May 4, 2013

When is it a rape-threat hoax and when is it a sock-puppeting moby?

I've been thinking about the Meg Lanker-Simons incident. Here's James Taranto asking: "Why are phony 'hate crimes' so common, especially on college campuses?" He also looks into the First Amendment doctrine of "true threats." Obviously, it's not a "true threat" when the threat is actually written by the person targeted in the threat, but the police cited Lanker-Simons for statements she made to them, not for the original statement put up on the University of Wyoming "Crushes" page on Facebook. I can't tell from the articles I've read whether Lanker-Simons was the one who reported the Facebook post to the police, but the police did an investigation and had a warrant to search her computer, where they found evidence that she'd made the statement.
Sarah Zacharias, Wyoming state director for UniteWomen.org, said she and Lanker-Simons are friends. Zacharias spoke Monday during a campus demonstration against UW Crushes.  Zacharias said she was with Lanker-Simons when she found the post on UW Crushes.

“If the police are going to give her handcuffs for this, they need to give her an Oscar as well for her acting skills because I saw a woman devastated,” she said. Zacharias said she’d stake her own reputation on Lanker-Simons being innocent of creating the controversial post.
Did Zacharias report it to the police? Did the police initiate the investigation because of the demonstration? How awful to have the police seize your computer! It was the decision to leverage the Facebook posting into a demonstration — stirring up fear and outrage — that turned this thing into a hoax (and brought the apparently unforeseen horrible consequence of the police going through her computer). Thinking about the potential for the police to search your computer should make victims of true threats worry about calling the police, but it should also be a powerful deterrent to doing a fake threat.

But let's consider the Facebook posting alone:
“I want to hatef--- Meg Lanker- so hard. That chick that runs her liberal mouth all the time and doesn’t care who knows it. I think its hot and it makes me angry. One night with me and shes gonna be a good Republican b----.”
It's really not in threat form. It expresses a desire, not an intent to do something. And, let's be clear: "hatefuck" does not mean rape. It means: "To have sex, especially in a rough manner, with someone who one finds physically attractive but personally loathsome." So — assuming that Lanker really did write the post — we're seeing the work of a sockpuppet + moby. She was a sockpuppet to the extent that she was complimenting herself, proclaiming herself extremely seductive. She was a moby to the extent that she pretended to be one of her own antagonists and made that fake entity speak in a way that would bring her antagonists into disrepute.

Sockpuppets and mobys are ordinary characters all over the internet. As I said in my earlier post about Lanker-Simons: "People need better bullshit detectors!" The elements of sockpuppetry and mobyism are all over that Facebook posting. "Crush" pages for various institutions — like the University of Wyoming, in this case — invite statements about crushes on various students and make these statements anonymous. Of course, students are tempted to post about themselves, advertising how attractive they are. And of course, they are tempted to weave in their political opinions. The Lanker-Simons posting is exactly what you ought to expect. Sharpen up, everyone.

But what are the school authorities supposed to do? If they slough off these postings as the usual internet flimflam, they'll be denounced for minimizing violence against women. There lies the real problem: There's pressure against sharpening up.

Remember when feminism was about consciousness-raising?

87 comments:

Bender said...

"Why are phony 'hate crimes' so common, especially on college campuses?"

Because campuses are bastions of leftism. And for the left, the ends justifies the means - the ends being tearing down institutions of tradition and discrediting and destroying conservatives who seek to uphold tradition. The false flag has long been a tactic of the left.

Chip S. said...

But what are the school authorities supposed to do?

At Dartmouth, they cancel classes for a day to allow for deep thoughts about the kind of environment in which people are so oppressed that they're driven to post as mobys on a college message board.

Unknown said...

"“If the police are going to give her handcuffs for this, they need to give her an Oscar as well for her acting skills because I saw a woman devastated,” she said. Zacharias said she’d stake her own reputation on Lanker-Simons being innocent of creating the controversial post."


Oscars for everyone!

Brian Brown said...

It's really not in threat form. It expresses a desire, not an intent to do something.

Yeah, but it made the special little snowflake uncomfortable (allegedly) and therefore it should be illegal.

Leftists want to criminalize things they find personally offensive. The list of examples for this is rather, long.

cubanbob said...

Permanently banning her from the state university system would go a long way in discouraging this mind of behavior.

Unknown said...

Only one university in Wyoming. All others are Jr Colleges.

KCFleming said...

They could expel her from school for starters.

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

I'll be the first jerk to point out that maybe the most cringe-worthy thing of all is fat girl with trashy tattoos sockpuppeting that she inspires lust.

Brian Brown said...

What is even funnier is that this:

That chick that runs her liberal mouth all the time and doesn’t care who knows it. I think its hot and it makes me angry.

Was accepted by her silly little fellow travelers as how a "Republican" thinks.

These people are not that bright and easily misled.

campy said...

Remember when feminism was about consciousness-raising?

No, I only remember it being about misandry.

Brian Brown said...

Remember when feminism was about consciousness-raising?

No, I remember when bullshit artists claimed this, but it was never actually so.

campy said...

Zacharias said she’d stake her own reputation on Lanker-Simons being innocent

So not risking much, in other words.

KCFleming said...

See? This is what happens when you stop using the stocks for punishment.

Tom Armstrong said...

I still think it was funnier when Cleavon Little did it...

KCFleming said...

Whodathunk that the flighty girls making witch accusations in The Crucible would be the template for modern college feminists?

Nothing happened to them either.

Left Bank of the Charles said...

How do we know her husband, who perhaps might be a Republican or just desirous of some of that kinky Republican sex, didn't use her computer to write this post without telling her?

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Leftists often get away with their fake garbage. It's worth it to try.

Chip S. said...

I thought feminism was about having it all.

And, really, isn't that what this chick is trying to do? To be a hideous harpy who's a sex magnet for those bad-boy Young Republicans?

Nonapod said...

As I've said before, we as a culture have made victimhood too much of a desirable status. We not only sympathy, and empathy to victims, but also attention and validation and a forum. It's enough of an issue that dysfunctional individuals seek victimhood. Unfortunately I don't have an easy solution for that problem.

David said...

If you believe the feminists, you would be sending your daughters to convents not universities. If anyone sensible actually believed the assertions of the prevalence of rape at my alma mater, they would leave.

glenn said...

BTW: Lanker-Simons all by itself is proof she's a twit. fortunately she lives in a country that breeds twits like bunnyrabbits.

Unknown said...

Nonapod

You're right. And the lack of solutions comes from no one wanting to be the meanie who says "Get over it!"

Synova said...

The whole concept of a "Crush" page is twisted and stupid from the get-go. But that's campus life these days, right? Lets have a sponsored event week all about how to have an orgasm and another sponsored week all about how to have an orgasm with a same-sex partner and then lets follow that with a sponsored week about how empowering the sex-trade is.

The only good thing that can be said about it is that when you're actually on campus it's easy to ignore and you see all the rolled-eyes from students who understand how stupid it all is.

Bruce Hayden said...

Won't expel her though. She is apparently a feminist, which makes her part of a protected class in most universities. Now, if it had been a guy doing that..... And of course membership in the class is entirely voluntary, at least for women. So, why wouldn't all the women on campus join? Because most of the rest of them can get dates (channelling Rush's famous statement about feminists). Picture I saw of supposedly her was short and dumpy with her taller gawky husband at her side. Which would have made true sexual stalking unlikely, and a cry for attention maybe more likely.

fivewheels said...

You know what else you would expect about a post you wrote yourself to be shocking? That you would "discover" that post in the company of someone else, who could witness you "discovering" it.

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Alex said...

Looking at the urban dictionary entry, the term "hatefuck" was invented by liberals as a weapon against conservative women. What deplorable people liberals are.

Alex said...

Apparently it's PC to express the most vile intentions on conservative women like Sarah Palin, Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulter.

Mark O said...

There are just so many groups that need protection. Gosh. I can recall when people defended themselves. But, that was before being weak and helpless endowed one with special privileges, including the right to lie and perpetrate crimes without repercussion.

Ah, me. They're rioting in Africa.

chickelit said...

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...
I'll be the first jerk to point out that maybe the most cringe-worthy thing of all is fat girl with trashy tattoos sockpuppeting that she inspires lust.

...which prompted me to google the beast.

dc said...

"But what are the school authorities supposed to do?"
What they are supposed to do is expel her.What they will probably do is wait for everyone to go home in a few weeks and then drop the charges.

Achilles said...

The best part is we have all payed for this "women" to be "educated" in this manner.

I am personally proud that our education system is so good at producing victims of this caliber. It makes me feel patriotic when paying my taxes. Hopefully she grows up to run a planned parenthood clinic that I can subsidize and she can employ that poor maligned Dr. Gosnell after he is acquitted. Or more likely she will start popping out kids, getting welfare and food stamps and HUD rent support. If she remains fat enough SSDI if waiting for her to add to the rolls. We will all have the honor of supporting this paragon of virtue.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

There lies the real problem:

Everybody lies about sex?

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Where is that image of Lanker-Simons standing outside protesting with her sign about "rape culture"?

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

This story is too rich...

If I gorge I could end looking like that woman... the lofty lusty lefty.

Michael K said...

"someone who one finds physically attractive but personally loathsome."

Does anyone know if her husband is male ? Who finds her "physically attractive?"

Achilles said...

As far as her husband goes if such exists I have some guesses about his "orientation." My first guess is eunuch/metrosexual. He is probably either physically or mentally castrated.

ricpic said...

If you stroke paranoia there are hate crimes everywhere. Committed by, ya know, "the enemy."

bagoh20 said...

"Remember when feminism was about consciousness-raising?"

Somebody's bullshit detector needed new batteries.

Gospace said...

Without even looking at the urban dictionary as someone above did, I was going to mention that the only people I have ever heard use the term "hatefuck" are liberals.

Right off the bat- HOAX. Because only liberals like her use the term.

Limited Blogger said...

She certainly brought the "threatening" post to the Facebook administrator's attention (or so she claimed, anyway). I thought I read on her blog that she reported it to the police -- but she's since pulled her blog down. It was called "cognitive dissonance."

http://www.campusreform.org/blog/?ID=4731

bagoh20 said...

I'll assume she realizes a hatefuck is her best hope.

cubanbob said...

Now that is one fugly woman. One can almost believe that she secretly wants her fantasy to come true.

Zach said...

But what are the school authorities supposed to do? If they slough off these postings as the usual internet flimflam, they'll be denounced for minimizing violence against women. There lies the real problem: There's pressure against sharpening up.

I would go further and say that there is an unmet demand for confrontation.

Radicals of any stripe are in constant conflict with people who just aren't that worked up about their pet subject. Provocations demonstrate the need for marginal allies to become more involved and retroactively justify people who have been working for extreme solutions.

Fake incidents satisfy a need for conflict and emotional release that isn't necessarily being met by day to day life.

KCFleming said...

It's a rape threat hoax becaus she went public decrying the post writing "Rape is not a Joke" on posters she made at a protest the next day or so.

The original post was a sophomoric money thing. She turned it into a threat of rape.

chuck said...

let's be clear: "hatefuck" ... is a word used by progressive folks. At least I've never heard of anyone but progressives using it. Can someone provide a counter example?

McTriumph said...

Hatefucking, so in the early 70s, those hippie chics that called me a Nazi for being a republican in poli-sci class, but would fuck my brains out after a pitcher of beer were hatefucking me?

Zach said...

“I want to hatef--- Meg Lanker- so hard. That chick that runs her liberal mouth all the time and doesn’t care who knows it. I think its hot and it makes me angry. One night with me and shes gonna be a good Republican b----.”

Once you identify Lanker as the author of this paragraph, the wish fulfillment jumps out at you:

I want to hatef--- Meg Lanker- so hard.

Somebody knows my name!

That chick that runs her liberal mouth all the time

They're listening!

and doesn’t care who knows it.

I'm edgy and dangerous!

I think its hot

I'm sexy!

and it makes me angry.

I elicit strong emotions!

One night with me and shes gonna be a good Republican b----.

A big strong man wants to ravish me!

(I say "big strong man" because Lanker is so specific that the imaginary rapist is a Republican. Also, though I'm hardly an expert on this, isn't the strength and animalistic nature of the man a pretty key element of the rape fantasy?)

virgil xenophon said...

@El Pollo Real/

GAAAAAA!!!!! MY EYES!!! MY EYES!!! You rotten SOB, you, you just HAD to provide the link, didn't you?--and with NO WARNING WHATSOEVER! Ye Gods, man, have you no consideration for your fellow man? I could have gone my entire life w.o. viewing that, that, thing..

Synova said...

BTW... it's entirely possible for her to write the post *and* be upset by reading it for the first time.

Zach said...

A few years after I graduated, the cluster of colleges I graduated from had a fake hate crime. A professor who was in danger of not getting a tenure offer faked up a bunch of racist graffiti and vandalized her car.

Like this case, there was a strong element of wish fulfillment. She wasn't a marginal professor hanging on by her fingertips -- she was a target! The attackers weren't just racists or antisemites, they were both, and anti-women, too! You halfway expected them to scratch an arrow pointing to a nearby manifesto.

ed said...

*Yawn*

Wake me up when liberals show outrage over other liberals using the phrase "hate fuck" on conservative women. Otherwise; who gives a shit.

Steven said...

Remember when feminism was about consciousness-raising?

No, but I'm young enough my first memory of feminism was the Anita Hill campaign, where a woman supposedly was unacceptably harassed at the Department of Education—and then deliberately followed her supposed harasser to a new job at the EEOC.

Which was immediately followed by feminists rolling over for Bill Clinton.

edutcher said...

Meg Wanker, yeah, dat's da ticket.

I guess she couldn't wait any longer to be the change Choom had been waiting for.

Or something.

PS "hatefuck" - "To have sex, especially in a rough manner, with someone who one finds physically attractive but personally loathsome."

Kids today are a lot weirder than we ever were.

Anonymous said...

I once was in a writing class where each week you have a partner and exchange short writing pieces in email each day.

One week my partner was a 20-something woman who sent me three first-person pieces in which a woman is explaining to a helpless man that she is about to kill him and how much she would enjoy it.

I found it pretty creepy. And I knew that if I had sent her writing like that with the roles reversed, I'd probably see a policeman drive up to my door.

jr565 said...

She also self identified as a non violent communist, and supposedly sued the school to get Bill Ayers to speak at her school. The leftist militant indoctrination retardation is strong in that one.

And we wonder why she is also a liar.

jr565 said...

Remember when feminism was about consciousness-raising?

Do you remember when shit smelled like roses?
Me neither.

Anonymous said...

Remember when feminism was about consciousness-raising?

My first experience of that feminism was when Robin Morgan came to my college. My roommate took her class and discovered that men were not allowed to speak.

Morgan then organized a classic New Left confrontation with the school administration, complete with non-negotiable demands and take-over of the president's office.

Back then I was running with college radical types and I got pulled into a male consciousness-raising group, which entailed confessing to sexual fantasies which degraded women.

Meanwhile Morgan was secretly meeting and aiding one of the most dangerous New Left bombers who was hiding in my college town.

So, yeah, I remember that feminism -- it was mostly a cover for SDS/Weather Underground agitation.

Apparently not much has changed.

Bruce Hayden said...

This is the photo that suggested to me that she was married: Bill Ayers Fan Stages Fake Republican Rape Threat Against Herself to Protest Rape Culture. It showed in el Pollo's links, third down on the left. Looks to be three different angles shown there of the same public appearance, and it does look like the same woman in the top dozen or so photos.

A number of the photos show her with red lipstick, and that says, to me (and I am likely quite prejudiced here) that she is trying to be attractive sexually, but is desperate to do so due to her excess weight and overly fleshy features.

Any case, as I pointed out earlier, how credible does anyone think that some guy would have been sexually stalking this somewhat overweight, somewhat ugly, married woman, in the midst of all of the much more attractive co-eds on campus?

Seeing Red said...

I would like to think the republican males at the U of W had not only better taste, but don't want to poach someone's spouse.

Why bother with her when they can get it for free from someone unattached?

fivewheels said...

I will say that although I already stated in the other thread that the original post reeks of projection on her part and seems tailor-made to emerge from the addled brain of that kind of woman, I am still slightly open to the possibility that she is innocent.

Not just in a legal until-proven-guilty way, but it could have been her husband, one supposes. You can imagine compatible political motivations and access to the computer. It changes the calculations of the projection, but one may deduce that he has some thoughts on hatefucking someone who is loathsome.

glenn said...

"“If the police are going to give her handcuffs for this, they need to give her an Oscar as well for her acting skills because I saw a woman devastated,” she said."

Saw what she wanted to. See how simple that is?

Unknown said...

The population of UW males is mostly conservative by liberal standards. They probably have never heard of this woman.

madAsHell said...

google the beast

I'm I the only one, or does any one else see the perpetual I'm-smarter-than-you smirk on her face??

MD Greene said...

It was hate speech.
If it had been written by a right-wing man, he likely would have been prosecuted by the university.
Why is it not prosecuted when it was written by a progressive feminist?

MD Greene said...

It was hate speech.
If it had been written by a right-wing man, he likely would have been prosecuted by the university.
Why is it not prosecuted when it was written by a progressive feminist?

Cody Jarrett said...

Be nice if Ann would actually do some research before she starts her deal.

The bitch got her computer searched because she complained to everyone and sundry about the threat made. Her husband even jumped and tried to make it someone who was into guns--"if this is who I think it is who was rallying to be able to have a concealed weapon" or something similar, in other words there was a specific person/s they were trying to tar here. Complaints were made. Cops investigated the threat and found...voila.

Oh how horrible! To have your computer seized!

Oh how much bullshit! To fucking lie about something and get caught!

Fuck me.

As bags said further up--someone's bullshit detector needs new batteries.

Titus said...

"Google the beast"-LOL

Anonymous said...

As bags said further up--someone's bullshit detector needs new batteries.

Yes. Everyone gets stuff wrong, but it's standard operating procedure for Althouse to lecture down to people to "Sharpen up" and such.

As far as I'm concerned, anyone who was taken in by feminism as consciousness-raising and voted for Obama once then almost twice can kiss their lecturing privileges goodbye outside the classroom.

Bruce Hayden said...

The population of UW males is mostly conservative by liberal standards. They probably have never heard of this woman.

And probably a little liberal by Wyoming standards. Still, I think it likely that there are a lot of universities where she (and presumably her husband) would fit a lot better. Maybe CSU 50 or so miles south, or CU 80 or so miles south might fit her better, and there is some sort of exchange program for western states that allows students from one state to attend college at a state school in another western state at a tuition halfway between in-state and out-of-state. My kid, from Colorado, was looking at using it to go to Montana, but decided to go back east instead.

Big Mike said...

I haven't heard that Lanker-Simons has been expelled, though perhaps she should receive mental health evaluation first.

But Zacharias and other faculty in Wyoming who have expressed support for Lanker-Simons' far-fetched story need letters of reprimand placed in their permanent personnel records.

Sam L. said...

Colleges are "programmed to believe". And they deeply WANT to believe.

chickelit said...

Universities that tolerate these sorts of hoaxes and fail to deliver consequences to perps ultimately risk tarnishing their own brand. Look at it like the NYT--hardcore liberal to a fault but an ultimate failure as a business model.

There is probably a growing cohort of parents--the kind who homeschool or otherwise avoid public schools--who will extend that to colleges and universities who don't offer a balanced education w/ perspective and yet milk and bilk to feed their ilk. Alternatives are developing.

Ann Althouse said...

"The bitch got her computer searched because she complained to everyone and sundry about the threat made."

The victim is subjected to the search. To me, that's scary. What if it wasn't fake? I have twice reported threats to the police, and it never crossed my mind that my computer might be searched. I assume the police traced it to her first, and my point in the post is that she wouldn't have cried threat if she'd known it would be traced to her. I don't see the point about my missing something.

Rabel said...

A couple of older quotes.

From the husband:

"Andrew Simons, who unsuccessfully ran for secretary of state in 2010, said the key to breaking the Republican dominance over Wyoming politics is for Democrats to get out and show voters that they’re not as bad as they might think.

“A lot of [voters] have never had any contact with a Democratic politician,” Simons said. “And I think a lot of people are going to have a whole different view of Democrats if we just go out there and ... show them that Democrats aren’t communist, gun-grabbing liberal welfare queens.”

From Meg:

"I'm a 28-year-old undergrad at the University of Wyoming. I'm married to my fantastic (and patient) husband Andrew, who's working on a degree in Secondary Education. I'm heading to law school in 2013."

I especially like the last line.

Cody Jarrett said...

Ann: she cried threatened rape, culture of rape, violence against womyn and every other damn thing. Her husband suggested he knew who it was and that they were into guns.

This led to the school conducting an investigation. They were going to arrest this dastardly gun loving republican rapist by god. They did whatever it is they do with computer forensics and found it was her computer so they got a warrant to search her computer. During this time she lied to the cops and that's why she was cited.

So I don't see how you get off with all this "oh my god the victim!" stuff. If they'd looked at the post and found it came from somewhere else, they'd have never gone for her computer.

She's not a victim.

Sharpen up, as you like to say while you talk down to all of us rabble down here amongst the weeds.

Cody Jarrett said...

By the way: this is not the first time she's done something like this. She sent herself a fake death threat a couple of years ago.

Rabel said...

Althouse said:

"I assume the police traced it to her first.."

Yes, they probably would have been able to get the IP address for the threatening comment without seizing the computer. When it matched Meg's, they got a warrant.

Cody Jarrett said...

According to trib.com (wyoming star tribune) that's exactly what happened. Both facebook and survey monkey were very quick to give information to the school police.

Iconochasm said...

@MadasHell, I was just thinking, looking through the GIS, that she's not too overweight to be attractive. The much deeper problem is that her expression in every picture seems like it should be described by a strong negative adjective followed by the word "visage". She just looks like the inside is far uglier than the out.

Petunia said...

Wonder what law school accepted this woman? Wonder if they'll rescind their offer? Or offer her a scholarship?

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

Althouse: I think you should consider the possibility that the school/police already knew she is a nutter and had other evidence that suggested she might have been behind the "threat" that justified taking the computer.

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

Wait, so if you assume police traced it to her first, why are you bent out of shape that they took her computer as evidence? They presumably wouldn't have done so if they didn't know she was the perp...? What am I missing here?

Rabel said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Rabel said...

Maybe the threat wasn't meant to be posted publicaly and was part of an elaborate role-play sex game between Meg and her hubby. Once it was online, she just rolled with it.

I saw something like that on South Park. A UPS uniform was involved.

TMink said...

Progressive thought abandoned truth for narratives. Very postmodern, and completely unreliable.

Trey

pdug said...

I think hatef- is a euphemism with plausible deniability for rape.

Its certainly an aggressive thing to say to someone. Its hostile.