Short Take: Remembering FritzMuffKnuckle

He was a regular at the SJ Hotel bar for years, but as occasionally happens, didn’t come in one day.

At a subreddit called “Bad Cop, No Donut,” a mod who went by the handle FritzMuffKnuckle started having some doubts. He reached out to me. He had an issue with a poster there, a guy who said he was a lawyer, who appeared to be knowledgeable about the law, and who was schooling others about the “meaning” of stories posted. He asked me whether this commenter was for real, knew what he was talking about.

Fritz was annoyed by this guy, as he derailed threads and, to Fritz, was kinda nuts and made people stupider. Fritz was mostly right, and we talked about it. His sense was right, even if he wasn’t clear on the details. As a subreddit mod*, he felt it was his job to not let the place get any worse than it naturally was. 

Fritz and I became friendly, and Fritz would send me links daily. Sometimes, many times a day. And he would take SJ posts and put them up on BCND. That would cause people in the BCND community to stray to SJ, and they began commenting here. Eventually, the one-eyed lawyer did too, pontificating as he had on Reddit. He was not warmly received here. In fact, most of the commenters from BCND found SJ inhospitable.

Eventually, I asked Fritz to stop linking SJ posts at BCND. Most blawgers appreciated the links, as it brought eyeballs. I took a different view. I wanted eyeballs, sure, but only the ones that, in my view, contributed to interesting and illuminating thought. Wild-eyed ignorant rants of the sort that predominated on BCND were neither desired nor appreciated. At Reddit, such stupidity was applauded and validated. Here, not so much.

But Fritz was a regular here, and always welcome. Until one day when he didn’t come anymore.

Fritz eventually moved on to other interests, and I haven’t heard from him in a couple years. That’s one of the weird things about the internet. People come. People go. People are suddenly in your face out of nowhere, and then they disappear. Poof. No clue why. I sometimes wonder if they’re okay, if perhaps they got cancer or were in a car accident. Sometimes, I ask and find out. Other times, I never hear back.

An email arrived yesterday from a relative of Fritz. I got an answer to the question of what happened to my old pal. On January 10, 2019, FritzMuffKnuckle took his life.

Some of you, and you know who you are, have written me over the years about the problems you’ve faced, the personal and professional harm you’ve endured. The nature of criminal law draws in a lot of people who are angry, frustrated and suffering. Some of you have thanked me for what I write, telling me that it helped them to know that they weren’t alone, that there was someone else who understood what they have suffered. Some of you sought help from me that I couldn’t provide. I’m no wizard. I can’t fix everything. I can’t fix most things.

I missed Fritz before. I miss him still. I wish I could have done more as a friend so that this didn’t happen, not that I’m so narcissistic to believe that this was about me or that I had the capacity to fix Fritz’s world. But losing a friend, even if only an online friend, is still painful. Rest in peace, Fritz. i’m sorry that I didn’t do more to help.

*Years ago, Fritz was un-personed as a mod at BCND, even though his name remains listed there to this day.

This was a hard blow to Fritz. His efforts to bring accuracy to a subreddit were unappreciated and let to his ouster. Let that be a lesson.

11 thoughts on “Short Take: Remembering FritzMuffKnuckle

  1. Skink

    Hail FritzMuffKnuckle!

    I obviously have no idea why he ended his life, but I generally get it. Life is hard, and lawyer-life is much harder if done right. Sometimes it makes sense to decide when you’ve done enough. It’s a decision made by many lawyers, even those having success beyond expectation.

    Everyone should put a big, wet kiss on a pal today.

    1. SHG Post author

      There are a lot of alienated people on the internets. You can feel it oozing out once in a while, and you get the sense that it’s going beyond the point of disaffection into something more serious and nefarious. But when does it cross the line of being something that threatens a person’s life? It’s hard to say. It’s only afterward that you realize it happened and you missed it.

      1. Fubar

        It’s only afterward that you realize it happened and you missed it.

        Richard Cory

        Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
        We people on the pavement looked at him:
        He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
        Clean favored, and imperially slim.

        And he was always quietly arrayed,
        And he was always human when he talked;
        But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
        ‘Good-morning,’ and he glittered when he walked.

        And he was rich – yes, richer than a king –
        And admirably schooled in every grace:
        In fine, we thought that he was everything
        To make us wish that we were in his place.

        So on we worked, and waited for the light,
        And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
        And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
        Went home and put a bullet through his head.

        — Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869 – 1935)
        — from The Children of the Night, 1897

  2. B. McLeod

    A “subreddit.” That sounds awful. But then, bringing accuracy is a chore in most places. Increasingly, as the various subjective “truths” supplant notions of objective facts.

  3. Noxx

    I’ve been a member of varying online communities since Usenet. Losing online friends is weird and unpleasant. I often wondered what extent of loss I was entitled to, after all I didn’t “really” know the deceased. I still miss a lot of them more than people I “knew” out in the world. I can’t seem to get my thoughts to coalesce without telling a long story, so just, empathy offered I suppose.

  4. Jake

    RIP FritzMuffKnuckle. I was sad to see his comment history over on the Reddit is no more. It gives me significant comfort, in those dark moments deep into the night, to know all our thoughts will continue to exist in all the places we publish and converse online in perpetuity, or until someone pulls the plug on this wild experiment, we call the internet. You have given the memory of an internet pal more than most would expect, and for that, I appreciate you.

    1. SHG Post author

      There are a lot of people with whom I’ve interacted online over the years. Some I’ve met IRL. Others, not. But to me, they’re real people who became a part of my life.

  5. John Barleycorn

    Mr. FritzMuffKnuckle, if you happen to carve out any spare time in the afterlife rumor has it haunting GoDaddy and WordPress is pretty fun and if that gets boring I am sure a few precinct houses ought to keep you smiling.

    Rest in Peace….

  6. Patrick Maupin

    RIP, Fritz.
    And kudos to you for noting his passing, and even more kudos to his relative who had the presence of mind to notify you.
    We are daily inundated with news of the demise of random strangers — sure, other people die, we get it.
    But how many people who had a positive influence on us died without us having a clue? Could my first or second grade teacher still be with us? Seems very unlikely. Stalin certainly had it partly right — the statistic of millions of daily deaths doesn’t move us much. But even a single random tragic death nearby doesn’t invoke the same reflection and compassion as the death of someone within a few degrees of separation of us.

  7. Casual Lurker

    I always feel sad when I hear these stories. Mostly because I know they were, for the most part, preventable. But usually not by people who don’t have close day-to-day contact with the person. So don’t blame yourself.

    PSA: The problem is getting people into treatment. The sooner the better. Everyone has many reasons for not seeking treatment. And close friends, family, and other relatives are usually reluctant to be pushy for any number of their own reasons. Free advice: If you’re close enough to see the signs, be pushy!

    One problem I often see is where folks try to self-diagnose and self-treat with all kinds of nonsense. The Internet is great for many types of research. But leave medical diagnosis and treatment to those who are trained professionals.

    However, for knowing when and where to seek help, there are many good sites that list warning signs, risk factors, where help is available, Etc. Punch “Signs, Suicide, Depression” (without the quote marks) into your favorite search engine. Many search specifically for “suicidal ideation”, which is a high risk factor. But other factors, like despair, hopelessness, and others the average person would not think to look for, are far more common, especially in the early stages.

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