An Open Letter to Vic Mignogna

Hey, Vic.

I saw a clip from your most recent Unlocked video, and it’s upsetting because it doesn’t seem that you understand what’s actually happening. I’m neither your close friend or confidant, but I think you need to hear an honest voice — Or maybe just a different point-of-view.

Your behavior — which you have already admitted has been inappropriate and that you claimed you would seek counseling for — has caused severe problems with your ability to get work and convention invitations.

You decided to go to court and sue some of the people who were speaking about your behavior and their experiences with money raised by an angry, vitriolic loudmouth. He (and the lawyer he recommended to you) have done tremendous damage to your reputation that far exceed anything that anyone has ever said regarding your behavior.

You’re certainly correct about one thing — You‘ve developed a bad habit of trusting the wrong people.

Nick Rekieta is using you for his YouTube-based culture war agenda. I have a strong suspicion that Ty Beard and Nick Rekieta don’t care if you end up dead in the ground, as long as they get paid for the flowers at the funeral.

You seem very concerned about unknown people using you and your situation for clout, but you need look no further than these two that almost no one had ever heard of before you enlisted them in your court battle. When your attorney — a man you trusted to protect you and your interests — went on Nick’s stream and asked for help to make people’s lives miserable, it sent a very strong message that you’re not the affable and kind person that I’ve met a few times at conventions. His continued employ in your service sent an even stronger one.

Their impact to your reputation is almost incalculable. Nick raised a lot of money, but his persistent attacks on others have converted a considerable number of folks who were neutral about you into people that actively celebrate any perception of your failure.

I’m not among them, of course. I’ve never advocated that you should lose work or get dropped from conventions. Even after you grabbed Dayna without her consent, I still looked forward to sharing convention guest space with you (and I did, in Phoenix). I didn’t think that you were a malicious or unkind person, simply that you didn’t always understand the way your behavior affected people. I’ve never thought for a single moment that you legitimately intended to be unkind or thoughtless.

But your recent statements are starting to feed doubt that’s only been growing over the past year.

The documentation put forward by the defense in your lawsuit has put your questionable behavior into sharp relief with your long-stated and deeply-held religious beliefs. Your actions and decisions — no one else’s — have converted your reputation from an occasional laughingstock among the inside-baseball convention crowd into that of a vengeful, litigious person with a tremendous ego that would be dangerous for anyone to hire.

While we’ve never spent a lot of time together, I don’t think that’s who you are. More importantly, I don’t think that’s who you want to be. The people that pay to see you on Unlocked or the crowds that show up to your events probably aren’t the people that need to hear from you the most right now.

You need to have a long and honest conversation with a talented and outgoing guy named Vic Mignogna.

I hope this letter finds you in the best of health, and with all the hope in the world that you can find a way to turn this around. I think you’d be surprised at the number of people that feel the same way.

Emmett