A few nights ago, after taking an Ambien and looking through old DMs, I thought, “Parks Denton seems too nice to me—what if he’s a catfish?” I searched his name on Facebook and Instagram and nothing came up. I was immediately convinced he was indeed a catfish. I felt like a gay Latinx Veronica Mars!
The next day I shrugged it off as me having taken an Ambien (which can often lead me to order things from Amazon and eBay that I can’t actually afford). I mean, after all, lots of people don’t have Facebook or Instagram, right? And there was no way a catfish could have the same Twitter account for literal years like he did…right? Incorrect, dickhead!
If you’ve been anywhere near Twitter or, more specifically, Gay Twitter™ recently then you’ve seen tweets about Parks Denton. He was a catfish that got called out by a woman named Sarah, who is apparently the best friend of the real Denton (which isn’t his name, just his face).
You can read all about it here and here. But what I’m here to tell you is I’m 34 years old and this is my first time ever being catfished and it was insane.
I followed @ParksDenton back about a few weeks ago. His avi was of a cute pale ginger lookin’ twink and, like most people on twitter, I’m vapid and followed back this attractive guy who liked my tweets and replied to them with compliments.
The night he DMed me (which was very close to his end), it was after I’d tweeted this:
He replied, in my mentions, with something like an eyeroll emoji and I replied back with that image of Rihanna looking over it on a jet ski. That’s when he slid into my DMs to tell me how attractive I was. I’ve blurred out the avi since it’s not really the person I was speaking to…
But I was immediately weary. I’ve had such a depressing summer and what gay man on Twitter is actually that nice out of nowhere? I even messaged my friend David to talk about how weird it was. I literally said I felt like “Carrie at prom”—so subconsciously I knew I was being tricked, no one is that nice.
Our conversation went on and off nearly all night. He was aggressive and nice and kept telling me nice things about myself. He also kept apologizing for being so forward and saying he was drunk. He kept saying things like, "I promise I'm fun in person."
And where my story differs from everyone else’s story about him (because mine does overlap with the other stories), is that he then started to tell me how he was always the villain and I didn’t know how bad he really was. I’m no Jessica Jones but I do believe he was actually drunk (or at least, unraveling) when DMing me. I don’t know if I buy he was ever a copywriter or had “recently moved to NYC” like he told me—but I do believe something was wrong (which like, duh). We discussed our mutual love of Carly Rae Jepsen and our mutual dislike of the city of SF. He said he took the job in copywriting to impress his evil ex. His story then ended up taking a really dark and insane turn (especially taking into consideration it was all probably fake). He told me he moved to NYC from LA for a new start. That he stole a good friend’s boyfriend in LA, and then got dumped by that boyfriend and that’s when he moved to NYC. Then the big news dropped—he said that good friend who he’d stolen the boyfriend from, attempted suicide.
I then spent the next few hours talking a catfish into reconciling a friendship with a madeup friend. I almost want to believe there was some kind of truth in there somewhere? Half of me is telling this story hoping someone will be like, “OH WAIT, I do know who that is!”
But, I mean, Jesus, aren’t there better things to catfish someone about? He wasn’t conning me into sending nudes, he never did (which is not fucking okay that he’s done that to friends of mine), he wasn’t conning me into giving him money (and good luck with that, my card was declined over the weekend)—he was conning me into talking him through some probably madeup reconciliation with a probably madeup friend who he’d said had attempted suicide. At the end of the conversation, I gave him my number and said I was going to the gym (because I’m a vampire who likes to go to the gym at 11pm). He told me his phone was dead and across the room but that he’d text me.
The next day I DMed him to make sure he was okay. I was legit concerned about this person I’d just started speaking to. He said it went well and it was sweet of me to check in with him.
We didn't speak much after that. Two days later, he messaged me to say no one was giving him attention and he wanted to makeout. I replied “Text me, dickhead” because I’m very charming and also felt like something was off and didn't want to DM. He said he would as long as I didn't call him mean names and then he didn’t.
Then I took an Ambien and searched for him on other social platforms. The following day he was outed as a catfish. I’m not someone immune to trolling—hell, I’ve had to double my Xanax dosage in the last year. But this was the weirdest kind of trolling/catfish. He honestly just wanted someone to talk to and say nice things to. So, if that’s all catfish want to do with me—then sign me up. I could use the ego boost.
And, when I first saw he was a catfish, I immediately thought it was one of the Awful Gay Men who had trolled me in the past. But no, those guys were obvious and mean. I really think whoever was behind Parks Denton was probably some random person who really wanted to be a part of Gay Twitter™.
Or, I could be totally fucking wrong and maybe had a long DM conversation with a guy who once nearly drove me to suicide. Or maybe it was Taylor Swift. Only time will (or won’t) tell.
Facebook: Ian Carlos Photography
Twitter: @ianxcarlos