Alright, here's the skinny on this little feud that's started brewing between cottygee.iwarp.com and the EGroup, "GayHugeCigars"...

Back in June 2000, I re-submitted my web site to the "Top 6 Search Engines". I also re-worked my "keywords" at the same time, hoping more folks looking for cigar info would make their way to my site. And, in addition to the "Top 6" search engines, I submitted to several others, one at a time. So, when I started seeing more hits, I was pleased.

I started checking my web site stats more frequently, trying to figure out which search engines were bringing up the hits. And lo and behold, one day, I see a hit from this "EGroup", and the words "gayhugecigars" are in the URL.

Well, to say the least, I thought this URL was pretty strange. I went to the web site, and took a look at what was there.

I was pretty revolted, to tell the truth about it. There was a link to this one guy's web site where he's smoking this 300 ring gauge cigar, wearing nothing but a jock strap. And there was this other web site where some guy from the U.K. is trolling for men interested in receiving anal sex, and playing a submissive role to his dominant role.

I was grossed out - particularly at the thought of some gay guy looking at the photos I took when we were in TJ and getting his (sexual) jollies. I mean, you know what these guys are thinking about and probably doing as they look at my picture lighting up my Puros Indios Chief. And really, that's not at ALL what this web site is or has ever been about!

So, I sent an email to the guy who is the "moderator" of the GayHugeCigars EGroup, asking him to remove the link. No response. So then I sent a complaint to EGroups, and asked them to please ask this guy to remove the link. And guess what - no response, again.

Well, the more I thought about it, the more I felt like I wanted to make a statement about this. I mean, what business do these people have sexualizing me and my friends? What business do they have treating us like some "object" for their jollies? As far as I'm concerned, they've taken something that was pure and wonderful, and turned it into something offensive - to me, anyways.

So I decided to take action.

I really don't give a hoot what people do by themselves. I don't care what lifestyle they choose to live. I just don't want to have their lifestyle interfere with mine! In keeping with these sentiments, I put up what I thought was a fairly nice request to cease and desist. That's the July 4th message.

But then the hits started coming in bigger than ever!

7/19 - Well, my nifty html editor did it again. I lost my code - again. Suffice it to say that I'm really not a gay-hater. All I wanted was to have them stop...