After I finished my first book, How to Lose the Information War, people would often ask me what I planned for my next book. “Is that a threat?” I’d joke. Amid a pandemic and disinformation-laden election followed by a disinformation-fueled insurrection, I often found it difficult to think, let alone write.
There was one topic that knocked me out of my pandemic-induced stupor. It angered and upset me, frightened and worried me. It also motivated me to action, because the circumstances surrounding it were by no means unchangeable. It is the online misogyny and the gendered abuse, harassment, and disinformation campaigns to which it leads.
Over the past year or so, I have become the token angry lady online and at events, calling out poorly behaving men, shaming persistent organizers of “manels” (all-male panels, for the uninitiated), and spouting off about the dangers of deep fake porn. I used to be a lot more diplomatic, more careful. I used to give my Twitter “reply guys” the benefit of the doubt, responding to them two or three times before accepting that they saw me as subhuman. Back then, unless they used particularly violent or vulgar language, I’d quietly mute them, not wanting to give them the satisfaction of a block.
That changed last fall, when I made a video about “color revolutions” that upset some people on the right. I was the target of Trumpian conspiracy theorist men’s rights activists who believed my guest room office-cum-studio, where I shot the video, was actually in Langley, and I was part of a CIA psy-op. That was the tame part. Their other comments included gems asserting that I am secretly transgender, dissecting my breast size, expressing pity for my husband, and wishing they could repeal the 19th Amendment and institute Sharia Law in the United States. They showed up (virtually, thank God) to a book talk I was giving and spammed the Zoom chat. They left comments on my Instagram profile about how “traitors like me” would be sent to Guantanamo Bay or “be dealt with in the streets.” And they dug deep enough into my internet history, finding pictures and video from performances I did with my band 15 years ago, that I had reason to believe they were searching for my private information in hopes of doxing me. Feeling exhausted and isolated after days of relentless abuse, I pulled out my credit card and signed up for an anti-doxing service, hoping it wasn’t already too late to protect me in some way.
I had covered gendered and sexualized online abuse before; in my time at the National Democratic Institute, I worked on projects on violence—both online and off—against women in politics. In 2017 I reported on foreign disinformation campaigns attacking women activists and politicians. And as I was being targeted last fall, I was in the midst of leading a study on 13 women running for office in 2020, and how their gender and sexuality was weaponized against them.
Even with this knowledge, I was surprised by how unsettling I found the online abuse against me. I have never been a timid woman. When I was in preschool, I dressed up as a “bird princess” for Halloween and pecked a little boy in the face with my mask when he made me mad. (I swear. We have it on casette.) That energy has followed me into adulthood, when I have happily called out Russian propagandists in debates on live television and answered difficult questions in Congressional hearings. But these anonymous little Twitter jerks and the conservative influencers who sent them bothered me, partly because some of the closest people in my support network just didn’t seem to understand what I was going through, and what so many other women, particularly those with intersectional identities, endure on a daily basis. The most common advice they dispensed—“Ignore them! Don’t feed the trolls!”—amounts to self-silencing, which is exactly what online abusers want.
I pushed ahead. Eventually that round of abuse died down and the Trumpian conspiracy theorist men’s rights activists moved on to their next target. It was a woman. The next one was a woman, too. Once, they attacked my male friend, writer Casey Michel. The worst thing they told him, though, was that he needed a haircut.
To be a woman online is an inherently dangerous act. I want to help other women feel safer and freer to express their minds, to call out bad behavior, to feed the trolls if they wish. I want them to feel as confident as the average white middle aged men in my replies when they hit “send tweet,” and I want them to know, if they do find themselves at the center of a shitstorm, that they’re not alone.
I’ve channeled my frustration and anger and worry into a new book project. Bloomsbury/IBTauris will publish How to Be a Woman Online: Surviving Abuse and Harassment in Politics, and How to Fight Back (working title!) next year. It will be a short, snappy paperback that I hope will be helpful to everyone from recent grads to seasoned professionals. Using case studies from my research and interviews with women in journalism, academia, the private sector, and public service who have been the targets of these attacks, I will not only unpack the problem, but provide a toolkit for surviving and pushing back in an increasingly dangerous online environment.
Men reacted predictably when I announced my new project. One replied: “Driving an 18 wheeler is an inherently dangerous act. The difference being that nobody ever got killed by a mean tweet.” In his profile picture, a blonde woman kisses him on the cheek. So let’s do a little exercise. It’s one that should not be necessary, but is useful for those misogyny-addled men who only see women as worthy of respect when they are connected to themselves.
Assuming the woman in the picture is his partner, how would he feel if she went through what I did? What if she went through worse, and online threats escalated into offline harm? If a stranger sent dozens of pizzas to her house, or called in a bomb threat and a SWAT team showed up? If a notice with her picture on it was pinned to a bulletin board at the metro station nearest her house, as recently happened to BBC journalist Marianna Spring? How would he feel about those “mean tweets” then?
I wish I did not feel compelled to write this book, but as Mr. 18-Wheeler and the Reply Guys have so beautifully demonstrated, it is necessary and it is urgent.
Reminder! If you enjoy the audio version of this newsletter, this benefit will disappear for free subscribers after next week. Free subscribers can still read posts, but you won’t be able to listen or comment, and will lose access to special outside-schedule posts. Those benefits will remain available to those who spend $5 a month on a subscription. Thanks for your support!
how to be a woman online