The following articles recently came to my attention:
https://www.vulture.com/article/neil...man-madoc.html
Spoiler:
According to the podcast, which quoted Gaiman through his representatives, his position was that “sexual degradation, bondage, domination, sadism, and masochism may not be to everyone’s taste, but between consenting adults, BDSM is lawful.” (Gaiman declined to speak with me despite multiple requests, but through a legal representative, he responded to some claims.)
If you know nothing about BDSM, Gaiman’s claim that he was engaging in it with these women may sound plausible, at least in some cases. The kind of domineering violence he inflicted on them is common among people who practice BDSM, and all of the women, at some point, played along, calling him their master, texting him afterward that they needed him, even writing that they loved and missed him.
But there is a crucial difference between BDSM and what Gaiman was doing. An acronym for “bondage and discipline, dominance and submission, and sadism and masochism,” BDSM is a culture with a set of long-standing norms, the most important of which is that all parties must eagerly and clearly consent to the overall dynamic as well as to each act before they engage in it.
This, as many practitioners, including sex educators like Dossie Easton and Janet W. Hardy who wrote some of the defining texts of the subculture, have stressed over decades, is the defining line that separates BDSM from abuse. And it was a line that Gaiman, according to the women, did not respect. Two of the women, who have never spoken to each other, compared him to an anglerfish, the deep-sea predator that uses a bulb of bioluminescence to lure prey into its jaws. “Instead of a light,” on
https://nymag.com/magazine/toc/2025-01-13.html
"Call me Master" entitles Gaiman's photo on the front cover
Gaiman's sexual life and proclivities since the 80's are now exposed to the light, and it's a dark manipulative light.
Does this sort of revelation reduce his readability?
Is his personna part of his readability?
Dunno ...