Internet Hate Machine
Cool Zone Media and iHeartPodcasts·Hosted by Bridget Todd·19 episodes
Bridget Todd explains how bad actors use the internet to target and silence marginalized people, especially Black women. Excluding them from discourse and desensitizing us to sexist, racist attacks makes us all less safe. Bridget talks with people who have been the targets of coordinated attacks, activists who are fighting back, and experts to help break down the deliberate agenda behind it.
Why listen
Internet Hate Machine is a sharp, accessible look at how online harassment campaigns are built, amplified, and aimed at people with less institutional power, especially Black women. Bridget Todd grounds each episode in a real case, then brings in journalists, activists, experts, and targets of harassment to show how internet drama connects to politics, media, tech platforms, and offline safety. It is a strong fit for listeners who want tech criticism with a social justice lens rather than gadget news.
Episodes
Tech shapes almost every aspect of our daily lives. And yet the tech we use has been controlled by a select few for far too long. On the new show B the Way Forward, Bridget talks to AnitaB.org's President and CEO Brenda Darden Wilkerson about challenging this disparity head-on. Let’s reclaim our digital agency, redefine tech, and create a future where those who create tech truly mirror the faces of those who use it.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In the final episode of Internet Hate Machine, we look back on where we’ve been and where we’re going. Plus some big news from Cool Zone Media!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Ifeoma Ozoma has spent her career trying to make the internet safer. At Pinterest, she created clear content policies that earned the company praise. In return, she was targeted and doxxed by a white supremacist colleague, and then retaliated against by management when she spoke up. She talks with Bridget about the Sisyphean struggle of Black women trying to make a difference.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Bridget is joined by James Stout to discuss Cecilia Lewis, a Maryland educator who was targeted and run out of Georgia after being hired to lead a DEI program in Cherokee County schools, thanks to a cooked up moral panic about Critical Race Theory. "Why the Black Educator Forced Out Over Bogus Critical Race Theory Claims Agreed to Share Her Story": https://www.propublica.org/article/cecelia-lewis-educator-cherokee-georgiaSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Bridget is joined by BuzzFeed's Ellie Hall to discuss the online hate campaign facing Meghan Markle and the harassment Ellie herself has faced for reporting on it. Refinery 29's: "I Went Undercover In The Sinister World Of Meghan Markle Hate Accounts" Ellie’s viral BuzzFeed piece about Royal double standards (all of her reporting is great though!):"People Are Once Again Calling Out A Royal Double Standard After Harry And Meghan Got Attacked For Holding Hands At The Queen’s Lying-In-State"See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Ruby Freeman & Shaye Moss are heroes for their testimony before the Jan 6th commission, but they shouldn’t have to be. In part two of this episode, Bridget continues her conversation with The Daily Zeitgeist’s Miles Gray, discussing what happened when the disgraced president and the right wing digital media ecosystem coalesced to attack Black women for simply doing their jobs as poll workers during the 2020 election.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Ruby Freeman & Shaye Moss are heroes for their testimony before the Jan 6th commission, but they shouldn’t have to be. The Daily Zeitgeist’s Miles Gray joins Bridget to discuss what happened when the disgraced president and the right wing digital media ecosystem coalesced to attack Black women for simply doing their jobs as poll workers during the 2020 election.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
The moral panic around the film Cuties explains why so many right wing extremists are using the “groomer” “child predator” attack to smear their enemies todaySee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
On her other tech podcast There Are No Girls on the Internet, Bridget explored how Elon Musk keeps trying to make fetch happen with the “Twitter Files,” by releasing internal Twitter emails about content moderation decisions on the platform before he took over as CEO. But here’s why it’s not the bombshell he says it is.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
The last few weeks online have been pretty interesting. Bridget is joined by Behind the Bastards’ Robert Evans, to talk though the whackamole of extremists popping back up online and off.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In the conclusion of this two part episode, Bridget continues her conversation with journalist and comedian Francesca Fiorentini to talk through the midterm elections and how online harassment keeps women from succeeding in elected office.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In the first installment of this two part episode, we’re joined by journalist and comedian Francesca Fiorentini to talk through the midterm elections and how online harassment keeps women from succeeding in elected office.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
We're joined by Prop, host of Hood Politics, to discuss the targeted Twitter hate campaign led by Milo Yiannopoulos against comedian & SNL alum Leslie Jones, that stemmed from her casting in the 2016 Ghostbusters remake.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This past week demonstrated what happens when you let just anybody buy verification on Twitter.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
We’re joined by Joelle Monique to revisit the 4chan hoax #EndFathersDay and what it says about impersonation as a destabilization tactic on Twitter. Mikki Kendall's Guardian piece about starting #SolidarityIsforWhiteWomen: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/14/solidarityisforwhitewomen-hashtag-feminismSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Dr. Joan Donavan, research director of Harvard’s Technology and Social Change Research Project at the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics & Public Policy and coauthor of the new book Meme Wars: The Untold Story of the Online Battles Upending Democracy in America, charts how the impact of GamerGate is still shaping our political landscape today. Check out Dr. Donavan’s book MEME WARS: https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/meme-wars-9781635578638/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Most people recall GamerGate, but fewer are familiar with DongleGate, the coordinated online harassment campaign against a Black woman tech worker named Adria Richards that happened in 2013. Bridget charts the story of Adria Richards and why it still matters today. The Hacker News post from the fired PlayHaven employee: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5398681 Amanda Blum's blog post about the fallout from DongleGate: https://amandablumwords.wordpress.com/2013/03/21/3/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Black women are sometimes called “canaries in the coal mine” for online harms. On this preview of Internet Hate Machine, Bridget Todd charts how harm against Black women online has led to our current social and political landscape.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Our social media platforms are being used to silence marginalized people, disrupt our democracy, and keep all of us more fearful and polarized than ever. Bridget Todd chronicles how our current social and political hellscape started with attacks on Black women that went overlooked. And what we can do to fight back.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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