Ladies and Gentleman, forum readers, friends, "enemies", Nintendo fans a like. This is my first truly serious, and last ever, post in the "Fun House."
It has been brought to my attention that I was naively mistaken as to what goes on in here. I also believe that I retaliated negatively because I was harboring a lot of resentment from the past. But I realize now, through talking to some good friends who have pointed out where I was mistaken, that I wasn't behaving well as I thought I was. You see I originally created "THE RAT" as my own version of Slim Shady, you know who Marshall Mathers, Eminem is well when I was a teenager I lived in a town in Nevada where I was the only white kid. I had a rap persona because I was a DJ in a hip-hop group. When the group slit, well I took it hard so I became frustrated and took over as primary rapper. Yes at the time I was less mature than I am now and I was a hateful person.
When I came to this forum, it was at a time when Game Cube was winding down. I was frustrated as a gamer from going into game stores like Game Stop and being criticized for asking for Game Cube stuff. Anyways after a while I began mixing my offline frustrations with my rap act into a persona that I played because it was therapeutic for a while. Then real life got me down, I became a major jerk and pushed all my friends away. This was the time I became somewhat harsh towards non-white people because being the only white kid in a ton of non-whites and being hated for it, well it made me bitter. So I started mixing that aspect into the character I was playing.
When I FIRST came here I guess I didn't compose myself well which garnered some negative reactions. Fair enough but I mistook some of it as bullying and retaliated accordingly. As you can see my spelling and grammar have greatly improved. I chalk much of that up to my college degree in journalism, had to write a lot of papers and spelling is important.
Well over time when I was pushed into really frustrating anger I lashed out, I said hurtful things and was banned. I took it personal and kept coming back partly to continue to lash out, I regret that. I also kept coming back for the same reason I came here, to talk about Nintendo. Also to keep in touch with a few online friends that I have become somewhat close fond of over the years.
So for all my past sins, I am sorry and I am officially and formally dropping the rat persona for good. Also you should all be pleased to know that through the last two years of therapy, school, and now having the greatest job I have ever had, I am far more emotionally stable than I was. Since I made mistakes by making false assumptions I will put those in the past and start over just sticking to the Console forum and talk back for the time being. Just to be clear I will from now on only be posting as me, my real self, not as "the rat" so my tone, style, prose, and views are going to change as I will no longer be playing a character that I should have let die years ago. Or better yet never created in the first place. I put part of the blame on MTV for idolizing Eminem back in the day.
I hope going forward I can show you people I really am a decent person and stop digging up the past. Stay cool friends.
Richard A. Todd,
aka (formerly) the rat.