And so the MRAs have found yet another woman to hate.
Earlier this month, as many of you no doubt know, a Men’s Rights group sponsored a lecture at the University of Toronto. The event drew protesters, and the protesters drew MRAs with video cameras. One of the MRAs filmed a confrontation between a red-haired feminist activist and a number of MRAs who continually interrupted her as she tried to read a brief statement.
Her crime? She wasn’t exactly polite in responding to the interrupters. And so, after video of the confrontation was uploaded to YouTube, and linked to on the Men’s Rights subreddit and elsewhere, she became a virtual punching bag for the angry misogynists of the internet.
A Voice for Men, naturally, led the charge, running an article by Canadian MRA Dan Perrins labeling her “Little red frothing fornication mouth” and commenting on her breasts. The Amazing Atheist weighed in with a video I couldn’t bring myself to even watch.
Since being targeted by angry YouTube misogynists and MRAs, the red-haired activist has received death threats, rape threats and literally hundreds of other hateful and harassing messages. She’s also been “doxxed” — that is, she’s had her personal information plastered all over the internet, including on A Voice for Men’s forum. Ten days after being uploaded to YouTube, the video of her faceoff against the MRAs has garnered more than 300,000 views, and YouTubers are still leaving threats and insults and crude sexual comments.
This, apparently, is what “Men’s Human Rights Activism” consists of: the doxxing and harassment of individual women.
Several days ago, she contacted me to tell me about the harassment she’s endured. Here’s some of what she wrote:
I’m the red-head. I’m sure by now, you’re one of the 260,000 people who have seen the video of me … .
Because I had the audacity to tell a dude to stfu, an MRA no less, I have since been the target of not only just online misogyny (as if that’s a surprise) but cyber stalking, rape and death threats. They somehow found my facebook, they found my tumblr, they found a twitter acct that I don’t even use, they even found an old [dating site] profile of mine with outdated info …
I also got an anonymous message on tumblr that specifically said “[name deleted] would be disappointed”. [Name deleted] is my dog that died 1.5 years ago, I don’t talk about him on tumblr, nor fb, so they would have had to reaaaaalllly dig to find this info. …
In about 12-24hours, I got about400-500 new messages on my blog, most of them hate, which included rape and death threats, also people wishing death upon me or the typical troll “kill yourself” message. They made a meme of me.
I dunno how many haters I have, and I don’t know where they are. I can’t be sure at any given second, if I’m ever outside my house … if anyone is going to recognize me and try to hurt me.
With her permission, I am reposting screenshots she sent me documenting some of the harassment she’s endured. Even though her personal information has already been widely disseminated online, I don’t want to contribute to that, so I’ve whited out any information that might reveal her identity.
TRIGGER WARNING for what follows, for threatening language and crude sexual remarks.
Here’s a death threat she received from someone claiming to represent the “Islamic Brotherhood.”
Here are some sample comments from her Tumblr inbox. I’ve whited out comments and parts of comments that consist of her contact info, which being sent to her in an attempt to intimidate and frighten her by letting her know they “know where she lives.”
Here’s another threatening comment sent to her via Tumblr:
Here are some comments sent to her via her YouTube account. You’ll notice that the second comment comes from AVFM’s Dan Perrins, who is clearly relishing the attacks on her.
And another glimpse into her YouTube inbox:
Here’s a screenshot from a Men’s Rights forum revealing her personal information.
Meanwhile, over on YouTube, the hateful comments continue to pile up. Here are some of the nastiest ones I’ve collected. I am deliberately posting a lot of them in an attempt to convey something of the relentless nature of the attacks on teh red-haired activist — though I should note I’ve only gone through a small portion of the total comments there and this doesn’t even reflect all of the awful ones I found. These are not in any particular order. I threw in a few non-threatening ones that struck me as a tad ironic or otherwise revealing.
Again, this is only a small fraction of the abuse she’s gotten on YouTube.
This is what happens when MRAs and other misogynists target a woman online. The only thing that’s surprising here is the sheer amount of the hateful comments.
I’ve seen no serious attempts from any MRAs to rein in this sort of hatred. A Voice for Men has tried to distance itself in a superficial way from some of the harassment it has played a central role in unleashing, with an official announcement asking readers to refrain from posting the personal information of the red-haired activist in the comments. Meanwhile, in the AVFM forum, comments linking to her defunct dating profiles remain up.
This is what MRA “activism” looks like.
Coming tomorrow: A more detailed look at AVFM’s role in the harassment.
Someone’s… party. VS someone’s safety, stress, and wellbeing.
Fuck you, those are not comparable.
DID SHE SEND THEM DEATH AND RAPE THREATS? Are you fucking stupid?
Check your own head, it’s lodged up your ass.
Use condoms. Better yet, have a goddamn vasectomy.
clintiskeen,
Allow me to put this in plain language. This is basic social justice stuff, but I realize that MRAs aren’t exactly a real human rights organization, so you don’t really understand social justice anything, so I will explain.
When you say something like “I don’t condone the responses of people who have given her death/rape threats BUUUUUT she also did some bad things too so let’s not pretend like it’s a one-way street” (And yes, this is what you said. This is not a direct quote, but this is a fair synopsis), you are effectively victim-blaming. You are justifying the way this woman is being treated right now by implying that she somehow deserves it.
Imagine if someone sparked a large campaign of harassment against an MRA in retaliation for something they did in a protest. A gang of hundreds of followers found their address, their real name, their personal information, and posted it all on the internet, and sent all sorts of threatening messages to them on social networks. I don’t think you would feel very charitable when someone wants to discuss EXACTLY what said MRA did in order to avoid being targeted, or what they did wrong that led up to their demonization. There would be a cry and hue at AVfM for even SUGGESTING that there was something they could have done different to avoid being targeted.
If you think that Redhead did something wrong, that is fine. Being a ‘victim’ is not an automatic insulation from all criticism. But trying to criticize her here, in a comment thread detailing the horrible harrassment she is getting might not be the best idea. If you want to do that, you need to be EXTREMELY careful to avoid victim-blaming. I would suggest saying something more like “What is happening to Redhead is terrible, and those who are engaging in it are engaging in a kind of terrorism. Perhaps she didn’t behave PERFECTLY, but nothing she could have said or done could warrant this kind of awful response.”
And even then, you’re getting questionable. If you want to criticize redhead, you should probably SOMEWHERE ELSE, and when you do it, do it in a level-headed manner, MAKING SURE to also criticize those who are victimizing her (preferably in MUCH stronger terms), and making sure to emphasize that you aren’t saying “If she didn’t want to be victimized like this, she shouldn’t have done X.”, but rather, “I think Redhead was mistaken when she said/did X, and here is a well-reasoned argument explaining why.”
She ruined the misogyny party. I imagine that would be a rather bleak affair. Lots of growls and bad beer.
Oh boy oh boy! What in the world have I missed? Time to read through the thread…
Clint, both sides have a right to assemble and protest. Whining about what this lady did, even if you don’t condone the MRAs reaction, makes it seem like you are justifying their behavior. Honestly I don’t agree with either parties tactics/responses. But what she did is in no way comparable to the amount of hate, and bigotry she has recieved since.
@kirbywarp
You’re here! 😀 (people were getting worried about you I think)
quoting edude for a point, surprisingly.
MRA’s don’t have a right to being given a podium paid for by the students of UofT to spread their hate speech. I commend those young women and men for getting rid of you rats and kicking you off campus. You can slink down into some dank hole that accepts your kind if you want to speak.
do you have any proof that anything they were going to say was hate speech?
Edude, why are arguments for abortion based on finances and impact on the womb owners rights and not simply the health impact of pregnancy?
Because the potential for womb havers to die or suffer serious medical complications is not seen as justification enough. Seeing as the stereotype of abortion procurors is slutty college age girl or poor colored slutty girl, no one wants to pay for the supports needed to help support those children. Thus, pregnant womb havers chose to use finances as the go to reason.
Hell, I’m forty and going to doctors and saying ” I don’t want another child and would like my tubes tied” isn’t good enough. I have yet to find a doctor who says “okay! Let’s set that up. “. Instead, I’ve been grilled on why? And what happens if you meet mister wonderful? And what happens if you won a lottery?. And so I’m supposed to wait for a lotteryy or menopause.
Although I suppose that going now to the doctor and explaining that my mister wonderful also does not wish children might suffice. Which is flat out angry making because it means that women essentially need permission for a decision that should be ours to start with.
*and I told them flat out that if I won a lottery and decided at that point I’d adopt… Some alpacas.
Does getting your tubes tied mess with your hormones? Because if it doesn’t, it’s definitely something I want to do when I grow up b/c I want no kids ever. Period.
I’d like to also remind you that UoT is in Canada, where the “I Love Hitler” party would be breaking the law on seditious and hate speech. The fact that most MRAs talk *exactly* like the I Love Hitler party hasn’t yet resulted in adequate enforcement of that law, so in the meantime I guess concerned citizens will have to do the work.
I am loving seeing all the manboobzers making all the points so nicely. I shouldn’t be on this site period until courses finish up in a few weeks, but that guy, boy, oh boy.
Free speech goes both ways. You DON’T have a right to not be interrupted, not be protested against, or not to be yelled at. You DO have a right to not be threatened with physical violence.
esmnmb I didn’t say the feminists had no right to protest. What they did wasn’t protesting. What they did was disorderly conduct, which is a misdemeanor. Pulling the fire alarm, in the US is a felony because it misdirects emergency personnel and can result in people dying because the fire trucks followed a false report.
We have a saying here in the states, your right to swing your fist stops where my face starts.
It’s impossible to argue that the intent wasn’t to keep the group from having their meeting, and therefore saying that her only crime was not being polite is disingenuous.
Where this issue has gotten away was all the other respondents added in extraneous shit, which was in fact extraneous shit and I made the mistake of being baited into answering it with other facts, but the fact is a house built on shit is still a house built on shit.
The point no one can refute is as follows:
It was the intent of Channity to deny the group their right to listen to the speakers they invited and were approved by the university; therefore someone can’t possibly both say they have a 0 tolerance for harassment and also be in favor of Chanity’s actions.
@Fade Some people get super bad mood swings and heavy bleeding. I have had neither but I think it might be a crapshoot.
Um, I forget who pulled the fire alarm? Because Clintshit has yet to provide proof.
I mean, if they did pull the fire alarm, that was wrong. But… that still doesn’t excuse any of the death threats.
So… what the heck is your point, Clintshit? I mean, you accuse David of dishonest reporting yet you do it when you tried to make it sound like the blocking the exits was here.
… what’s a crapshoot mean?
I mean, does that mean good idea? bad idea? I can’t tell
@Marie:
Yup, I’m here and ok, thankfully. Just caught up with the thread… sort of. Now that I have, Clint’s video makes even less sense in context. Was xie implying that some of the hate towards the woman in the op was motivated by her being part of the protest in the video?
Ah well, I’ll find some point to jump in to the discussion eventually.
I got of clinty and am kinda ignoring him now, but still hanging around to see all of you guyses responses.
@kirbywarp
yay that you’re okay 🙂
It means it’s all up in the air. Could be good, might not be.
ah
oh well, its nothing to be worried about until I start having sex*, but I like to collect information early. 😉
*which given my current sex drive, may be never
Fade, getting your tubes tied has zero impact on horomones.
Now, if you were to get your ovaries removed, that would be a different matter. Ovaries do produce horomones, so it would alter your balance. A full hysterctomy puts you into full menopause.
Just want to make it clear that I don’t support male “paper abortion”. I won’t deny it as a possible reasonable argument either. I’m on the fence about it. I’m just posting the arguments I’ve heard.