Speaker 1: You're listening to Disinformed, a mini series from There Are
Speaker 1: No Girls on the Internet. I'm Bridget Todd. You might
Speaker 1: know attorney Rabbia Chadri from her role in the case
Speaker 1: of Ann said Adnan was convicted of first degree murder
Speaker 1: for the death of hay Menley, a high school student
Speaker 1: in Baltimore who was last seen on January. Lee's family
Speaker 1: remains convinced of Ann's guilt, that he maintains his innocence,
Speaker 1: and Robbia has been fighting to disonerate him. She brought
Speaker 1: his story to investigative journalist Sarah kaneg which became the
Speaker 1: hit true crime podcast Cereal. Robbia hosts her own true
Speaker 1: crime podcast called Undisclosed. Rashid her co host who are
Speaker 1: also lawyers, explore wrongful convictions. Now, even though there's literally
Speaker 1: hundreds of thousands of podcasts out there, the podcast community
Speaker 1: can be kind of small. We see each other at
Speaker 1: events and conferences, and right now Robbia is facing a
Speaker 1: coordinated harassment campaign from another podcaster. Now, talking about this
Speaker 1: kind of online harassment is tricky, and it's so easy
Speaker 1: to do it irresponsibly. Let me talk about harassment. Were
Speaker 1: often centering the harassmer and their tactics. The experience of
Speaker 1: the person who has been harassed, how they're feeling, and
Speaker 1: how it shapes their work and their perspective can often
Speaker 1: go overlooked or not mentioned at all. So I don't
Speaker 1: want to do that, and honestly, the person harassing Robbia
Speaker 1: does not need a bigger spotlight, but I do need
Speaker 1: to tell you the broad strokes of what's going on
Speaker 1: to make clear the full weight of how harassment can
Speaker 1: impact our real lives. I believe Robbia is at the
Speaker 1: center of a dangerous, coordinated harassment campaign being orchestrated by
Speaker 1: Mike Boudet, the host of Sword and Scale, a popular
Speaker 1: and successful true crime podcast. On his website, Mike sells
Speaker 1: merchandise with the slogan Adnan Did It, a reference to
Speaker 1: Robbia's relationship with Adnan. He's encouraged his followers to show
Speaker 1: up at her public speaking events. Stuff that is just
Speaker 1: super scary, stuff that makes me concerned for Robbie's actual safety.
Speaker 1: If you check out the verified Twitter page for Sword
Speaker 1: and Scale, you can see a little of what I mean.
Speaker 1: Mike's podcast, it's really popular and he has a huge
Speaker 1: fan base and This is another reason why talking about
Speaker 1: online harassment is kind of tricky. No one wants to
Speaker 1: be on the radar of someone who's a harasser. Other
Speaker 1: members of the true crime podcast community have talked about
Speaker 1: being afraid to speak up because of the behavior they've
Speaker 1: seen from him. No one wants to wake up and
Speaker 1: find a flood of hateful comments directed at you on
Speaker 1: social media, or a flood of one star reviews on
Speaker 1: your podcast. But this is also how harassment festers. People
Speaker 1: don't speak up and they don't call it out for
Speaker 1: what it is. In doing research for this episode, an
Speaker 1: article about what Robbie is going through described her as
Speaker 1: having a feud with Mike Boudet. A feud is a
Speaker 1: difference of opinion. A feud might be tense exchanges on
Speaker 1: social media. A feud is not when one person is
Speaker 1: concerned with their actual safety. That's harassment, and we need
Speaker 1: to talk about the way it un packs our work
Speaker 1: and our lives. I was in law school, um when
Speaker 1: when the best friend of my younger brother was arrested,
Speaker 1: non say, and that has kind of gotten me um.
Speaker 1: You know, it was just one of those things where
Speaker 1: I witnessed it a close and personal I was there
Speaker 1: in his trial when he was convicted, and I just
Speaker 1: witnessed the horror of all of it, and I couldn't
Speaker 1: believe what I was seeing. And I had no idea
Speaker 1: what the criminal justice system was like until what happened
Speaker 1: with Annan, and our community also was pretty naive. So
Speaker 1: that's what really drew me in and kept me there
Speaker 1: all these years. He's still incarcerated, as most people know, um,
Speaker 1: but from his case, my my work has stemmed out
Speaker 1: into doing other wrongful conviction work. For the last six
Speaker 1: seven years, that's been the focus of my work. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, I read this great quote from your mom.
Speaker 1: She says, your time in this world is really limited?
Speaker 1: What are you going to do with it? And something
Speaker 1: about that. First of all, your mom sounds awesome. She's
Speaker 1: a force to be reckoned with, for sure. Something about
Speaker 1: that quote that really struck me was this idea that
Speaker 1: you are doing very important work, you know, legitimately life
Speaker 1: and death work, you know, working with people who have
Speaker 1: been incarcerated, all of that. This is important stuff. And
Speaker 1: you know, we only have so much time in a day,
Speaker 1: and so much time on this world, and so much
Speaker 1: energy that we that we can expand and so to
Speaker 1: see somebody like you going through harassment campaigns, do you
Speaker 1: ever feel that this, these kinds of campaigns are kind
Speaker 1: of deliberately meant to distract you from this important work
Speaker 1: that you actually have to do. You know, I have
Speaker 1: been through I mean numerous very intense uh kind of
Speaker 1: onslaughts um, like in in different different times in my
Speaker 1: life for different reasons, so different groups who want to
Speaker 1: attack me for different reasons. And UM, I think the
Speaker 1: first time I went through it really really it was
Speaker 1: really terrible. It was around the time Cereal came out actually, um,
Speaker 1: but it wasn't so much related to Cereals related some
Speaker 1: of the interfaith work I did and I spent. Um.
Speaker 1: I learned my lesson because I spent about three months
Speaker 1: trying to respond to everything, not realizing that how trolling
Speaker 1: works and how harassment works. UM. Then I when I realized,
Speaker 1: first of all, I was I felt, I was sick,
Speaker 1: I was exhausted, I was physically I had gotten really
Speaker 1: sick over that time, just from the strain of it. UM.
Speaker 1: Then I the realization hit me that you know, what
Speaker 1: they want me to do is not to function. They
Speaker 1: want me to and they're winning because I'm spending all
Speaker 1: my time, like you know, it's like that whack a
Speaker 1: mole game, right, like, trying to respond to this thing,
Speaker 1: and you responded this thing and they come at you
Speaker 1: with another thing. I'm like, oh, this is brilliant. They're
Speaker 1: keeping me wrapped up in this crazy and I'm wasting
Speaker 1: my time and my health and my sanity, um, and
Speaker 1: not doing my work. And so now I always think
Speaker 1: about it like that, but like, if this is preventing
Speaker 1: me from doing my work, they're winning, um. And so
Speaker 1: hundred percent it's a distraction. What people who harassing you
Speaker 1: online want to do is to make sure you cannot
Speaker 1: actually function. Yet, all the women that I talked to
Speaker 1: who face, you know, intense harassment, that's something that they
Speaker 1: talk about. That's something that a lot of their situations
Speaker 1: have in common that at one point they you know,
Speaker 1: they are trying to respond to everything and really engaged,
Speaker 1: and then they realize they're spending all their time focusing
Speaker 1: on the harassment. So whatever the thing is, whether it
Speaker 1: was justice work like you, or activist work or writing,
Speaker 1: they are spending more time trying to respond to the trolls,
Speaker 1: which they will never be able to satisfy because sort
Speaker 1: of the trip of harassment, they're spending more time on
Speaker 1: that than they are sort of doing the thing that
Speaker 1: is their purpose. And I believe that really is one
Speaker 1: of the the purposes of this kind of harassment. It's
Speaker 1: to keep powerful women or quote mouthy women or women
Speaker 1: who you know, could accomplish something to keep. It's to
Speaker 1: keep us from accomplishing whatever it is that we're meant
Speaker 1: to be doing on this. Yeah, there's that, There's that
Speaker 1: aspect of it, and then there's the aspect of they
Speaker 1: want you to like, they wanted to drag you down
Speaker 1: to their level. They're they're punching up. In almost every case,
Speaker 1: they're punching up. They want your attention, they want relevance,
Speaker 1: so your attention gives them relevance. Otherwise they are irrelevant essentially.
Speaker 1: That's so true. It's so true. And I I know
Speaker 1: in your case, I can't help but wonder if part
Speaker 1: of the reason why some of the folks who really
Speaker 1: have like an obsession with you and your work part
Speaker 1: of it is because you're very successful, You're very effective
Speaker 1: at what you do, and that makes them even more angry.
Speaker 1: You know, it is kind of an attempt to drag
Speaker 1: you down to their level because you're so successful, because
Speaker 1: they know you can be so effective. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it's interesting, you know, I UM, most recently in
Speaker 1: the last couple of years, the attacks have been coming
Speaker 1: from this one particular podcaster and he's he's actually an
Speaker 1: incredibly successful podcaster. Which is what's shocking about this particular
Speaker 1: situation is like, dude, you he might be much more
Speaker 1: successful in the sense of UM. I mean in one metric,
Speaker 1: which is like, I think he probably makes a lot
Speaker 1: more money than what me and my team make doing
Speaker 1: the work that we do. But the metric that's important
Speaker 1: for us is like the value of our work and
Speaker 1: the value of our work is are we able to
Speaker 1: help exonerate the people whose cases we're working on and
Speaker 1: um and basically just be able to pay cover our
Speaker 1: costs that we can do it so it doesn't cost
Speaker 1: anything to the defendant because for for most and cart
Speaker 1: rated people, they can't afford uh the appeals, they can't
Speaker 1: afford the reinvestigation, and we're able to cover those costs.
Speaker 1: So by that metric, my work is more I would say,
Speaker 1: much more meaningful. UM. Maybe that's mothers something to to
Speaker 1: to some people, But I can't say that I'm the
Speaker 1: most successful podcast and senses like we're not minting money
Speaker 1: over here, you know, we're not not. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes I wish the kind of work that you're producing
Speaker 1: was valued in that same way. It can be a
Speaker 1: little bit frustrating sometimes I'm like, man, I could be
Speaker 1: doing like the kind of true crime and podcast that
Speaker 1: you can just knock out, like in an hour or
Speaker 1: so and just get online and chat with somebody about
Speaker 1: some case. But our shows, for every hour that we air,
Speaker 1: we were talking about hundreds of hours of prep of
Speaker 1: maybe two years lead time, of two years of investigation
Speaker 1: before we can air a case. So it's very very intensive.
Speaker 1: And but then the day that's what that's it's purposeful
Speaker 1: and and that's what I can do. That's what I
Speaker 1: do best. I don't do well what other people do, right,
Speaker 1: I can't do to a crime prompt comedy, and I
Speaker 1: can't do other things. But this is what I do.
Speaker 1: And so you know, as long as we're able to
Speaker 1: cover our costs um and provide this really as a
Speaker 1: service to the people who whose cases we're looking at,
Speaker 1: we're going to continue to do it. Talking about this
Speaker 1: in terms of being in the podcast industry. You know,
Speaker 1: one of the people who is waging uh targeted harassment
Speaker 1: campaign against you is a very popular podcaster, Mike Uday.
Speaker 1: And I think that it's hard for me to watch
Speaker 1: as a like, as a podcaster, it's hard for me
Speaker 1: to watch the podcast industry and ecosystems still support this.
Speaker 1: And you know, one of the things I saw on
Speaker 1: your Twitter that I think is so correct is like
Speaker 1: people need to understand that if you listen to if
Speaker 1: you like, when you listen to this podcast, this is
Speaker 1: what you're supporting. I think it can be really easy
Speaker 1: for listeners to say, oh, well, I'm just listening to
Speaker 1: the show. I don't know what's going on. You know,
Speaker 1: I don't. I'm I'm not quote following whatever's happening. But really,
Speaker 1: it's been hard to see the silence, I would say,
Speaker 1: from the podcast industry in terms of watching someone essentially
Speaker 1: harass a colleague. You know, I think of all podcasters
Speaker 1: that's kind of in the same you know, the same club,
Speaker 1: and a kind of way. It's been really hard. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, there there and you know why though, because
Speaker 1: um and then you're right, I mean, so we are.
Speaker 1: Podcasting is a community podcast content creators. We are a community,
Speaker 1: and then you have your genres. So the true crime
Speaker 1: community is even as a smaller subsect of that, and
Speaker 1: many of us are close. We teach at their different
Speaker 1: conferences and conventions. We support each other this work. We're listeners.
Speaker 1: We listened to each other shows. UM. So what I know, Uh,
Speaker 1: what I know for sure because we've we've people have
Speaker 1: confessed this to be privately, they have said it publicly,
Speaker 1: they have written about it. Is that the same person
Speaker 1: who I think he's I just think he's like a
Speaker 1: disturbed individual. Um. Many of them are afraid to really
Speaker 1: be public because when they have tried to push back
Speaker 1: publicly on any of his day, he will come after them.
Speaker 1: And he does have a very big show and he
Speaker 1: has um a lot of followers, and so he can
Speaker 1: really crush the smaller shows by flooding them with one
Speaker 1: star reviews, by harassing them into like leaving social media. UM,
Speaker 1: and so a lot I've had people reach out and say,
Speaker 1: I'm afraid to say anything, but I just want you
Speaker 1: to know that you know I'm support you, But I
Speaker 1: this guy scares me. He's done this to me. Before
Speaker 1: like give it's like, so, um, that's why. But there
Speaker 1: are some folks who have, like in a very public way,
Speaker 1: stepped up in the last couple of months and been
Speaker 1: like enough is enough, right, and and they have really
Speaker 1: condemned his behavior. Uh, And I appreciate that, but not
Speaker 1: everybody can afford to and I completely understand them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's so tough. And I think you just articulated one
Speaker 1: of the hallmarks of online harassment and abuse and coordinated
Speaker 1: harassment campaigns is that it really has a silencing effect,
Speaker 1: not just on the person that is targeted, but anyone
Speaker 1: who might want to, you know, stick up for that person,
Speaker 1: anyone who you know, might want to challenge what's going on.
Speaker 1: It's such a big silencing effect. And I think that
Speaker 1: we don't talk enough about that as a speech issue
Speaker 1: that the kind of people who you know, we're saying like, oh, gee,
Speaker 1: I don't want to be too outspoken because I don't
Speaker 1: want what's happening to her to happen to me. I
Speaker 1: don't want it to be me next. I can't afford
Speaker 1: to have this kind of thing, So they they don't
Speaker 1: speak up, or they just leave social media altogether, or
Speaker 1: they don't say the things that they actually want to say.
Speaker 1: That is one of the hallmarks of online harassment campaigns
Speaker 1: that we just don't talk about. And truly, we with
Speaker 1: all of the you know, rigamar role about free speech
Speaker 1: and cancel culture, we need to start taking that more
Speaker 1: seriously as a spee issue because you know, if if
Speaker 1: an entire group of you know, already marginalized contact creators,
Speaker 1: I feel like they can't speak up and say what
Speaker 1: they want to say because they're terrified of this person
Speaker 1: one person, Like that's that's that is not good, and
Speaker 1: we need to be talking about like perhaps we have
Speaker 1: perhaps it's a problem with our our kind of media
Speaker 1: and digital media landscape, but also it's a wider problem
Speaker 1: about how much space one person is allowed to take up,
Speaker 1: how how much how much that one person is allowed
Speaker 1: to dictate this entire community. I mean, look, we we
Speaker 1: saw this um in as big as way as possible
Speaker 1: with the former guy, the former guy who is in
Speaker 1: the White House. UM. So, yeah, one person can have
Speaker 1: a lot of power. They can be very destructive. One
Speaker 1: person can be a complete wrecking ball. And that's what
Speaker 1: this particular person is. He's a wrecking ball. But what's
Speaker 1: really crazy about the whole thing is that he's mostly
Speaker 1: wrecking himself, right Like in all of this as he's
Speaker 1: scaring people and stuff, He's getting deep platforms, getting dropped
Speaker 1: by sponsors, getting draw by his um, his um, his
Speaker 1: his different companies and uh and at the end of
Speaker 1: the day, you know, the rest of us are still
Speaker 1: going to be invited and show up to two different
Speaker 1: spaces that uh, you know, a relevant to our our work.
Speaker 1: And while he's kind of been ostracized for years, so
Speaker 1: it's not just you know, I'm a target. Um. I
Speaker 1: think I'm a big target for him because I won't
Speaker 1: just take it and disappear. Um. And it's frustrating to him.
Speaker 1: But um, most people just kind of quietly, like you know,
Speaker 1: fade into the background, and so he stops attacking them
Speaker 1: after a while. UM. And you know, for me, also,
Speaker 1: what I realized was, like what gives people like that
Speaker 1: fuel is this attention. And so they're just star for
Speaker 1: attention and I assume purpose and meaning their life. And
Speaker 1: I don't have the time to give that to them
Speaker 1: because I got too much going on in my life.
Speaker 1: You know, I have too much work that's actually has
Speaker 1: an impact on people's lives that I got to do,
Speaker 1: I don't got time for it. Let's take a quick
Speaker 1: break and are back. According to data from Amnesty International,
Speaker 1: women of color are disproportionately targeted for online harassment and abuse,
Speaker 1: and we see this playing out in all kinds of places.
Speaker 1: For instance, former President Donald Trump was known for lashing
Speaker 1: out at reporters of all stripes, but it's worst both
Speaker 1: vitriolic comments are always reserved for journalists who also happened
Speaker 1: to be black women or women of color, like White
Speaker 1: House correspondence Yamichel Sendor, April Ryan, and Young, and that
Speaker 1: his behavior towards them made them even bigger targets for abuse,
Speaker 1: precisely because they're women of color. Knowing this, it's not
Speaker 1: surprising that even though Mike has had issues with white
Speaker 1: male podcasters in the past, he isn't selling merchandise referencing
Speaker 1: their work on his website, and those men aren't being
Speaker 1: called out specifically by name in his podcast official Twitter bio,
Speaker 1: like Robbia is. Robbia is far from the only podcaster
Speaker 1: who has criticized him, Yet Mike has not threatened to
Speaker 1: make a daily podcast blaming those men if he's ever
Speaker 1: kicked off social media, but he's threatened to do that
Speaker 1: to Robbia. I also think part of it is that
Speaker 1: you're a woman of color. You know, the data is
Speaker 1: very clear like women of color, we are disproportionately targeted.
Speaker 1: I think that you know, we you said earlier that
Speaker 1: he has gone after other podcasters white man. He's not
Speaker 1: making you know, merchandise based around their work. There are people,
Speaker 1: there are certain kinds of people we know exactly who
Speaker 1: they are, that they cannot stand a woman of color, Uh,
Speaker 1: like having any kind of backbone. They want us to
Speaker 1: be subservient. They want us to they want us to
Speaker 1: be in our place. They want to put us in
Speaker 1: our place. Um and yeah, I think that that that's
Speaker 1: one of the biggest triggers for this guy and for
Speaker 1: others like him, is that who the hell does she
Speaker 1: think she is? Why isn't she, like, you know, getting
Speaker 1: in her place where she needs to be? Um and
Speaker 1: uh and you know, but what do you do? I mean, like,
Speaker 1: we've seen this happen on a national stage. We've seen
Speaker 1: this happen with incredible black female correspondence and journalists. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, coming from a presidential administration. So we've just
Speaker 1: seen this happen in so many different ways. Um, And
Speaker 1: I think that's really a big part of why I
Speaker 1: am a particular target for this person. I think that's
Speaker 1: so true. I think there's something about when a woman
Speaker 1: of color is outspoken, where people look at us and say,
Speaker 1: who does she think she is? Doesn't she know that
Speaker 1: she's supposed to just lie down and take it or immediately,
Speaker 1: you know, fall all over self apologizing the fact that
Speaker 1: you won't do that. I think it just it's it
Speaker 1: triggers something very ugly inside of a certain kind of person. Yeah. Definitely,
Speaker 1: when these kinds of harassment campaigns, the kind of thing
Speaker 1: that you've gone through were happening, so many people and
Speaker 1: institutions that actually have power do nothing. And I think
Speaker 1: that that's another hallmark of this kind of harassment that
Speaker 1: we see, you know, uh, social like I was, you
Speaker 1: know on Twitter, this person's podcast has a verified account.
Speaker 1: You know, we know that d platforming is a very
Speaker 1: effective way of curbing harassment, and yet you know, social
Speaker 1: media platforms seem to be doing nothing. You know, we
Speaker 1: see journalists describe what's happening to you as a quote feud,
Speaker 1: as if you as if you two are just sort
Speaker 1: of having some kind of a a sparring match, and
Speaker 1: that this is not a pretty intense and serious, coordinated
Speaker 1: online harassment campaign against you. You know, what is it
Speaker 1: like to see so many institutions and people with power
Speaker 1: really do nothing to curb this when they could. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's not surprising. We've seen this so many times, especially
Speaker 1: with women. We've seen this in so many different um, like,
Speaker 1: you know, different controversies I have taken place with women
Speaker 1: getting harassed and and and making it public, and you
Speaker 1: know it's, uh, they gaslight you. So it's like if
Speaker 1: you if I'm being attacked and harassed, whether it's in
Speaker 1: my d M s, it's my emails, it's all coming
Speaker 1: from the same source. However it's happening. If I call
Speaker 1: attention to it in order to get some kind of
Speaker 1: response from these platforms, UM, then people say, well why
Speaker 1: are that? Then it becomes a few they frame it
Speaker 1: like it's a feud, and it's not a feud. It's
Speaker 1: me calling attention to his behavior. UM. And if you
Speaker 1: don't say anything and you just take it, I mean,
Speaker 1: I guess that's kind of what they want. Just don't
Speaker 1: take and take it. But these platforms, they don't really
Speaker 1: do anything. What is effect what has been more effective
Speaker 1: is just asking people to just report um certain posts
Speaker 1: and tweets and stuff. Some get removed, some don't get removed.
Speaker 1: I mean free speech first amment is what it is.
Speaker 1: I guess we have the legal right to be as
Speaker 1: ugly as you want. I think I hit my UM,
Speaker 1: I kind of hit my limit when there were people um,
Speaker 1: his followers and his mentions and he's like kind of encouraging.
Speaker 1: He's encouraging people to go to like my speaking events,
Speaker 1: to like find me in real life. Uh, and then
Speaker 1: he had people saying things like hopefully she'll get murdered herself,
Speaker 1: hopefully a non woman. Then I was like, this has
Speaker 1: gone too far. And that's when I really that's when
Speaker 1: I finally kind of posted. I said, I have called
Speaker 1: on Twitter and Facebook to the platform him. This is
Speaker 1: the kind of stuff he's saying and encouraging, and they
Speaker 1: won't and if something happens to me or my family,
Speaker 1: then there they know they also need to be held responsible. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean the kind of things that I've seen, I've
Speaker 1: seen you know people, I will see people be like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: she should just block him if she doesn't like what
Speaker 1: he has to say. I mean, yes, exactly, you know,
Speaker 1: And it's like getting people to understand that this is
Speaker 1: not just something that is happening like quote unquote on
Speaker 1: Twitter on the computer. I very genuinely sometimes worry for
Speaker 1: your safety in real life and everything that we know
Speaker 1: about online harassment, but even if it starts online, it
Speaker 1: doesn't stay online, and very often it's connected to real
Speaker 1: world violence. And so I am I when I see
Speaker 1: the kinds of things that he's encouraging his followers to do,
Speaker 1: I get very concerned for your actual safety. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've had my moments of concern. I mean I think, um,
Speaker 1: he it just takes one unhinged person to think I
Speaker 1: gotta do something about this, you know, especially because the
Speaker 1: way he particularly frames it is, I mean this it's
Speaker 1: such I mean, like you see, we've seen this technique
Speaker 1: at unfold like online, um, like with the elections, right,
Speaker 1: So what Trump said was that these people are harming
Speaker 1: our elections. What this guy says is this woman is
Speaker 1: shutting down my podcast. I mean he's got an incredibly
Speaker 1: successful podcast. I'm not shutting anything down. Um, He's continuing
Speaker 1: to produce and I've gotten messages from from people from
Speaker 1: men saying, um, if you if if he ends up
Speaker 1: losing his podcast because of you, I'm gonna come get
Speaker 1: you kind of stuff for a podcast, right Like, So
Speaker 1: the way he's framing it is to basically target, is
Speaker 1: to direct people's rage towards me in case like, you know,
Speaker 1: so they can like take out, take out revenge or
Speaker 1: something in case like he you know, he stops making
Speaker 1: a show which is not gonna but um and on
Speaker 1: top of which everything that he's lost in terms of
Speaker 1: sponsors and it's it's been a pent him more. After
Speaker 1: a quick break, let's get right back and do it.
Speaker 1: In twenty nineteen, after Mike celebrated International Women's Day by
Speaker 1: posting a really gross meme about violence against women on
Speaker 1: social media, people on the podcast community spoke up and
Speaker 1: wondering sort in Scales Network eventually announced they were parting
Speaker 1: ways with the show. Mike vowed to keep the show
Speaker 1: running without the support of the network, tweeting anything that
Speaker 1: was ad supported is over now because of Aaron Manky
Speaker 1: from Lore and Robbia from undisclosed, who led this boycott
Speaker 1: against me and my company because they didn't like certain
Speaker 1: things I said, But that tweet pretty conveniently leave out
Speaker 1: any responsibility for the consequences of his own actions, Like
Speaker 1: it's his own actions that have caused it, and he
Speaker 1: won't take responsibility for his behavior. So yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: but there's only so much. You know, I did report
Speaker 1: um that, I did report the harassment to law enforcement.
Speaker 1: But you know, we also don't have very strong cyber
Speaker 1: stalking laws and stuff in this country. There's only so
Speaker 1: much you can do to protect yourself. And other than that,
Speaker 1: it's kind of like, Okay, try to keep my family safe.
Speaker 1: You know, got got security cameras up, got alarm system,
Speaker 1: things like that. But what can I do if, you know,
Speaker 1: once COVID is lifted and I'm out in the public again.
Speaker 1: I always did a lot of traveling and speaking and
Speaker 1: and uh and and I have a new book coming
Speaker 1: out next year and I'll be traveling for that. And
Speaker 1: it is what it is. I can't like hide, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: And it goes back to what we were talking about earlier.
Speaker 1: Of this is preventing you from living your life, from
Speaker 1: doing your work, from making your living, you know, especially
Speaker 1: as kind of public contact creators like that d of
Speaker 1: thing you do have to have a fair amount of
Speaker 1: like public stuff, whether it's appearances or are speaking engagements
Speaker 1: or conferences or panels or whatever to to do that.
Speaker 1: And so the way that this is really like would
Speaker 1: really make it difficult for you to be able to
Speaker 1: do that without wondering in the back of your head,
Speaker 1: like is today the day that some you know, some
Speaker 1: listener of his takes matters into his own hands. It's
Speaker 1: preventing you from being able to live life the way
Speaker 1: that you want to live your life. And I think
Speaker 1: that that's something that people really forget about this kind
Speaker 1: of harassment, is that it's not just online, it's in
Speaker 1: real life as well. Oh it is, I mean a
Speaker 1: percent I um. But at the same time, I mean,
Speaker 1: like you know, and I've had to process through this
Speaker 1: with my own lawyer and and people who are close
Speaker 1: to me, and um that I turned to for advice
Speaker 1: that you know, it's actually not gonna happen. I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna change the way I live my life. Um, other
Speaker 1: than just taking some general precautions. I'm going to continue.
Speaker 1: I want to continue to the work. I'm gonna continue
Speaker 1: to travel and speak. I mean, I I speak to
Speaker 1: a lot of law schools and law firms and um
Speaker 1: and universities about this work. And that's the kind of
Speaker 1: stuff that helps scale it up. You know, you get
Speaker 1: people to support the work. You get students saying I
Speaker 1: want to go to law school now, um, And so yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm going to continue to do it at the end
Speaker 1: of the day. Um. And it is what it is.
Speaker 1: I mean, like there's just you know, I like, I'm
Speaker 1: also a religious person. I'm a person of faith, and
Speaker 1: I firmly believe that when your time is written, it's
Speaker 1: written what it's supposed to come, it's supposed to come.
Speaker 1: So you know, yeah, I mean like there's this kind
Speaker 1: of no avoiding it. So what it's gonna happen. It's
Speaker 1: gonna happen. But you know, but of course you don't
Speaker 1: want it to happen because it's something as ridiculous and
Speaker 1: stupid or something like this. Yeah. Yeah, And I think
Speaker 1: something that you said is so touching knowing that you
Speaker 1: are going to continue to inspire so many It's like
Speaker 1: you're building this little army of people who are inspired
Speaker 1: to following your footsteps and following your legacy and continue
Speaker 1: to create that kind of justice. You know, the impact
Speaker 1: that you will have on so many people is so big,
Speaker 1: and your voice can be so big, and the idea
Speaker 1: that this one asshole could stop it is obviously he
Speaker 1: couldn't write like you're like, the impact that you can
Speaker 1: have that you have is so much bigger than anything
Speaker 1: that this person could ever, you know, dream up to
Speaker 1: try to stop it. I feel, yeah, you know, I
Speaker 1: kind of laugh about it sometimes when he he posts
Speaker 1: things about a NONS case or other aspects of work,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, I'm an attorney. I've been doing this
Speaker 1: for like twenty odd years. I have I have a
Speaker 1: team of attorneys I work with. I work with the
Speaker 1: Innocence Project across the country on cases. And this completely unqualified,
Speaker 1: you know, white guy, really like, this completely qualified guy
Speaker 1: thinks that he has the same like skill set or
Speaker 1: or even has the same like he's he's so entitled
Speaker 1: that he feels like his opinion is equal to my expertise.
Speaker 1: I mean really, um, and I think that prior drives
Speaker 1: me crazy too. I mean, like, is the fact that
Speaker 1: I want to be like listen, go to law school,
Speaker 1: spent about ten fifteen years doing it, is since work
Speaker 1: and then let's talk about this case, like you know
Speaker 1: you have a completely uninformed opinion. You you can't come
Speaker 1: close to like my you know, the work that I do,
Speaker 1: because you don't have the experience. I'm sure he's great
Speaker 1: at what he does. I can't do what he does.
Speaker 1: I will never do what he does, and he can't
Speaker 1: do what I do, as simple as that. And so
Speaker 1: it's just like apples and oranges. And I think what
Speaker 1: it is is he thinks, oh, she's got a true
Speaker 1: crime podcast. My podcast as a means to an end um.
Speaker 1: The whole point of the podcast is I could end
Speaker 1: the podcast tomorrow as long as I could find a
Speaker 1: way to financially support the work of of helping people
Speaker 1: get back in court. Right, it's been cars for years.
Speaker 1: The podcast is a way to do that. That's not
Speaker 1: the work. The work is the other work that I
Speaker 1: do outside of the recording studio. Yeah. That's something I
Speaker 1: love about your work is that it's not just so
Speaker 1: many folks like and not to not to crap on them,
Speaker 1: but the work begins and ends in the podcast studio,
Speaker 1: and you are out there making like, doing the actual work,
Speaker 1: making the actual difference. And and I love those two.
Speaker 1: I listen to them all the time. I love. I
Speaker 1: love those kinds of I love all kinds of shows.
Speaker 1: I mean that's you know, I love the investigative stuff.
Speaker 1: But this is what I do. And so, uh, you
Speaker 1: know what I think is kind of interesting is like,
Speaker 1: um his he's calling on those followers and other people
Speaker 1: who attack me too to try and stop, like I
Speaker 1: want to be, like you really want to you really
Speaker 1: want to prevent a person from doing the kind of
Speaker 1: work I'm doing. Like that in itself is like almost evil.
Speaker 1: It's like if I was handing out water bottles at
Speaker 1: the border and somebody's like, note, I want to shoot
Speaker 1: them all out of your hand, Like you want to
Speaker 1: prevent me from doing like work that's going to change
Speaker 1: people's lives, like Hayes. It's really crappy, right, And because yeah,
Speaker 1: you're doing this this important justice work. And I think
Speaker 1: that all the people who see what's happening, who might
Speaker 1: otherwise be inspired to follow in your footsteps and do
Speaker 1: this kind of work, how many of them are going
Speaker 1: to see this and be like, oh, well, I don't
Speaker 1: want to do that. You know. It's like you're preventing
Speaker 1: the spread of justice in the world by by you know,
Speaker 1: behaving in this way. But you know, look up, he
Speaker 1: can only he and others can only harass me if
Speaker 1: I allow myself to like feel harassed in some extent um.
Speaker 1: And it was only in the time when I felt
Speaker 1: like this is getting kind of dangerous, some of the
Speaker 1: rhetorics getting dangerous, that I really felt stress over it. Um.
Speaker 1: But then I was like, my due diligence is that
Speaker 1: I've told my attorney, I've notified the platforms. I've put
Speaker 1: everybody else on notice. Anybody who follows me knows now, right.
Speaker 1: So others are hundreds of if not thousands of people
Speaker 1: are watching him, um, watching and documenting every because he
Speaker 1: does have a history of like posting things and deleting
Speaker 1: them as if things disappear from the internet. Um. And
Speaker 1: so I've done my due diligence. That's that's all I
Speaker 1: can do. And now I have to get back to
Speaker 1: my life. I also have kids, I've got a husband,
Speaker 1: I've got cats, I've got elderly parents, I have a garden,
Speaker 1: I have things to take care of. I don't want
Speaker 1: to time for this, absolutely. I mean, that's a great question.
Speaker 1: How do you take care of yourself? How do you
Speaker 1: make sure that you know you're the things that matter
Speaker 1: in your life are nurtured and protected during all of this.
Speaker 1: I mean, look, when you're working, mom, I can't be like, hey, kids,
Speaker 1: I'm having a bad day. You're just gonna have to
Speaker 1: feed yourselves and you know, drive yourself to school. Um.
Speaker 1: There are things that are nonegotiable that you have to
Speaker 1: take care of every single day. In a way, just
Speaker 1: having that, they're like, um, it's a good distraction from
Speaker 1: like this meaningless stuff that's happening online in many instances.
Speaker 1: So I I feel taken. I feel like I I'm
Speaker 1: taking care of myself when I get my work done,
Speaker 1: when I you know, it's it's I write words a day,
Speaker 1: when I hit my fift words a day. Uh, and
Speaker 1: I've made sure that you know, my family's got food
Speaker 1: for today, or I know we're getting take out, or
Speaker 1: I've made the plans um and my plants aren't dying
Speaker 1: and my parents. You know, as long as I'm checking
Speaker 1: the boxes of the things that I need to do
Speaker 1: for the people are important to me, then that's taking
Speaker 1: care of myself as well. That is how I take
Speaker 1: care of myself. That's so important. So how can folks
Speaker 1: who might be out there listening either support you during
Speaker 1: this time or support the criminal justice work that you're
Speaker 1: involved in. Now, Um, well, you know, I just think
Speaker 1: it's important that, look, we do have free speech in
Speaker 1: this country, but that means that we allow hate speech.
Speaker 1: I mean, the First Amendment is actually created to protect
Speaker 1: the worst kind of speech possible. It's not created to
Speaker 1: protect the speech everybody loves right. So, but we also
Speaker 1: have to be able to identify and call out hate speech.
Speaker 1: So what I would say, just to help create a
Speaker 1: safer space, um, in any kind of public discourse in
Speaker 1: the media, in social media, is to call out hate speech,
Speaker 1: and this is hate speech. What you're doing and saying
Speaker 1: is hate speech. Report hate speech, you know, and then
Speaker 1: let the platforms decide what they're gonna do with it.
Speaker 1: That's one way to make a more safer space for
Speaker 1: all of us online and even in real life. Um.
Speaker 1: But in order to support the justice work, I think,
Speaker 1: you know, the cases that we do on undisclosed, We've
Speaker 1: covered about twenty five cases from different parts of the country.
Speaker 1: Just listening to the cases, reaching out to the defendants.
Speaker 1: You can find a lot of information online writing to them,
Speaker 1: leaching out to your local I mean, my work is
Speaker 1: pretty focused on innocence work, but criminal justice reform is
Speaker 1: much brought is needed in a much more brighter way.
Speaker 1: But certainly you can reach out to your local Innocence
Speaker 1: UM chapters to ask how you can support them. But
Speaker 1: believe me, there's a lot of incarce righted people behind
Speaker 1: bars who have not had visitors and years who have
Speaker 1: nobody to write them, who have nobody to call. So
Speaker 1: in that way, Non is incredibly blessed. I mean he's
Speaker 1: never not had family support and friends and people to
Speaker 1: visit him and love him. But there are so many
Speaker 1: people who have nobody and so just finding organizations that
Speaker 1: can connect you to those kinds of people, writing letters
Speaker 1: once or twice a month, you can change somebody's life
Speaker 1: like that. Can you tell us a little bit about
Speaker 1: the upcoming book. Oh yeah, it's a complete departure from
Speaker 1: any of the work that I am known for. It's
Speaker 1: called Fatty Fatty Boom Boom, and it's a memoir. Fatty
Speaker 1: Fetty boom Boom was one of my many childhood nicknames
Speaker 1: because I've always struggled with late issues. Um so the
Speaker 1: memoirs about food, fat and family, and I think it
Speaker 1: will resonate with a lot of people, a lot of
Speaker 1: people who have spent their lives struggling with UM, who
Speaker 1: love food and struggle with weight and have to deal
Speaker 1: with family. I love food, man, what can I do?
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, so, and my family loves food and
Speaker 1: they want to feed me, but also they want me
Speaker 1: to lose weight. It's like never kind of works out,
Speaker 1: um So, but it was, it was, It was a
Speaker 1: fun right. It was fun to write it because it
Speaker 1: was very different than like some of the more serious
Speaker 1: stuff that I do. Our voices matter and we shouldn't
Speaker 1: have to put up with a digital landscape that just
Speaker 1: allows for our voices to be drowned out by harassment.
Speaker 1: I know it can be hard to speak up, to
Speaker 1: keep joining the conversation, to keep using our voices, but
Speaker 1: that's exactly what harassmers want, for us to just shut
Speaker 1: up and go away. And even as she's facing a
Speaker 1: flood of threats and harassment, Robbia hopes that other women,
Speaker 1: especially women of color, won't let this kind of thing
Speaker 1: stop them. The only message I would want to leave
Speaker 1: with especially to UM women of color too, peopleho are
Speaker 1: marginalized in any way, UM in our society is not
Speaker 1: to let people push you out of spaces. Don't ever
Speaker 1: let it happen. Just don't let it happen. Stand your ground.
Speaker 1: If you enjoyed this podcast, please help us grow by subscribing.
Speaker 1: Got a story about an interesting thing in tech, or
Speaker 1: just want to say hi. We'd love to hear from
Speaker 1: you at Hello at tangoi dot com. Disinformed is brought
Speaker 1: to you by There Are No Girls on the Internet.
Speaker 1: It's a production of iHeart Radio and unbost Creative. Jonathan
Speaker 1: Strickland is our executive producer. Tary Harrison is our supervising
Speaker 1: producer and engineer. Michael Lamato is our contributing producer. I'm
Speaker 1: your host Bridget Todd. For more great podcast check out
Speaker 1: the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get
Speaker 1: your podcasts.