True Sunlight: TSP #7 - ‘Just Unreal’: Online Hate And The unsettling Reality For Victims and Influencers

I don't know why some people choose to spend so much time attacking, harassing, and maligning

victims, journalists, influencers, and content creators online.

But I do know that I have seen enough to know that this is a dangerous behavior, not only

to individuals, but to the justice system as a whole.

I have seen enough, I have had enough, and it is time to do something about it.

My name is Manny Matney.

This is True Sunlight, a podcast exposing crime and corruption previously known as the

Murdoch Murders podcast.

True Sunlight is written with journalist Liz Farrell and produced by Lunasharq Media.

Well, this is our 100th scripted episode between the Murdoch Murders podcast and True Sunlight,

and that, my friends, is a big deal, especially considering all of the people and systems

that have tried to stop us.

Here we are.

I'm more proud than ever to say that we dug deep, held no punches, and fought the

good fight for more than a hundred episodes.

I have been thinking about this two-year journey that we've been on a lot, especially since

things have gotten increasingly dark in the past few months with the online harassment

and accompanying anxiety and depression that it caused.

As we discuss at length in this week's Cup of Justice, which by the way, please listen

to that if you haven't already.

Friends with online harassment came to a head in the last week, so David and I finally had

enough and we filed a police report on Monday.

I have been wanting to do this for years, but I haven't had it in me to take the steps

and actually do it.

I wanted to file a police report a long time ago when a troll emailed me pretending to

be my dead brother.

I wanted to file a police report when another troll, who obsessively harassed and maligned

me and other victims, showed up at a charity event, I believe, to intimidate me, or it

sure felt like it.

I wanted to file a police report when I got a series of texts from a stranger who made

it clear that he hated me for my reporting and he knew exactly where I lived.

I could go on, but I think you get it.

Each of these times, I did tell law enforcement about what was going on, but I never actually

made the step of driving to my local sheriff's office to say I need to file a police report.

Something happened to me.

Why?

Because I was terrified of making this situation worse.

I was terrified of being told that I was paranoid, that I was crazy for worrying about

these things, that I was making a big deal out of nothing, that I was just being dramatic.

These are the same worries so many women have when considering whether or not to report

domestic violence, harassment, threats, and especially sexual assault.

You so badly want to be believed about the very thing that is stealing your joy and

consuming your life.

I was in a fragile state this entire time and felt so alone in all of this that I couldn't

bear the thought of working up the courage to file a report and then to be told I was

trying to make something out of nothing and that nothing could be done.

I can't imagine what sexual assault victims go through.

But strangely, I immediately felt better when I walked into the Buford County Sheriff's

office and the man at the front desk recognized both of us and seemed to be a fan of the show.

Before I could explain why I was there, he said thank you for what you were doing and

let me ask you one question.

Did you have any idea back in 2019 when you were investigating the Murdochs that it would

lead to all of this?

I was caught off guard, but I thought about it and said absolutely not.

I then joked that I probably wouldn't have continued my investigation had I known the

earth that would be shattered in the low country going down that path.

I thought about all of the public officials who have been exposed, all of the charges

that have been filed, all of the lawsuits.

I thought about all of the victims who have gotten a taste of justice or the truth about

their cases.

And I thought about all of the horrific, unbelievable corruption that we've uncovered.

Would I do it again, honestly?

Absolutely, if I had to, but I really don't want to.

And if I could go back, I wouldn't change much, but I would change one thing that I

want to talk about today.

I would have changed the way that I dealt with online harassment, which was mostly by

trying to avoid it and processing it a lot on my own.

So many of my closest friends had no idea what I was going through, because it was so

hard to explain without sounding insane, because what was happening was absolutely crazy and

mind-blowing.

I've maintained some sense of normalcy with my friends in the last two years, and that

normalcy is sacred to me.

I hardly ever talk about the podcast or my work with my friends, because it's just hard

to relate to.

And where do you even start?

How do you explain to a friend you've known since high school that there is an entire

group of people on Reddit who are dedicated to hating me and everyone I love?

And how do you do that without making your friends feel like it is putting them in danger

too?

Like, if I started to tell them about how people stalk my photos, zoom in on every detail,

and make up horrific lies to fill in the blanks, I honestly wouldn't blame my very

private friends, especially the ones with children, for wanting to distance themselves

from me.

It made me feel toxic for something that I had no control over, and it made me feel

even more alone.

So I mostly stay quiet about the harassment in hopes that they would get bored and go

away.

I didn't want to bring any attention to them whatsoever.

Trolls want attention, everyone said.

Don't let them win.

But trying to ignore this level of online harassment is like allowing a mosquito to bite you and

those you love over and over and over again, instead of squishing it because you are bigger

and better than that mosquito to begin with.

It drives you mad.

In the bites, they still hurt, even if it's just from a stupid mosquito.

So Monday was about taking the first steps to exterminate the bugs that are biting me

and those I love.

And man, did that feel good.

I won't go into details about what happened in the last week related to online harassment

in the lawsuit that I'm now facing.

Again, we covered that all in this week's Cup of Justice, and I highly recommend you

listening to that episode.

But if I could do it all again, I would have started filing police reports about the harassment

much sooner.

I would have spent more time and energy practicing what I preach and being pesky, more time taking

legal action, speaking up and speaking out against this, and connecting with other people

who are going through the same thing to put an end to this madness.

How can I tell victims to stand up and fight for themselves when I wouldn't do it myself?

Well today, we want to tell you a story about a mother who in the wake of her son's death

that she believed was a murder fought the good fight against online harassment and corruption

and mustered up the strength to do something about it like I should have done a long time

ago.

Before we get into it, we wanted to share a quick update about former fugitive Gerard

Price whose capture was announced right as we were finishing up with today's episode.

This past March, Price was released 15 years early from his 35-year sentence for murder

after state representative Todd Rutherford, who was his attorney, and fifth circuit solicitor

Byron Gibson struck a secret deal with retiring judge Casey Manning, and we have covered this

a lot on the show.

A month after Price's baffling release, the state Supreme Court rescinded Judge Manning's

order and ordered law enforcement to apprehend Price, who, shocker, had gone on the lam.

He has been on the run for the past few months.

He was arrested Wednesday by the FBI and the New York Police Department in an apartment

in the Bronx after a tip came into sled from someone in South Carolina.

You probably remember that Price's release happened without a hearing that included the

family of his victim, 22-year-old Carl Smalls Jr.

Just one day before Price's capture, Carl's parents Carl Sr. and Lily Smalls had released

a nine-page letter they had written to the state's Office of Disciplinary Counsel calling

for Rutherford to be disbarred, calling for sanctions against Solicitor Gibson, calling

for a reprimand for Judge Manning, and calling for Rutherford's and Manning's court records

to be released and examined.

While Price's capture is great news, the Smalls family's letter must be addressed.

We applaud the Smalls family for taking a stand, and we hope that our state officials, namely

Attorney General Allen Wilson and Supreme Court Justice Donald Beatty, do the right

thing and hold everyone who made Price's early release accountable.

OK, now let's get into it.

You've heard us say before just how important it is for victims to make noise.

Like Mandy said, it's not an easy thing to do.

It takes a lot of bravery and can involve a lot of self-doubt and a lot of setbacks.

Oftentimes, when the absolute worst has happened in people's lives and they have very little

left to give, we saw that bravery in the Dallas dollar case and the effect it had in calling

attention to the injustices that were being done to her.

First, we saw that bravery from Dallas and from Chloe Bess, who were harassed, sometimes

by adults, for having the audacity to go to the police after being sexually assaulted.

The extreme harassment Dallas faced tragically contributed to her accidental death in 2021.

We saw that bravery continue when the Stoller and the Bess families took matters into their own

hands and brought much-needed sunlight to the dubious secretive deal that was being struck

between the defendants, Bowen Turner's, legislator attorney, and the prosecution,

to keep Bowen, who had been accused of three rapes in three counties at that point, out of prison.

We've seen that bravery in the Mallory Beach case as the Beach family continues to press forward

and demand accountability of those who fueled Paul Murdock's drunken boat crash,

which led to their daughter's death. For four long years, they have been targeted

and tormented by online commenters whose sole motivation seems to be to shake their resolve

in pursuing their legal cases against Parker's gas station.

And we've seen that bravery from Sandy Smith, who from the very beginning had to stand up to

bullies to long-held cultural norms in Hampton County and to a corrupt system that bent over

backward for certain people, just so she could get some basic answers about her son's death.

Sandy has been treated horribly online, including by those who claim to have come into her life

to help her. She has been falsely accused of committing crimes and she's had private family

information disseminated to the world. You might hear us say this over and over,

so we apologize in advance if it gets annoying, but we feel like we have to say it,

so that you understand that we understand that online criticism is not the same thing as harassment.

We are not saying that criticizing someone online or sharing an opinion is immediately

considered harassment. It's not. Nor are we discouraging people from expressing their

opinions in a way that is authentic to them. What we're talking about here is the relentless

targeting of a person, whether it's a victim of a crime, a journalist, a blogger, whoever,

with hateful messaging and lies in the hopes of silencing them. It's a thing, you guys.

It's widespread and this doesn't have to be the world that we live in.

So there are two motivations that we can see here. Clearly one of them is to silence the victim,

the journalist, the blogger, etc. In our opinion, that is the main motivation,

but there are different reasons attached to that motivation. The bulk of online harassment

across the board seems to be coming from people who are jealous that other people are getting

attention and are in the spotlight, that other people are doing something, whether it's calling

for action, offering a solution to a problem or simply sharing their stories or opinions,

and that other people may be getting money as a result of the attention they're getting or

the work that they're doing, whether that's through GoFundMe type accounts or civil suits

or being featured in documentaries or being paid through sponsorships. And so these tyrants use

that person who is getting that attention as a way to latch on to the spotlight, maybe.

By being a contrarian who pushes the limits, they're carving out their own little niche

at the expense of their own humanity and with little regard for ethics and the law.

One case we want to talk about today is out of Meridian, Mississippi.

It's one that many listeners have shared with us. So in February 2014, a 21-year-old man named

Christian Andriacchio was found dead in his apartment from a gunshot wound to the head.

His case was immediately labeled as suicide by law enforcement and basic investigative work

was ignored completely, done sloppily, and allowed to linger inconclusively.

And that's a problem because the circumstances surrounding Christian's death did not seem to

point to suicide. The gun he supposedly used to shoot himself did not have his fingerprints on

it, which is weird. In fact, the gun appeared to have been wiped clean. There was a void in

blood spatter, meaning there was no blood in the area that one would have expected to find it

when considering the force and the direction of the gunshot, meaning it appeared that something,

or somebody, had been standing in the way at the time Christian was shot.

There is so much to this case that still needs to be looked into and we plan to do this.

We will be covering this case much more in depth as Christian's family continues to fight the system

to bring his killers to justice. Today we want to talk about what happened after Christian's

family began bravely speaking out publicly about the lack of support they were getting

from law enforcement and from the prosecutor's office. We want to talk about what happened

as they continued to speak out about the acts of retaliation they received from their own

government as a result of their public calls for action. Christian's case was covered locally but

gained national attention in 2019 when it was featured in the first season of a podcast called

Culpable. With that came online scrutiny, which the family accepted until that criticism began to

cross the line in all those ways we've been talking about. We spoke to Christian's mother,

Ray Andriacchio, this week about what it was like in the years after Christian's death.

You know, it's not just my family. I know that. I know it's been multiple families because I had

people contact me when we were going through some of the things we've gone through saying the same

thing happened to us and you're already dealing with losing a family member or a close friend or

whoever the person is that you're involved with and then you're also many of us fighting to get

something done about it and you're dealing with all that and then you have things and people who

are totally unrelated. You know, you don't know them. You don't really know why they're even

involving themselves and in our case they of course went after other members of my family

and my other children and myself and so it you know then it comes a thing of trying to protect

in my case my living children not just Christian and so

that was the reason why you know I fall back was because it was I tried to ignore and ignore for

a period of time and you know people will lose interest and they'll quit and then it just seemed

to me the longer you ignored they would ratchet up the the sensationalism of whatever they were

saying to see if they would get a reaction that way and you know it became very hurtful and and

you know defamatory so we I just said enough enough this is something gotta be done.

One of the loudest critics of Christian's family was a Michigan woman named Karen Yax

who goes by the name Critical K on social media. Sound familiar? Soon after the murders of Maggie

and Paul Murdock we got a fast lesson about the world of true crime and the political

infighting that sometimes exists among those who seem to want to stake a claim in that particular

story. We learn that discussion groups get set up and administrators get chosen and sometimes

those administrators have opposing missions. We learn that some Facebookers and redditors

see themselves as true detectives or journalists and are locked into unspoken races to solve the

crime. We learn that there is even a counterpoint component a contrarian group who seeks to absolve

the accused and malign the accusers who position themselves as the holders of the real story as

they post misinformation about the case and ask questions that seem designed to mislead people.

We also learned that people get paid by interested parties to take down victims or

anyone who dares to speak out publicly about wrongdoing. The true crime world is a community.

When it's good it's great but when it's bad it is vicious. In the Murdock case Critical K's

voice was one of the loudest almost from the start. I wasn't at all familiar with the super

sleuth true crime world in June 2021 and I remember being shocked to search Facebook one day and find

several groups dedicated to the Murdock murders including hers. As a curious journalist thinking

these groups might have some good leads and angles I joined every group I saw including Critical K's.

But soon after joining I noticed Critical K's theories and posts on the Murdock murders were

not at all like the others. They lacked logic basic knowledge of the case in Hampton County

and also they really lacked sympathy for anyone involved except for the Murdocks. In fact I looked

back on texts that I sent to Liz in June 2021 and I said things like who was paying this woman

what's going on here with screenshots of Critical K's absurd post mostly pointing

blame at the boat crash victims and anyone besides Alec Murdock. Critical K positioning

herself as a neutral party not afraid to be devil's advocate greatly contributed to several

false narratives in the wake of the Murdock murders. It was odd looking back on those screenshots

that I saved from June 2021 now knowing what we know of Alec Murdock's attempts to tell police

that the murders of his wife and son had to do with the boat crash that his son Paul was in.

I did then believe it was the boat wreck and I believe now that the boat wreck

all right so we've got something to do with it all right so we've got random vigilantes because

of the boat wreck now I don't know that they're random vigilantes well you just said it wasn't

the family or the kids or the kids or the family of the other kids in the boat right so you're

saying it's somebody awful social media and you don't have any evidence of that do you just believe

that you're telling that jury that as you try to explain the lie that you told for the first time

yesterday isn't that right no sir that's not right well I found it particularly disturbing

the K was pushing this narrative along with Alec in one post in particular she said that it had

been brought to her attention that Mallory's relative is quote a bit of a wild card and some

are suspecting him in the murders of Maggie and Paul that was never true why would this woman

from Michigan want to terrorize the family of Mallory Beach like that other things I noticed

looking back on posts from critical K in the early days how she oddly pushed a narrative that seemed

to perfectly align with team Murdoch for instance one post said quote I have a couple people close

to the Murdoch family reach out to me to express frustration with how the media is portraying

them I have to say this because I've seen this case after case and the Murdochs have been described

to me as good hardworking loving people who have many people who love them the post also said quote

I am being told that Alex Murdoch is a good man who loves his family and there is no way he harmed

them wow so that was a weird one to unpack we've lost count of the number of people that we have

spoken to who knew the Murdochs well over a hundred probably in the hundreds at this point

not one of them has described Alex Murdoch as a good man and no one for the record has told me

that the Murdoch family as a whole are good hardworking people a lot of people have described

Alex as a father who was proud of his family and family name and they described him as someone

they have a hard time imagining killing a son because of how much they thought he loved him

but not a good man a lot of sources have described individual members of the Murdoch family as quote

unquote good but never the family as a whole or their history and if someone would say that considering

the amount of not good things I know about Alex Murdoch and his family history I would find out

who this person was that said this and what they had to gain from the Murdochs because the thing

about people in power is that they are going to be nice to some people because that is how they

stay powerful Alex was nice to plenty of people who could do things for him but he stole and took

advantage of those who were vulnerable and that was well documented so here is the difference

between a lot of these loose true crime folks and actual journalists journalists do not publish

everything that we have heard from the gossip mill we publish very little of it actually what we

publish is thoroughly vetted question for intention and credibility and backed up by

multiple sources we don't just hear that elik murdoch is a bad person and then run with that

you hear it over and over and over and you see it for yourself in documents before you publish

anything with these loose and some true crime content creators are doing is taking information

from sources that could very much be from a PR company that is pushing a dangerous narrative

and rolling with it or sometimes I've seen them just make up a lie based off of one photo

and spread it across the internet essentially good sources close to the situation and good

vetting are what separates us from the critical k content creators of true crime

we'll be right back

in the years since the murders critical case main focus continues to be on maligning us and others

who have been covering the case maligning the boat crash passengers maligning attorney mark tinsley

who is leading the fight for civil accountability in the case and critical case main achievement

seems to be promoting spurious theories that take the blame away from elik murdoch paul murdoch and

parker's gas station if critical case followers defend those she seeks to malign she often kicks

them out of her group if anyone questions the accuracy of her information or the appropriateness

of her posts she often kicks them out of her group her arrival on the murdoch scene was baffling

to us what was her interest in this case why was she spreading so much demonstrably false

information and why was she so vicious and cruel to the victims christian's mother ray andriakio

can relate to our confusion before the murdoch case karen yaks aka critical k had attached herself

to the andriakio case and with an audience of 17 000 listeners to her webcast began to make false

assertions against ray who is a medical provider in the mental health field in 2021 ray andriakio

filed a federal defamation case against karen this past spring a judge granted ray's motion for a

default judgment because of karen's ongoing refusal to participate in the case currently ray

is awaiting a ruling from the judge on what monetary damages will be awarded to her we spoke

to ray's attorney matthew wilson about the complaint he filed on his client's behalf

in a nutshell what the complaint alleged was that this particular defendant had a webcast

in uh where she was was in discussing in depth of this particular case and in in doing these

podcasts or webcasts the uh that if in that alleged first one of the things she alleged was that

my client had a pattern in history of bribing people and getting people drunk and getting

young people drunk in order to get people to change their stories about what happened to her son

so which in and of itself is outrageous but then she she in another conversation she had

with some mississippi residents she made the implication that one of my clients alleged

patients and we you know because we can't say whether this person really was a patient or not but

but allegedly this person is one of my client's patients this this now deceased person and that

the the defendant uh stated or made the implication that you know here my client has a client that

died of self-harm and she had a son that died of self-harm and of course the way she arranged

those words you walk away with the impression that she's trying to communicate the message that

that my client had something to do with the self-harm of her son and the self-harm of a patient

and that was just representable because that that that impugned not only her

well her her reputation as a medical provider but it also made it like you know

my client had something to do with her son's death when you start arranging those sentences in a way

that people walk away with an impression with the implication that my client had something to do

with the death of an alleged patient and maybe even her own son we can't we can't tolerate that

okay but then the thing that really really just made this put the salt in the wound was

there was this one dialogue that she had with one of her followers where um this defendant

started to talk to my client saying i know you're listening to my show mentioned my client's name

i know you're listening and you're not ignoring me and then she goes on to say i'm a powerball

you've never met a mother still in the blink like me before and i'm thinking to myself

what audacity you know what i mean that is just unreal what matt is referring to

is from an april 2021 episode of karen yaks's webcast in which karen said this according to the

lawsuit here's david you're not ignoring me ray you are very well aware of me and you know that i

have taken up for dylan and whitley i am a force to be reckoned with i am a powerball you never

met a mother ever like me ray dylan and whitley are christian's friends and ex-girlfriend

who say they found christian's body and as we said victims decisions to go public about their

loved one's case to demand justice is not an easy one it's often a last resort ironically we were

told by the the chief of police at the time um uh was chief do those and we had a meeting with him

and this of course is several years down the road of me running around you know kind of chasing after

all the different agencies and um we met with him to say you know look this is what we have

we believe that this is whether it's a cover-up or whether it's just incompetence or negligence

we feel like you know this needs to be investigated further uh this you know again kind of laid out

what we had and you know his comment or his was that the da wasn't going to do anything

and it didn't matter if we had a confession that the da was not going to pursue this case

and he kind of nonchalantly said you know if i were you i would get some media coverage

now i doubt he really thought that we would do that or that we would be able to do that and um

you know luckily um the attorney you know knew someone who knew someone and we were able to get

the um first article that was in Mississippi Today which was a digital newspaper and they did

really the first um it took you know that many years where nothing had been ever put in the

paper nothing had ever been said and um it they did this Mississippi Today um article our story and

and i didn't really expect that much you know i i was hoping it would at least

put some pressure on the police department to at least listen to us and and the da to say hey

they do have enough to reopen the eyes for for y'all to investigate and it was just a few weeks

i don't even know if it was a few weeks but it was a very short period of time

that crime watch daily contacted us and said well we have people who kind of

monitor for these stories in smaller communities and um or smaller i guess papers and they

contacted us if we'd like to do the story so of course then when crime watch did that well then

it got more attention because that was more of a national um publication or or media source

and it kind of snowballed from there the much needed attention was a double-edged sword though

but i mean really we didn't want media attention there's a lot of people of course

that will tell and you hear this i'm sure with your coverage of the murdoch case or other cases

that you may have done you know the other side or people who are against you will say oh they just

like they love the attention they're just doing this for attention um or fame or whatever

believe me i would love for my name to never have been out there as a part of you know i

wish this case had never happened because then i wouldn't you know then christian be here um i

trade that any day of the week for all this stuff that has happened the family knew they needed to

forge ahead that this media attention was critical to getting justice for their son but you know you

don't you the only thing you have is to put pressure or um and a public attention on the

local authorities and you know there for a while it does help but if you don't get something done

and you don't get them moving quickly after that kind of media attention well then you know it kind

of just like anything else everybody moves on to the next thing and so you're always looking for

another pressure point another you know okay we've done this so what's the next thing we can do that

because we got this done when this came out so if we get something a little bit bigger or a little

bit you know more attention well then maybe we'll get it moved a little bit further and we have been

able to move kind of the case along a little bit at a time with each you know kind of media

coverage it has received um so again unfortunately that's what families i don't think that most

families want to get on tv and have to go through talking about this over and over again and crying

and showing your emotions and things that most people want to do behind closed doors they don't

you know i i don't think that normal person wants to do that on national tv but you sacrifice that

to try to get something done for your child's you know case again this isn't about negative

opinions this is about something so much more dangerous and destructive i don't expect everyone

to be on my side i don't expect everyone to say you agree with me on everything and it's not like

i hate you or i don't you know i'm against you if you have a different opinion as long as you're

respectful with it and as long as you agree that that's your opinion and that you know that they

could be wrong about that but it's when i mean there's been plenty of people that i'm sure

have done episodes that have raised questions and things that i didn't agree with but

that you know again that's their their right and their i don't care i don't their opinion does not

change christian's case their opinion doesn't change my belief or many people's belief or

actually just the facts it doesn't change facts and so um i don't really care if people agree or

don't agree on other media sources but when you begin talking about you know things that you

don't have facts about when you start talking about um you know degrading or downgrading or

trying to humiliate christian my son my you know christian or whoever's family member it is that's

in that situation um again i think that that line has crossed you can be respectful and and disagree

and and that's perfectly fine but you don't have to sit there and drag up every you know make up things

now critical k and others like her would say that they're simply trying to present the quote

other side of the story this is how k described her mission in christian's case according to the

lawsuit here's david again first thing i want to say is if re i.e the plaintiff wants to try this case

on social media as she has attempted to do since 2017 i am happy to oblige her right i am happy

to oblige her and until now she has really dominated the narrative about this case via

intimidation bullying outright lies and i sort of set the groundwork for that the other night

and i am going to continue to lay that groundwork and continue to provide proof of the things

that i claim that she has attempted to control the narrative via intimidation bullying lies

bribery getting people drunk getting young people drunk etc etc and that is very troubling to me

but she has truly dominated the narrative her her family her brother her children

and it's time for the other side to have their say it's time for the other side to have someone

who takes up the mantle for them

the problem here isn't that critical k wanted to tell the other side of the story

it's that she didn't actually do that instead she seems to have told the story she wanted to tell

according to the lawsuit critical k spoke with two sources about someone she claims to have been a

patient of ray andriacchio k asked them to confirm that this person named haze mitchell was in fact a

patient of ray here's how that went down defendant wasn't haze also treated by ray

matt miller i don't know that defendant dylan wasn't haze was haze treated by ray dylan we

know you were dylan swearing in i was told through someone else at some time that may have happened

i'm not 100 sure so i can't vouch for it but i am sure there is somebody in my group that if this

can vouch for it matt miller yep you heard that right they told critical k that they don't know

and here's what she did with that information according to the lawsuit defendant it seems to

me that that is something that i've heard that haze mitchell was also treated by ray and that

is what i need people to understand there is a whole host of young people here specifically

teenagers and young adults who have been treated by ray in this community via her workplace they

have been treated both counseling wise and medically by ray and some of these people who

have been treated by her counseling wise and medically have gone on to be accused by her of

being involved in this this is how far her reach goes um i really do believe that haze was treated

by ray and haze is now dead with a drug overdose and he was treated by ray he was he's dead also

by self harm so she has a son that is dead by self harm and she has a patient who is dead by

self harm critical k was told by two sources right then and there that they did not know whether ray

had treated this patient but she was determined to tell the story the way she wanted to tell it

apparently not the way it was told to her the facts were presented to her and she ignored them and

instead insinuated that ray might have had something to do with those two deaths that is

inexcusable that is duplicitous in anyone following critical k is supporting that kind

of tactic and that kind of abuse there are a few things to note about the federal defamation case

against her one is that karen moved to have the case against her dismissed in that motion she

downplayed her audience reach and referred to her blog as quote marginally interactive she also

claimed that her webcast was not widely heard in mississippi because the people of mississippi

already knew the facts of the case and would therefore have no need to listen to her webcast

she also told the court that she was not rich like the plaintiff and would therefore be unable to

travel to mississippi from michigan she sent her motion via overnight mail and listed her return

address in michigan but the post office paperwork attached to the envelope showed that karen actually

mailed her motion from honolulu hawaii where she had traveled for vacation this did not help her

case later on when she refused to participate in hearings due to economic constraints for her

part critical k contends that this case was bogus and designed to harass and terrify her but here's

the thing it didn't seem to terrify her at all because as this was going on in her life critical

k had taken up the murdoch fight and continued with her pattern of taking up for the quote other

side while conducting herself in the same ways she was alleged to have conducted herself in this case

when and how does this kind of thing end how can victims of injustice speak out while also

protecting themselves from those who seemingly have no boundaries when it comes to what they're

willing to say online like we said there are dangerous consequences to this kind of harassment

the more we look into online harassment the more disturbed we are by what we're finding

because again this is not the world any one of us should want to live in the despair and loneliness

that comes as a result of this kind of targeted harassment cannot be overstated both mandy and

i have experienced it it's been difficult to explain to people what being subjected to harassment

is like because putting it into words almost flattens it makes it seem manageable and like

something that bothers you only because you're sensitive or have thin skin but the more research

we've done the more we're finding out how widespread this issue is we will not stand for

the stifling of victims voices their voices the ability to tell their story is sometimes the only

power they still have left but we also won't stand for the stifling of reporters voices or

the voices of bloggers and other influencers in may longtime blogger heather armstrong who some

call the original mommy blogger died as a result of self-harm soon after her death news reports came

out that she'd been ruthlessly and relentlessly harassed by people who followed what is referred

to as an anti-fan website called gomi or get off my internets the systematic hatred and harassment

was seen by her friends as a factor in her decision to end her own life at 47 years old

the site is primarily a place for people to share their hatred of various bloggers and influencers

and podcasters almost all of them women but the hatred goes beyond just commiseration with

like-minded people and it goes beyond just that one site there are pages upon pages of what are

called snark forums on reddit in which quote anti-fans not only share their distaste of people

they create a community that becomes frothy with one-up bits where they take their mutual dislike

of someone and put it into action a story in the new york post published shortly after heather's

death includes several quotes from other mom bloggers who not only saw the organized cruelty

that came for heather but they have experienced it themselves deborah cruise a blogger on

motherhoodthetruth.com told the post quote i've been told my children should die but heather got

it really bad and she was more fragile than the rest of us but she was more successful too

people are jealous she had an empire she built on living her truth and as it grew some people were

like why should she have that mandy and i have reflected on that statement a lot this week when

we ask ourselves what is driving this online terrorism blogger jenna anderson of that wife

blog told the guardian in 2016 that followers of gomi reported her to child protective services

quote they were pursuing efforts to have our children taken away because they had read about us

on gomi and that was enough evidence to prove we shouldn't be able to have our kids anymore she

told the news agency the organized cruelty and harassment experienced by bloggers is long

established the anti-fansite people coordinate efforts to put their hatred into action they

share instructions with each other on how to create and manage fake social media accounts

and then use those accounts to force sponsors to drop specific writers or influencers they

study photos of influencers and bloggers on vacation and call the hotel or the airbnb where

they're staying to falsely report them for using drugs or making too much noise or things like that

and the victims of this abuse seem to suffer alone because of how insidious the harassment is

we don't think anyone should suffer this alone ever whether they are victims of crime or victims

of injustice or content creators no one should be subjected to online harassment that crosses

the line from opinion sharing to what is essentially terrorism that seeks to silence their voice

and we'll be right back

so what can be done about this we can all help each other we can report the harassment when we

see it online we can report pages for this kind of mental warfare where people are encouraging

each other to act upon their dislike of a person we can also send kind messages to people we see

getting harassed and let them know that they aren't alone and we can stop following the people

pages and websites that engage in this behavior or who seem to report it a lot of this hateful

content seems to live on reddit so please send an email to contact at reddit.com and tell them

enough is enough and look for specific language that we will post soon on social media for a call

to action but the biggest lesson however that i have learned in all of this is that we all have

to start sticking up for ourselves and for each other because there is so much power in the army

of good-hearted folks listening to this podcast right now i've learned that inaction when it comes

to dangerous behavior is no longer a choice for those of us who want to make the world a place

where victims feel comfortable to tell their stories and where journalists feel empowered

to tell victim stories or at least i want a world where there are consequences for those

who participate in this i had a major turning point in this fight this weekend when i posted

that the reddit hate group going after us dubbed luna snark was finally shut down thanks to a group

of super pesky and brilliant women who reported the harassment hundreds of times to reddit to a

point where they could no longer ignore it after connecting with a few women who have gone through

similar struggles i realized that there is nothing i can do to convince the trolls to stop

terrorizing me i could shrink and disappear and they would claim victory and go on to the next

victim but this is no longer about me it's about stopping bad behavior and stopping people from

hurting others like they hurt me so it is time instead of shrinking that we get bigger and louder

we are currently combining forces with other skilled investigators and attorneys so that we

can change this system of abuse that endangers women just by trying to do their jobs so that if

anyone is considering becoming a critical k or a gomi or a reddit snark troll they will fear the

consequences like anyone considering committing a crime in the companies facilitating these hateful

conversations will consider the repercussions so that they will think of rey's story and heather's

story when they make their rules of engagement and they will choose safety and sunlight over

dark money and nameless faces it is time that we force the system to stand up for women for victims

for kindness and i hope you all will join me in this endeavor stay tuned stay pesky and stay in the

sunlight

true sunlight is created by me mandy matinee co-hosted by journalist liz ferrell and produced by my

husband david moses true sunlight is a luna shark production right luna

Machine-generated transcript that may contain inaccuracies.