EXILED! The stories from Defected Fragrantican Members

Hello @AnyaK and welcome to Parfumo! 🥰🤗 I wish your experience here will be better than at Fragrantica, just like @Nidodelia. And yes, I can confirm that exactly similar issues were happening at international Fragrantica too. I know a few members whose access to certain areas of the forums was restricted basically for no reason. The moderators choose their side even though you would provide them evidence like screenshots etc., they don't listen. The actions there are not transparent at all. And exactly, several new articles etc. are now about political issues and the views they provide are very one-sided, like almost spreading misinformation or conspiracy theories - like they wanted to create division in the community in purpose. Probably they even want to get rid of all "unwanted" users who disagree with them and then turn Fragrantica into the ultimate Alt-right leaning fragrance community 🤷 Well, couldn't care less anymore, I'm outta there and won't be going back 😂

Hi all! I was Punkrockbebop over on Fragrant**a. I decided to move my collection over here a few days ago, and possibly delete my ID over there, because I’m sick to death of the horrible political agenda and intolerance over there, which is perpetuated by the founders of the site, with Elena using a separate IDs posing as a random member. I find it incredibly manipulative and distasteful, and I haven’t really been on that site for many months. I visited recently and I think the last straw was a weird article by that twit Elena (aka Jeca when she wants to make bigoted comments incognito) “questioning” climate change, and I decided that’s it, I have had it. I could have decided this a long time ago, but I forgot that there were alternatives. Now I understand why certain people I really liked on there would suddenly disappear.

Besides, their site is janky and glitchy as hell and is full of intrusive ads. Their “tech people” completely ignore tech issues. Also it seems that the only database additions they make are corporate perfumes, and indies take forever, if they are added at all.
I love the features of this website and have a really good feeling about it. Plus the database is better, especially for indie brands, and more accurate. I think I’m going to like it here. Three more of my friends also moved over here for the same reasons. I will try my best to add content and reviews here as I’m able, and spread the word.

I have not been part of the fragrance community for very long and only joined the F site a few weeks ago, though I've been browsing perfumes on there for years. I was not aware of the owner's bigotry when I joined the F site, otherwise I would never have signed up.

I was excited to share my fragrance journey on the forums and hoping to engage in discussion, but instead someone was rude to me and made me feel like I shouldn't be there. I decided I wanted to delete my account as I clearly wasn't welcome in the community, but couldn't figure out how to do so. While trying to google the solution, some of the first results that came up were a reddit thread and a page on trustpilot where people were sharing their experiences of bigotry, harassment, bullying, unfair practices and doxxing on the F site. Many also mentioned that it's impossible to delete your account. I looked into it and sure enough, while the Privacy Policy says you can delete your account by going to account settings, I am able to find no such setting. This seems like it would actually be illegal.

All of this has made me feel not just disillusioned, but quite unsafe. I take my online privacy and control of my information very seriously and don't feel like I'm in good hands with the F site. I really hope that Parfumo will be a more welcoming and safe environment. Since the community here is smaller I'm excited to be able to contribute to its growth.

I didn't know you could rate fragrantica on trust pilot. That site is very funny. Some people complain about prices and not getting their orders and one crazy person said fragrantica was far-left, overly positive and even warned about parfumo being German fragrantica 🤣 Oh dear... 

far-left! overly positive! that is hilarious 🤣

Yeah you have to message the mod in order to delete your account, it's very frustrating. I emailed them and waited days with no reply. Then I changed my profile pic to the Ukranian flag and voila my account got deleted instantly 🙃

 Haha! Literally same, changed my profile pic and bam, worked like a charm. Got deleted in no time. Good to have y'all here tho

Think I'll be trying this trick too lol

I've been over here for a few weeks, moved all my little digital bottles and still moving my reviews. Elena and her band of idiots who literally push negativity and bigotry as well as climate denialism and other crazy conspiracy theories for ad revenue will no longer be getting my business. I am so glad i made this change and I look forward to continuing to contribute to this community and watching it grow! 😄 

Welcome!!  Glad to have you here!

I've just signed up but I think I'm going to be moving my reviews over here. I already like the UI much more, and there's a dark mode! I may as well bring the moving van over right now.

I haven't been into fragrances for that long so I had no idea what was really going on in Fragrantica. It wasn't until I did a little bit of digging that I found out what an awful person the owner of the site really is. I saw an article she posted about how she thinks the perfume industry is going to implode in a few years time without providing any justification, like what? Not to mention her clear political beliefs; I had no idea about her sock puppet account.

But I think the thing that did it for me was realising that I'm not really welcome there. Among a lot of reviews, there's an undercurrent of... traditionalism, I guess would be the best way to put it? The whole "this is how a real man/woman smells" sort of thing. Which I find absurd, considering that fragrance has no gender, and if it does, then masculine-marketed releases have become extremely similar to feminine-marketed ones. I'm a firm believer in wearing what you want because you like it and because it reflects elements of yourself that you want to highlight.

And the review bombing of fragrances by saying it smells like any fragrance with the word "gay" in it... yeah, not a fan of casual homophobia even when the people who do it don't think they are. I'll take my business somewhere that doesn't use that part of myself as a punchline.

Absolutely agree on the incessant traditionalism. There's even a strain of delusional fundamentalist superstition, which makes the rest of it even more eerie, but less surprising. There's also the casual homophobia sprinkled everywhere, as well as the blatant and direct homophobia and transphobia as seen in, among others, the JPG Pride article which was taken down. It's sad to see a place that used to be one of my favorite online hangout spots turn into that ... 

Thank you! I'm glad to be here ☺️

I wouldn't say that I'm truly defecting from Fragrantica simply because I've only used it on and off in the past year, but I didn't really know anything at all about the owners until just today when I found a post on the fragrance sub on Reddit talking about the seriously abhorrent things the owners have said and allowed on their site. and as others have mentioned, I'm really not a fan of the traditional, binary view of how they look at fragrance (I mean, the very first thing you see opening up their forums is "Perfumes for Women" and "Perfumes for Men", and that just makes me inherently cringe). I don't feel as though I have a place there, frankly; I'm a forum girl at heart, but just didn't feel comfortable talking over there. also their UI is downright awful and outdated -- Parfumo so far has been much kinder on the eyes and the browser <3

Hi all!  Joined today after Elena's article about T***'s new launch and that disgusting discourse on "Manly Man" crap.  Encountered enough radical-right hatred and lies that were supported and **bolstered** by F's editors that I moved over here.  I only joined that other place a few months ago and it didn't take long for it to leave a very bad taste in my mouth.

Hi AliaAtreides,

Welcome! I also just requested that my Fragrantica account be deleted. Although I've had an account on Parfumo for several months, I had kept my Fragrantica account due to having friends who are on there as well. But after the T**** ad (it wasn't really an article because Elena merely copied and pasted copy from the company putting out the T**** scent) and all the despicable comments, I decided to permanently leave. To stay would be to condone the site and its racist, fascist, homophobic, transphobic, sexist, right-wing nut job owners, Elena Knezevic (aka Jeca) and her foul husband Zoran. 

Feels good to no longer be a part of that cesspool!

Absolutely!  I was seriously laughing out loud when she defended Copy + Paste as journalism.    Apparently, I'm a journalist too.  

Messy website, wrong informations about perfumes and unability to propose a correction, missing references ( so many !)

The French forum is rather safe though.