Did Anita Sarkeesian Fake Death Threats Against Herself?

On Wednsday, August 27, 2014, feminist game critic Anita Sarkessian made the following tweet:

With this screencap attached:

Anita claimed that the above user had tweeted her real home address (blacked out above) with public death threats.

Immediately the gaming press community rallied to her defense, publishing article after article discussing harassment and misogyny in the gaming community. The only problem? The death threats against Anita Sarkeesian are cleary fake, and most likely made by Anita herself.

The Evidence

Let’s look at the screen-cap Anita posted:

This screen-cap was taken 12 seconds after the last of three minutes of tweeting, by a user who was not logged in. There is nothing in the search bar, clearly showing no search was done. Whoever took this had to know this user was making threatening tweets, and enter the exact url of their account at within three minutes of the users first post…

…or make the tweets themselves and then log out and take a screen-cap.

Also, notice anything else odd about these tweets?

Yes, that’s right – perfect spelling and punctuation. Does that sound like any angry gamer you know? Plus, these tweets fit exactly under the 140 twitter character limit. Whoever made these planned and typed them out ahead of time. While this still could be the work of a very obsessive stalker, it shows that these tweets were not the work of a rage troll or someone spontaneously going off. This person created a new account just for these tweets rather than ranting from a previous account.

If someone was going to create a false attack on themselves, creating a dummy account would be the obvious way to go. Creating a full online persona would take a long time, and if Anita wanted to ride the publicity of the recent Zoe Quinn story in gaming, and synchronize death threat with the release her latest video release, she wouldn’t have time to create fully developed hater.

Anita wants us to believe she just happened to find this account, despite the fact it would be highly unlikely, if not impossible for Anita to have seen these tweets and taken the screencap she took had she not been logged into the account making them only a moment before. The more likely explanation is that Anita made these tweets herself, logged out, and took a screen-cap.

All of the above evidence is based solely on the public information Anita posted. But here at ROK, we have another level of insight – an insight into the psychology of the feminine mind.

Anita’s Fake Tweets Reveal Her Twisted Fantasies

Look at the actual content of the threats:

Does this sound like any male hater you know?

Neck biting and blood drinking is a feminine vampire fantasy. This isn’t an angry gamer saying “I hate you, you’re destroying games.” This is a man who wants to overpower her and possess her sexually because he finds her so attractive. Where have I seen this kind of writing before?

In Anita’s fantasy, her stalkers are men overpowered by her beauty, who want to dispose of her beta provider and fulfill her darkest rape fantasies. Her stalker vacillates between wanting to “caress and taste” her and threatening to kill her loved ones so he can possess her. This is exactly the kind of bad writing found in the female dominated genre of romance novels, where a dangerous and powerful man can’t help but be driven to extreme acts by the intoxicating presence of the heroine.

Anita drops a few threats of actual physical violence to establish the danger of the fantasy she is creating, but quickly goes back to 50 Shades of Grey style sex with tweets like this:

This is classic psychological projection. Anita is sexually attracted to men who are the opposite of what constitutes a good male feminist, so she assumes her haters must feel the same way about her. “They hate me because I’m pretty. These guys are obviously all just mad because they’re not good enough for me.”

Why Would Anita Make A Death Threat Against Herself?

As documentary filmmakers Davis Aurini and Jordan Owen are attempting to expose in their new film The Sarkessian Effect, victimhood is the business model of social justice warriors. By receiving public threats, Anita gets news outlets to write about her, give her free publicity, and help her raise money.

Sarkeesian was previously able to raise over $150,000 for her kickstarter campaign, using publicity generated by harassment. Her wikipedia entry on the kickstarter and harassment states:

The events [of her harassment] also led to speaking engagements on related topics. In June 2012, video game developer Bungie invited Sarkeesian to its offices to present on the creation of female characters in games.^[26] In December 2012, Sarkeesian was a speaker at the TEDxWomen conference, discussing online sexual harassment and the nature of online communities.^[27] She has also spoken at Lincoln Land Community College,^[28]Western Kentucky University,^[29] and Northeastern University.^[30][31]

You can bet those speaking engagements weren’t free. That’s that social justice business model: troll a community, claim harassment when they criticize your actions, and turn the publicity into funding and speaking engagements. It worked for Suey Park, whose hashtag campaign against Colbert resulted paid speaking engagements, and Zoe Quinn who turned criticisms of her game Depression Quest into a story about harassment against female developers and got additional publicity for her work. This isn’t a lone con, but a pattern in social justice work.

The Media Doesn’t Report Death Threats Against Men

Compare the way the media handled a single threat against Anita to the way it handles the regular death threats made against ROK and other men’s writers. To my knowledge, no media outlet has ever done a single story on the violent threats made against Return of Kings, whereas a quick google search for “anita sarkeesian death threats” returns 43,300 results.

I believe the mainstream press has not covered the death threats made against men’s writers because on some level they believes we deserve death threats, because of the beliefs we hold. Read that again. The mainstream media believes we deserve to have people threaten to kill us, mutilate our genitals, and hurt our families, because we hold different perspectives. This isn’t the belief of fringe haters. This is the mainstream media. Keep that in mind the next time you read the news.

Law Enforcement Should Pursue Whoever Made Those Tweets

Personally, I believe no human being deserves to suffer from physical violence or the threat of it. If someone has made a genuine threat against Anita or any public figure, they deserve to suffer the full punishment of the law. That is why I am calling on twitter to release the IP address those tweets were made from and work with law enforcement to arrest whoever is responsible for them.

The statements made in those tweets clearly qualify as a threat of physical violence. If Anita did not make these tweets herself, then it is her duty as a feminist to ensure that whoever did is brought to justice, before he threatens other women or commits and act of physical violence. Police have raided people’s houses for more ambiguous statements made on social media.

Of course, if Anita made those tweets herself, the police would raid her. Maybe that’s why all she’s done is use them for publicity.

Read More: Why Is The Zoe Quinn Scandal Blacked Out Across The Internet?