One of the The most surprising phenomena I have encountered since I started appearing on television in 2017 have been the sudden increase in men in Twitter mentions, my email inbox, my Instagram and Facebook followers and direct messages. The most innocuous (but still disturbing and terrifying) people simply follow you en masse on the social media platform of their choice after appearing. I realized, and within minutes, my Facebook or Instagram account was flooded with notifications one after another staring at me from behind their profile picture after quietly clicking the follow button. On Twitter, the platform that best suits my work, where I have tens of thousands of anonymous followers, I wouldn’t think about it. But the idea that these men were searching for personal platforms where I would normally share my pictures and doing so soon after seeing me on television, gave me goosebumps. I can think of the only time when a young woman followed me on Instagram after appearing on TV; she sent me a message to tell me how she found my review inspirational. The men, on the other hand, were mostly just hanging around, occasionally enjoying my long sequences of selfies with scrolls and double-taps.
Unfortunately, there are a lot of denizens on the Internet who are much more vocal than the recluses. It helps to familiarize yourself with their different incarnations before you meet them so you don’t mistake their initial approach for anything other than bad faith. They fiercely attack your mentions and your life as the Kool-aid man, demanding your attention, blatant opinions they believe are undeniable, obvious. is true and indispensable. “ANSWER ATTENTION TO ME!” they bellow. “MY OPINION PROBLEM!”
Trolls may write differently, or lash out differently, or become grotesquely fixated on different parts of your appearance or background, but ultimately, what drives them is attachment to you. They hope this will encourage you to finally shut up and make room for their infinitely more deserving thoughts. Later surname will get blue checks, TV appearances, content streams. They will curse and block and post hot pictures with elevation and give up. And in their mind, the internet will praise them for it. Their motivations are certainly hateful, but I find that humor is a good antidote to troll-induced resentment. Let’s explore the types of creatures you may encounter in your online adventures.
First, we have a man I’ll call @ProfessorActentlyEsq, aka the guy replied. Every woman who is publicly available online has at least one guy responding. Most women have some. If you’re particularly unlucky, or particularly striking, you may have dozens or hundreds. (Granny!) @ProfessorActentlyEsq embodies them. He is a man who reacts to feeling like everything mundane you post, be it your breakfast pictures or your latest publication, always finds the faintest connection to make. so the content, your life, about him. “Actually, let the toast take a little longer next time,” he tells you about your bacon, eggs, and cheese. “It should be golden brown.” You may have liked one of his answers, once, a few decades ago, encouraging his engagement. He’s often the explainer, making sure to assert his pseudo-predominance by explaining topics in which you specialize. Sometimes he repeats your own points to you, or better yet, links you to the very articles you wrote while arguing with you. These men are confirmed sometimes and like @ProfessorActentlyEsq, they don’t mind reminding you of it. Professor of philosophy, law and engineering; former senior diplomats; and present-day entrepreneurs all engage in behaviors we can only hope not to see in their classrooms or offices. (Except it certainly does.)
Followed by @TrojanHorace, or bait and switch guy. As a writer and commentator, I get a lot of engagement, leads, and opportunities through my direct messages on social media. Leaving my DMs open is essential to my job, although it does expose me to dodgy photos, romantic offers, as well as unwanted attention and abuse. other. I sometimes receive positive messages expressing solidarity with me when I post about online harassment, thank me for my work, or congratulate me on a recent publication. I thought these messages were the lovely antidote to sexism and vitriol on the rest of the internet, until I met @TrojanHorace. His initial approach is one of ally or admiring. When you reply with a curt, “Thanks, I appreciate that!” @TrojanHorace take this to mean you are now friends or equals. Commit boner enabled. One thing he knows for sure: You want to talk to him longer. Here, his tactics change. He may be wrong for the behavior of his friend, @ProfessorActentlyEsq, offers to educate you. He might ask you disturbing questions about what you’re wearing or what you’ve had for dinner. He might send you voice memos that you’re too afraid to open because of the hard sounds they might contain. If you try to gracefully bow out of the conversation after this nasty turn, @TrojanHorace will turn hostile, using the same misbehavior he’s been so terrified of lately. Because of @TrojanHorace, I no longer respond to kind messages from strangers. This is why we cannot have good things.
Then there’s @LazyLogan or man can’t seem to use Google. There are a lot of lazy people – mostly men – who seem to think that the purpose of women on the internet is not to inform others about their expertise, analyze the news or amplify their work, but rather to answer unnecessary questions about basic concepts that they can easily educate themselves on. Instead, they seem to prefer asking you to do it. While researching and writing this book and tweeting my thoughts and related updates, I received questions like: What is SWATing? What is anti-doxing service? These easy googled queries are a dual tool of subversion; if you answer, rewards drive @LazyLogan engagement and you prove yourself to be an encyclopedia of compliant and serious people. If only men like @LazyLogan were aware of how needy, childish and incapable they are in the process.
