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Writer's pictureAmanda Riddell

Cease and desist - what must happen

Well, given you've all spent the last 18-24 months threatening me with criminal charges if I didn't play ball and be Tina for VUW and the so-called 'community' - people that can't tolerate me IRL as a trans person*, but want me to be that on-screen - I thought it was my turn to reply in kind: 1. Even if you had the right to claim credit for my Tina screenplay (which you don't), you must stop asking about a script that doesn't exist. That script is the vision that VUW and James Ashcroft have of doing the plot of the Tina story while I sing my EP songs, instead of the New Zealand folk songs that I put in the script . That script has never existed. The Shipwrecked on Island songs have never been in any draft of Weeded Out, and other parties are genuinely interested in using those songs in their original context: the 2030 climate change musical.


Other parties = Otago University and possibly Don and Harry or Wingnut. Again, VUW has to stop presuming that as a former student I'm somehow their property. I'm not, and I'm legally entitled to explore other options. 2. Carefully re-read the terms of my cease and desist letters, which include a ban on discussing doing an MA, and strongly imply that I'd never agree to a fellowship if that's what VUW is willing to offer instead of cash. I have been very firm that the only way to acquire the script was to pay a fair and reasonable licencing fee. My student debt for my undergraduate degree doesn't just magically disappear because you're pretending to like me due to my underground cred and mana. I have been very explicit in negotiations that the sale price had to put a big dent in that debt, which is still in the high $40,000 range. 3. Meet the terms of those letters and also consider whether an apology to me regarding the attempts to convert me is a better option than me taking this to court. For the people who can't seem to help themselves in terms of trying to use porn to manipulate me, I expect an end to 'untitled' and 'ponytail-only' as coded references to your desire that I be Tina this summer. Your actions in that realm are also illegal. It's still blackmail if you use a false name. It says it all about the selfishness of these people that they're getting paid salaries that are in excess of the $50,000 I asked them to pay me to licence Weeded Out, yet still can't find a few spare bucks in their massive operating budgets to pay me fairly. Your only real offers have been a free ride and endless threats of criminal or civil action. Unlike you idiots, I formalised my disagreement and wrote legally valid threats: you've spent six months ducking my valid request for a face-to-face meeting or arbitration. Now, it's fair to say that legal action will result if VUW doesn't simply give up. I had been led to understand that they had given up. If that's not the case, then I refuse to attend Question Time. 4. The Wellington Greens have to make this right with me in a non-Tina fashion, and must actually apologise for Tory's hui in 2022. They tried to shame me into detransitioning. That is beyond bad form from a woke party that is supposed to defend the rights of minorities (including gender minorities). Those anti-trans lezzies and anti-Amanda Wellingtonians owe me a formal apology for their continued insistence that I was a sick freak and a TV fetishist. They owe me a formal apology for their attempts to tell me to be 'he/they' when I wasn't diagnosed with DID and prefer she pronouns. They probably owe me compensation for lost wages too. Their rumour mill cost me a job and told RNZ that I was a sicko. Tam might not have planned it, but she's now the Wellington Central MP: she has to make it right with me if I'm to continue living here. Tam, your idiot mates made me have a mental breakdown, and are definitely the reason that I left your electorate. They just couldn't take 'no' for an answer, even though that was a legally valid answer. If you want me to move back to town, organise that apology that I'm asking for. *Re: 'can't tolerate me' - have you had lunch or dinner with me? Have you ever come to Parliament Grounds when I said I was going to perform (Tam has, btw)? Have you ever considered writing to me about my script formally? Have you ever considered inviting me to collaborate on your projects without singing? Have you ever considered asking me to explain myself to you IRL? No, you haven't. You just saw fucking dollar signs when you read Weeded Out. Selfish, transphobic cunts that can't handle a non-Western vision of gender diversity. Yes, they wanted to rewrite Tina's big speech to Jade in the first episode, alongside all the stuff about being a music teacher. That's how retarded they are, and how sure they are that their method of expression is superior to mine. I don't give a flying fuck what the mainstream gay scene thinks is 'PC' -- if their attitudes were helping trans rights, then we wouldn't be in this situation where trans people are genuinely fighting for our basic human rights. I said we should go to mediation; you refused. Now I'm simply making my final warning that these attempts to alter both my script and my gender expression MUST CEASE.

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Amanda Riddell
Amanda Riddell
Sep 11

Whether I'd take the Mozart Fellowship and move to Dunedin... well, it's definitely tempting. Maybe in 2026 -- missed the deadline. I've been too focussed on the politics and the IP war. The rongoā course is open, but I'm not sure whether the Level 2 Te Reo Māori qualification that I'm getting at the moment qualifies me for that course.

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Amanda Riddell
Amanda Riddell
Sep 11
Replying to

Marama, it's just a giant pain that they refuse to accept basic things like 'I'm not the ideal guitarist to premiere my own piece' or 'My copyrights are still valid even if I'm a pirate' -- they keep on accusing me of being selfish, but from my perspective it's me that has the ideas and the IP for creating jobs in a down market for the creative sector.


They really do think they own me, and that's fucking insulting given I'm studying at the wānanga. They're pretending as if TWOA is 'pre-school' for my triumphant return now that I'm not considered to be a dangerous fetishist.


Such a fucking insult! Did it ever occur to them I went to the…

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