Episode 317: Literally Knitler (with Jessica the '80s Baby)

Summary

Blocked and Reported – Episode 317: “Literally Knitler” (with Jessica the ’80s Baby)

Podcast Hosts: Katie Herzog (with guest, Jessica the '80s Baby – Blocked and Reported researcher)
Release Date: July 17, 2026

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Overview of the Episode

In this episode, co-host Katie Herzog welcomes Jessica the ’80s Baby to explore one of the knitting world’s most spectacular and convoluted online dramas—complete with accidental swastikas, social media pile-ons, free-speech debates, and high-profile personalities like Stephen West and Carlin “Dr. Cluster B” Borisenko. The show traces how a geometric knitting pattern spiraled into accusations of Nazism and examines the never-ending culture war battles raging in even the coziest internet communities.

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Major Discussion Segments

1. Jessica the ’80s Baby: International Correspondent

• [00:07-04:19]
• Jessica marks her second podcast appearance, sharing updates on her nomadic life in academia (now moving from Vietnam to an undisclosed, “more Sharia” Middle Eastern location).
• Issues discussed: living abroad, using multiple passports, lack of compatibility between expat life and dog ownership, and dark humor about dogs in Vietnam.
• Quote:
  • “This is my longest relationship, you know, this thruffle.” – Jessica [00:36]
  • “Do they eat dogs in Vietnam?” – Katie [04:05]
  • “They do, but only in the North. I was living in the South.” – Jessica [04:10]

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2. Knitting World: A History of Online Meltdown

• [04:19-07:32]
• Katie and Jessica recap infamous knitting controversies:
  • A knitter canceled for a blog post likening travel to India to going to Mars (“terribly racist” [05:33]);
  • A yarn dyer who themed colors after the Salem Witch Trials (“seen as anti-feminist because, you know, 300 years ago is too soon” [05:48]);
  • Crafting cancel culture and the dominance of the Ravelry platform.
• Knitting world is described as perpetually woke—“We are in an eternal 2020 in the knitting world” [07:20].

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3. Knitting’s Latest Enemy: Artificial Intelligence

• [07:32-08:56]
• Recent trend: crafters boycott small businesses for using AI-generated graphics.
• “Most knitters are focused on [AI]. Not a week goes by without another small crafting business being called out…” – Jessica [07:30]

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4. The “Swastika Shawl” Crisis: Stephen West’s Pattern Drama

• [09:13-22:23]
• Main Character: Stephen West—“one of the biggest knitting designers in the world” [09:17]. Known for bold, geometric, and “a bit gay” shawls [10:05].
• The Drama:
  • In 2023, West launched his annual Mystery Knit Along (MKAL); Clue 1’s pattern, when knitted, resembled a swastika (“a hazard of the job if you’re a crafter," [14:39]).
  • Historic and cross-cultural complexity of the symbol discussed (“accidental swastikas are kind of a hazard,” [14:39]; “If you go to the Native American Museum in DC you will see a lot of swastikas,” [17:07]).
  • West’s Response: Immediate apology and pattern withdrawal, plus an alternative version [19:07–19:47].
  • Community Response: Wide debate on Reddit, mixed Jewish perspectives, gripes about reknitting time and loss of “interesting” design (“knitters already invested days making the pattern,” [22:05]).
  • Quote:
    • “After focusing so much on the details… it never crossed my mind that the style and line resembled this horrific symbol.” – Stephen West, apology [19:07]
    • “If you saw a pinwheel or a knot, I’m not holding space for those types of comments… That’s not what this knit along is about.” – Stephen West, video [20:51]

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5. Anti-Woke Backlash: Dr. Carlin Borisenko Returns

• [22:34-29:10]
• Carlin Borisenko—perennial anti-woke firebrand and self-styled victim of knitting cancel culture—leads resistance to West’s pattern removal.
  • Stole and redistributed the original “swastika” pattern; posted threats of creating “unwoke” pattern lines [25:41, 27:41]; knitted the so-called Groyper Shawl in green (pattern’s resemblance to a swastika is “optical illusion, you know” [29:44]).
• Borisenko receives endorsement from Nick Fuentes, raising the stakes (“De Awoke knitters… Nick Fuentes officially endorsed…” [28:20]).
• Quote:
  • “You shouldn't tell people what your revenge is going to be. You've got to wait like two years until the guy who fucked up your water feature forgets about you and then start sending him postcards that say, ‘I know what you did.’ That’s how you get revenge.” – Katie [27:57]
• Reflection on whether the drama was a deliberate right-wing opportunity or just chaos [29:41].

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6. Blocked Magazine and the Knitting Free Speech Wars

• [31:01-36:01]
• Introduction of Neil James ("literally Knitler") and Blocked, an anti-cancel culture, anti-woke knitting magazine (“Blocked will be a refuge for those that find themselves canceled…” [32:18]).
• Neil is “an older English gay guy” who leans into his villain role in the knitting world, with social bios like, “labeled evil Santa and literally Knitler by haters…” [35:33].
• Blocked magazine’s content is a blend of free-speech debates, anti-progressive sentiment, and niche hobby drama.

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7. The 2026 Drama: Stephen West on “Knitler’s” Podcast

• [37:34-48:05]
• Stephen West appears on Neil James’ obscure Mystery Knit Along YouTube channel; claims ignorance of Neil’s politics. Appearance is purely about knitting and non-political [37:59].
• Autumn Eden Goodman (size inclusivity activist on Instagram) exposes the connection, sparking new outrage [38:25].
  • Her call-out post prompts more community pile-on, with responses like:
    • “I never liked Stephen West. Something was off with him.” – @Tinamakesnine [44:20]
    • “Ravelry faves have been purged… is there anywhere I can find a list of other designers with hateful views/politics?” – @Sarahmakes [44:20]
    • “Nazis of a feather flock together…” followed by an argument over whether ‘smooth brain’ is ableist [45:18].
• Stephen West posts a first apology, claims he wasn’t aware and asked for the video to be taken down (it wasn’t) [45:59].
  • “I apologize for using my platform to highlight this interviewer and not diligently looking into their posts and views...” – Stephen West [45:59]
• Many in the community do not accept this, demand further action/accountability [46:50–47:06].

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8. Second and Third Waves of Apologies

• [51:33, 54:14, 65:07]
• West posts a second apology—stronger condemnation of Neil, admits he should have done “minimum due diligence” [51:42, 53:36].
  • “This man is vile. His posts and beliefs are outright lies and propaganda.” – Stephen West [51:42]
• Co-owner Malia Joseph posts her own lengthy apology, identifying as a queer indigenous person “partnered with a transhuman” [54:14].
  • Katie and Jessica debate the oddness of the “transhuman” moniker and the stretching of the term “indigenous” [54:51–55:20].
• Neil James responds with mockery: “If I wanted to harm queer indigenous people partnered with transhumans, do you really think I would have talked to you and bought yarn from you?” [55:27]

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9. Collateral Damage: Secondary Targets and the Art of the Apology

• [55:46–62:56]
• Designer Zanete Hussaina is called out for also appearing on Neil’s podcast (and once, for an “accidental swastika” sweater) [55:46].
  • Her first “non-apology” emphasizes open dialogue:
    • “If we only ever talk to people who already share our views, I'm not sure how anything ever shifts.” – Zanete [57:28]
  • After ongoing criticism on Reddit and Instagram, she issues a full apology:
    • “Please believe me when I say that I am very sorry for the upset my naive ignorance has caused. It's a lesson I've well and truly learned.” – Zanete [61:53]
  • Community reactions still mostly negative—“Please don’t victimize yourself here… that is privilege you have yet to acknowledge.” [62:31]

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10. Legal Aftermath & Fallout

• [63:00–65:54]
• Neil James claims he was reported to police for calling Autumn a bitch (and reported her in retaliation)—Katie and Jessica note the difference in harassment law by country [63:10].
• Neil’s video receives a surge in views, but business returns to normal for most participants [63:51–63:56].
• Stephen West withdraws from a planned yarn fair and takes a lengthy break from Instagram, posting a third—vaguely self-flagellating—apology [64:17, 65:07].
  • “I hear the hurt and disappointment I caused… I’ve been reflecting, reading, having accountability conversations and working with people who have real expertise in this work to help me move forward responsibly.” – Stephen West [64:26]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Jessica, on the knitting world:
  • “If you craft, woke is not dead… We are in an eternal 2020 in the knitting world.” [07:20]
• Katie, on the circularity of cancellation:
  • “You shouldn't tell people what your revenge is going to be. You've got to wait like two years until the guy who fucked up your water feature forgets about you and then start sending him postcards that say, ‘I know what you did.’ That’s how you get revenge.” [27:57]
• Autumn, on political boundaries in creative communities:
  • “I'm seeing discussions… with tones of can't we just knit to—can't we just agree to disagree. And when it comes to the election and human rights, gonna be an emphatic nope for me.” [39:05]
• Katie, on accidental swastikas:
  • “Any pinwheel design can easily become a swastika… It's usually not something you realize until it's too late.” [14:43–15:26]

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Timestamps of Key Segments

• 00:07 – Jessica returns; updates on itinerant life
• 04:19 – Knitting world cancel culture overview
• 07:32 – The rise of AI as enemy number one
• 09:13 – Introduction of Stephen West; accidental swastika
• 19:07 – Stephen West’s first apology (quoted)
• 22:34 – Carlin Borisenko joins the fray
• 25:41–27:41 – Carlin’s threats, stolen patterns, “revenge”
• 28:20 – Nick Fuentes endorsement
• 31:01 – Neil James and “Blocked” magazine enter the scene
• 37:34 – Stephen West’s controversial podcast appearance
• 38:25 – Autumn Eden Goodman begins the latest pile-on
• 44:20 – Reddit/pile-on comments
• 45:59 – West’s first apology for the podcast
• 51:42 – West’s second apology (quoted)
• 54:14 – Malia Joseph “as a queer indigenous person partnered with a transhuman…” statement
• 55:46 – Zanete Hussaina’s secondary cancellation
• 57:28 – Zanete’s initial plea for open conversation
• 61:53 – Zanete’s final apology
• 63:00 – Police reporting, legal threats, video view bump
• 64:26 – Stephen West’s third apology

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Tone and Final Thoughts

Blocked and Reported maintains its irreverent, slyly skeptical voice throughout. Katie and Jessica skewer the absurdities and ironies of the “coziest” internet battlefields, never losing sight of the human foibles that drive both sides. The episode traces how something as niche and supposedly apolitical as knitting can become a stand-in for the culture wars—with accidental swastikas sometimes spiraling into real-life consequences and performative atonement.

The closing notes reflect on the draining, circular nature of public apology culture ("we’re still waiting to see what will be this ‘something specific and visible’ thing," Jessica [65:54]), the chilling effect on even low-stakes community engagement, and the uniquely intense drama that blooms wherever lots of women and online “progressives” gather.

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For Listeners in A Hurry:

• Subject: Knitting world drama—accidental swastikas, social media mobs, and the culture war’s reach.
• Key Player: Stephen West, top knitting designer—accused, apologized, accused again.
• Vibe: “Eternal 2020” in progressive crafting; endless pile-ons and apology cycles.
• Memorable Visual: A green “Groypershawl” pattern, denounced and defended online—right up there with the internet’s greatest Rorschach tests.
• Takeaway: Even the softest of hobbies isn’t safe from the mess and mania of digital cancel culture—especially when geometric design meets online mobs.

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Next Free Episode: August 10th
Primo content will release during the summer hiatus.

Transcript

[Unknown Announcer]

Foreign.

[Katie Herzog]

Welcome to Blocked and Reported. I'm Katie Herzog. And joining me today, while Jesse is wandering around Provincetown wondering where all the girls are, we have our very own researcher, Jessica the 80s, baby. Jessica the 80s, baby. Welcome back.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Thank you.

[Katie Herzog]

So this is your second appearance on the show, and you've been with us now for a while. How long. Do you know how long it's been?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, it's been three years.

[Katie Herzog]

Wow. Congratulations. Three years. That's a long time. That's longer than any job that I have had, aside from this one.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

It's like my. My longest relationship, you know, this. This thruffle. Yeah.

[Unknown Announcer]

Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

So where are you now?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So I'm currently in London temporarily. So I can say. I can say it now like I didn't say it last time I was on.

[Katie Herzog]

Yes.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Sort of concerns about overzealous governments. But I was living in Vietnam for the last three years.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. And this is a place that few people, I think a lot of people guess that you were living in Singapore.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, people kind of thought I was of a higher socio than I am. Yeah, No, I was born and raised in Hong Kong, but I was living in Vietnam. I was working there.

[Katie Herzog]

And just so everybody knows, she is a person of color.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

The color is white, though.

[Katie Herzog]

Damn it. But, yeah. Born in Hong Kong and you've lived all over the world.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I have. I've been in a lot of places. And actually, so I'm in London right now. My mother lives here at the moment, but I'm just here temporarily. In fact, next week I am moving to. And speaking of countries with extremist governments, I'm moving to the Middle East. London. I'm moving somewhere even more Islamist than London. I'm going to the Middle East. And I really don't want to say yeah, much more than that, because, yeah, it's good call.

[Katie Herzog]

Good call.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

Can you tell people sort of why you have this lifestyle or what you do in these places? Because you do have a career outside of producing this podcast.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, I do. I work in universities, so I'm working in education in different places. And in my kind of particular sphere, the place like the places that will give you the most money, the Middle east and are the worst places, pretty much. They're the countries that no one wants to move to. So. And when I say Middle East, I don't mean like Dubai, you know, I'm.

[Katie Herzog]

I'm mean it's real Middle East.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

It's. It's. It's more Sharia, you know, but we'll see how that goes.

[Katie Herzog]

Do you have concerns? I mean, do you have. Will there be a free and open Internet in this unnamed, very sandy country where you're moving to?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I actually don't know. As far as I know, I can use a VPN and that'll be fine. I think the main things they block are porn.

[Katie Herzog]

Sure.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So I'm not gonna affect.

[Katie Herzog]

Who knows? Honestly, you know?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. Depending on what episodes we do, it is the kind of place where I'm gonna advise the embassy when I arrive, you know, which is something I've never done before. Yeah. Just be like, hey, heads up. I'm living here now in case evacuations are needed at some point.

[Katie Herzog]

So for you, would this be the British Embassy? What's your sort of like, home country?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes, I. I have multiple nationalities, but the passport I'm traveling on is my British passport.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Because that's. That seems like the one with the. The. The most likely to protect citizens, basically.

[Katie Herzog]

So do you just pick and choose based on where you're going? If you want to take the red passport or. I don't even know what other colors they have.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I mostly use the British passport nowadays, which is dark blue. I have a European passport as well, but that's kind of only really relevant if I'm in the EU and I don't live there anymore.

[Katie Herzog]

Well, a fascinating life indeed. Not a life that is very compatible with. With having a large dog that you must take everywhere with you.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No, I really want to have a dog, but I can't. And especially, I think. I actually don't know if pet dogs are allowed where I'm going.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah, they might. Well, I don't know if they. If you. Do they eat dogs in Vietnam?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

They do, but only in the North. I was living in the South.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

And like, people in the south are quite proud of the fact that they don't eat dogs.

[Katie Herzog]

Well, hopefully they only the ugly, ugly ones up there in the north.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so we are. We have a lot to talk about today. At the end of this free episode, you have very kindly agreed to stay on and take questions from our premium subscribers. That segment will just be available for primos. So if you want to listen to Jessica the 80s baby answer some very random questions from our listeners, go ahead and join us. Blocked andreported.org but before we get to that, you have a story for me. So what are we talking about today?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, so this week we're going back to a field that we haven't plowed for a while, which is knitting. My favorite. We've covered a number of crafting incidents in the past, but to be honest, there hasn't been that much drama in the knitting world for quite a while now.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. Yeah. So for anyone who is new to the show, the knitting community tends to be very progressive for whatever reason. Libs love fiber arts, I guess. Or maybe it's because it's like a hobby dominated by women and where women gather, conflict follows. I know this from my wife's bravo watching habit. And this community has had its fair share of meltdowns. So can you remind people of a few of our past knitting stories?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, we've had a few. We had the knitter who was canceled because she wanted to go to India and she wrote a blog post about it. Yeah. This was actually the first contact I had with you guys. I suggested this story many years ago. She said it would be like going to India.

[Katie Herzog]

She said it would be like going to Mars.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Like going to Mars. Yes. And so that was, you know, terribly racist. We had a yarn dyer who made some colorways and she named them after the Salem witch trials.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, right. Yeah. Like a Halloween theme.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes.

[Katie Herzog]

And that was a Halloween murder theme.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. And that was seen as anti feminist because, you know, 300 years ago is too soon. Yeah. We've also had a couple of other crafting dramas. We had the historical costumer who wanted to make a dress inspired by one worn in India during the time of the British Empire. Again, cancel for racism. Basically. Crafters cancel each other a lot.

[Katie Herzog]

Yes. This is what we love about them. And there was the Ravelry. Did we do the Ravelry? Was that with you or was that pre your time that.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I think we only ever touched briefly on Ravelry. That was in the same episode as the woman who was canceled because she wanted to go to India.

[Katie Herzog]

Right?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. Like Ravelry banned all Trump band related patterns.

[Katie Herzog]

And Ravelry is this giant. It's forums, it's patterns. It's like the. The online hub for the knitting community. It is.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

And like, I mean, years later, even though there was a time when everyone was complaining about it, there's like, no, there's no competition with it, you know, there's no. No one's made like a blue sky or like a right wing blue sky.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah, like an X. Yeah.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No, like Ravelry is kind of. It's. It's got a monopoly, you know.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. Well, okay, so we've seen it. We've seen a vibe shift in other online communities. I mean, have we, have we seen that in knitting have they abandoned woke? Are they talking about iq? What's going on with the knitters?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Nothing of the sort. In fact, like when we had that episode not too long ago where we're talking about, like, is woke dead?

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I was listening and it made me laugh because, like, if you craft, woke is not dead. You know, it's. It's like, it's. We are in an internal 2020 in the knitting world, you know.

[Katie Herzog]

Great, I love to hear that.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

What's happened instead is that actually AI has emerged a greater enemy than racism. So most knitters are focused on that. So for the last week. Sorry, for the last year or so, not a week goes by without another small crafting business being called out for including AI content on its website or social media. So there are terminally online crafters all over the world vowing to boycott some random small business in North Wales or in Melbourne that they've previously never even heard of. And then the cycle repeats a week later.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. The real pandemic is AI. And is there a lot of, like, what would the word be? Like, transvestigating, but for AI? Like, people posting photos of patterns and being like, is it AI or do people willingly admit that they're using AI?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So basically there's two things. Like, there's AI patterns, which is basically. That's your scammers. Right. It's people on Etsy selling patterns, which are blatantly AI. The cancellations tend to be more of the sort of like, imagine I've got a little yarn store and I'm advertising my sale and I make an AI generated sale graphic.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. Which is. I would do that.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

I mean, I use AI for our images all the time because people love them so much.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, that's the most popular part of the show. But these tiny businesses with like one or two employees, you know, so instead

[Katie Herzog]

of doing a bespoke, handcrafted, photoshopped flyer, they're dumping some info into Claude and saying, making, make this flyer for me. And that's a casual offense.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. And then they're getting a craft snark thread about them. Craft snark being the main Reddit, the main subreddit, which will feature in today's show. Like, that's where the knitting cancellations happen. But AI is not going to be the focus of today's episode. We're going to good old fashioned racism and Nazism.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, hell yes. Okay, so tell me about it. Who's our main character?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Our main character is Stephen west, who is one of the biggest knitting designers. In the world today. In fact, like, he may actually be the single biggest knitting designer currently working. He even has a Wikipedia page, which, you know, most knitters do not. He's famous enough that knitters who are very far removed from the online knitting community know who he is. Like my mother knows who he is. You know, he's 67 years old or at least like, they would recognize his

[Katie Herzog]

style and what's his style?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Putting a link in our notes to his ravelry page. So take a look there and can you describe.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so I'm seeing a lot of very colorful, ornate shawls, bold colors, geometric designs. I think I see a little Fibonacci sequence in there. Mostly male models. I assume that's him and his one black friend. It's a bit gay.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, like the bald guy is him and yeah, he is gay. Like, like most men in the knitting world, he's a. He's a gay American guy. He lives in Amsterdam where he co owns a yarn store called Stephen and Penelope. And he's been actively designing for many, many years. And he really sort of stands out from the field, partly because he's a man and knitting is obviously very female dominated and partly because he has such a distinctive style. And he designs many different things. Socks, sweaters, blankets, even dog clothes. You know, you could, you could knit something for Moose.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, I wonder if I could get him to knit something for Moose out of Moose's hair.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

That would stink. You don't want to do that.

[Katie Herzog]

No, he, he doesn't smell bad. He's not like a normal dog.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

What does that.

[Katie Herzog]

Take my word for it, he smells good.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No, but like, imagine, imagine when like your dog sweater gets wet.

[Katie Herzog]

Well, I wouldn't, I wouldn't wear the dog sweater and Moose wouldn't wear the dog sweater out of the house. This would be sort of an indoor thing. I'd have to use the dog raincoat over the dog sweater.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, at this point we're getting into kind of it's furry stuff. Chaotic territory. Anyway, he's best known for his shawls and his designs usually use two or more colors. As you said, they're bold colors. And he'll use like a variety of stitch patterns in a single piece. So fans would say they're bold and distinctive. Haters would say they're garish.

[Katie Herzog]

I can see both.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, but you know, whether you like that style or not, you can't deny he has a particular point of view.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah, I mean, I would certainly notice if I saw someone on the street wearing one of These designs, I might think something like, why is that faggot wearing a blanket? But I can definitely see the artistry involved. So where does the drama start here?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So it starts with an event. Every year, Stephen runs a mystery knit along. And the concept of a knit along is simple. The organizer, which is maybe the designer, maybe the yarn store owner, picks a starting date, makes an announcement, and participating knitters all make the same pattern. And while the knit along is going knitting, which you know is usually a pretty solitary hobby, it becomes a little bit more social because you can go online, compare notes, check other people's versions of the pattern, comment, and so on. Now, the mystery knit along also adds an element of surprise because you don't see the pattern before you start. That might seem a little odd, but in Stephen's case, the mystery patterns are always shawls or socks, so you don't need to worry about getting the right size or whatever. And while the knit along is going, he'll release a new clue, which is to say part of the pattern every week. So part of the fun is seeing how the pattern evolves over the weeks as you work towards having a finished shawl.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so you're getting a little snippet of the overall pattern, working on that, and then the next week, there's another snippet.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

That's right. Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

And this is a popular event in the knitting world, I take it?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes. Stephen West's annual mystery knit along is a really, really big deal for the online knitting world. In fact, I'd say it's probably the biggest knitting event of the year.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so it's the Met Gala for knitters, but everyone is cozy.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes. So for three months, the entire online knitting world is taken over by Stephen west content. He sells kits so you can get, like, a few skeins of yarn in complementary colors to make the year's pattern. And lots of other unrelated yarn stores will do the same thing. Right. So it's really popular. But there are also. There are always complainers, of course. So people will complain that his kits are overpriced. People complain that the patterns are ugly. People complain that patterns are too ubiquitous. Basically, whether you love him or hate him, during the mystery knit along, you can't escape him. And while the MKAL is running, every time you log into Ravelry, which we've just talked about, you'll be confronted with dozens and dozens of knitters diligently producing their own Stephen west shawl like it is inescapable.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so he's got lovers and haters where's the controversy start?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So our first controversy took place back in 2023. So as usual, Stephen posted the first part of the pattern, people started knitting it and then things went wrong. So Katie, I put an image there in your note, in our notes. Can you see the problem?

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, this is if you squint, a swastika.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes.

[Katie Herzog]

It's like an interlock locking swastika. Like a swastika eating its own tail.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

And was this, this. So this was just a snippet of the pattern, not the overall full.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, I think this was, this was like the first clue. So this was.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, like I think that probably should have held this one off.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

This would have been like starting, you know. Yeah. Really, it should have been the final part.

[Katie Herzog]

Right.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

You know, surprise, you're a Nazi, but you've just spent three months making a Nazi shawl. Whoops. Now I should say accidental swastikas are kind of a hazard of the job

[Katie Herzog]

if you're a crafter.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

It's particularly common if you make quilts. Right.

[Katie Herzog]

Any, you know, my mother in law is a, is a quilt maker. We got swastikas all over this house.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, but you know, like unrelated to the quilts. Right. But really any pinwheel design can easily become a swastika. And it depends on the colors you choose and how you organize them. So like I could be making something with dark and light in one way. You could be making the same pattern with dark and light reversed. And mine could be a swastika and yours could be like a beautiful abstract art. And it's usually not something you realize until it's too late. Right. You're working, you're focused on the little details. Then you finish, you take a step back and you have that like oh, shit moment, you know?

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. You know, I could see this being a problem. We did an episode in the very beginning of the show about a designer in Seattle, Shannon, she's now, she now does the art for this show. Not the, not our beautiful AI generated images, but she does our logos and stuff like that. And Shannon was, she was a graphic designer for a Seattle theater theater company. And this company had to, not because of Shannon, but because of another racial incident which was also kind of. They hired Robin d' Angelo to come in the. Lee Robin d' Angelo hired her company to come in and do a full year's worth of. Of anti racism trainings. This non profit. I don't know how much this non profit theater paid on this. Presumably a lot. Although it was before 2020. So maybe they got discount rates back then.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

And at one point during one of these trainings, Shannon had. So she, they, the theater was playing the Odyssey or showing the Odyssey and Shannon had made a design based on these sort of these. It was like she, she looked up like ancient Greek patterns and part of her design on this poster were these interlocking colors. And during a. She basically got called out by these anti racism trainers for making a subliminal swastika. And you look at the pattern and it's like, yes, if you squint you can see the swastika. But she was saying, like, it's just this is a, this is an ancient Greek design. It's got nothing to do with the actual swastika itself. It's a pattern that, that appears over and over throughout history.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

There's a limit to the number of simple geometric patterns that you can create.

[Katie Herzog]

If you go to the, go to the American Indian Museum or the Native American Museum in D.C. you will see a lot of swastikas because this was like a Navajo design before it was a Nazi design.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

If you use Google Maps, in Japan, every Buddhist temple is marked with a swastika.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, really? Yeah, that's highly problematic.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

The Japanese don't care, you know.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. Have the Japanese gone woke? Does that exist there?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Definitely not.

[Katie Herzog]

What about Vietnam?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Oh, God no. Like generally East Asia and Southeast Asia is an extremely anti woke territory.

[Katie Herzog]

Are they, are they aware of these? Is that just sort of how they are? Or they. Are they aware of these sort of battle lines being drawn and redrawn and all of this cultural shit happening in the US or is it just completely foreign?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, to be honest, that would depend a bit on the country. My friends in Singapore are more aware of that because they're English speakers and they have like more of a connection to the English speaking world. A lot of countries like Vietnam, Thailand, et cetera, they don't pay that much attention to the English speaking world. They're more consuming media from Korea and Japan and they might occasionally hear about these. And it seemed like a really distant cultural thing that you laugh at, you know?

[Katie Herzog]

Right. Like us laughing at like used panties being sold at a, at a Japanese.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Exactly, exactly. Like, like it seems like something you can't really take seriously.

[Katie Herzog]

Right.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

You know? Right.

[Katie Herzog]

What is. So you've traveled all over the world. What, what are the most racist countries?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Oh, that's a good question.

[Katie Herzog]

Where do the United States fall into this?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Ah. Oh my gosh. I might have to come back to this at the end of the.

[Katie Herzog]

You know what, let's do that. Let's save this for the primo.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I need to think about it.

[Katie Herzog]

We're going to get a ranking, folks. Join us.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, let's go for it. Anyway, so back to the Swanstalker and basically Stephen West. Once people started saying, look, there's a swastika, he said he hadn't noticed it. We've got a quote from his post in a Ravel group. So, Katie, can you read this please?

[Katie Herzog]

Thank you all for your input and feedback on the Clue one design in shape. It was absolutely not my intention to create a design that resembles a swastika. After focusing so much on the details of this geometric, retro, wallpaper inspired section, it never crossed my mind that the style and line resembled this horrific symbol. I am working on an alternate version of Clue one today for those of you who would like to knit the same square Clue one shape but with different construction color layout. I'll send this alternate option as a PDF update as soon as it is ready. Thanks so much for your patience.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

And so knitters began proposing their own alternatives. But Stephen actually went a step further. He removed the original PDF altogether. He replaced it with a new version and he explained it in this video. We can watch a clip.

[Unknown Announcer]

I haven't done this before in a previous mcal, but it is necessary and important to do so this year because it was brought to my attention when I released the Clue one on Thursday that the geometric motif of those original instructions resembled a swastika, a hate symbol. Which was obviously not the intention and I was embarrassed I didn't even realize such a resemblance. And I decided to omit those instructions and refocus on a new shape and a new version for this knit along as we move forward with it. And the reason for that is it's not so much about exactly what the lines and shapes are exactly identical to this symbol. It's about the resemblance of it and that it was not. Yeah, not appropriate and it was hurtful and harmful. And it doesn't matter whether you saw that resemblance or not. If you saw a pinwheel or a knot or a. I don't see that they, they can just go on. I don't see that thing. Yeah, if you see it, then that's not what it is. I'm not holding space for those types of comments. And that's not what this knit along is about.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so he doesn't want anyone to continue using the old pattern even if they didn't see the swastika. There will be no Swastikas in the mystery. Mystery knit along. Exactly how did this go over in the community?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, you know, as we know by now, the knitting community is nothing if not dramatic. So there was a lot of debate about Steven's decision and some people applauded him for his quick response. Some people felt that they should still be allowed to knit the original version. And there was some debate about whether or not the pattern actually made a swastika. So for example, here's a comment from Reddit if you want to read this.

[Katie Herzog]

As a Jewish person, I'm extremely tired of people freaking out over, over anything vaguely reminiscent. There are actual neo Nazis out there in the world. We don't need to get worked up over some slightly unfortunate knitting designs. Edited to add. As with all mystery knit alongs, I think this is pretty ugly and I wouldn't make it. I agree, this is pretty ugly. Maybe that's just the colors that he used. It's like, like in the original image. I don't know if that's actually the colors or if it's just a black and white photo, but it's like grayscale.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No, I think that that was like another knitter that wasn't him, his original one. That was. Someone started knitting it in.

[Katie Herzog]

That was like, woo, I know what this is.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Oh shit. Yeah. Anyway, some knitters were also pissed off because like knitting is a slow hobby. It takes a lot of time to make progress and particularly with these like, color work heavy designs like Stephen West's. So people had already invested days in making the pattern and now the design is telling them to rip it all back and start again.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Plus like a lot of knitters saw the new version of the pattern as being more boring than the original because it didn't contaminate, it didn't contain any swastikas. You know, there were no hate symbols. It was less interesting.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah, I know we've talked a bit in the past about this anti woke knitting contingent, which is small but loud. So how did they react to the controversy? Did they knit swastikas in protest?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes, they did. Right, of course. So Stephen west declared that the mystery knit along was a swastika free zone. And of course some people railed against that. And one person posted their correspondence with him on Medium along with a very long essay about how censorship is the tool of Nazis. And actually one of Stephen's most prolific critics was friend of the pod and knitter, Dr. Carlin Borisenko.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh my God, of course she's involved in this. Okay, so There has never been a knitting controversy. Carlin didn't somehow make herself the center of. And for people who don't know that name, Carlin Porcinko, affectionately referred to online as Dr. Cluster B, was somewhat of a recurring character on the show in the early days. She actually ran for governor of New Hampshire at one point as a libertarian from the Mises Caucus, which is the crazy wing of the Libertarian Party, the crazier wing. And I'm very sorry to report that she did not win because that would have been hilarious. She's basically a chaos agent who stumbled into politics because she was annoyed about how woke and anti maga the online knitting community was because Ravelry, which we've talked about, this big hub for patterns, they, they banned Trump. So she wrote this somewhat viral article about this in 2020. Like I didn't leave the left, the left left me, that kind of thing. And she's just a real character. Like she has her. Her PhD from some for profit online university. She calls herself doctor and her dissertation was about workplace bullying, which is very funny if you know anything about her online presence. She is a bully. And if I recall correctly, she worked for New Hampshire Public Radio. At one point she was let go and she then threw a binder at a wall and then burned her New Hampshire Public Radio hat on a grill and then of course posted a picture of that or a video of it. And I haven't kept up with her recently, but the last we spoke about her, she claimed she was kicked out of a Wisconsin water park hotel for wearing a MAGA mask. But the hotel said that she was kicked out for banging on doors and threatening staff, like in the middle of the night.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Was she wearing a mega mask at the time?

[Katie Herzog]

I. I don't know that she was. She also tweeted that Holocaust victims choose their deaths and that Hitler went to heaven. She'd been issued a no trespass order by a school district she doesn't even live in after yelling we know where you live at the school board. And she'd been accused of stalking by approximately everyone she has ever collaborated with. And after we talked about her, she attempted to sick her minions on me. But there was only one person who sent me an annoying number of emails and I blocked the email address and then never. I mean, this person might still be emailing me. I don't know. Let's just say Cluster B is an app nickname for the good doctor. So what did Carlin have to say about Stephen West?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, of course, Carlin is the kind of Person who. An accidental swastika is a gift, you know.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, yes.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, it's a. It's a.

[Katie Herzog]

The fact that it's accidental is unfortunate. She would prefer it just to be a purposeful swastika.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. But for her, it's a beautiful surprise. Right? It's like Christmas has come early.

[Katie Herzog]

Yes, absolutely.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So she posted this on her Instagram. Can you take a look at that, please?

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. It's a screenshot of a. Of a YouTube video. Watch the original West Knits video for clue one. And then the caption says westnits. That's Stephen west has decided to remove his original Clue one video and pattern. Good thing I downloaded it before he did. While I sympathize with the stress Steven has been under by the woke cancel mob, bending the knee to them and giving it is never the answer. Sadly, Steven doesn't know that things will get worse for him now, not better. The authoritarian mob will control Stephen for the foreseeable future. I'm personally really sad about this because there's nothing that can be done when people don't want to fight back. Just because Steven has been the knee doesn't mean we have to. He may want the mob to control him, but that doesn't mean it has to control us. I posted the clue1 PDF and clue1 video for the hashtag West Knits MCall203. I think that's supposed to be 2003.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

2023.

[Katie Herzog]

2023, yeah. On my sub stack for those who want to access it. And I do not need to say the name of her substack. You can Google it if you want. Okay, so she stole his IP and is reposting it without his consent, which, yeah, that's very Carlin move. And let me guess, was she leaving endless comments on his post as well?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes, he deleted them and eventually he blocked her.

[Katie Herzog]

And let me guess again, she posted a screenshot of his blog.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes. She put a caption.

[Katie Herzog]

Of course.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, the end of an era. I can't say this one doesn't hurt. West Knits is ready to dismiss people who question him. Bending the knee to the mob that have been loyal customers for over a decade. I've spent tens of thousands of dollars in your store, Stephen. And Penelope, thanks for treating me like a valued customer, for politely asking you not to dismiss people like me. And then a lot of hashtags.

[Katie Herzog]

Somehow I doubt her comments were polite.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, here's one.

[Katie Herzog]

Just a guess, knowing Carlin here was

[Jessica the 80s baby]

one of her comments. You can take a look at it

[Katie Herzog]

Even don't think I don't have my own little revenge prepared for this. Including taking your shawls, the ones I paid tens of thousands of dollars over the years, modifying the pattern and then creating a whole new line of unwokeness. So she's going to take his patterns and, like, turn them into maga shawls?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. Also, like, you shouldn't tell people what your revenge is going to be. You've got to wait, like, two years until the guy who fucked up your water feature forgets about you and then start sending him postcards that say, I know what you did. That's how you get revenge. Did she knit the swastika?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes. So of course she made a point of knitting the original version and it received a compliment from Nick Fuentes.

[Katie Herzog]

She posted that too, didn't she?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, of course she posted this. De Awoke knitters. You're going to be thrilled. Nick Fuentes officially endorsed the hashtag WestKnitsMKL2023 Ban Shawl on Twitter. Brought together by the love of knitting, isn't life grand and unpredictable? Isn't it?

[Katie Herzog]

You start out making legitimate points about online censorship and cancel culture, and six years later you're knitting swastikas and flirting with a Holocaust denier. Truly a wild ride. Is Carlin a good knitter?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I mean, yeah, knitting is not difficult, really. It's.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah, maybe I should get into that.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

It's just something it really isn't.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Like, all you need is practice, and then. Yeah, it's just something that takes time. It's like. It's like walking, you know?

[Katie Herzog]

Not that good at that either.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, then we have problems. But you can check out her finished shawl here on her Instagram. She called it the groiper shawl, of course.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so it is green, presumably in honor of the groipers and their connection to. Because their mascot is Pepe the Frog, who is also green. So clever. There's. And it's. It's got this. This pattern in it that. Yeah, I mean, it looks it. It's not like. It's not obviously a swastika, but actually, if you look at, like, the dark lines in the center, it looks more obviously like a swastika. The light lines kind of break it up. Do you see a swastika here?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I do, but I know what I'm looking for.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

And I. That's the question. Like, all of this, I'd seen it with the knowledge that people were posting it saying, it's a swastika, and If I hadn't been told that, I don't know, you know, because it's like an optical illusion, you know, you're looking for the. For the duck head or whatever, then, you know, you're. Then obviously that's going to affect the way you view something.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. I mean, if I saw, like, if I saw a random person wearing this, I probably wouldn't think, like, oh, there's a Nazi. If I saw Dr. Carlin B. Wearing this, I would think, yes, that's a swastika and it's on purpose. But that's more. More. It's more personal thing.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

But she'd probably also be wearing like a MAGA hat and waving a. Of some kind, you know? Exactly. Yeah. But anyway, so Stephen west got through the incident largely unscathed. Right. Most knitters felt he had behaved appropriately, or at least the loudest knitters did. He was very apologetic. He made a point of, like, censoring the word swastika every time he wrote it. You know why?

[Katie Herzog]

Is that for algorithms or is that for trigger warnings?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

At this point, I don't even know. You know, I think it's just performance, isn't it? But, like, you know, Carlin Borisenko targeted him. Some people on her side targeted him. But as we know, you can only be canceled by your own side, right?

[Katie Herzog]

Totally. Totally. Yeah. This is never going to work. Sorry, Carlin.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. So that was all in 2023. So now we fast forward to April 2026, when Stephen west committed a far more serious crime than making an accidental swastika. But before we can explain that, we need a little bit of backstory. So we've discussed knitting witch hunts and cancellations in the past. And back in January 2022, a knitter named Neil James started his own online magazine called Blocked. Now, this is not someone copying us. Don't worry. This is a pun. Because blocking is.

[Katie Herzog]

I'm gonna assume, anyway.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, Block. The magazine's closed already, so good luck. But blocking is something knitters do, Right. When you finish knitting something, you wet it, you lay it out, you pin it in a shape that's blocking. So it's a knitting punch, right?

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. Yeah.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Now, Blocked was a publication by and for knitters who had been canceled or who sided with those who've been cancelled. I've got a snippet here of the editor's letter from its first issue here. Do you want to take a look at that?

[Katie Herzog]

Sure. All right. Welcome to Blocked. Blocked is a free to read online publication. Please freely share each issue. We at Blocked are not interested in your race, your sex or gender identity, your sexuality, your size or abilities or disabilities, or religious beliefs or political beliefs, or any intersection of victimhood you may align with with. All are welcome. That would look really good on a yard sign, wouldn't it?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Especially held by Carlin Borisenko.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah, we hope the content herein will delight and offend you in equal measure when something does offend, annoy, and or upset you. And it probably will at some point. You don't have to read it. You can simply turn the page so it goes on and then it ends. Blocked will be a refuge for those that find themselves canceled. When the mob won't listen, we will tell your story. This may sometimes be uncomfortable to read. We may sometimes make mistakes. That's when we trust our readers to let us know.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Now, I'll be honest. I genuinely didn't realize that Block magazine lasted more than its first issue. In fact, Neil James produced 24 issues before shutting it down in December last year, apparently because he's getting older and he's not in the best of health.

[Katie Herzog]

And what would be the sort of like an average Blocked magazine article?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, we've got one here, and the. The COVID is some graffiti that says, freedom is slavery. Big Brother is watching you. In inside content. It says it's going to talk about mansplaining, reminiscing, spelled incorrectly on 1984, and spring into action.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so he's got an array of interests. Interesting. Knitting and censorship. You wouldn't think these two things go together, but we know at this point they do.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Knitting seems to go with a lot of things you wouldn't expect.

[Katie Herzog]

Well, you can do it anywhere. You know, you could do it at a. At a tribunal.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Katie. I've just opened this one. So this was published in autumn of last year, and what. What do you think the first topic is about?

[Katie Herzog]

Autumn of last year. So that would have been. What year was that? 2025.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

2025.

[Katie Herzog]

What was happening? Was that when Trump was elected or that was the year before.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

In September 2025, millions of people witnessed the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, that's right. I forgot. I. I'm sorry about that, Charlie. I did forget about that. So is he pro assassination, anti.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Um, he's anti assassination, pro knitting. Not sure how those two go together.

[Katie Herzog]

Interesting. Maybe Charlie Kirk was a knitter.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Um, I don't think he was.

[Katie Herzog]

He should have been. You know, that would have been sort of cute and relatable if he'd been on those stages debating college students knitting

[Jessica the 80s baby]

at the Same time it would have been. Yeah, a lot. A lot more interesting. I think I would have liked him more now. Block magazine and Neil James have always been like really niche concerns in the knitting world. The first issue, so this was the biggest one, had 30,000 views and no other issue ever came close to that. The final issue had about 5,000. Neil himself is this older English gay guy who started the magazine to defend people who had been canceled.

[Katie Herzog]

Valiant effort. And does he have a cancellation origin story himself? Usually there's something personal that gets people into this business.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No, actually he hadn't previously been at the center of any scandals. He doesn't design patterns or sell yarn, so he's never had a business that people could target, apart from this free online magazine. And he's anti woke. He pops up from time to time to attack left wing knitters. But I mean, he's no Carlin Morosenko.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so he's basically a conservative and a very progressive hobby and this is his outlet.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes.

[Katie Herzog]

And how did the community respond to this magazine?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, he was widely criticized, of course, and he sort of leaned into it. So if you look at his Instagram profile picture, you can see he's aiming both middle fingers at the camera and he's got the slogan, you can't cancel me thrice. And if you read his Instagram bio,

[Katie Herzog]

it reads labeled evil Santa and literally nitler by haters. Okay, that's funny. So now I reclaim these insults as usernames. Most thing you've. Most things you've heard about me are lies.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

And he's his Twitter bio for good measure.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. All lives matter. It's okay to be white. There are only two genders. Abortion is murder. Adult human, male. And. And what?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

And he's got two flags.

[Katie Herzog]

Two flags that is. He's got the. The Israeli flag. And what's that first one? Is that. What's that?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

That's the English flag.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. The English. The English flag is a. Just a. A has just a cross.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, it's like. It's the Cross of St. George.

[Katie Herzog]

I should have known that. What sort of stuff does he post?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

His content is a mixture of knitting and politics. I've got an example of the latter, which is a comment on the recent anti Semitic stabbings in London. If you want to read this.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. He says too many immigrants have settled in the UK from cultures where they believe Jews, gays, adulteresses and apostates should be executed. Golder's Green is a high density Jewish area. If Jews aren't safe there, then they are not safe anywhere in the uk. This is what happens when pro Palestiners demonize Jews. This is on you. Pro Palestiners. First the Jews, then the gays, then the Christians. Learn what the phrase Sunday follows Saturday means and you'll know what comes next. Is that a common Britishism? Sunday follows Saturday?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I've never heard it.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, all right, I'm getting, I'm getting the picture here. Cantankerous older gay men who just not respect the younger.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, pretty much. Now, since finishing Block Magazine, Neil is focused on his own very small YouTube channel called Mystery Knit along, in which he and his co host, a woman called Shauna Stitches, knit various patterns that have been released as Mystery Knit Alongs. I watched a bit. The videos are just Neil and his co host knitting and chatting about knitting. And they suffer from the same thing that all knitting videos suffer from, which is that knitting is really not a spectator sport. So his channel has fewer than 500 subscribers. There's no discussion of politics or cancel culture or anything like that. It is just knitting. Then on the 10th of April this year, Stephen west made a guest appearance on Neil's livestream.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, now that is a twist. Did Stephen west know what he was getting into?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No. So it seems that Neil and Stephen had met at a yarn show in Manchester. Stephen didn't know who Neil was. They got on well and Neil invited him to come on the YouTube channel

[Katie Herzog]

and he apparently did not Google him first. Okay, so what did they talk about on the show? Like, did Steven agree that it's okay to be white or did they just do knitting?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No, it's just a pleasant, friendly chat about knitting and the designing process. There's really nothing controversial, nothing political, nothing interesting, to be quite honest. Just knitting talk. It's not even worth playing a clip. Right. It was just very normal. Stephen didn't publicize it on his own social media. It seems he thought he was just chatting with some fans with a very, very small YouTube channel.

[Katie Herzog]

I assume he has since learned to Google the host before you accept the podcast invite. Well, what happened?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes, so it was immediately highlighted by a woman named Autumn. Eden Goodman. Autumn runs an Instagram account called Size Inclusive Collective, which is all about size inclusivity in knitting patterns. Autumn considers a 59 inch or 150 centimeter chest to be inclusive.

[Katie Herzog]

That's a big chest.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

That's a very big chest. And that's going to take a lot of yarn.

[Katie Herzog]

Yes.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

She does not appear to agitate the smaller sizes, which are also often missing from patterns. But on this account, she highlights patterns which are inclusive and sometimes calls out designers for making patterns. Sorry for not making patterns that are big enough. Okay, so here's a post to give you an idea of what Autumn is like. You can read this.

[Katie Herzog]

She says, I'm seeing discussions happening with tones of can't we just knit to. Can't we just agree to disagree. And when it comes to the election and human rights going to be an emphatic nope for me. We aren't talking about throwing versus flicking or that sounds sexual. Or magazine loop versus DPNs or whether pineapple belongs on pizza, by the way. It does. Pineapple is good on pizza.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Oh, yeah. Agree.

[Katie Herzog]

Good. I'm glad we can agree on that. Why. But why does everything have to be political? That's in quotes. Because everything about my page is political. It serves folks with an X who are traditionally marginalized just for existing and larger bodies. Fatphobia is literally rooted in misogyny and racism. Yes, the maker space is full of a lot of white women, myself included. But MySpace centers and serves fat, disabled, queer and non binary makers across a diverse spectrum of ethnicities and financial backgrounds. Question for you. All right. She says that fatphobia is rooted in racism.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Do you want to know the most fat phobic countries?

[Katie Herzog]

I'm guessing it's Asian.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, I would say pretty much all of Asia. Yeah, well, all of east and Southeast Asia. Oh, yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

Was that. Was that an import from the west or do they do that all on their own?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No, there's this, there's this myth, I think, quite common in the west that sort of Asian beauty standards are due to white supremacy or whatever.

[Katie Herzog]

And like skin lightening, things like that.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. And it's really. I mean, it's not true because those have been their beauty standards for hundreds, if not thousands of years. And it's also the typical kind of what we call the bigotry of low expectations. Right. The idea that, you know, these people couldn't possibly have developed anything without white influence. But. Yeah, like, because also the sort of standards of being very, very slim.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Like it. Which, which is the beauty standard in eastern Southeast Asia is far more so than the west, you know?

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. Do. Are there. I mean, when you. Do they have fat people there?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

They do, but not very many because like, basically things. People will speak in ways that just. They don't speak about. They don't.

[Katie Herzog]

Right.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

People will speak about things in ways that they don't in the US or in Europe. You know, people will open. You will openly tell you, hey, you're looking Fat.

[Unknown Announcer]

Yeah.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

And actually I remember one once being in Bangkok and I was. I somehow ended up in a mall with a load of plus size clothing stores. And the plus size clothing stores have names like Fatty, Fatty Fat Fat and I love Calories and Miss Fatty and things like that, you know?

[Katie Herzog]

That's amazing. That's amazing. Although there, I assume that part of that is just like translational differences. Like my. My sister, after college, she went and taught English in Japan for a year. And I remember distinctly she sent me a photo of her. She had some, like a. Just like a pan, like a cooking pan, and the brand name on the bottom. You know, they would put English words on shit that they didn't really understand. And the brand name was Marinated Retard.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, I mean, there's always a bit of, you know, here are some fun words, but yeah, right.

[Katie Herzog]

It's like, I mean, then again, here it's like, I know people from the 90s who got like, con, you know, kanji symbols that mean probably marinated retarded are tattooed as tramp stamps on their backs.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Exactly.

[Katie Herzog]

No idea.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Exactly. But, yeah, like, basically this is a part of the world that could actually really use people like Autumn Eden Goodman to show up and, you know, start railing against that phobia.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, so I guess I'm guessing that Autumn is not the type of person you want aware that you did a problematic thing on the Internet.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes. So Autumn, I guess, must have subscribed. Must be. I've been among the 500 subscribers to Neil's channel because she immediately shared Stephen's appearance on the Size Inclusive collective in this Instagram post, which you can read here.

[Katie Herzog]

It's Friday, and here's one big. What the. The same magazine that shall not be named who dubbed the west knits call that's Knit along the Swastikall and even went on to say. And then she's quoting Neil. What's Neil's last name here?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

James.

[Katie Herzog]

Neil James here. I guess Stephen west or his moderator couldn't bear that I received more positive responses than negatives. Only one view is permitted. Wes has nailed his colors to the mast. Where I once had every sympathy for him, now I have none. His actions will embolden the bullies to engage in witch hunts against those who dare to knit, slash, wear the original clue one. Okay, so Neil James had criticized Stephen west several years before. I guess three years before during Swastika Gate. And then he had him on his YouTube show.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes. He had been written about in the magazine. Right.

[Katie Herzog]

And then Autumn concludes This with it appears that swastikal was a compliment. And surely Stephen must know who he's hanging out with. Hard pass. All right, so how did people respond

[Jessica the 80s baby]

to this call out now, some confusion, I think, partly because Autumn was so determined not to name anything. That does make it a bit hard to for people to understand what you're going on about.

[Katie Herzog]

True.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

And Neil, as I said, like, he's really not that well known. So the comments are things like people saying, what am I looking at? Yeah, yeah. But of course other commenters were eager to join in the classic knitting activity of piling on. We've got some examples here if you want to take a look at them.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. Tina makes nine says I never liked Stephen West. Something was off with him. That sounds homophobic. Sarah makes common common name in knitting world. She says ravelry faves have been purged. I haven't actually knit any of his patterns yet. Now I never will. Without wanting to promote snark, is there any anywhere I can find a list of other designers with hateful views slash politics? I really want my money to be spent with small businesses I am proud to support. And the black sheep knitter says, I want to say that maybe Wes was unaware, but going on a podcast without informing yourself seems unlikely in 2026. The swastika controversy from a few mcals ago, that's mystery net alongs ago now has me wondering.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So Autumn also shared it on the subreddit crafts not which I mentioned earlier and which is really the epicenter of most knitting witch hunts. And of course most of the comments immediately went anti Stephen West. My favorite comment is this one which is discussing Neil's co host Shauna. Just read the first comment in that thread.

[Katie Herzog]

Nazis of a feather flock together. There are far more than 800 or 2k disgusting bigoted smooth brain knitters in this world. So yeah, the 2k followers of Shauna know and endorse. So this is talking about. Yeah, I GUESS she has two, 2,000 followers. And then someone says, hey, just so you know, smooth brain is an ableist insult demeaning people with actual smooth brains. And there's apparently a term for that licensephaly. All intelligence based insults are ableist, but even some people who know that don't realize that this is one if they didn't know this particular type of disability exists. And the ab and the adjective describes real people. Well, that is new to me as well. Did Stephen west apologize after this backlash?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, so Stephen west quickly issued an apology. He put it on his Instagram it says here I participated in a YouTube live interview earlier today. I was unaware of the opinions and comments made by one of the hosts, including harmful posts and attacks on marginalized people in our crafting community. Those actions do not reflect my own opinions or values and I apologize for using my platform to highlight this interviewer and not diligently looking into their posts and views which absolutely do not align with my values. I have asked that they remove the interview content and posts. I've closed the comments as I do not want to spotlight them or allow my platform to aid in their harmful posts.

[Katie Herzog]

Did Neil James remove the video?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No.

[Katie Herzog]

And how did this go over?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, he kept the comments turned off and of course that means that it's not good enough.

[Katie Herzog]

Right? Right.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. If you want to have a look at this Reddit post by emotional gear8950

[Katie Herzog]

Bruh, you disable the comments so you don't have to deal with the follow up from your actions and then someone else replies. If you have time to disable comments, you have time to do a basic Google search of who is hosting you on their podcast.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah. And of course Autumn continued to lead a witch hunt here. So here was her response to that.

[Katie Herzog]

She says the apology slash I didn't know tour has begun and I'm not buying it. 1 this is not the first time they've met. You can see them together at the Textile festival in Manchester. 2 He's thanking them for having him. Neil has block stuff on his profile as well as having an actual block page itself. 3. Why would Stephen 349,000 followers on Instagram plus another 666,000 on YouTube need to spend time on a podcast with 403 followers? Not knowing is ridiculous and I don't for a second believe that a person of this level of popularity doesn't spend a couple of minutes online checking out who he is supporting. Anywho, do with that information what you will. I personally like to know where my money goes. So she does not buy his explanation here. She thinks that he obviously knew who Neil James was and he must endorse his views.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes, she's. You know they've been seen together at a knitting festival before, so presumably they were there talking about how much they love swastikas.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah. Do you buy this at all? Do you think it's possible that he actually does endorse or agree with Stephen West? I mean he looks like a middle aged gay man. Like it's totally possible that he is kind of anti woke, is it not? Although he did apologize for the swastika thing.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So, yeah, like, I think it's extremely unlikely. Or you know what, if he does have any of those views in private, which is possible, I think he's smart enough to never vocalize them publicly. Because if you're a big name in the knitting world, if he turned around and started sharing something that J.K. rowling had written or something like that, destroy his business. Oh, my God. Yeah. The fallout would be insane. Right? And everyone knows that. So I think it's far more likely these two men met at a knitting festival. They probably talked about knitting because, you know, you're there, you're buying yarn, you're talking about knitting patterns. They got on talking about knitting and then, you know, Steven appeared on his podcast because he enjoyed talking about knitting with Neil. Right, yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

You know, and for a major figure like that to bestow a podcast with a few hundred followers with his presence is a very generous thing to do. I'm sure he's a busy guy.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes. Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

And the unfortunate thing about this, he probably wouldn't do something like this again.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I would say definitely not. Right. Because this has shown you have to vet so carefully anyone who you have any, have any connection with. And it's actually kind of sad because you know what? One nice thing about having a hobby like knitting or, well, really any kind of non political hobby is that, yeah, potentially I could meet someone at a knitting festival and have completely opposite views from them and not know that because we're only talking about yarn, you know, and it is quite nice to have a day off from talking about politics.

[Katie Herzog]

Right. And I'm sure that the fact that there had been this prior controversy about the swastika and then now there's this secondary controversy about going on this guy's YouTube show. I'm guessing people, you know, put some connections there together there.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So suddenly the swastika incident was seen in this sort of new, far more sinister light white. Right.

[Katie Herzog]

Not an accidental swastika. A no on purpose swastika.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

A secret, deliberate swastika.

[Katie Herzog]

Although, I mean, although that doesn't even really make sense because Neil James, politics are obviously. He's got an Israeli flag on his. On his Twitter profile, he wrote, he wrote, he's like obviously more pro Israel than pro Palestine.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, but you know, Nazis nowadays are Israeli. Don't you know?

[Katie Herzog]

I have heard that. Yes.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, but, but yeah, so like the idea is if you are a secret Nazi, how do you spread your message? First of all, you knitting, convince knitters to secretly knit a Swastika symbol when they realize you cancel it completely and then you wait three years, go on a tiny YouTube channel and have a conversation about knitting.

[Katie Herzog]

Totally, you know, being canceled or have. I mean it. Stephen west was not canceled during that first, that first controversy. But have. But having your moment at the bottom of a dog pile like this often does change people and it makes people hyper aware of censorship and cancel culture and group like mob behavior.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes.

[Katie Herzog]

So I would be curious to know his real views on all of this,

[Jessica the 80s baby]

but I think it'd probably have to get him very drunk to find them out. But anyway, of course he issued a second apology, which you'll find here on Instagram.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. He says, I've heard the call from people wanting me to clarify my position on the right wing knitter I allowed to interview me in the this past weekend. This man is vile. His posts and beliefs are outright lies and propaganda. And the harm he has caused people in our community makes me deeply ashamed. I didn't know who he was when he approached me at my booth at Textile in Manchester. When he emailed me requesting an interview, he shared his YouTube channel and the Shauna Stitches social media. Neither of which showed the deeply hateful content I have since found on his personal profiles. But that's exactly the point. All it took was a basic search to find his bigoted post and particularly this harassment of women in color and particularly his harassment of women of color in our community. So, okay, so a couple things here. First, it's interesting that Neil James sent him Shauna Stitches social media and not his own. It seems like he was probably deliberately attempting to distance himself from his own views so that if he clicked, if he, if he clicked, you know, Neil James's Twitter profile or Instagram and he sees it's okay to be white, he's probably saying no. If he sees, if he sends his co host and it's like nice woman knitting, much more likely to say yes to the, to the. Yeah, and, and then, and then harassment of women of color. I mean, what's that this about? Who did he supposedly harass?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So this is one of those things where there's a lot of drama but not a lot of stories. As the editor of Block magazine, Neil would often have some beef with a knitting designer over something and they would both kind of whine at each other about the like saying the other one was harassing them. Right. So I spent a while looking for more concrete, specific examples of actual harassment, but I just found, I hate to say it, but just the kind of Histrionic crap. That happens a lot in spaces dominated by women and gay men.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. And Steven continues. I should have done that. Minimum due diligence. I didn't, and I am ashamed of the association I allowed as a result.

[Unknown Announcer]

Result.

[Katie Herzog]

This was irresponsible, and I apologize for the harm it caused, especially to those who have been directly targeted by his behavior. So how did this. Are we on apology 22 now?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

This is the second apology? Yes.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. How did Apology 2 go over?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

The comments are mixed. Some people were like, hey, shut up. Focus on knitting. Other people were angry, you know, you're not doing the work. Do better. And a lot of people still had no idea what exactly this was talking about right now. His business partner, Malia Joseph, who is the co owner of the Ste&P yarn store, also made a statement. And I want to read a little bit of this one as well.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. All right. She says, the past few days have been hard. I felt genuinely disappointed in my friend and colleague both for this mistake and for our reticence to be publicly vocal about his values to anyone who has been feeling similarly. I'm sorry it took me a few days to move through the initial panic and get here. I wish I had responded sooner or more. Clearly, she's kind of drawing him under the bus here.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well, there's one line in it that really got my attention, which was this one she said, says, as a queer indigenous person partnered with a transhuman, the views held by the man who interviewed Stephen affected me personally and deeply. So, first of all, this weird phrasing about partner with a transhuman. I was quite excited.

[Katie Herzog]

Yeah.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yes. But I went through her Instagram. Her partner is a butch with a quiff.

[Unknown Announcer]

Right.

[Katie Herzog]

Not a robot. Yeah.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

No. I was hoping this was going to be one of these I'm in love with my AI situations.

[Katie Herzog]

The next evolution.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

But also, she refers to her there as herself as indigenous. Right. So Malia is a Samoan American who lives in the UK and runs a business in Amsterdam, which is kind of stretching the definition of indigenous far, really far beyond all logic.

[Katie Herzog]

She should have gone with immigrant or possibly gentrifier.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

And how did Neil James, how did he respond to all of this?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

He posted a screenshot of her statement and wrote in the caption, malia, if I wanted to harm queer indigenous people partnered with transhumans, do you really think I would have talked to you and bought yarn from you? Also, is transhuman someone who thinks they're not human or a human who says he or she Is trans. Very confusing.

[Katie Herzog]

I agree with that.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Now, a few days later, Autumn, the fat, inclusive influencer, called out another designer, Zanette Hussaina, who had also previously appeared on Neil's podcast. She'd been the other guest on the show. So she's a fairly big name, nowhere near the level of Stephen west, but she's very much someone who's on the right side of history. She raises funds for Palestine through her patent sales. She does things like that. Funnily enough, though, she's also been called out before for an accidental swastika, which is a real reach. If we take a look at this one, there's a photo of it here in the notes.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay, let's look at this one. Yeah, this one. It's a woman wearing a very soft sweater. I cannot see Hitler wearing this sweater. It looks like a. Like a snowflake pattern. Or maybe that's barbed wire from the. From the camps. I'm not. I'm not really seeing the swastika. I mean, I guess I. You know, again, it's. It's interlocking lines.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

It's diagonal lines.

[Katie Herzog]

Yes.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Right. If you're gonna say that anything with diagonal lines is a swastika, you know, then like cancel the multiplication symbol, you know?

[Katie Herzog]

Right. And did she apologize for going on. On his show?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

She actually put a kind of a non apology in her Instagram stories. I'm gonna it here, she says. Before going on the podcast, I watched the full back catalog of that channel. God knows why. Like I said, it was. It was very dull content. Nothing I saw raised concerns for me, and if it had, I wouldn't have agreed. I'll be honest. I don't research people's history before having a conversation with them. I check people as I find them, and I try to believe in the good in people. I know that's not how everyone approaches these things, and I understand why some people feel differently. I also believe that disagreement isn't always a reason to stop engaging with someone. If we only ever talk to people who already share our views, I'm not sure how anything ever shifts.

[Katie Herzog]

Okay. She's a reasonable centrist. I'm. I'm with her on this. I. I do think it's far more. This question about who to engage with is obviously more fraught for public figures, as Stephen west learned, like, one conversation can become a PR crisis. One conversation could destroy your business. And only a certain type of person is going to risk the brand for this vision of the world. But the idea that we're never supposed to converse with people with different politics is so, so corrosive. You know, I, I actually, I saw an example of that not long ago here in Washington state. So there's this anti tax, anti big government activist in this area. His name's Brian Haywood. He's definitely conservative, libertarian type. And he runs a group, it's called let's Go Washington. And they do things like they oppose tax increases and they're involved in with this initiative that will appear on the November ballot that if it passes, it would bar trans girls from participating in women's women and girls sports. It's very controversial and Brian Heywood is really seen as a boogeyman in parts of Seattle and Western Washington. And during the USA Australia World cup match in Seattle last month, he posted a photo of himself with another local politician, King County Executive Grimai Zahala. He's very progressive. And they had this nice. Or Brian had this nice caption and his post about different sides coming together and a moment of celebration and patriotism.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

That's quite nice, isn't it?

[Katie Herzog]

It was good. It was totally good. And then Hannah Krieg, this former stranger reporter, she was fired. She's come up on the show before. She was fired for covering up an affair between a stranger editor named Rich Smith. Again, that's Richard Smith of Seattle, Washington. He slept with a sitting city council member. And Hannah was fired during the fallout from that. Oh, she basically, she and a co and a. And a coworker, like, lied to, like cover up Rich's affair.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Did Rich get fired?

[Katie Herzog]

He had already been fired.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Okay, okay.

[Katie Herzog]

So Hannah had public. So after this Brian Haywood post, she publicly called out Grimai Zahale and he Apollo. And he apologized. He just completely rolled over completely. Like, he just. It was so dispiriting. The moment an activist journalist was like, you are bad. He was like, yes, I am bad. And I'm not saying that no one is beyond the pale like some people are. There are plenty of podcasts I would not go on on. And if you're going to converse with truly controversial radical figures, you need to press them on their. Like, this was the problem with Tucker Carlson interviewing Nick Fuentes or Tim Dillon interviewing J.D. vance. It's not that they spoke, it's that they didn't ask probing questions. But the general principle that there are good people and bad people and you shouldn't sully yourself by engaging with the other side is just. It's so toxic. And so I, I commend this woman. What was her name? Zanette. Zanette. I commend her for not giving into this impulse. But how did people react to her statement?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So this video we've got here from an account called Caricraft Geek is quite a typical reaction. We want to see. Take a look at that.

[Katie Herzog]

I think her statement really speaks to a sort of live and let knit attitude about oh, can't people who disagree still talk to to each other? And maybe she was going on his podcast to have it out about these issues. Okay, but that's not what's going on here. What's going on is she went on a podcast, didn't research the person she was speaking to, and unwittingly amplified and normalized him. You know, I want to hate this, but I think what she's saying isn't that different from what I just said about Tucker Carlson and Nick Fuentes ways. Although from what I can tell, like this guy Neil James, it looks like his having it's okay to be white in your Twitter bio is definitely a bit sus I I For the record, I do think it's okay to be white. I wouldn't put it in a tagline, but you know, like if someone went on Cluster B's podcast for a nice little chat about about knitting and didn't mention all the psychotic she's done, I would certainly judge them either way. I'm I'm taking it Zanette's non apology did not go over well.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Well no. So she deleted most of the comments that were made on her Instagram. But of course there was a bit more witch hunting on Reddit, a bit of a pile on on the craft snark subreddit and eventually that backlash got a second apology out of it out of her. If you want to read this here

[Katie Herzog]

from her Instagram y she says she she tags Autumn the size inclusive inf influencer. She says thank you. I am genuinely sorry for not checking his social profiles before engaging and if he had brought up brought any of this nonsense up during our conversation, I would not have stayed quiet one bit. Please believe me when I say that I am very sorry for the upset my naive ignorance has caused. It's a lesson I've well and truly learned. That is it is a very effective way to teach someone a lesson is to attempt to destroy their reputation.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, but of course that was not enough of a lesson as you can see from this response.

[Katie Herzog]

Fox and fleece says taxer and says please don't victimize yourself here. Your story lacks your story response lacks accountability and critical thinking. You are removed from the severity of the situation because you are privileged and you've yet to acknowledge, let alone do anything about that. What is she supposed to do about her privilege?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

I don't know. Like get a tan.

[Unknown Announcer]

Yeah.

[Katie Herzog]

Maybe she should give all her of her knitting away to starving Gossens.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Probably. Yarn is expensive.

[Katie Herzog]

All right, so. So where do things stand now?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So Neil James claims that Autumn reported him to the Greater Manchester Police for calling her a bitch and for making a false allegation of doxing her.

[Katie Herzog]

Is calling someone a bitch online a crime in the uk? I honestly would not be surprised.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Probably not if you do it once. So harassment law is pretty broad in the uk, but speech must be grossly offensive, threatening or intended to cause distress.

[Katie Herzog]

It's kind of vague.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Anyway, he responded by reporting Autumn to the police, but he probably won't.

[Katie Herzog]

She's American, right?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, exactly.

[Katie Herzog]

So you can call people a in America. That's totally fine.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Exactly. God bless the United States. But in one respect, this is a happy story. Because after Autumn called out Stephen West, Neil James's video got over 10,000 views.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, well, a very happy story indeed. Any updates from the other characters in this saga?

[Jessica the 80s baby]

So Zaneta Hussaina has made no further comments. She's back to posting as usual. Everything on her end seems to be be back to normal, business as usual. Stephen west has taken it a bit more to heart. He took a long break from Instagram after his second apology. Now, he's a really big influencer. He usually posts every day, but he had more than three weeks offline, which, you know, for an influencer, that's a lifetime.

[Katie Herzog]

Probably in a psych ward.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

He pulled out of a. Of a yarn fair that he was planning to attend, and when he came back, he got a third apology. Here, if you want to read that.

[Katie Herzog]

I've read your comments, all of them. I hear the hurt and disappointment I caused and I hear the gap between what I've said and what I've shown. I. I'm not going to respond to everything here, but I want you to know I've been doing real work. Not just sitting with discomfort. I've been reflecting, reading, having accountability conversations and working with people who have real expertise in this work to help me move forward responsibly. What comes next won't be another statement. I guess three is enough. It will be something specific and visible and I'll be sharing that with you in the coming weeks. Not as a gesture, as something you can hold me to. Thank you to all. Thank you to those who have spoke honestly, whether you stayed or stepped away. I hear you, you and I'll still be here doing the work. A couple things. First, this sounds like it was written by Chat GPT.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

It does, doesn't it?

[Katie Herzog]

Yes. There's going to be another scandal over this. And second, I really hope that what comes next will just be another knitting pattern that's going to be his gift to the community. Will be another pattern that you can purchase for the low, low price of 17.95.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Maybe he's gonna make a mystery knit along and it turns out to be the progress flag.

[Katie Herzog]

Oh, let's hope so.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

God, I would ask my money back. But anyway, that was six weeks ago. He hasn't mentioned anything on the subject since. You know, he's just gone back to his regular schedule. So we're still waiting to see what will be. There's something specific and visible and actually at the time that we're recording this, there was a thread on Craftsnark a couple of days ago because he hasn't actually done anything specific and visible like he promised.

[Katie Herzog]

Steven.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Yeah, his annual mystery knit along usually comes out in October. So we'll have to wait and see what happens with that this year.

[Katie Herzog]

He should make it easy on himself and just do a plain white hood. Yes. All right. Thank you so much for this story and for being here. Great to talk to you as always.

[Jessica the 80s baby]

Thank you.

[Katie Herzog]

You're going to stay on and answer questions from our Primo subscribers. If you are not a Primo subscriber and you want to hear that, join [e-mail] help keep this show going. One note, we are going to be taking the next two weeks off of the free show for summer break. Jesse is, I will be hopefully on vacation. Jesse is going to be hopefully finally, finally finishing his book. We will have Primo episodes and that time. So if you want to get your fix and to hear Jessica the 80s baby tell all with our AMA, join [e-mail] Otherwise, Primos, we will be back on August 10th. So thanks for listening and and we'll

[Jessica the 80s baby]

see you in a few weeks.