INTRODUCING: INTERNET HATE MACHINE

our current social media platforms. You know, it's not a bug, it's a feature. And I also think it has a lot to do with our current social and political landscape.

I think a lot of the awful stuff that we're seeing right now that we've talked about on the podcast, you know, stuff like school teachers being attacked and smeared as groomers, or election workers and poll workers being attacked and threatened and accused of vote tampering, or women who want to run for a public office being physically threatened

and docked. I think a lot of this stuff really originated with a tax on black women online, and because nobody with the power to do anything actually listened or took any kind of meaningful action when it was happening to those women. Now those kinds of things are happening to all of us, and it is not great. You know. It's not great for the ability to have a meaningful discourse about some of the issues that we actually do need to have meaningful conversations about to move forward on.

It's not great for women and people of color, and queer folks and trans folks who just want to be involved in civic life or public life by being a teacher, running for office, becoming a journalist, working as an election worker, or even just expressing themselves politically online. And it's not great for our democracy when everybody is not able to meaningfully and safely participate in civic life on our biggest

social media platforms and communication platforms. I would argue that we do not have a healthy national democracy like people's ability to do that is a tenet of having a healthy democracy. So I am fully aware that I sound like I am ranting, but I really do firmly believe that the harassment of women online is deeply connected to

the downfall of our democracy. So I have partnered with cool Zone Media, the team who brought you great podcasts like Behind the Bastards with Robert Evans, and Cool People who did cool stuff with Margaret Killjoy and many many others like too many to name, to make a new podcast exploring this very connection, the connection between online violence and harassment of black women and are crumbling democracy. The podcast is called Internet Hate Machine. You know, queue the

nine inch nails here. Internet Hate Machine is a podcast that will chronicle the stories of women who have been targeted, harassed, and attacked online, why and what it means for the rest of us, Because I think that there's this misconception that when someone is harassed online, it's in visual and it absolutely is individual, Like there's individual and personal consequences for these women who are attacked, but it's also systemic,

it's also institutional, and it also creates really big consequences for all of us. So you might be wondering, you know, if you talk about some of these issues on there are no girls on the Internet, why are you doing

a brand new podcast specifically to explore online harassment. And the answer to that question is kind of tricky, but it really comes down to something that I discussed with internet historian Claire Evans on the very first ever episode of There are no girls on the Internet, which is that women and queer folks and black folks and transfolks and all of us we deserve monuments to all the

amazing stuff that we have done online. Claire Evans basically wrote the book on the Internet and women and technology called Broadband, where she chronicles women's contributions to the Internet from the very beginning. And this fascinating history actually stops when gamer gate gains and I asked her why. Here's what she said, Yeah, it's it's interesting that you bring that up. In researching for this podcast and sort of

putting together what this podcast will look like. I've been sort of really bummed out by the fact that so many the episode or topics ideas that I come up with are about women being harassed and like how women are fighting online. And you know, it is an aspect to what it means to show up as a marginalized

person online. It's just a reality. But it's difficult because I feel like I want to build a monument to the way that women and other marginalized communities are using the Internet, and it sucks that it has to be

so reactionary. And I guess was there attention in the book about that, Like, do you feel a tension between wanting to tell that the full scope of the story of women online and having to include I mean, I know that you include Gamergate, but things like me too, you know, things about like women being harassed and fighting back or do you want to build a monument to just that celebrates and affirms how women have built online and it's it is there attention there? Because I've certainly

felt attention. Yeah, I can totally relate to that. I mean, I kind of made a choice that I didn't want my book to be about about fighting back against the trolls. I wanted my book to be, you know, a showcase for all the amazing things that people accomplished despite the fact, uh you know that they had to fight against the

trolls or whatever their their circumstances were. Um, you know, I think I'm kind of I was able to cop out from that a little bit because my book ends basically the collapse of the dot com bubble, and I'm not saying that harassment didn't exist before then. Certainly did. But you know, things like GM regate me to move with the sort of larger conversations that are happening as like a consequence of systemic sexism in the text industry

and in the world. Um, you know, sort of became much much uglier more recently, and um yeah, but I don't know. I have this mantra that is like, don't don't fight the darkness, bring the light, and the darkness will disappear. And I think that, uh, I don't know.

I think people need to see how much light there really has been and how much how many fascinating, beautiful, interesting, you know, dynamic contributions had been made, um and by women and you know throughout history, and that it's it's not always about having to it's not always about being

a victim. I don't want to always have that. I don't want that to be like a core part of the identity of the characters and that I profile in the book because they're all they're not you know, like they all they're all tough as nails and super interesting and hard working and I've done great things in this world and maybe people didn't believe in them at the right time, and maybe people have forgotten some of their contributions,

but that doesn't make them any less incredible. So, like Claire, I hate the idea of only defining and talking about what we have done in opposition to the people who hate us. You know, we deserve spaces that center our accomplishments, our conversations, and our work, not just the fights and the struggles and the traumas. Even though yes, I am fully aware that there are no girls on the inner

sometimes gets into that territory too. It's inevitable. Like our last episode was definitely about child abuse and dark stuff regarding children on the internet. Yes, it is inevitable, but I'm not gonna lie. You know. It is something that I have really struggled with and putting this podcast together. You know, I don't want to be the person that bums everybody out every week just by talking about dark

stuff working on the Internet. But I also don't want to completely ignore it because that is also part of the story. It's it's part of the way that marginalized people have to show up online, you know, the good and the bed of the Internet. And I want to tell the full, honest story. And trust me, there are times when I am craving escapism just as much as I'm sure that you are. You can probably hear it

in some of the episodes that we've done. So it is something that I struggle with, and honestly, I would welcome any feedback about the balance that I'm striving for. You know, every people tell me one day you're talking about something really dark on the Internet, someone who's been harassed or attacked, and the next week you're talking about like how much you love the X Files. So yes,

I get it. And anyway, all of that is to say that I am starting Internet Hate Machine, a totally new podcast, to really have a place to dig into all of that, because, as I said at the top, I do believe the consequences are really important for all of us. I think the health and safety of our Internet and our democracy depends on having honest conversations about what's already happened, who was harmed and how, and most importantly,

what needs to be done about it. So I will be digging into all of that on the new podcast, Internet Hate Machine, and I hope that you'll check it out. Internet Hate Machine drops on October. You can find it on all of the normal podcast platforms, Like if you're listening to this, you probably know where to find it.

I think I'm supposed to say Spotify, Apple podcasts, Um, you know you although you know where to find a podcast, or this is the podcast you found this you know where about and I hope that you listen and subscribe. And here is the trail were for my new podcast with cool Zone Media Internet Hate Machine. So if you were online, you're probably familiar with gamer Gate, where a lot of men who were supposedly big mad about quote ethics and video game journalism harassed women on the internet.

It was awful, and it rightly got a lot of coverage from the tech press, but a lot of people, even people who were very online, might not know that it was a black women who were attacked by the very same people using the very same tactic as gamer Gate years earlier. Only when those women spoke up about it, the people with the power to do something pretty much

ignored them. And I'd also be willing to bet that even less people know that the kinds of online harassment and deceptive accounts that those women were reporting would go on to be the very same tactics that a twenty nineteen Senate inquiry confirmed were used by Russian assets to

disrupt the election. So there's a pretty clear through line from ignoring Black women when they speak up about the harassed and they face on the Internet and pretty important stuff like I don't know the security of our elections, So what if someone with the power to do something had just listened to black women when they reported what

was going on years earlier. I'm Bridget Todd, and I make podcasts about the Internet, specifically the way that women, people of color, LGBTQ, folks, and other marginalized identities show up to do cool stuff on the Internet. But I am sad the same that. As true as it is that traditionally marginalized people do a lot of the coolest stuff online, it's also true that those same people are targeted online and really scary ways, and when it happens,

it can feel like it just goes overlooked. We don't really get the opportunity to learn from it or take anything away from it, and as the Internet often does, everyone just moves on. And I don't like that. So on my new podcast, Internet Hate Machine, I'm trying to

right that wrong. We'll be telling the stories of women who were harassed online, how it happened, why it happened, and what it all means for the rest of us because these kinds of attacks threaten our democracy, They keep marginalized people from doing things like running for office or just participating in civic and public life, and they threaten our ability to have meaningful discourse and make any progress

on some of the big issues facing us today. And what's worse, this kind of thing has been steadily creeping from the computer screen into our wider political and social landscape. On the new podcast Internet Hate Machine, I'll be charting how the harassment and abuse of women and other traditionally marginalized people online has led us to our current political

health scape and what we can do about it. Listen to Internet Hate Machine on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, wherever you get your podcast