This is what an ignorant jackass looks like

[laceblade]

Okay, so it appears as though Something Awful has deleted the offensive post* made by a Wiscon attendee at her request. Indeed, she is so sorry.

So here is my question. I am assuming that people are going to want to discuss what happened. People should discuss what happened, and IMO, how it can be prevented next time.

I still have the window open on my laptop with the original post. Should I post the text in a public post so that it might be accessible to the interwebs once more? If so, where would be most appropriate: my personal blog, or the Wiscon blog? Is it offensive to re-post the material, or is it more offensive for the perpetrator to hurt people so egregiously and then do a hand-wave because she "did not even begin to consider how much harm it would do to people"?

I'd rather not re-post the pictures in my blog, and I'm not even sure that I could. If the post was deleted, I don't think that I can save them, even if they're still on a web browser window that's been open for hours.



*In case you missed it, someone who attended Wiscon spent her time snapping photographs of people without their permission, removing their faces from pictures, and uploading them to the Something Awful forums with some of the most hateful and ignorant commentary I have ever seen in my life. She attended panels such as "Fat is Not the Enemy," took pictures of people whom she considered to be fat, and then hatefully mocked them for the rest of the world to see, often posting people's names with the pictures. I felt physically ill reading the post, and was nearly in tears by the end of it.

I am disgusted and ashamed that this girl attends my University, and presumably lives in this city. I hope for her sake that our paths never cross. Verily, words would be exchanged.
(Thank God for Facebook, so I know what she looks like, am I right?)


ETA: Read the comments for a link to the first half of the original post. Also, the threads of that post on the SASS forums contain lots more pictures (did people find flickr pools?). People seem to be posting lots of just random photos from Wiscon, including a cute picture of littlebutfierce, raanve, and someone I don't recognize. NORMALITY, IT TRANSLATES TO LOLS. I guess I'm just really out of touch with Internet humor. I don't get it.

ETA2: One of the Con-Chairs has posted to the Wiscon LJ community, asking people to please cease violent threats of any kind. The post is here. Please sit tight, people. The Con-Chairs and ConCommittee are aware of the problem and working on it. Please refrain from posting personal information about the person in question, etc.

Also, the thread on SASS seems to be using pictures from the Wiscon Flickr pool in an ever-increasing number of posts. If you have photos of children on Flickr, please lock them. If you took photos of people without asking for their permission, I would recommend locking those as well, until you obtain it.


EDIT 3: Do not threaten the original poster (that's just stupid). Do not post her personal information (there is more than one person with her name in the world). If you happen across her personal information, I would go with: Do not contact her.

EDIT 4: If you want to disagree with my friends and I in the comments, that's fine. But if your comments are in any way derogatory, they will be deleted. I am open to discourse, but will not tolerate slurs.

Comments

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

>Stupidity and ignorance know no bounds.

True enough, but hostility is different from stupidity or ignorance. I don't think educating the perp would help any (and education usually helps ignorance.) Or, of course, it might be delusion. Education doesn't help delusion, either. Stupidity is a different thing, too. Smart people can maintain more complicated delusions and grudges.

>Finding out that a con member (badged & all) can also be a troll is disappointing, to be sure.

It really is disappointing. On one level, I know that anyone who wants to can buy a con membership. There's no loyalty oath or background check. (I'd be disturbed if a con tried to investigate me before letting me join. The openness of fandom is part of what appeals to me.) Yet WisCon *feels* so much like a community of like-minded people. It's easy to think those who are not fundamentally in sympathy with WisCon's ideals are all taking themselves elsewhere. It's unsettling to find that isn't so.

>Does it help to know that the troll was escorted off the premises?

It does help. Thanks for telling us that part. I expect there will be other trolls at future WisCons, but it's good to know the community can take some action to protect itself. Why was she thrown out? Was it a post she made during the con, or something she said or did face to face?

[bibliofile.livejournal.com]

> True enough, but hostility is different from stupidity or ignorance. . .

Oh yes indeed. I was thinking of an entire range of negative motivations (conscious or not), yet the subtext didn't make it into my typing. What you say.

> On one level, I know that anyone who wants to can buy a con membership.

Yes, and this was her second WisCon. Presumably she got something out of the first one, and then her behavior took a bizarre turn at this one.

> There's no loyalty oath or background check.

That's what I call a horror story! And yet I feel safely reassured that that is unlikely to happen at the cons I tend to frequent (e.g., WisCon). Thankfullly.

[thorswitch.livejournal.com]

I've only read what is posted here and about half (maybe) of the post at SASS, but I noticed in a couple places she talks about having a goal of hating "everyone." She mentions it specifically in the section labeled "Fat is not you Enemy" and notes that she had been reading fat acceptance blogs as fuel, basically, toward her goal of total misanthropy.

So it doesn't seem to necessarily be ignorance OR stupidity - it seems like she's just a very miserable person who has a need to hate everyone.

NOTE: I am NOT defending her - what she did was horrible, and why she did it is not really the point. I just thought, though, that it might be good to throw that info in to the discussion of her motivations, since that's the one she ascribes to herself.

[coffeeandink.livejournal.com]

Yeah, except she didn't go to a con and mock people for being thin, or for being white, or for being straight. Her "misanthropy" is directed down lines of cultural power.