There was a time many people spread lies relating to me online years ago. If these got to you or if you just feel like reading, let's start here and thank you for reading.
I create using epoxy resin, gemstones of a wide variety, nature inspired charms, Christian and Judaica symbols with a middle Eastern spice. Beading is slow, repetitive and based on patterns designed and set onto a thread then closed with crimp beads and clousure parts. Resin rings and pendants are set within a mixed metal or most often stainless steel frame (often gold plated), I set the charms and dreid Israeli flowers and leaves onto the frame and fill it with resin, drying it under UV light and repeat for gloss and dexterity. Some of my works are hypoallergenic and some are not, I do take commissions and make hypoallergenic adjustments made of sterling silver and stainless steel based on a person's preference, and I really enjoy turning your visions into a personal and gorgeous reality.
Below is information on a time when I tried out non handmade works for just two days out of curiousity and marketing studies, and got a lot of hate for it online with lots of lies spreading. It gets ah...spicy. But in Israel we say: spicy's good, if you can handle it.
Do you know drop shipping? It’s basic commerce in its online version. You go into a physical shop and buy a cool mug for say 10 usd, which was made in China at production costs of likely much less than 50 cents. I think most people already know that’s how almost every single shop works and we accept it as they do the hard work of branding and finding the right audience, bringing the items to our attention when we need them and so forth, simply being merchants. With drop shipping it’s the about same concept but digitally, you can buy an item on Amazon for say 30 usd and it’s sold also on Ali Baba for 1 usd. You can go on Amazon and then on Temu to see. Or use Google Lens when you go into unbranded shops, take a photo of something and see that it pops up on Temu/Ali Baba etc for sometimes a hundredth of the price.
My works are all handmade, every single item on my website is handmade. I don't make the charms or beads, my work is to use existing rough and polished gemstones, beads and charms and handcraft resin and beaded compositions with these elements. With that said, for 2 days only in 2024 I tried promoting and selling non handmade merchandise. I always like to learn new strategies and experiment with them, and specifically drop-shipping is huge in Israel, with many teens becoming millionaires in a few months and running success podcasts and huge talks about it (thought not as popular today as it was a few years ago). So I tried it out, I posted two items on my shop for sale which were not handmade, I didn’t advertise them as handmade, but as my other items were handmade, some people assumed wrongly that these were too. Many handmade art businesses combine drop shipped and already made items with their handmade items in in person events and on their websites. It maxes sales and everyone’s happy. In my case too, in reality I recall only 4 persons were ever drop shipped to, out of many hundreds of customers, and they wrote back to me how happy they were with their items. So if they were happy, what was the issue? My non customers. At start.
What followed those two days were tens, maybe hundreds of posts and comments by people I never met, spoken to or knew they have ever existed, claiming I lied about these two items being handmade, and claiming other delusional things such as that I wasn’t a real person, wasn’t Israeli or Jewish (סליחה?!), to which I can always show my censored Israeli ID, or that everything I ever designed and hand crafted was not handmade, to which I followed up with hand crafting photos and videos. They even accused me of not actually donating to the families of the hostages, to which I followed up with receipts. They blamed me for not actually having a truth obsession being a sub of sevre pure OCD (God, I wish, being able to lie would have made life so much easier) to which I almost replied with my psychiatric diagnosis but I chose to avoid going that route (though I can if I ever choose to). One other jewlery seller reached out to criticize me and then I saw they do the exact same and they said "right but only in person" as if it's any different.
A few of my customers reached out to me to get clarity, understood and stood by me. Most ignored or never noticed the pointless drama. Sadly, two of my customers who ordered handmade creations from me read these posts and instead of speaking with me directly, immediately blocked me and started spreading the lie that their items were not handmade, receiving much attention based on lies. It really hurt, I hate the idea of a piece of my heart being owned and disrespected, I would prefer not making a sale in the first place if it was going to someone who treats my art with disrespect. One of them harassed me from multiple accounts, reached out to my boyfriend telling him not to work with me in film, wrote to customers of mine many offensive slurs and just kept posting about me in many groups. The maddest thing for me was, I actually didn’t offer her much of a hand creation service, but a more minimal service, as she asked for clip on earrings and I told her I’m ordering existing pendants for her to just attach clip ons. It's something I don’t normally do but she commissioned me to do and then regretted when she saw the hate posts from others and hopped on, becoming an obsessive troll and online stalker.
I think there was something else happening there which was the potential cause for why I was so heavily blamed, invented stories about and so on for momentarily trying out a common practice. Something that maybe explains the very uncomfortable obsession some people had with me then and still.
One aspect is ignorance, which is a bit embarassing, many other business owners and marketers responded to the false rumors in my defense explaining that's how all commerce works. It was suprising for me that people were wearing China made clothes typing from a China made phone about how I wasn't allowed to sell 2 China made items amongst 730 handmade ones. And others said I should have said it was drop shipped, like sure, when you walk into a store to buy a cool mug they give you a barcode with the link to go and buy it on Ali Baba? When you buy cloth or stickers at Michael's do you yell at the cashier that you found the same exact item for 50th of the price online? Do Apple let you buy the iPhones straight from the chinese factories who make it for a few dollars? Do you look at Cartier and tell them to sell their gold items at the gold material value alone? I don't think so. The reality is almost everything we own we paid for way way more than it is worth at producer costs as we get the comfort of branding, accessability and more, these things are way more valuable than the items themselves. I'm in peace with this being how the world works, I'm still so happy to buy a Swarovsi piece made of glass, quartz and gold vermill copper at 280 usd knowing it is materially worth maybe 5 to 20, but I love the brand and adore the designs and history of it. It's hella worth it.
Then there was something else. At that time, I was often posting very vulnerably about my life and the two extremes: Being the daughter of oct 7th survivors living 4 miles from the Gaza border, how I lost almost all of my friendships in London and my previous music fanbase and jewelry customer base at where I lived previously for a few years, for speaking out against Jew hatred and the mental impact I barely survived right after oct 7th and which lasted a long time of care. On the other end, at that time about a year after oct 7th, I was in Bermuda, my boyfriend’s homeland visiting him and his family. Bermuda is a gorgeous tropical island that I most people mostly only dream about visiting, and I look good I'm told, young and was really happy and successful. I took nice tropical and swimsuit photos, I was happy and shared it with my followers. I healed into a successful small business owner and artist making art for a living whilst traveling around the world.
People often pointed out as soon as hateful posts came on about me, that it didn’t make sense that I was having fun on a tropical island with all that I lived through. One even said blatantly I was abusing Israeli pain for profit, as if it wasn’t my own pain as an Israeli directly from the otef, the area where the massacre took place. And truly? I get the confusion a little bit, I mean I didn’t even knew Bermuda existed until I met my boyfriend and everyone of my neighbours still jokes about the ships gone missing when my boyfriend tells them he’s from there while staying with me in Gevim, Israel. But it’s an amazing place, they even have a wonderful Chabad branch there I love going to for Shabbat. And being on a tropical island doesn’t change a thing about the trauma I lived through, the pain, the mental breakdowns, the thoughts of giving up, the 10 panic attacks a day for months and high antidepressants and more. Two things can be true at once and healing is possible, even if it causes some people cognitive dissonance. Some people make their whole identity about being forever victims, I was like that for some point in time too following a 4 year sexually abusive relationship, and when you’re this type of person who doesn’t believe in healing and growth, God how annoying it is to see someone who’s been at a similar position as yours and made it out and thriving.
I would have preferred the hate train to not come down onto me. It hurt, I have my own insecurities and it brought them back up for a while. But I actually ended up way more happy and successful after it, the following year was the best year of my life so far. I’m proud of how I handled the situation, I found strength I didn’t know I had.
I was always wondering why they didn’t just talk to me? And my boyfriend pointed out “they have a crush on you, an obsession” and I realised, they are just intimidated? I’m just another person I thought, I wasn’t famous or anything like that, I felt so confused as to why people wouldn’t just talk to me as 99.999% of the people who spoke shit about me are people I never knew existed and if they had doubts about anything they could have just sent me a DM instead of spreading online gossip. And they were so ready…. Like they just waited for the opportunity. Maybe that made them feel better about themselves. I feel it takes some level of trauma to be this mean and bored, to spread lies and hate on the internet.
Something that bothered me personally was it all came from other Jewish persons like me and it was so…. Anti Jewish. In Judaism we always say to never speak Leshon Hara. Meaning, evil tongue, which in reality means gossip, it’s a very anti gossip faith. One of my favourite things about Judaism and the reason why I myself never engage with gossip, it makes me feel gross just thinking about treating someone like that. I got hurt, but I never apologised and never will. I’m proud of being a person who dares to experiment with business and art techniques and grow. I since learned how to build a website learned more marketing, based my business officially registered in Israel, I grew a lot in earnings, and in the quality of my art working with more precious gemstones and more personal designs. I became more me, more accurately so.
Every once in a while it pops in, a hateful comment from another person I never spoke with who never bothered speaking with me in person. Another hateful post, another account made by my stalker and so on.
And to this I say? I’m the strongest, boldest, happiest today I’ve ever been in my entire life. I live a dream life that I made a reality by hard work and luck both, I did it in spite of severe struggles and I’m so grateful for the many people who stuck around. Funny enough, the haters? They made me and many of my customers get closer, they realised they stand by something stronger than a hate train. A mission of Jewish joy, a story that insists to keep being told, and an artist that never stops creating one of a kind, colorful and unapolegetic pieces.
So to all of my supporters, I love you and God you're awesome, thank you for allowing me the chance to make a living our of my passion and art. And to all the haters, you can keep trying to pull me down, but I ain’t going anywhere but up. The air is good here. It doesn’t smell like sad bitches. You should try it.
Love,
Emmanuelle