Reader’s advisory: old news + I was not involved.
A few months ago, a promising science fiction author called Benjanun Sriduangkaew was exposed as the secret identity of notorious troll/cyberbully Requires Hate (who has also gone by the name of Winterfox, ACrackedMoon, and several others).
I was a regular reader of Requires Hate. I actually planned to submit one of my books for a Requires Hate review, but I didn’t have any ready in time. Everyone’s shocked that this person gained so much traction in “da scene”. Nobody can see the truth: that the problem lies with them, and the community they created.
Over the past few years, we’ve seen the rise of the “social justice” movement, which combats sexism, racism, and oppression (or thinks it does). For years, it was a harmless tumor, confined to places like LiveJournal and SomethingAwful. But Tumblr and Twitter shot it full of steroids, and it has metastasized into a proud, fierce, non-gender-binary cancer.
In CS Lewis’s city of Tashbaan, the less important bow and scrape for the more important. In the social justice, the less oppressed bow and scrape for the more oppressed. There’s not much more too it. If you have light skin, or a penis, disagreement with a minority (or someone who claims they’re a minority) is very unwise, as you are silencing them, erasing them, forcing them out of the discourse, denying their lived experiences, et cetera.
Obviously, these kinds of communities are very vulnerable to sociopaths, and manipulators, and Requires Hate leveraged her Oppressed Person status to the full. She was a woman, she was queer, and she was Asian. That’s a pretty strong hand. Maybe the ace-high straight Social Justice Poker. You had to listen to her, because you were privileged and she was not.
One of the victims of Requires Hate’s taunting was Kari Sperring, who apparently attempted suicide because of it. I find that…unhealthy. Abnormal. Why would you let an internet troll have that much power over you? I think it’s because of social justice. Sperring wasn’t able to brush those comments off, because Requires Hate outranked her. Arguing with a member of THREE marginalised groups? No way. That would have made her a bad person, an oppressor. Only one way out…the medicine cabinet.
4chan wish they had a trolling thermonuke this powerful. All they can do is leak your naked selfies.
Hopefully people will have learned a lesson from Requires Hate…that societies should not act like the saddest, most downtrodden class of saps deserves to be running things. There’s men who volunteer at rape shelters and women who’s biggest concern is shopping for oversized sunglasses. And being black – even an actually oppressed black – doesn’t mean you know a damn thing about racism, just as getting shot doesn’t confer understanding of ballistics or catching a cold doesn’t make you an expert on immunology. These are complicated topics, and I want to hear smart viewpoints, wherever they come from, not “lived-in” viewpoints. The idea is got-a-cool-toy-banned-by-rectally-inserting-it grade stupid.
As for Benjanun Sriduangkaew, I wish she’d stuck around. She got busted, posted a groveling apology, and is now keeping a low profile. I think she should have stuck to her guns. “Yeah, I was Requires Hate, and here’s news: I regret nothing. You’re trash, your favorite books suck, and if that makes you try to kill yourself, take a fucking seat. You haven’t seen anything yet.”
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