The SyFy channel has a new show out called The Internet Ruined My Life. One of their first segments involves Suey Park, who started the #CancelColbert hashtag, and then had to go into hiding due to people doxxing her, threatening her, and even stalking her IRL.
Wired has some background on the #CancelColbert fiasco. In March 2014, The Colbert Report aired a segment making fun of the Washington Redskins’ owner starting the Washington Redskins Original Americans Foundation to appease those who took issue with the use of “redskins” as a slur. The segment was later referenced on The Colbert Report‘s Twitter account, “I am willing to show #Asian community I care by introducing the Ching-Chong Ding-Dong Foundation for Sensitivity to Orientals or Whatever.”
Park, who was building a following as an outspoken Asian-American activist, took issue with slurs reserved for Asians being used in this way. She tweeted, “The Ching-Chong Ding-Dong Foundation for Sensitivity to Orientals has decided to call for #CancelColbert. Trend it.” People started using the hashtag, and soon the backlash grew.
As the SyFy clip above shows, the blowback Park got included HuffPost Live making fun of her for not understanding satire, the boyfriend who encouraged her to speak out breaking up with her, and then Reddit users doxxing her, to the point where she went into hiding and started using burner phones to communicate with friends.
The scariest parts are when someone claiming to be an ex military sniper said that he was outside her window with a target trained on her. This caused her to flee from Chicago to New York, where her friends cut off her hair so that she could go dancing one night. Unfortunately, a group of people followed her to a club and took pictures of her. When she grabbed a phone to delete them, she found photos of her from previous days.
That’s some truly scary stuff, and it goes to show how far people will go to threaten someone they don’t agree with on the Internet.
(Via Wired)
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boo hoo, she tried to use the internet to get someone to lose their job and it backfired on her, i have no sympathy for her whatsoever
No sympathy whatsoever? Racist.
That’s a joke. But seriously, she was stalked by a stranger because she wanted to cancel a TV show. That’s fucking insane. She has the right to be offended and to express that offence, and people are welcome to disagree. Taking that into death threats and stalking is beyond unnecessary, it’s fucking mental and pathetic.
So..trying to get a show canceled means it’s ok that she was harassed and stalked to the point of going into hiding, received death threats and had to flee the state? You sound like a swell person and your family and friends are lucky to have you.
What are you, typing in character, Bob? Let’s hope, because stalking and death threats in response to a vocalized desire to get a TV show canceled isn’t okay.
When you attention whore the attention isn’t necessarily positive
attention whore? because she posted on Twitter? i’m wondering which word you don’t know the definition of… i’m guessing “attention” because you probably have a pretty good handle on whore, based on your likely internet search history.
Attention, like trying to make people take notice of her cause through the use of a hashtag? Whore, like trying to monetize her hashtag activism by writing companion pieces to them and latching onto any media figures to further clickthroughs to her writing with the use of tags like #BlackPowerYellowPeril and #NotYourAsianSidekick ?
No, I mean attention whore in a very meaningful way.
She was an activist. She was trying to get her voice heard. You know, 1st amendment? Because, you know, Asian females are everywhere getting voices heard compared to everyone else. Those attention whores…
Jfs, the first amendment applies to everybody, not just the person who speaks first. Suey Park had the freedom to attack Colbert, everybody else has the freedom to call her an idiot for doing so. Also, the first amendment guarantees you the right to speak, not the right to be heard. You can talk all you want, but you can’t force people to listen to you.
It’s amazing to me that people look at a story like this, and the first thing they think/write is, “Well, she brought it on herself.” Is she kind of dumb? Yeah, but being dumb shouldn’t give people free reign to make life a living hell. How is there any scenario where writing something dumb on twitter should lead to death threats?
I don’t think people are saying she deserved it. I think people are saying she was hoping for a reaction and she got one. Just not the one she wanted. The lack of sympathy comes in when she is trying to twist something that is clearly a nonissue into and issue. It struck an “Enough is enough” nerve.
Free *rain
A death threat on twitter shouldn’t be a crime. You don’t have to go there to read it. If you want fame, then you’re accepting some of the negatives along with the positives.
Same for someone having a photo of you. If you’re in public, then people are allowed to take pictures.
So unless she has had something other than these two things happen to her, I don’t have any sympathy for her.
No, not *rain
Sorry. Free *rein
The twitter threats are definitely ridiculous and shouldn’t happen! Hopefully we can all figure that problem out. But, the story about people taking photos of her over a period of time sounds suspiciously like gang-stalking delusions. Probably brought on by her stress in the first place … but it kind of takes the wind out of her story overall. & having the exaggerated “Sniper” pointing a real gun at her for the purposes of television doesn’t help.
I’m gonna be the big asshole and ask why anyone would assume that she is being totally honest. These sound like great stories based on a grain of truth.
Yeah I agree. She says she was being stalked by a bunch of people who were taking photos of her outside yet she said that for weeks she didn’t leave her apartment …
I’m gonna be the big asshole and ask why anyone assumes she is telling the truth? These sound like fanciful stories based on a tiny thread of reality.
I’d like to see some of this substantiated before I form an opinion.
At least now she really does know what being mistreated feels like.
man, i can’t even believe i can read articles like this and see some of the human garbage that rises to the top. no sympathy for her? she was stalked, harassed, threatened and had people send shit to her house just to prove that they had her address. what would it take for you to feel an ounce of human sympathy? “on today’s news, local baby lost face in freak-razor fight accident by Isreaeli Terrorists” – internet commenter – “eh, stupid baby probably deserved it.” …does decency only exist outside of the internet? this might be crazy, i know, but you should be able to have an opinion that is unpopular and not get doxxed for it. who even has the time to doxx people? does nobody have jobs?
She put herself in a situation to get harassed and can remove herself at any time. That’s like complaining about drowning after you jump into a lake and having access to a air tank the whole time.
Sometimes the person you need protection from is yourself.
On the other hand, you’re infantilizing this grown woman by comparing her to a baby. So there’s that.
“Activist” is a little generous, don’t you think?
ZING
‘Professional Victim”.
There are millions of people who don’t understand satire, as shown by all the people who believe Onion articles. They shouldn’t be the subject of threats, but of pity.
Got far worse than she deserved. As long as she woke up one morning and realized what an idiot she was, she has my full sympathy.
The best part is at 3:40. Her friend, trying to defend her against the backlash roughly says, people took what she said out of context to make a “juicy quote” that would get them clicks and traffic… which is EXACTLY what she did to Colbert in the first place.
Exactly what I came down here to say
Suey Park’s ‘activism’ is the same as Anita Sarkeesian’s. It hasn’t ruined their lives. As a matter of fact, they’ve parlayed these exaggerations into careers by monetizing their alleged victimhood at speaking engagements around the globe.
I hope next episode is ‘Ghosts almost ruined my life: The Peter Venkman Story”
Death threats etc. are awful but she does herself no favours by complaining about HuffPo making fun of her if she’s looking for people to take her side in general. She either is stupid and doesn’t know what satire is or knows what it is but chose to ignore that fact. Either way, mockery of her idiocy by HuffPo guy was fair game.
Not the brightest bulb but yeah, some people took shit too far
I struggle to find the take-home message in all this.Did she try to court controversy? Sure, but when was the last time Rush Limbaugh went into hiding? Is it because she had lots of twitter followers? No – as we’ve seen with Justine Sacco, you don’t need to be a social media “star” to get singled out. As far as I can tell, she just managed to attract the attention of angry, entitled people with lots of spare time. So yeah, that’s it. Kids: Avoid voicing unpopular opinions in front of angry, entitled people, especially if you’re a woman or ethnic minority.
Are you under the impression that Rush Limbaugh never went into hiding BECAUSE no one ever disparaged or threatened him in social media?
I can’t believe anyone actually believes any of this shit happened to this delusional attention whore. It’s adorable how she’s sill trying to cover up that she’s too stupid to realize Colbert’s show and character were satire, and that her stupidity shows in the pathetic transparency of her bullshit stalker story.
The cognitive dissonance from the internet every time a woman says she got a raw deal is amazing. Wait, not amazing. I mean pathetic and sad. 40 guys show up to call her a bitch or whore and point out that anything bad that happens to her is her fault. Good job fellas. I hope you all develop some perspective and empathy at some point in your very small lives.
“People are basically stupid, and will believe anything they’re told.” – George Carlin
I have this crazy suspicion that everything Park said was taken as absolute fact, no fact checking or actual investigation was done, and the truth of the matter likely isn’t what was presented in a professionally produced and edited TV show. I realize how unprecedented that would be, for personal accounts and entertainment media filtered ideas not to be 100% accurate, but that’s where I stand at the moment.
When you have conviction then there will always be people who will hate you for it. The sad truth is that being outspoken, particularly on matters of race, can be very dangerous. Up to that point she was preaching to the choir with her activism. Tweeting things to people who already agreed with her and speaking at colleges who thought as she did. What happened to her is what can happen when those who don’t think like you do now become your audience.
This seems a bit ridiculous… What kind of military trained sniper, would announce to their target that they’re watching them? Why WOULDN’T you call the police in this situation? She just goes on to say how they wouldn’t be any help… how so!? That’s ridiculous.
She goes on to say that she was being stalked and these guys were taking photos of her from previous days yet she stated earlier that she spent all her days in the past weeks in her apartment.