Reality – What A Concept!

I admit I have shamefully neglected this blog in recent weeks. I was so embroiled in the Misha Defonseca hoax for awhile there that it seemed that was all I thought about. Things have simmered down at the moment but more interesting stuff is coming to light every day. Eventually most of it will wind up being posted here but I have to tell you this has been an educational experience for me.

I’ve long subscribed to the belief that people as a general rule believe what they want to believe regardless of what the facts may be. Nowhere has this been more glaringly pointed out than in the articles, blog posts, comments and emails that have surfaced around this controversy. Sometimes I read some of the responses and think, “Have you read ANYTHING that was written about this?” There are a lot of people who have their opinions and don’t want that screwed up by having to face facts.

One of the strangest things I encountered in my Google-powered trips around the internet was a “statement” written and posted by Vera Lee, the woman who acted as translator and ghost writer for the original Misha book. I realize Ms. Lee is in her eighties but the entire statement is virtually unreadable. She rambles all over the place, indulges in endless gossip, throws in peculiar little stories that supposedly attest to her abilities. Well, I’ll be honest, she lost me. I have no idea where she was headed with that piece. But the strangest thing about it is that she started out saying --- saying in black and white --- that she was hired as the ghostwriter. In fact she uses the word ghostwriter several times. Now, correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t a ghostwriter called a ghostwriter because they are supposed to be invisible? Isn’t that where the “ghost” part comes in? Yet, it was Ms. Lee who initiated the entire legal debacle with a lawsuit against the publisher because the publisher wouldn’t put her name on the cover of the book!

Somebody help me out here --- she openly and publickally admits she was the ghostwriter and she brought a lawsuit because her name wasn’t going on the cover? She also complains endlessly about the poor writing quality of the book, simultaneously touting her own talents as a writer and yet the entire statement eludes comprehension or even a modicum of sense. I know Ms. Lee has an impressive academic background --- Professor Emeritus at Boston College. Certainly distinguished. But, reading her statement in response to the recent press about this hoax, one wonders how long ago that was and what has happened to her abilities in the mean time.

Then there are all the comments on the publishing blogs from independent publishers who seem genuinely confused as to what their position should be. They realize that holding publishers accountable for the books they publish is not in their best interest but they also don’t feel comfortable standing up for freedom of the press. One of the worst things that has happened to this country since 9/11 is the regrettable trend among people who are genuinely frightened to be willing to sacrifice a freedom or two in exchange for the illusion of security. There is no security, folks, but freedoms are being endangered all over the place. This is one more example. If publishers are held accountable for vetting the truth of what they publish who will publish things that no one wants to believe? Who will publish the Harriet Beecher Stowes of the future if publishers cannot publish what they cannot prove?

Well, it’s crazy making. However, Sharon Sergeant, the genealogist whose skills lead to the discovery of the documents posted here and on BESTSELLERtheBook.blogspot.com, has sent the following. Listen to her talk and you’ll learn more about how she accomplished what she did. The world can use all the extra truth it can get:

"For more than a decade, historians had focussed on the implausibility
of the Defonseca popular allegory. We took a page from Pulitizer Prize
historian David Hackett Fischer's early work 'Historians' Fallacies' for
the process of Inquiry, Explanation and Argument and applied it to the
entire body of work created as a result of Defonseca's storytelling: her
public appearances and interviews, various book versions and the many
lawsuits.

We found many problems with previous inquiries. Question framing,
factual verification and significance were definitely lacking.
Explanations were generalized and narrations were all tainted by the
basic inquiry. Cause and effect, motivations, composition of the
information and analogies were all over the board.

Highly charged emotional issues were given undue proportion, distracting
the inquiries from actually testing theories against the facts.

We were thus able to frame the inquiry in the search for the factual
evidence trail by asking "What is wrong with this picture?"

I presented these findings to my team on January 5, 2008.
http://www.generalvoice.com/

Sergeant will also present how her team used this preliminary analysis
to find the proof trail for Misha Defonseca's true identity at the
Massachusetts Genealogical Seminar on April 26th at Bentley College in
Waltham, MA.
http://www.massgencouncil.com/