Secrets, secrets secrets

I received the following message via email the other day:

Mr. Krauss,
If the Guild you say is so secret, how can tell everyone about it? Won't they kill you or something? I would.

First of all, if you're going to insist on formalities, it's Rev. Krauss. I may not take confession or pass out fucking crackers and wine at the Holy Snacktime, but I'm ordained, damn it.

Secondly, you're missing some words.

Finally, I never said it was secret; the Guild doesn't give a shit if I tell people, because on the large scale, nobody will ever believe it.

Let me elaborate: The Guild refers to its existence (and the existence of vampyrs) as "the secret we tell everybody." The only level of awareness we care about is what we call global credulity. If anybody ever found any bit of evidence that could prove beyond a doubt to the world that the Guild and vampyrs exist outside of bad novels and tv shows, we'd suppress it. But other than that, talk away. Everybody will think you're crazy anyhow.

The only reason we care about this minor level of secrecy is that we don't know how people would react to this nasty bit of information, and whether or not they'd get in our way. The Guild is not officially sanctioned by the United States, or any other government (save some small, useless bits of land in the Eastern bloc), and we don't want to see the work we do federalized. Plus, people are nuts; I guarantee within 6 months of such a revelation, some hippy lobbying group would start putting bills on the table to protect the rights of these blood-drinking fuckwits.

But short of world-wide acceptance of our existence, we encourage people to study up on vampyr mythology. That way, if you're ever in a position to actually see this shit with your own eyes, you won't be a total fucking moron about it - you'll at least have a context with which to focus your paranoia.

Occasionally, we have to use non-Guild contractors or friends of victims to take care of vamp problems. We avoid this hocus-pocus bullshit and tell them straight-out what's up. The few who felt like telling people about it afterwards ended up on heavy doses of anti-psychotics at their local nut farm.

I take that back. One wrote a book, which was made into a movie, which sucked rectum and tanked at the box office.

A few years back, we had a bit of a publicity scare. A particularly repudiated reporter found some verifiable evidence about a vampyr colony in the north Bronx. The Guild was all a-flutter: "Are we going to have to kill him? Blah blah blah." Turns out, all it took was sending a smooth talker in to explain to this guy what would really happen to his reputation if he brought the story to the Times. The conversation didn't last long.

Oh, and by the way, you'd kill me? No, I'd laugh in your face while I beat you about the head with your own leg.