Sunday night, a friend Jade Vixen (Edythe Maa) and her boyfriend came home from dinner, where an angry stalker shot her boyfriend. That same individual, a fetish client not unknown to the Dominant women of New York and Philly, then kidnapped her at gunpoint drove her around in his car and molested her. Only by using her charm and wits was she able to convince him to let her escape with her life after four hours of a car ride through hell.
But none of these incidents compare to the rape she is now experiencing in the news media, especially here in Philadelphia.
I first learned of the incident on Monday afternoon, before anyone knew that killer David Kreig had finally taken his own life. It was already a sad day as I learned of the death of a friend just minutes before learning about what happened to Jade. I didn't want to make the trauma public out of respect to Jade. What could I (or anyone) do?
On Tuesday, the Philadelphia Inquirer ran a small non-inflammatory piece about the incident, which was a huge relief to me. Having a violent stalker is every woman's nightmare, and the mainstream world is often unkind to women who work in the adult industry. So I was prematurely relieved that the news had kindly overlooked the sensational aspects of Jade's life and loves. But now the episode has gone public at high speed.
The Daily News didn't even break the story until after the New York Post plastered Jade on the cover yesterday. Today's story manipulated her tale into a B-movie plotline where femme fatale "Jade Vixen" plays a villainess who destroyed the lives of two (innocent?) men. Masturbatory embellishments regarding "sissy-slut training" and descriptions of photos featuring her (in a jumpsuit) "squatting with her legs spread," left an especially foul taste in my mouth. Killer David Kreig was described as having "seemed like a nice guy" after several paragraphs detailing Edythe's sexual proclivities.
As if the print copy weren't inflammatory enough, http://phillynews.com ran online slide show of copyrighted photographs from photographers who are clearly not on the Daily News payroll alongside anonymous racist, sexist and personal comments (including the Jade's cell phone number) in what seems to me an almost criminal encouragement of future harassment and attacks. Thankfully, some of the most offensive comments, including her now-disconnected phone number have been deleted, but the damage is done.
To know Edythe "Jade Vixen" Maa is to love her. She is an intelligent, generous and kind person, which is very likely what sent David Kraig into a fit of obsession. Her only crime was having treating this disturbed man with compassion after repeated episodes of harassment.
The crimes of the news are more numerous and more severe.
Jade has donated her modeling services and dozens of hours of her time to several independent artists, designers, retailers and charitable causes yet the Daily News didn't see fit to balance this information against salacious and potentially disturbing details about her sexuality found on the internet.
Right now, it unfortunately seems as though any online fantasy post about Jade is going to become part of a public feeding frenzy of quasi-pornographic publishing masquerading as news. I can't imagine its going to be very much fun for a woman who has just lost a lover at the hands of a lunatic.
Please keep Jade in your thoughts and prayers.