Sunshine Soap COD Zine SCAM?

Head Moderator Micky Allegedly “Loses” Zine’s Donation Funds to Hospital Bill

On May 8th, 2025, Zine Twitter page SoapZine2024, display name “Sunshine” Soap Zine, posted a two-image confession from their finance moderator “Micky.” Micky stated that in December of 2024, he was hospitalized for two days and every bit of the funds raised by the zine’s work on both print products and merch was spent inadvertently on their medical bills by a careless “caretaker” who ran their debit card before they left the hospital. Now, as someone who recently had a near-death experience in the hospital in the United States, I can tell you one thing very clearly: you do not get charged upon discharge at the hospital. They send you an invoice. If your insurance paid for it, the insurance will send you a notice of “paid services” under your plan. So does the ambulance company, by the way, who will also send you a discounted amount if you do not have insurance. This should immediately cast severe doubt over Micky’s statements, as he is based in the United States and being charged upon discharge is not normal or business as usual when it comes to the American hospital system.

So. Who is Micky? We know that he’s based out of Fort Worth Texas, according to his (now banned) Etsy shop, and we know that he, and maybe his brother, have been hospitalized in the last few months…allegedly. In terms of his involvement in several zines, it seems that many have discovered to have incurred missing funds and at least one has released Micky from its administrative team, not including the Sunshine Soap Zine. This shady character has apparently been making the rounds in zine spaces, grifting as he goes and this time hit a bit of a jackpot, making off with a decent chunk of change. Estimates at the exact amount are everywhere, ranging from 6,000 to 30,000 USD but is more likely somewhere around 10-18,000 USD, as at least 12,000 of the approximate 30,000 total mentioned by the other moderators was spent on verified merchandise purchases. According to the Google Doc timeline, Micky had stated that he had already made the donations (to Palestine) back in December and this was further pressed on January 24th when he stated in a Discord message, “[…] I already calculated and donated everything when I heard the Trump Admin is planning to take away tax breaks to charities they deem to be ‘terrorist sympathizers’ etc […],” but as things fell apart it became clear that those donations were never actually completed.

As is expected, the general fandom public is not amused, bringing up rather thoughtful questions and criticisms. Twitter user Hopefulonion responded to Micky’s statement post with, “GENUINELY How can anyone believe that your caretaker used the money without your knowledge when you literally lied/made up reasons for the delays to both the participants/artists of the zine AND all the customers??” Many in the fandom pointed out that the other head moderator, Angie, had worked to protect Micky after having learned the truth and had been actively defensive after Twitter user SwCw1409 made a few simple phone calls and discovered that things weren’t adding up when it came to production delays and ordering snaffus, effectively breaking the “case” wide open. Had Micky or Angie been transparent from the get-go or the moderation team had been more vocal, even just internally, about unexpected delays and lack of communications, merchant disputes and fraud notification time limits would have been well within reach, but as we know by now, it’s shit’s creek and no paddle.

The actions (or inactions) of the rest of the moderation team are coming into question. Most of the focus is on Angie who, it seems, is content throwing Micky under every single bus that passes by in order to make the attempt to remain unscathed by the eventual consequences of running what is essentially a business without the paperwork (or the intellectual property rights) to do so. Twitter user redrprincess pointed out, “Tbh the highly anticipated FAQ is a new nothingburger document. ‘Why didn’t you ask for donation proof when he said he did?’ This ONE very normal question […] would’ve saved everyone.” In a tweet further down-thread, she points out that there were conflicting accounts from Angie in the statement FAQ, at first claiming that it was impossible to reach Mixam by phone due to the lines being busy and also that Mixam “refused” to give out information without an order number, leading some to doubt the veracity of statements. SwCw1409 quote retweeted one of the zine’s official statements and said, “All I needed was Mickys email and the reps gave me all that information. Why lie?” In another tweet she added, “You’re the responsible party. My involvement only mattered because you weren’t doing anything about it.”

The true unsung hero to the tale, SwCw1409, has been insistent that there’s still dishonestly afoot as they’re of the mind that complete and utter transparency is now the only option (and one I fully agree with). In a series of Tweets, they run through the whole of their timeline, beginning with the red flag they’d noticed of the Etsy shop having been banned, laying out some damning testimony that calls into question not just Micky but Angie as well. Knowing that the two of them had known each other for quite a while beforehand and that Angie had visited Micky in person, SwCw1509’s throwaway parenthetical about having discussed with their friends that perhaps the whole of the zine was less than legitimate is becoming more and more a credible theory. Twitter user elo_trashbin posed the thought that the moderators were “Probably getting their stories to match so they don’t incriminate themselves accidentally. Even if they’re innocent” but my humble opinion hinges simply on plain old fashioned unwillingness to believe that a “friend” would betray.

As someone who has worked on solo and collaborative zines in the past (and done the donations for charity-driven work through my own personal account rather than a separate business account), there is a certain level of personal accountability and decorum that must be strictly adhered to within these spaces and moreso when the fundraising and charity cause is public. The decisions I personally make with zines are designed specifically to avoid these exact scenarios, and extend to include basic mantras like “keep it simple” and “stick to basics.” Zines, in my opinion, are run by a couple losers who want to share their unhinged love for something relatively niche; they’re not corpo-lite shitshows of clusterfuckery with some extra shenanigans on top. This particular zine was ambitious. Especially something with only two “head” moderators and only one person with access to any financial clarity. Keychains? Prints? Journals? Dog Tags? Stickers? A project this utterly bloated with “merch” is not a “personal project” that any old rando on the internet can provide and requires professional project management skills. There are people who are paid nearly six-figures to manage projects out there and recruiters who head-hunt for them every single day: you’re not going to do it on a whim, friendos. Even if this project wasn’t a complete scam, it would have been in complete shambles anyway. People in comments talking about how they wanted this to be their “first” zine (girly, you can just make a zine out of a single sheet of paper, you don’t have to buy them) and how everything was “unprofessional” clearly do not have a grasp over what goes into making zines. If you keep it simple: almost nothing. Again, a zine and its fandom have traded stability for hype and again it has tumbled from the sky with even the barest hint of scrutiny.

So what’s the lesson? If it sounds too good to be true: IT FUCKING IS. Do NOT put your money into overly-ambitious zine projects and DO NOT try to RUN an overly-ambitious zine project unless you literally have your MBA in project management, I shit you not: you will not survive.

Hopefully Micky gets to meet some hot, uniformed federal agents in the near future. Lucky him.