The REAL Steve Levicoff???

Discussion in 'Off-Topic Discussions' started by Steve Levicoff, Mar 10, 2017.

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  1. Steve Levicoff

    Steve Levicoff Well-Known Member

    Nice try, Kiz, but no cigar. I never look him up, but once every six months or so I look me up - to see if there's anything new that needs my attention (such as people publishing my books online without permission).
    Perhaps. If that's the case, the good posts are mine, and the obnoxious posts are the other guy.

    But seriously, as a moderator, you would be the first to know if I were doing that. When I was trucking around the country, Chip once told me that I had more ISP's than any other member - makes sense, since I was constantly traveling. But now that I'm retired I use only one or two ISP's and they're generally in the same city. I assume that mods can detect a user's ISP, so you would already know if anyone else were posting under my name.
     
  2. Kizmet

    Kizmet Moderator

    Yeah well I still think it seems pretty stalkerish. As for the posts, at least you recognize that they're obnoxious. Maybe there's hope for you.
     
  3. Rich Douglas

    Rich Douglas Well-Known Member

    By Emo Phillips:

    Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, "Don't do it!" He said, "Nobody loves me." I said, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?"

    He said, "Yes." I said, "Are you a Christian or a Jew?" He said, "A Christian." I said, "Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?" He said, "Protestant." I said, "Me, too! What franchise?" He said, "Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?" He said, "Northern Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?"

    He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist." I said, "Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region." I said, "Me, too!"

    Northern Conservative†Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879, or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?" He said, "Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912." I said, "Die, heretic!" And I pushed him over.
     
    newsongs likes this.
  4. Steve Levicoff

    Steve Levicoff Well-Known Member

    This joke is soooooooooooo old - even older than Emo Phillips.
    FWIW, however, here's his live version:
     
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  6. nosborne48

    nosborne48 Well-Known Member

    Clearly Dr. Levicoff has reached the level of spiritual discipline and enlightenment that allows him to bi-locate. Common enough in the Middle Ages.
     
  7. nosborne48

    nosborne48 Well-Known Member

    Or perhaps he is merely beside himself.
     
    Johann likes this.
  8. Is Bi-Locate the new dating service for poly folks?
     
  9. Filmmaker2Be

    Filmmaker2Be Active Member

    My last name is not common and there is only one other person with my name; however, she has a different middle initial. I found out because I discovered a second Facebook account with my name, and I knew it wasn't mine. I thought my account was spoofed and sent a DM telling whomever it was to stop using my name. I got no reply, but noticed that the name changed to include the first letter of her maiden name as her middle initial. Now, it's showing her full maiden name as her middle name.

    My last name is so uncommon that I know that I'm somehow related to anyone else with this name. When I was in Navy boot camp, there was another recruit there whose last name was Gash. I got her mail a few times, so I'm sure she probably got mine. Then, one Sunday in boot camp we both went to the same church service and ended up sitting right next to each other. That was the first and last time I saw her. In the few words we were able to sneak and speak to each other, I think I remember her saying she was from Missouri.

    I didn't know it then, but I know now that she's a relative. Our namesake had a lot of children, including several sons. The family originally settled in western North Carolina. For some reason, the patriarch decided to move to Missouri and all but two of his sons went with him. I descend from one of the sons who stayed behind (slave rape). My boot camp cousin descends from one of the sons who moved to Missouri.
     
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  10. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    That's quite a story - I'm sure there would be a book in it - or (from your forum-name) a movie, if you wanted there to be one. Now you know your boot-camp cousin has roots in Missouri - have you thought of reaching out to her? Maybe she knows even more of the story than you do -and there's a chance she'd want to talk about her story to someone related.

    As a guy who didn't know who he really was until he was nearly 75 years old, I take a real interest when I hear a story like yours.
     
    Last edited: Jun 30, 2020
    Filmmaker2Be likes this.
  11. Filmmaker2Be

    Filmmaker2Be Active Member

    There's definitely a book in it. I just don't know how well-received it would be. What are the implications of a Black American woman, the descendant of slaves, writing a book and proving that she is a direct descendant of most of the royal houses of Europe? So far, I've traced back to the 800s on one twig of a branch, and all the way back to Byzantine emperors on another twig on that same branch. I'm blood related to Queen Elizabeth and her husband... and Attila the Hun... and a Russian Tsar... and also a Holy Roman Emperor - and that's just for starters, LOL. I'm still not finished following the paper trail. I might only be about 14% European, but a big part of that is royal blood.

    So, yeahhh... that might not go over too well coming from me. But, that's never really stopped me from doing anything I wanted to do before, so I kind of don't have an excuse. But, I don't even know where to start writing a book like that; there's so much information. I would need someone to help me and/or an agent and a publicist. I don't even know how to put out feelers because this subject is so delicate. :emoji_thinking:

    European history becomes much more interesting when you have a personal connection to it, LOL.
     
  12. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    Might well be much better-received than you think. After all, didn't a Black American woman marry into the Royal Family, only a couple-three years back? I wouldn't be surprised if Her Majesty and His Royal Highness invited you to tea, as soon as they heard the news.

    Whatever you do, don't forget the other 86%. There are likely people in many places in Africa who can recite accurate genealogies back to the days before your ancestors were taken from their people. What they know might be surprising. Remember Alex Haley. This is not made-up stuff for American tourists.

    Holy Cow! And I thought it was something, when I discovered one of my 19th Century ancestors was the first person in Somerset to own a bicycle!
     
    Last edited: Jun 30, 2020
    Maniac Craniac and Filmmaker2Be like this.
  13. Filmmaker2Be

    Filmmaker2Be Active Member

    Thank you for the encouragement! About Meghan, though... She doesn't claim to be Black. My community is done claiming people that won't claim us. So, she can't come to the cookout. I highly doubt any royals, anywhere, will invite me to meet them and have tea. Even if they did, I wouldn't go.

    No, I certainly won't forget the other 86%. I'm working on that too, but it's much harder. Johann, I hate to be the one to tell you this, but Alex Haley's Roots was more fiction than fact and he plagiarized another man's novel. I think he used the few facts he had about his ancestor, Kunta Kinte, as a skeleton and then used details from the other novel to fill out the story. Haley got sued and had to settle out of court, where he was forced to admit his plagiarism.
     
    Johann likes this.
  14. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    I guess I never caught on to that, about Meghan and I think your community's decision is appropriate. Well, one more of my balloons popped, but I learned something, so it's all good.

    Balloon #2 just popped. Again, a valuable lesson for me. Thanks. I still believe your story would fascinate a lot of readers / watchers - and that there are Africans today who could shed a lot of light on your direct ancestors there.
     
  15. Filmmaker2Be

    Filmmaker2Be Active Member

    It's not as bad as it seems. She acknowledges that she's half Black... but she identifies as biracial and not Black. That's her choice, but it still irritates me because she's only claiming biracial because she can pass for white. Biracials who can't pass for white identify as Black: Halle Berry, Barack Obama, Tracee Ellis Ross and Evan Ross (Diana Ross' children) and actor Shemar Moore (SWAT) are examples. As an actress, she was banking on her looks to get roles reserved for white women, so she pretended to be fully white and defaulted to "I'm biracial" when pressed.

    You never see her with unstraightened hair, and that's on purpose. I've seen a picture of her when she was a teen and her hair is a dead giveaway - so she keeps it blown out, or maybe even chemically relaxed. Jennifer Beals (Flashdance) pretended she had no Black in her and now, even if she wanted to, she can't come to the cookout. :p We're done with people claiming us only when it's convenient or "cool" for them to be Black.

    And, that includes Carole Channing. She waited until her career was good and over and she was in her 80s to "announce" that she had been passing for a white woman her whole life, after finding out as a teenager that her father was a Black man. But, Clark Gable can come to the cookout. He didn't try to hide that he was Black and even demanded that movies he worked on treat Black people fairly.

    It's one thing to not hide it but not address it until it's brought up, and then saying "Yes, I'm Black". That's what Wentworth Miller (Prison Break) and Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson did. It's another thing to purposely try to hide who you are and then default to "I'm biracial" when you get found out, which is what Meghan Markle, Jennifer Beals, and Vin Diesel (notice that he keeps his head shaved) did. We don't want them. We defended Meghan because nobody else was, but she can't come to the cookout. She's a step-cousin, LOL. In the family, but not in the family. We will come to your aid in an emergency, but that's it. :D

    Don't get me wrong, Roots was still ground-breaking. I think my story would be fascinating in a voyeuristic/ reality TV type of way, and I'm fine with that as long as I can sell some books and get paid. :D

    GEDmatch has given me some clues as to what African ethnic groups my DNA matches the closest. I've been matched with ethnic groups all over Africa, including the Horn of Africa (Ethiopian Jews and Tigrinya/Tigre from Ethiopia and Eritrea) and every country in the Maghreb, except Tunisia, including North African Jews. So, as the old folks used to say, "there ain't no tellin".

    I can pay $300 to AfricanAncestry.com to take a DNA test that will attempt to match me to a specific tribe with a high percentage of accuracy, but that still wouldn't be the whole of me. It'd be better than nothing, but would still be limited because as a descendant of enslaved Africans - who were deliberately bred like livestock on plantations and breeding farms (horrific, but true) - I'm some of everything.

    When I found all this out and put it all together, I started singing "We Are the World" and "I'm Every Woman", because "it's all in meeee". :D:D:D
     
  16. Johann

    Johann Well-Known Member

    Right, it's not. I'm still dazzled. Meghan can do no wrong. :) And she says she's both races. That's the undeniable truth.

    Seriously, it's probably easy for me as an outsider to do this - but I don't blame anyone you named for what they did. I blame a society that rewards people in many occupations (it used to be pretty well all) munificently for masquerading as fully white and penalizes them heavily for known Black ancestry - or makes it necessary to hide in any way. You, of course, have the privilege of blaming any of them - I don't. I think they played by what they saw as "the rules" and the rules were/are wrong and need to be changed. And if you think I'm wrong - you can blame me too - I can take it.

    When I did the Ancestry bit - I was kind of disappointed to find I had zero Black ancestry, as far as they could tell. I play a lot of blues and I've always hoped I'd find a bit of Africa-via-Mississippi-or-Texas blood that would relate me, however distantly to John Lee Hooker, Lightnin' Hopkins or maybe even Blind Lemon Jefferson. All they could do for me was find <1% South Asian and <1% Iberian Peninsula - so I added them up and figured I was 2% Indo-Portuguese. That would have to do me.

    And yes - I knew about the breeding of slaves. They never told us in school (that was the 50s after all) but it was in all the historical novels . . . they sometimes had a lot more truth than the textbooks. I wasn't surprised when I learned some of the novelists were Black.
     
    Last edited: Jul 1, 2020
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  17. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    I'm not concerned about how other people identify themselves, partly because it's none of my business, and partly because I don't see why people in the 21st century should perpetuate slavemasters' one-drop rule when it comes to who gets to identify as what.
     
    Johann likes this.
  18. StevenKing

    StevenKing Active Member

    I can only imagine life had mom and dad opted for the "ph" option.
     
  19. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    True. You could have gone by your middle name, maybe?
     
  20. Neuhaus

    Neuhaus Well-Known Member

    One way to reclaim your internet search history would be to do something noteworthy in between that book you wrote when Bill Clinton was still a young up and coming politician and trolling a web forum...

    -blows on coffee-
     

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