Supreme Court’s ruling on online harassment outrages victims, advocates

“The Court just handed stalkers and harassers, including of politicians, journalists, climate scientists, doctors advocating for vaccines, you name it, a new weapon,” said Soraya Chemaly, director of the, an offshoot of the Women’s Media Center, which was founded in 2005 by the actress Jane Fonda and the feminists Robin Morgan and Gloria Steinem.

Lenora Claire, a TV producer and founding member of the Los Angeles District Attorney Crime Victims Advisory Board, and herself a victim of stalking, said she fears the court’s ruling will make people less willing to confront their harassers.For the past five years, Tomlinson’s life has been turned upside down by a community of aggressive cyberstalkers and trolls.

Tomlinson, an author, has had the police sent to his home more than 43 times in swatting incidents. He said stalkers have stolen his personal information and impersonated him in an effort to destroy his credit score. They’ve flooded sites with one-star reviews of his books, in some cases before the books were even released. His family members have been harassed with text messages and calls, he said.

Tomlinson, like many victims, filed a lawsuit against the owners of a forum he accused of driving harassment toward him, but he lost and now owes tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees.“It’s brought me to the conclusion that nondigital natives simply do not understand this environment,” he said. “They do not understand the world that’s been created, and the world we all live in.

“It’s not an option to just not exist online,” he said, adding that there really is no meaningful distinction between one’s online presence and real life. “Anybody who still thinks that distinction exists is … divorced from the experiences of hundreds of millions of people.”

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