Universities in the Philadelphia area were on high alert today after a threat directed at them was posted on 4chan’s /r9k/ board. The anonymous threat (everything is anonymous on 4chan) deliberately called to mind the threat/warning posted on the same message board last week, the day before a gunman shot and killed eight students and one professor at Umpqua Community College in Oregon.
“The first of our kind has struck fear into the hearts of America,” the writer of the new threat declared.
His cries have been heard, even by the president. This is only the beginning. On October 5, 2015 at 1:00 PM CT, a fellow robot will take up arms against a university near Philadelphia. His cries will be heard, his victims will cower in fear, and the strength of the Union will decay a little more. …
Martyr yourself for the cause or support those who have the courage to do so. We have the chance to make the world a better place for betas everywhere.
The deadline passed without incident — as did the deadline for a similar threat directed at schools in Edinburgh. Scotland, posted shortly after the Oregon shootings — but not without shaking a lot of people up.
Now the most malevolent trolls on the /r9k/ board, knowing that they have the attention of the world, are rhapsodizing about the coming “beta rebellion,” gleefully mocking the victims of the Oregon shootings, and posting threats aimed at an assortment of schools around the world, from Texas to the Netherlands.
And so, alongside more traditional /r9k/ topics as “Post your waifu” and “DAILY REMINDER THAT ALL FEMALES ARE DECEIVING SUBHUMAN WHORES,” the board today is filled with simultaneously ridiculous and chilling messages like these:
4chan being what it is, other anons are posting ironic “threats” aimed at, among other places, the moon, Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941, and Whoville — the latter a reference to a news reporter who mistook the board’s meme mascot, a frog called Pepe, for the Grinch.
In the wake of a mass shooting that left ten people dead, this is all a good deal less than hilarious. Yes, yes, 4chan apologists, I know that the anons writing the “real threats” are most likely shitposters, like the anons joking about shooting up the moon, in that they most likely have no intention of carrying out their threats.
But at the same time it’s clear they do intend to terrorize real people with their probably fake threats. As they know well, we have to take them seriously, given that a similar threat on the same message board only a few days ago was followed by an actual, real-world massacre.
This isn’t shitposting so much as it is terrorism, a form of terrorism enabled and in some ways encouraged by 4chan’s anonymous nature.
It’s also clear that the “beta uprising” the /r9k/ regulars are joking about — and designing flags for — isn’t altogether a joke to them either.
Aside from the picture of Hitler, there’s not much deliberate irony in this discussion. These are two people discussing the future of a would-be political movement, in the wake of an act of terrorism that may be tied to the message board they are posting on. One thinks the terror caused by the shootings in Oregon will lead people to take their “issues” seriously; the second sees to think that continued violence is the only answer.
I’m not seeing a joke here.
Thanks! Yes, this helps, and the whole part about entitlement and empathy was really well put.
Our University in NZ has had a threat made against it on 4chan, reddit and facebook also. All students and staff just got sent an email informing us of a “security threat”. Apparently the police and the “high tech crime group” are looking into it, but I’m not sure what they can do.
Crazy thing is, now I feel scared. Even though it’s probably just sh*t. Amazing what people threatening to kill you can do.
contrapangloss:
I’m not sure what the point would be in posting a real threat in a place where it will be mistaken for trolling.
@Moggie
If the goal of posting it is to incite terror, it could be more successful if people find that there was a true threat amongst a sea of false threats. Then every single threat posted online afterward becomes truly terrifying.
@ronanwills
I got an extension for Firefox that changes the word “cuck” to “pony” on webpages. Has made the internet a much more likable place.
Be interesting to know what the site administrators intend to do about that. Maybe I’m mistaken but directly inciting violence isn’t protected speech. Knowingly providing a platform for these people to network and egg each other on makes 4chan an accessory.
Someone reminded me the reason for the phrase “A few bad apples”. Rotten apples release lots of ethylene, which accelerates the ripening/rotting process. Unless you get rid of those few bad apples, the entire batch gets rotten.
That threshold was passed long ago. 4chan made the choice to preserve and protect the rotten apples, and by the time it was obvious they couldn’t ignore them, it was impossible to deal with them in any relevant way.
4chan isn’t “a few bad apples”, it’s an oozing pile with a few spots that look marginally palatable if you hold your nose and look under the right light.
Treat 4chan like a terrorist organization. Shut down the site and arrest anyone who was a member. Deny them bail and let them rot in jail until everything is sorted out.
There’s a simple solution here- get their IP addresses. Even if there can be no legal or criminal retribution, these pricks can still be named and shamed. I’m not big on social media vigilante justice in most cases, but I’ll make an exception here. These people are dangerous, and I’m willing to bet they’re not savvy enough to be using a VIP address while making their nasty little “anonymous” comments. Also, this isn’t the dark web we’re dealing with. Track them down and punish them.
@wwth
Yes it is very easy for the fbi to get their iown address. By unanimous it just means hide from users, it’s not really unanimous.
Some people may be using shared ips or bounceing there’s but most these people won’t be because they think they are actually hidden.
The website keeps a list of everyone’s ip, it is how they track their own users. :p
Moggie, what Kupo said.
Also, people who make threats with the intent of actually following through often don’t want people to take the threat seriously. If people did, they’d be prevented from causing as much harm, which is problematic.
For instance, when I was a kid, I threatened my older sister with a cold wake-up if she hit snooze in the morning.
She took me seriously.
She told my parents, who found my bag of marbles in the freezer and took them away. Because she took the threat seriously, I couldn’t throw frozen marbles in her bed to ruin her morning sleep, and I got to listen to her stupid alarm clocks snooze cycles, and it stunk.
What these types of threateners want, in order to cause the biggest impact, is for people to ignore their threats. Then, when the threat is carried through, the following happens:
1. People are hurt by the threaten-er
2. People feel like the event could have (and should have) been prevented, if only the threat had been taken seriously (either by placating the threaten-er by giving in to demands or taking precautionary measures like closing campuses).
3. Further (similar) threats by individuals with similar ideology get taken more seriously, meaning those with similar ideology can cause a lot of terror and wasted effort on the parts of first responders, police, and the organizations that get threatened by making ‘fake’ threats. Responding to threats is expensive, time consuming, and extremely stressful.
Rinse and repeat. Because there are a ton of of fake threats right now, we’re more likely to not figure out what (if any) are real, which means we’re less likely to take any threat seriously. This means that someone who wants to cause the additional pain to survivors from the “But this could have been prevented” has a pretty darned good opportunity to do it.
Also to anyone wondering, it is pretty easy to track someone even if they change (or bounce) their ip address once or twice. Tor does it something like 21 times, and while it is very hard to do, their was an international task force that did it last year to bust a high end drug smuggling ring the us was one of the countries. So even tor can be broken.
And 2 or 3 bounces are easy for the fbi or any other intlgence agency. It just fucks with local police for the most part. And even then only until they call in an expert.
The short answer is, yes it’s perfectly possible.
The long answer involved several rude words amounting to what I believe is the FBI galloping incompetence.
For instance Gamergate could have been exposed and shut down in two weeks, IMHO, if someone just did their damn JOB. I’m not going to explain how for obvious reasons(basically it’s intelligence work), but it’s dead obvious what to do if that’s your speciality and you’re being paid to do it. They just didn’t…for reasons. And now front man Hot Wheels is in the Philippines. Great going guys, really, our tax dollars at work. You shouldn’t have. Wait, you didn’t. *fume*
Hopefully, in the close wake of school shootings, that will be incentive enough for law enforcement to do something. This is exactly why Moot kicked GG out. Archive and report…maybe that will light a fire up someone’s arse:
https://tips.fbi.gov/
I was interested in chan culture awhile ago, but I decided to stay away after learning about the Epilepsy Foundation attack (which had actual victims): http://archive.wired.com/politics/security/news/2008/03/epilepsy
So yeah, edgy teenage racism isn’t on the same level as threatening or assaulting people. There’s just plenty of overlap.
They really believe this will turn into some sort of revolution? “The Beta Uprising?”
If anything, it’s just letting people know what worthless shits these people are, and what a festering cesspool 4chan is.
Somehow this comment section manages to be even edgier and more hypocritical than /r9k/.
You can always count on 4chan to do the most tasteless thing possible.
“Treat 4chan like a terrorist organization. Shut down the site and arrest anyone who was a member. Deny them bail and let them rot in jail until everything is sorted out.”
Going a bit far there, eh? I’m with you on shutting it down as inciting or aiding violence, but the rest… innocent until proven guilty.
Jenny, I’m glad something of worth came out of all that 🙂
bvh — thank you for better explaining what I was trying to say about yeah, it’s possible, but not worth the resources to trace every asshole.
@anon
Yeah, ’cause you know what’s on the mind of every single person who posts on 4chan.
Somehow I’m not reassured.
You know, even bone fide mainstream terrorist organization aren’t dealt with as harshly as that. Treating 4chan as a terrorist organization and shutting down the site is a thing, but it still need to be done within the limit of a non-autocratic state.
Note that 8chan (among other) prove that sites can be even more toxic than 4chan
– Latte Cat
And what would they demand? For every (beta?) man to get his own waifu slave?
For those of us who have lived blameless lives and are scared of googling 4chanisms, what’s a waifu? Is it a racist Japanese-mispronounced Victorian orphan?
– Argenti Aertheri
No. It’s pretty clear 4chan is/hosts a domestic terror group. And I’m pretty sure membership in such an organization is grounds for arrest and conviction *on it’s own*.
And that IS what should be done. Shut down the site. Arrest all members for participating in a terror network. Be prepared to do the same to other sites frequented by misogynist sadist creeps who threaten with or agitate for violence.
“For instance Gamergate could have been exposed and shut down in two weeks, IMHO, if someone just did their damn JOB. I’m not going to explain how for obvious reasons(basically it’s intelligence work), but it’s dead obvious what to do if that’s your speciality and you’re being paid to do it. They just didn’t…for reasons. And now front man Hot Wheels is in the Philippines. Great going guys, really, our tax dollars at work. You shouldn’t have. Wait, you didn’t. *fume*”
What do you mean by exposed and shut down?
A wifeu is basically when you say a fictional character is your wife or love interest. Husbando is the same thing.
It is usally used to refer to anime characters.
Basically it’s like that character or actor/actress is my dream man/women.
Think of the set pillows. It’s not really a harmful word by itself. And from what I’ve seen it’s used by men and women pretty equally.
Any other anime terms you need defined?