What do we do about Kiwifarms?
*CONTENT WARNING : Suicide, suicidal ideation, online mobbing, stalking and harassment **
This week I heard for the first time about something called Kiwi Farms; a Twitter mutual mentioned in passing that they are awful. As it turns out, the “Worst Website on the Internet” as Gizmodo recently called them are a forum of sorts dedicated to stalking and harassing vulnerable individuals that they refer to as “lolcows” who can be “milked for laughs”; targeting in exceedingly cruel and creepy ways particularly those who are transgender, neurodivergent, disabled or living with mental illness. After a quick Google search, a healthy shudder and Contrapoints’ video on “cringe”, I put the whole thing out of my mind in disgust.
Then yesterday I learned the news: a programmer known as Near /Byuu has died by suicide, after being targeted and harassed by trolls from Kiwi Farms. I learned it from one of my favourite Web cartoonists, Sophie Labelle, who has been, herself, on the receiving end of harassment campaigns by neo-Nazi and transphobic groups originating with Kiwifarms.
In the comments to Sophie’s Facebook post, someone mentioned that stalkers organised on Kiwi Farms attempted to…
