Name: Sawyer Gersh

Social Justice Group: 2022-2023, Technology: Free Speech v Hate Speech Online

Date of Fieldwork: February 22, 2023

Name of Organization and person (people) with whom you met and their title(s):N/A

Type of Fieldwork: Interview

What I did and what I learned about my topic, activism, social justice work or civil and human rights work from this fieldwork?:

At 1:45 we met with Tanya Gersh who is a real estate agent. At first we asked for a quick summary of her experience. She said she was a victim of a troll storm. A troll strom is when someone like Andrew Anglin gets your information and gives it to a bunch of hate filled people and primes them to harass you. For example they would find every website about you and leave bad reviews and destroy your online life. This caused people who didn’t even know Tanya to think she was bad at her job and an overall bad person. Eventually, there was a march set in her hometown of whitefish montana ending at her house filled with antisemitic people. Though later Tanya told us that these people are cowards having liked the feeling of power over the computer but would never dare go to her in person. She also told us about how things are changing though our perceptions of these people are not. For example, I usually think of antisemitic people as stupid and kind of like a redneck but instead they are taking perfectly fine college students who are smart and educated then indoctrinating them against Jewish people. Then we talked about her reactions which were fear and horror and shattered her entire world view. Which was very closely tied to the show Glee, where a very diverse community celebrated their differences this also made her think Americans had basically overcome adversity and Hate violence. Her children felt the same but were also unsure of whether they were on the right side. After the Judge ruled in her favor though she was reassured that the precedent was out and the judge showed how we won’t put up with these people and we will hold them accountable. After she told us how we could make a difference by being loud and proud showing the best possible image of ourselves combating these harmful stereotypes.