing the point. This thread is not personally attacking DS.

This thread is personally advocating for TS, who suffered so horribly she killed herself. Imagine her anguish. Taking your own life is not easy. It requires courage.

I know, because I have a dear friend attempt three times. She is mentally ill. And everyone, even her family, treats her like a monster. She is the family scapegoat.

This thread is also about DS' self-damaging public comments he made after his baby sis killed herself. If he hadn't been cruel after this tragedy, this thread would not exist.

There is no earthly explanation why Sedaris couldn't throw a few of his many, many, bucks at his horribly broke little sister. I know my opinion does not affect ds (not much does)but,the creepy little elf is dead to me.

How do you know he didn't (R372)?

If your surviving on a 700 dollar a month disability check, and living in a shit hole in a bad part of town, I would just assume that he was not helping her out much. Not everyone can afford to help out a down and out relative but when you have enough money to own three houses why not at least get your own sister a decent one bedroom apartment.

[quote] If your surviving on a 700 dollar a month disability check, and living in a shit hole in a bad part of town, I would just assume that he was not helping her out much. Not everyone can afford to help out a down and out relative but when you have enough money to own three houses why not at least get your own sister a decent one bedroom apartment.

You're assuming too much.

R374, it sounds as if you know nothing about mentally ill people like this woman. They are extremely resistant to help.

I don't care about the money. It's what he said about her after she suicided. It wasn't right. Doesn't sit well with humanity. Why can't he own it? Why does he have to justify and defend himself?

Suicide is not a verb, R377.

And nothing he said about her was offensive to anyone who's not crazy.

Here is a video of Tiffany.

In popular slang often used on anonymous Internet message boards,"suicided" is indeed a word.

If he didn't offend anyone, then why are you defending him?

All I said was that his comments don't bode well with the masses. Don't shoot the messenger.

But the message is entirely your invention, R380. Sedaris still sells out for all his readings and his book still sells. "The masses" are boding just fine.

You're the one with the issues.

It's become fashionable on the web to say "suicided" rather than saying "committed suicide" because it takes away the criminal implications. (as "committing" a crime) I hate it because it makes the act seem less destructive than it is. I have sympathy for the fact that people get to a point of despair where they feel they have no other choice, but it still is a terrible, violent and destructive murder of the self.

[quote]You're missing the point. This thread is not personally attacking DS.

[quote]This thread is personally advocating for TS, who suffered so horribly she killed herself. Imagine her anguish. Taking your own life is not easy. It requires courage.

Then allow me to point out just how fucked up that is. A bunch of strangers "advocating" for a mentally ill woman they didn't know and calling her brave while lashing out at the only members of her family who are famous and literally blaming them for her death.

I say this with no nastiness: if you're "advocating" for a mentally ill woman (by attacking her family) you don't know and calling her suicide an act of courage, you probably should be seeking out therapy of some sort yourself. It's not only not normal, it's sending up major red flags about your own mental health.

[quote]Why can't he own it? Why does he have to justify and defend himself?

Own, justify and defend... what, exactly?

Oh, and as to this:

[quote]You're missing the point. This thread is not personally attacking DS.

You're either a liar or you take no responsibility for your own words, because you've spent this entire thread attacking Sedaris.

Here you are at r85:

[quote]He wrote a stupid article about it. If he doesn't want to be picked apart now, he shouldn't have pissed on her suicide like he did on her life.

r86:

[quote]He's angry? HE'S angry??

What a dick.

How about some compassion? His sister suffered horribly, so much so, she killed herself.

Will he wear golf shoes when he dances on her grave? I'm sure it will make a fabulous story!!

r91:

[quote]Tiffany killed herself, and her brother ridiculed her posthumously. The family isn't all that great,

r136: [quote]You just hate that DS has totally been called out as being a dick.

And that doesn't even count the lashing out at anyone who defends him or points out the absurdity of the criticisms against him. My personal favorite was when you had a hissy fit, claimed I was bullied as a child, and called me a misogynist barbarian akin to the Westboro Baptist Church. Let's face it: you've been histrionic, unreasonable, and way too invested in this story.

And just to defer the inevitable childish retorts: I am not David Sedaris. I don't know David Sedaris. I think his writing has largely declined in quality since he lost the voice (quirky loser) that made him famous in the first place. I thought he and his family came off odd and cold in the piece that started this thread. But to me, THAT WAS THE POINT OF THE PIECE.

I'm a writer and author myself, and this thread bothers me because so many people in it are treating an essay as if it was an off-the-cuff remark, completely missing the point of writing an essay like that in the first place. As r298 noted, writers don't choose their phrasing randomly, without any regard as to how it comes off or what it says about them. Quite the opposite, in fact. They are keenly aware of word choice in a way non-writers aren't. A writer like Sedaris meticulously crafts his sentences and has no problem painting himself (and at times, his family) as a difficult person to know, if not an outright neurotic mess. If he comes off cold and harsh or annoyingly dismissive about his sister's problems, that was entirely the intention. But it was also his intention to paint himself and his family as genuinely hurt, confused, and grieving over their loss. People simply aren't as one-dimensional as some of the shriekers in this thread want to believe. Sedaris wrote an essay about the complicated, contradictory and confusing reactions of a family dealing with suicide and mental illness. He did not write an essay shitting all over his sister's grave and wishes. You have to shut off all the critical faculties of your brain and react in a purely emotional manner (i.e., OVERreact) in order to believe something like that.

[quote]I say this with no nastiness: if you're "advocating" for a mentally ill woman (by attacking her family) you don't know and calling her suicide an act of courage, you probably should be seeking out therapy of some sort yourself. It's not only not normal, it's sending up major red flags about your own mental health.

You've been on this thread for quite some time, berating people who aren't behaving the way you think they should, once telling someone to "take their meds." What does that say about YOUR mental health?

You people are the most gullible yahoos I've ever read. You are being so easily trolled and it makes you fair foam at the mouth.

[quote]You've been on this thread for quite some time, berating people who aren't behaving the way you think they should, once telling someone to "take their meds." What does that say about YOUR mental health?

Classic deflection. I'm afraid your contention that participating in a message forum as being somehow indicative of someone's mental health is pretty much exactly the "If I'm crazy, then EVERYONE is!" delusion of crazy people.

In other words, me participating in this thread says absolutely nothing about my mental health.

385...seriously...why are you stalking me?

This is a bitchy gossip site. He DID write a stupid article that pissed on his sister's suicide. Saying such is not an "attack."

Why so thin skinned?

Why so...invested?

Me...I have a good job, but need a break from it...so I like to debate here. I don't hate DS. I read a book by him...years ago. I own a book by AS. This is not personal.

Writers have been called far worse than "dick" on DL. Heck, fellow posters have been "attacked" more viciously than...being called a dick. Especially since he was acting like a dick.

I'll read the rest of your comments later. But for now...yeah, I stand by my, um, attacks that DS was a dick for slurring his sister after her suicide.

If he didn't want all this attention, then he should have not brought national attention to himself. It's kind of like Kim Kardashian complaining about being treated like a sex object. DS is the one who opened his big mouth to the world, and stuck both feet in it.

Mkay. Come back to me when you take your fingers out of your ears, r389.

Actually nevermind. You're just taking a break from your good job and debating here ("WHAT A DICK!" "WHAT A SICK FAMILY!" "YOU'RE A MISOGYNIST BARBARIAN!!!!!" "YOU'RE ALL FREAKS!" "You are the Westboro Church of DL!! You hate women just like they hate us!!" - note: actual quote) but I'm thin-skinned, over-invested and stalking you for noting how unhinged you sound. Right. Carry on with your delusions and/or your trolling, dear.

Dude, chill.

R390 is attributing things to ME that I did not write.

Who is unhinged...?

Which one of the quotes or paraphrases that I attributed to you are false, r391?

I'm enjoying the "Dude, chill." That was cute.

Oh, and since I'm quoting you, r391, I may as well point out that you said this:

[quote]Why so...invested?

[quote]Me...I have a good job, but need a break from it...so I like to debate here. I don't hate DS. I read a book by him...years ago. I own a book by AS. This is not personal.

After you said this:

[quote]This thread is personally advocating for TS, who suffered so horribly she killed herself. Imagine her anguish. Taking your own life is not easy. It requires courage.

[quote]I know, because I have a dear friend attempt three times. She is mentally ill. And everyone, even her family, treats her like a monster. She is the family scapegoat.

Can't have it both ways, sweetheart.

[quote]calling her suicide an act of courage

Sigh.

I never called it "an act of courage." I did say that it [italic]took courage[/italic].

Everybody fears death. Your sister overcame that fear. Why? Because of her mental illness. Her mental anguish was so intolerable, she did to herself what we all fear the most.

I have a dear friend who is mentally ill, and has attempted suicide three times. She said the only way she could attempt suicide was if her consciousness was altered. But when she was altered, she'd F up the suicide.

She has been hospitalized, and she can only get her meds refilled monthly so as to avoid another OD.

I've seen her have episodes...yes, they are scary, but I've learned how to help her while she's in them. I feel so bad for her...she can't trust her own mind. It tortures her.

[quote]I never called it "an act of courage." I did say that it took courage.

Why don't you read those two sentences out loud? Maybe it will prove illuminating to you.

Here. Let me help: There is literally no difference at all between claiming someone's act "took courage" and calling it "an act of courage."

[quote]"You are the Westboro Church of DL!! You hate women just like they hate us!!" -

Where did I write that...?

It's kind of cool to have someone track my every word. Maybe you can be my biographer?

393 points out nothing. There is no there there. Meaningless blather.

If I choose to say it takes courage to commit suicide but is not necessarily an act of courage, what's it to you? I'm not Lara Logan, and this is not 60 Minutes.

Wow.

I'm with R16. It tried to read his "Me Talk Pretty One Day" - it was boring, not funny at all. Amy also isn't as funny as everyone says she is.

I don't like them; they do seem like a creepy bunch.

RIP, Tiffany.

[quote]Where did I write that...?

At r146. It's called "trolldar," dear. i don't need to keep track of your every word. I only need to click.

[quote]393 points out nothing. There is no there there. Meaningless blather.

You are directly contradicting yourself in those quotes.

[quote]If I choose to say it takes courage to commit suicide but is not necessarily an act of courage, what's it to you?

It doesn't matter what it is to me. It is objectively contradictory, regardless of whether you want or believe it to be.

[quote]Wow.

Well, we agree on that, at least.

Also, I completely agree with R47. What a douchebag he is. I'll be donating my copy of Pretty to charity.

R307, yes, absolutely.

R307 just explained my family dynamic to me.

Jesus Christ, people ,why is there even a debate about this. When an acquaintance of Tiffany writes a letter to the editor that makes you feel a special person is gone(and in the saddest way possible) and her brothers "eulogy" leaves you icy cold then something is very wrong. Imagine that you reached the point of murdering yourself and your brother or sister told the world that at the age of 49 you had less than a 49 month year old(LOL)....I mean really.

It's generally easier to shrug off an acquaintance's flaws or transgressions than those of someone you love.

I feel just the opposite 405.

It's easier to shrug off the flaws of someone I love because I've bonded with them.

Perhaps flaws don't cover what I mean. I think there's a sense of betrayal felt by D. Sedaris that doesn't seem to be there for the woman who helped out Tiffany.

407, how did Tiffany betray David?

I don't know exactly. The picture tearing is obvious, but I think there was something else.

Tiffany was clearly not the "institutionalised" type of person with a medical condition, i.e. used to being taken care of/giving responsibility over to others. He mentions how she swore she'd pay him back money he gave her. I doubt he'd give her the kind of money that would affect his own financial status. Something must have happened that made her ask him to stop writing to her.

I don't see either of them as villains. Sedaris is a celebrity and for better or worse, celebrities put parts of their public life on show. In this instance, I doubt it made a huge difference to Tiffany. She seemed to live mostly in her own world.

I think people who commit suicide do betray their loved ones. It causes them such terrible pain that is often impossible to resolve.

Now that I saw the you tube that someone posted up thread I really kinda hate DS.She seems like such a fun ,vital woman.The last place I expected people(at least some people) to be disgusted by the great Sedaris was Data lounge. I have not read much about it outside of here.When I first read the New yorker piece I thought I'm getting my period or something.I googled "David Sedaris sociopath" and got nothing.I came to Datalounge and yes!

[quote]Tiffany remembers David playing tricks on her as a kid. He'd stick slugs to matchbooks and hang them over her bed, rouse her from sleep to stand for the national anthem, or tie rocks to her and toss her in the lake. 'He'd do that to me and Paul, especially," she says, ' and we would say, hey, that was fun, let's do it again! Then you spend the rest of your adult life looking for a rock and a rope."

That's from the article linked up thread. It also mentions that she couldn't handle being written about.

She committed suicide. She was deeply depressed and hopeless. Sedaris then seems heartless and kinda evil in his New Yorker article.

Bizarre trolls come here to insult those who have soul enough to see that the article was ugly and wrong.

It does not make good sense the attacks on those expressing normal human reactions.

hence, I urge the decent folk to realize that there truly are trolls for hire when money is at stake. "Take your meds" and "you are mental," are a big part of their arsenal. When faced with the truth they have found this kind of gaslighting to be their best weapon.

How is any of this a surprise? Sedaris's stories are often as disturbing as they are hilarious. It's clear there were some things with that family that were really, really wrong and that substance abuse and mental illness run rampant.

The people who wonder why David didn't "fix" Tiffany (because after all, he has money, and that's all it takes) are adorably naïve. It's clear you've never been close with anyone severely mentally ill...which is great! But it also means you have no idea what you're talking about. Some people are so unable to function that you would literally have to take over their lives (as if they'd let you) in order to even keep food on the table and a roof over their head. Just sending checks won't cut it.

It seems clear that Tiffany was such a one. Her story is very sad, but blaming her wretched existence on the most visible member of her dysfunctional family is as pointless as it is wrongheaded.

???

It's almost like we are having two totally different conversations. Because if anyone thinks that the content I've shared here promotes the idea that "David should have fixed Tiffany" because he was rich & famous, is mistaken.

Set your ego aside and truly comprehend these words:

Tiffany suffered from a disease. If it's easier for you to replace "clinical depression" with "cancer" then so be it.

What expectations would a family have of a cancer patient?

Coping with cancer is stressful. Imagine waking up in the middle of the night, as we all sometimes do, and remember, "Oh...I have cancer." How easy is it to roll over and fall back asleep?

Imagine if the cancer patient's older brother, a rich and famous writer, publishes entertaining stories about your harrowing experience...when your only personal goal is to retain your strength...and eat food.

Everybody in the world knows about your cancer, and think you're cool with talking about it. At the post office. Or the grocery store. Or the gas station. Or high school reunion. Or...

Her story didn't have to be sad. Just because one is mentally ill does not mean one has to have a tragic life ending in suicide.

Now do you see where I'm coming from...? Even just a little bit? I'm not being confrontational or attacking. I'm just trying to lay it out there for whomever it is who does not understand the reaction here.

His ability to humiliate her after she killed herself makes him a cruel bastard. I saw the youtube and she is not the waste of space mental case david wants us to believe she is. Since when was depression such a condition that she was such an awful drain on her large family? A little kindness and the right pills... what is all this she was mentally ill and so impossible to stand crap about.

Maybe she threatened to out him for making up much of his stories and he now has to discredit her. Maybe he even killed her. Considering the Brittany Murphy case, it seems that if one has enough resources they can get away with anything.

{quote] It's almost like we are having two totally different conversations. Because if anyone thinks that the content I've shared here promotes the idea that "David should have fixed Tiffany" because he was rich & famous, is mistaken.

Well... yes. That's generally how forum threads work; multiple people having multiple conversations around one topic. You may not have promoted the idea, but plenty of other people did. And now we're at the stage of the conversation where people are actually throwing out the theory that he killed his sister, which is pretty much where the conversation was guaranteed to go.

[quote]Now do you see where I'm coming from...?

Speaking for myself, I always saw where you were coming from. I just don't agree with it.

[quote]hence, I urge the decent folk to realize that there truly are trolls for hire when money is at stake. "Take your meds" and "you are mental," are a big part of their arsenal. When faced with the truth they have found this kind of gaslighting to be their best weapon.

For the record, stuff like this is EXACTLY why "Take your meds" is being bandied about. Because it's fucking batshit crazy. People disagree with you. It doesn't make them mercenaries from a shadowy cabal, paid to use the "weapons" in their "arsenal" against you and "the truth." Get a fucking grip.

[quote]Maybe she threatened to out him for making up much of his stories and he now has to discredit her. Maybe he even killed her. Considering the Brittany Murphy case, it seems that if one has enough resources they can get away with anything.

Seriously? You are implying David Sedaris killed his mentally ill sister? There is something disturbed about this and the rest of your post, to say the least. It is healthier not to project your own issues onto others, truly.

Tiffany's death was genuinely tragic. The vilification of her family is atrocious.

I guess I meant that it feels like we're not on the same page...not speaking the same language...like for example for me "compassion" means something else than it does for you.

Because you are seeing things here that I don't.

I don't get from this thread that the general consensus is that "DS killed his sister." You agree that I have not expressed that opinion, yet you want me to defend or address it...?

[quote]I guess I meant that it feels like we're not on the same page...not speaking the same language...like for example for me "compassion" means something else than it does for you.

LOL. Oh, please, you ridiculous troll. Could you possibly be more pleased with yourself?

[quote]I don't get from this thread that the general consensus is that "DS killed his sister." You agree that I have not expressed that opinion, yet you want me to defend or address it...?

This is something you've pulled entirely from your overworked imagination, because I said nothing of the sort; either that there was a general consensus or that you were required to defend or address it.

You really do have the most adorable approach to comprehending others.

[quote]I think it's hilarious that DL has decided that the root of all the Sedaris family's problems (that the DL have collectively also decided upon) lies with the only two famous members, absent any real information on the other 6 people in the family. - R363

[quote]hatever you say, dear. Because clearly, whatever I say is simply going to be re-tooled to fit your delusions. - r369

[quote]You're just taking a break from your good job and debating here ("WHAT A DICK!" "WHAT A SICK FAMILY!" "YOU'RE A MISOGYNIST BARBARIAN!!!!!" "YOU'RE ALL FREAKS!" "You are the Westboro Church of DL!! You hate women just like they hate us!!" - note: actual quote) but I'm thin-skinned, over-invested and stalking you for noting how unhinged you sound. Right. Carry on with your delusions and/or your trolling, dear. - r390

[quote]I'm enjoying the "Dude, chill." That was cute.

[quote]Can't have it both ways, sweetheart.

[quote]Here. Let me help: There is literally no difference at all between claiming someone's act "took courage" and calling it "an act of courage."

[quote]It's called "trolldar," dear. i don't need to keep track of your every word. I only need to click.

and this one is CLASSIC:

[quote]People disagree with you. It doesn't make them mercenaries from a shadowy cabal, paid to use the "weapons" in their "arsenal" against you and "the truth." Get a fucking grip.

*snicker*

Who da troll ?

I'm a troll because I posted throughout this thread?

Your definition of troll is perfectly in line with your abysmal reading comprehension and your nonexistent ability to own up to your own words.

You really think randomly quoting me and adding "This one is CLASSIC" amounts to some sort of point?

[quote]You really think randomly quoting me and adding "This one is CLASSIC" amounts to some sort of point?

Because whomever disagrees with you is treated like shit by you.

Look at your snark toward other posters here. "Sweetheart," "that was cute, "here let me help," "it's called trolldar, dear."

*eyes rolling*

Maybe you're a troll IRL, and therefore do not understand that condescending others is enticing them to flame you...isn't that the same as trolling? Intentionally eliciting an angry response? Trying to provoke people?

You're a cunt defending a cunt in a cunty way. For whatever reason, you have latched on to me. Though I haven't, imo, personally attacked another poster here. Perhaps you can say I've attacked "DS", but he's not anonymous.

He said cunty things about his dead sister in a newspaper. And you've PISSED at me. Why?

Bitch, you asked me if I was bullied as a child, called me a misogynist barbarian freak and compared me to the Westboro Baptist Church. You've lashed out at anyone who said anything you disagreed with in this thread. I thought you were full of shit from the very second you entered this thread but it's shooting out of your ears and nostrils at this point.

Give it a freaking rest, you loon. She's still dead and he's still a rich, famous author. Neither is going to change.

[quote]Bitch, ....

What exactly is your point?

You don't like that I was mean to you, so your response is to be mean to me...

You're mad at me for insulting and your response is...insulting me...

Truth: I'm right and you're wrong, and you can't stand that.

My issue here is David Sedaris' response to his little sister's suicide. '

I have no idea what your issue is.

If it makes you feel better, I'm sorry I hurt your feelings. I'm sorry if I asked you if you were bullied as a child, called you a misogynist barbarian, and compared you to the Westboro Church. But in truth, I think I've done well here. I stand by all my content.

But I am sorry I hurt your feelings, and I hope you feel better.

But DS treated his baby sis like shit...even after she killed herself. That's tacky, and you cannot convince me otherwise.

[quote]What exactly is your point?

LOL.

I told you. Laid it all out. You pretended not to hear it. ("I'll read the rest later..." ) But brava once again on the ability to switch back and forth from "Can you just understand what I'm trying to say without attacking?" to "YOU"RE A CUNT" to "I'm sorry I hurt your feelings and I hope you feel better."

You really are terribly entertaining.

Thanks, I find you entertaining as well. :)

I still have no idea what you want from me. You are not addressing the topic at hand.

I don't feel like tackling a new project, so maybe I'll re-read your rant.

[quote]But brava once again on the ability to switch back and forth from "Can you just understand what I'm trying to say without attacking?" to "YOU"RE A CUNT" to "I'm sorry I hurt your feelings and I hope you feel better."

Why do you assume I'm female?

Because I'm a misogynist of course!

[quote]And that doesn't even count the lashing out at anyone who defends him or points out the absurdity of the criticisms against him. ... you've been histrionic, unreasonable, and way too invested in this story.

OK. I take issue with "lashing out" part. But if you feel I'm an attacking troll, lashing out randomly for fun, then fine. I'm sorry you feel that way.

But I do detect misogyny in your posts. Sorry you don't agree with me, but my mom was a feminist...I know of what I speak.

[quote]I thought he and his family came off odd and cold in the piece that started this thread. But to me, THAT WAS THE POINT OF THE PIECE.

Great. TO YOU that was the point of the piece. Not to me or a lot of other people, but to you. Fine.

[quote]I'm a writer and author myself, and this thread bothers me because so many people in it are treating an essay as if it was an off-the-cuff remark,

Congrats for being a professional writer and author. That does not qualify you, however, to censor DL. In fact, one would think you'd appreciate the raw, honest feedback from PEOPLE WHO READ BOOKS.

[quote]Sedaris meticulously crafts his sentences and has no problem painting himself (and at times, his family) as a difficult person to know, if not an outright neurotic mess.

Oh, ok. DS likes to write about his family's neuroses. He's funny, successful, and you like him, so he can write about whatever he wants.

Even if it hurt his family. His little sister.

Why can DS write whatever he wants, but DL cannot?

Why is it ok for DS to write about TS, but not for me to write about DS?

[quote]If he comes off cold and harsh or annoyingly dismissive about his sister's problems, that was entirely the intention.

He succeeded. I don't like cold, harsh, annoying, dismissive people. I guess that means I don't like DS.

[quote]But it was also his intention to paint himself and his family as genuinely hurt, confused, and grieving over their loss. People simply aren't as one-dimensional as some of the shriekers in this thread want to believe. Sedaris wrote an essay about the complicated, contradictory and confusing reactions of a family dealing with suicide and mental illness. He did not write an essay shitting all over his sister's grave and wishes. You have to shut off all the critical faculties of your brain and react in a purely emotional manner (i.e., OVERreact) in order to believe something like that.

That is your opinion.

IMO, he did piss on his little sister...bitching about her tearing up a photo, or not paying him back. She was mentally ill and just took her own life. His writing contributed to her pain. And this is what he does? He does not respect the dead. Yeah, I have a problem with that. Maybe it's because my mom died in my arms?

oh, r429.

well.

at least you finally admitted it.

I think I will tackle that project now...

[quote] Maybe it's because my mom died in my arms?

That gets to the heart of why I think some of the remarks on this thread are way off-base, i.e. villifying DS while treating TS as "poor Tiffany".

None of us know what went on in that family. To fill in the gaps and come to a binary villain/victim conclusion is absurd. I think a lot of people's personal situations are unduly influencing their conclusions.

[quote]But I do detect misogyny in your posts. Sorry you don't agree with me, but my mom was a feminist...I know of what I speak.

One example. Let's hear it. Because I haven't made one comment about women in this entire exchange.

[quote]Great. TO YOU that was the point of the piece. Not to me or a lot of other people, but to you. Fine.

Thank you for restating my point and then telling me it was fine for me to make it."

[quote]Congrats for being a professional writer and author. That does not qualify you, however, to censor DL.

Why do you just make shit like this up? Why do you reserve the right to claim your stated words don't mean what they actually mean ("saying her act took courage does not mean I was saying it was an act of courage") and then turn around and simply make up arguments and put them in other people's mouths? I have made not one claim to censoring anyone and don't even have the ability to do so, seeing as how I'm not the webmaster here. You, on the other hand, literally told people to shut up, stop talking, and stay on topic.

It's your astounding hypocrisy that's just so darn fascinating.

[quote]In fact, one would think you'd appreciate the raw, honest feedback from PEOPLE WHO READ BOOKS.

Shrieking loons who call a writer sick and claim he's dancing on his sister's grave is not the kind of feedback any author appreciates or respects.

[quote]Oh, ok. DS likes to write about his family's neuroses. He's funny, successful, and you like him, so he can write about whatever he wants.

Just making things up now, I see.

Hey, remember when you called me unhinged and claimed I was making things up that you said? And then when I asked you to provide one example of me doing so, you couldn't?

Hypocrisy that shines like a supernova. It truly is astonishing.

[quote]Why can DS write whatever he wants, but DL cannot?

[quote]Why is it ok for DS to write about TS, but not for me to write about DS?

Again, never said anything of the sort. You are free to say what you want about David Sedaris, just as I am free to say you sound like a freaking lunatic who clearly doesn't understand how to approach memoir writing.

[quote]That is your opinion.

And the sky is blue and water is wet.

Can you two get a room already?

please tell me why anyone that is not David Sedaris or someone paid by him or a pit bull personal friend would lash out at posters who know what basic empathy looks like. why would a stranger say' Tiffany was a nut and David is rich and successful and all you losers are jealous " where's the passion coming from. I don't get it.

well, 434, r433 definitely has a lot of energy, that's for sure.

[quote]Shrieking loons who call a writer sick and claim he's dancing on his sister's grave

And his imagination is fervent. But I'm not into angry sex.

r436, by "fervent imagination" do you mean r86, where this was said:

quote]Will he wear golf shoes when he dances on her grave? I'm sure it will make a fabulous story!!

Is that what you meant?

[quote]please tell me why anyone that is not David Sedaris or someone paid by him or a pit bull personal friend would lash out at posters who know what basic empathy looks like. why would a stranger say' Tiffany was a nut and David is rich and successful and all you losers are jealous " where's the passion coming from. I don't get it.

This from the asshole who said "Maybe he killed her."

I wrote that, and it was directed to DAvid Sedaris. You are not David Sedaris.

Why does snark toward him upset you?

DS writes snarky shit all the time. Why can't I? My god, this is DL...pointless bithcery in digital.

[quote]Will he wear golf shoes when he dances on her grave?

Heh. You gotta admit, that was pretty good. You're a writer...you're welcome to use it. :)

I'd begun to worry that I spent too much time on DL. This thread might be the perfect aversion therapy.

Do you have some sort of neurological disorder that you can't follow a conversation you're participating in? First I have a "fervent imagination" for claiming you said something you actually said; then I'm "upset" for providing the proof that you actually said it.

Pointing out your own words doesn't mean I'm upset about a thing. It means the mountain of bullshit you're shoveling is easy to poke fun of.

[quote]Do you have some sort of neurological disorder that you can't follow a conversation you're participating in?

Yes, I do have a very serious neurological disorder that prevents me from comprehending what the hell you're talking about.

So, anyway...now that we have that cleared up.

DS was a dick for publicly bitching about his mentally ill sister after she committed suicide.

[quote]Yes, I do have a very serious neurological disorder

Allrighty then.

Something-something about a project.

eh, I blew that off.

But I give up...you win.

David Sedaris was a wonderful, heroic, big brother to his poor, crazy sister.

Tiffany Sedaris was very selfish when she killed herself, and ripping up her family photos was cruel.

Ergo, David = wonderful & heroic. And obviously talented!

Tiffany = selfish & cruel. And obviously dead!

And I forgive you for the repeated racist epithets you made throughout this thread, r444.

FF 445.

Girls, girls! You're both mentally ill!

did anyone watdh the video?

So, what does Hugh look like?

I think the intensity of r445 is due to the possibility that DS' comments ruined his writing for a lot of people.

DS...he's on the comedy circuit...so I guess his writing is considered comedy and not drama.

However, comedy & tragedy don't mix well. Tragedy ruins comedy.

TS' suicide was a tragedy. DS is a comedian. The two just don't mix.

SO...that's it. I accept that he's a comic, and that he was trying to be funny. Imo, it did not come off well...in fact, I think we can all agree, as displayed in this thread, that his comments after TS' suicide were polarizing & controversial.

He didn't lose me as a fan, because I was never a fan. And obviously he still has fans, by the impassioned posts defending him here.

Anyway, r445, again I am sorry for upsetting you here. I was just having fun on a message board...blowing off steam. I need to realize sooner when I am upsetting people...be a little more sensitive to how people react to what I post. I hope you have a great weekend. :)

I think she committed suicide to escape the two of you and your endless bitching st one another.

[quote]Anyway, [R445], again I am sorry for upsetting you here. I was just having fun on a message board...blowing off steam. I need to realize sooner when I am upsetting people...be a little more sensitive to how people react to what I post. I hope you have a great weekend. :)

And I'm sorry for goading you into making all those horrible jokes about the Holocaust and raping children.

Sweetheart, if you keep making up words and sticking them in my mouth, I'm going to do the exact same thing to you.

: )

Jeez r452. What is your problem?

[quote]And I'm sorry for goading you into making all those horrible jokes about the Holocaust and raping children.

Why not just "apology accepted"

For the same reason you didn't accept my apology. Because it was over something entirely imaginary.

I never thought I'd say this, but I think Zak wins the thread. The parents are to blame for naming her "Tiffany."

And the parents are to blame for sending her to boarding school.

452, nobody is sticking anything in your mouth here.

Maybe that's your problem :?)

r438 you stupid cunt, I don't think he killed her ,That was a joke that came of really badly refering to the Brittney murphy story.But. yes I do believe that there are trolls here.Why else would anyone who wasn't seriously twisted think that pissing all over a mentally disturbed sister is palatable to normal people.Why would that opinion make you angry?

I recently saw him on his tour. This was the third time I saw him and by far the worst performance. A fisting joke?! Then there was the cancer is funny but AIDS isn't story. Then the stupid story about dentistry in France. Several readings from his 'diary'. Then he said he loved a book about people in N Korea and their suffering and a woman disagreed with him and he kind of heckled her! I've read the book and didn't say anything but it's like saying ooh, I love reading about genocide in Rwanda. Just a passing mention of his sister dying earlier this year. But the sheeple laughed on cue at everything. I'm glad my ticket was free, because I hear funnier non PC stuff on one of the comedy central shows.

Really 459?

He loves North Korea because of their suffering...

It was recently discovered that North Korea recently had a mass execution of about 1,000 people in a stadium filled with 10,000 people.

I wonder what the DS Troll thinks about his comments.

The DST goes nuts when anyone "attacks" DS or a DS supporter. He has no stomach for cruelty...except when it is he being cruel.

He's the one that accused someone here of making jokes about the holocaust, racism and child rape.

DS fans are sick fucks.

For reals r460! He compared it to a book about Puerto Rico that I'm not familiar with, but said this book was better because N Korea is all the way on the other side of the world and there's nothing we could do about it, vs seeing Puerto Rican's on the subway and feeling sad. The book is Nothing to Envy, and it is an excellent read, but so, so heartbreaking. The rare few who do escape to S Korea have all kinds of different problems because everything there is high energy and shiny and bright and loud, and it's overwhelming for them.

Late to this thread:

Here's what I love about the New Yorker piece, and his reading of the New Yorker piece (with Lena Dunham reading her stuff, at least once, in a co-appearance, I understand) - the piece is described as moving and insightful - or similar words that would make one expect a moving and insightful piece. And then you read it. I didn't find it either of those things. I felt he was putting even more distance between himself and her than she'd created in her lifetime and by her manner of death. He was setting up markers saying she was an outlier. Why would she ever voluntarily leave the Sedaris club? Well, she was off. Always had been off. Hard to reach. There was the indication of drug activity in high school. That bad school experience. Really beautiful though, men were after her in her twenties and thirties. His article was sympathetic only in a cosmetic way - it was using her self-imposed isolation to protect the other Sedarises. The problem was always Tiffany, not the Sedarises, and it's one of life's mysteries, but maybe the reefer she smoked in high school was an early clue.

The piece was like that all over. What a mystery, Tiffany's troubles.

The whole thing sort of portrays Tiffany not as part of the family who was shaped by the family she was in, but someone who somehow rejected the family, and her rejection of the family was because she was warped, poor thing, and clearly not a reflection of the Sedarises.

There were no connections made by Sedaris, or even implied.

The line he did when his father said "a life down to one box" and then "two boxes" - maybe was meant to be poignant or gallows humor or cut the moment, but her life wasn't in the box. Then the rest of the article was all about their past sharing the rentals on Emerald Isle, and David's decision to buy a house to they can continue to be together, because nothing's more wonderful than being a Sedaris, and Tiffany's death is on Tiffany and has nothing to do with her being a Sedaris, or growing up Sedaris.

That's what the whole thing said.

I got that as the takeaway, and then when I read the 2004 Boston Globe article, basically he made what she said in the article come true. She said her stories make him wrong, and his stories make her wrong. She implied the family was mean and you weren't allowed to be upset about it. When she died, he wrote the New Yorker article making her wrong. It wasn't the family, it was drugs and some sort of streak that she was born with that sent Tiffany on her way, and just plain old willfulness as an adult, and probably unbalanced too, and she was poor (didn't mention her art) - so her ideas and point of view weren't validated by any success, and now she's dead, and the remaining Sedarises will gather closer together thanks to David, because nothing is so great as being one.

That's why it was creepy. He used her death to sort of try to shove everything she said in 2004 back in the can.

When I read that 2004 article it made me so glad for my family. We have plenty of dysfunction - my father was an alcoholic, there were seven kids, we were financially insecure most of the time, and we kids were very competitive in the house, loud and sometimes bossy. But not bullying. I can't imagine doing that shit to my siblings. And if any of his tried that kind of crap, on younger or on older, we'd get our asses kicked first by the sibling and then by the parent. Nobody would get away with pretending it was hilarious. They'd be eviscerated. That's so insane. I pretended to try to drown you with rocks - it's hilarious you were so scared!

No you fucking asshole, you tied rocks to me and put me in the lake.

How does a family bully someone out of saying that?

Great poat, r462. Your perceptions resonate with me...especially the part about David "making her wrong." To me, it's like he *defined* Tiffany, rather than allowing her to define herself.

And as a gay man, that hits me hard. I used to live in a small town where people defined one another. It's limiting...and rather oppressive. I want to be free to define myself...establish my own identity.

But David couldn't leave Tiffany alone. He has to bully her even from the grave.

[ quote]and the remaining Sedarises will gather closer together thanks to David

I'm not so sure about that, 462.

How will they manage without a scapegoat? This will be a first for them.

It's kind of like when the Cold War ended, and America no longer had a single enemy to unite against. We kind of turned on one another.

And now the public knows of their facade. Not sure people will still want to laugh at Family Sedaris Neuroses knowing they bullied one of their own to death.

I was the last person on this earth to speak with Tiffany Sedaris. We were close friends for nearly a dozen years. The night before she killed herself, she begged me to go along with her to her family reunion in order to help her through her anxiety over the event. I agreed to go, promising to rent a vehicle so she could flee at a moment’s notice should she feel uncomfortable. I even had her a little excited to show me around where she grew up and had her howling with laughter. I expressed the depth of my love and affection for her as a friend and did so again when we spoke very briefly the next day. It wasn’t enough. I know, or can logically guess at, reasons small and large why she committed suicide. I was her friend. I do not give a hoot what anyone else says about this letter. I will do whatever is required of me to defend her honor and legacy. I only wish I could have saved her and have her back in this world. I found David Sedaris’ article, “Now we are five,” in the Oct. 28 New Yorker to be obviously self-serving, often grossly inaccurate, almost completely unresearched and, at times, outright callous. Some of her family had been more than decent, loving and kind to her. “Two lousy boxes” is not Tiffany’s legacy. After her sister left with that meager lot, her house was still full of treasures. More than two vanloads of possession were pulled from there and other locations by friends. She was a hoarder of items worthless to most but vitally important to her. There were fantastic art materials -- milk crates of angular rocks (good ones), each crate containing one round stone, which perfectly fits the hand, bearing signs of some form of unorthodox flint knapping to bash and hammer the rocks into shapes she needed; dozens of boxes of antique broken ceramics or stained glass for her mosaics, many dug out of the ground from a hidden 19th Century dump whose location she shared only with me, my favorite broken bit being the bottom part of a piece of green McCoy pottery that now only said, “Coy,” (pure Tiffany wit); ephemera; old CDV photos; old letters; fragments of vintage children’s books; her collection of antique baleen corsets; an original picture sleeve from the Little Richard 45, “ooh! My soul/true, fine mama;” her antique baby blue high chair, in part covered with ancient happy dolphin decals in which sat a doll, representing her; and an old stuffed rabbit, a rabbit, representing the rabbit she once owned named “Little Sweet Miss Bitsy Who’s Its,” a.k.a., “Hooos,” (the number of ooo’s varied with her pronunciation) -- she gave the rabbit away when she could no longer afford or manage to feed it/care for it -- she had already long since given away her cat, Mister Wonderful; those beautiful, multicolored old vivid lead-paint broom handles David mentioned, which she used to have strung together as a divider between rooms when she had a larger apartment; and the cheap plastic flowers she scattered around her body before taking her life. I could go on and on.

As an artist, she was fixated on color and was one of the most colorful personalities I am ever likely to meet. She was the queen of trash pickers. Then there was her astounding artwork, willed to another loyal friend from long before I met her. And, most importantly, there is the intangible -- the love, the wit, the friendship, humor and affection that her friends will remember her for the most. She was 10 times funnier than any other Sedaris, since her humor stemmed partly from living a darker, harder life on the razor’s edge. Her passing and the circumstances surrounding it have been unbearably upsetting to her many friends and, personally, I will mourn her until my dying day.

Not only could Tiffany have been saved, she could have blossomed. While her friends had done pretty much all they could, at least half of her mental health issues stemmed from, or were exaggerated by, her poverty and unstable housing situation, but also from David’s occasional mockery of her in his writings.

Her father had the wealth and should have had the wisdom of age to see she was in dire need to more financial assistance.

David Sedaris has made a fortune writing about the foibles and idiosyncrasies of his family, which America and the world has latched onto, since most families are somewhat dysfunctional. As this holiday season and time of reunions approaches, let this be a warning to others -- not every black sheep is a lost sheep and some might come back into the fold with just a little more kind attention or modest financial assistance.

In an interview on Dutch TV, given about a month after Tiffany’s suicide, David was asked, “What if you could ask her one question?” He replied, “Can I have the money back that I loaned you?” He laughed. “She borrowed all this money from me. She said, ‘I will pay you back in my lifetime.’ I can’t believe I fell for that.”

David should consider the payment for his article about Tiffany’s suicide to be a debt paid in full. David’s detachment and insensitivity is insulting and offensive to all who loved Tiffany, likely including his own family. Maybe David could have given Tiffany some more of the money he made off of stories about her. He repeatedly heard she was living a hardscrabble life.

David spent a good 10 to 20 percent of the article talking about how to name the posh beach house he bought on a whim, three weeks after his youngest sister died, destitute, from a brutally violent suicide in her ramshackle hovel on the “hard side of Somerville, Massachusetts.” I have a good suggestion as to how to name the new beachfront vacation home, the one with a nice view from David’s bedroom, one of a few houses David owns. Perhaps this one should be named, “The House of Shame.”

Michael Knoblach is a Medford resident.

[quote] Her father had the wealth and should have had the wisdom of age to see she was in dire need to more financial assistance.

This is such a clueless statement.

Bully for you, 466

I think it's a mystery to us. I never knew Tiffany Sedaris or David Sedaris. Just reading his essay is not enough to draw any conclusions. I hope those close to Tiffany can make sense of things and learn something and find peace and I hope the Sedaris family can find peace.

@156

'David has his own version of the truth, and it bumps into my version. His makes mine not true, and mine makes his not true," Tiffany says matter-of-factly. 'He said he wrote about our pain because we weren't doing anything with it. When I die, you can recycle me. Till then, it's mine."

Trash picking is a crusade against anonymity, not waste.

When Tiffany goes picking, she's after stories. Sure, she can eat any of the 16 cans of Progresso soup she found one night in July. She can sell some jewelry and furniture. If she likes the buyers, and they're fair, she'll even pick for their needs, carting home Legos or oboes or any other oddity she can trade for marbles or pottery.

The stories, though, she keeps. Portraits and family photos fill file boxes in her stuffed spare room. She organizes the photos by person, even though she rarely learns their names. 'I don't split up lives," she declares.

Tiffany creates principles like this one, which guide her trash picking: Death is the ultimate adjudicator. Letters, pictures, and diaries are fair game only if Tiffany has never met the person who they describe. They don't leave her house again unless their previous owner is surely dead. 'Do I have the right to sell someone's letters, to print them, to give them away?" she asks. 'What if the woman who wrote that love letter as a kid is alive, and her husband beats her? These are real people, which means there are consequences to things."

@462 check out "The Golden Girls S6E12 "Ebbtide's Revenge" - feel free to ignore the following

“One of us should get hit by a car,” I said. “That would teach the both of them.” I pictured Gretchen, her life hanging by a thread as my parents paced the halls of Rex Hospital, wishing they had been more attentive. It was really the perfect solution. With her out of the way, the rest of us would be more valuable and have a bit more room to spread out. “Gretchen, go lie in the street.”

“Make Amy do it,” she said.

Amy, in turn, pushed it off on Tiffany, who was the youngest and had no concept of death. “It’s like sleeping,” we told her. “Only you get a canopy bed.”

Poor Tiffany. She’d do just about anything in return for a little affection. All you had to do was call her Tiff, and whatever you wanted was yours: her allowance, her dinner, the contents of her Easter basket. Her eagerness to please was absolute and naked. When we asked her to lie in the middle of the street, her only question was “Where?”

You guys care too much about this.

Please repeat this phrase until it finally sinks in:

"You know how bitchy fags can be."

He writes in "Let it Snow" from his book "Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim" about the mother locking the kids out of the house one day. As they were trying to figure a way to get back in after hours of pleading, they decided to pretend that one of them had been hit by a car. They picked Tiffany (she was six). "Poor Tiffany. She'd do just about anything in return for a little affection. All you had to do was call her Tiff and whatever you wanted was yours; her allowance money, her dinner, the content of her Easter basket Her eagerness to please was more absolute and and naked. When we asked her to lie in the middle of the street, her only question was "Where?"

I like Sedaris but he can be pathetic sometimes. Very pathetic.

He was on PBS' "Finding Your Roots" last week. The show looked at his Greek and American ancestors. At the end his DNA results were shown. He has a wide range of admixture. What I could see of the pie chart was 42% Italian/ Greek, 4% Caucasian, and 2% Jewish. There where 6 more pieces of the pie chart that weren't shown. I think two other pieces read Great Britain 2.5% and Iberian Pennisula 3.5%. You can see the pie chart at 49:27.

Why does DL love Tiffany so much? Let her go.

Let her go?? You're the one who bumped this thread after six fucking years, toots.

All that money and he does nothing about those teeth? I don't get it. I don't.