Chicago Activist Faced Doxxing And Death Threats After #CancelColbert

By Mae Rice in Arts & Entertainment on Mar 8, 2016 5:38PM

In 2014, a Chicago-based activist who goes by Suey Park started the hashtag #CancelColbert—and, as she recounts on the Wednesday premiere of SyFy’s new show The Internet Ruined My Life, it ruined her life.

“I really did think that I could die,” she says in the preview above.

Before the hashtag exploded, Park was a vocal activist for the Asian-American community, tweeting 50+ times per day about discrimination, stereotypical media representations, and other issues.

She spotted a now-deleted Tweet from Stephen Colbert, inspired by the Washington Redskins' owner's announcement he would start a foundation to benefit Native Americans: "I am willing to show #Asian community I care by introducing the Ching-Chong Ding-Dong Foundation for Sensitivity to Orientals or Whatever."

Park knew it was satirical, but didn’t like the joke. “I didn’t actually want the show to be cancelled,” she says in the preview, “but I was trying to think of something catchy and over the top to get my point across.”

She Tweeted: “The Ching-Chong Ding-Dong Foundation for Sensitivity to Orientals has decided to call for #CancelColbert. Trend it.”

The hashtag really did trend, and the backlash started immediately, snowballing into something truly horrific.

At first, her Twitter mentions were full of rape and death threats. TV pundits called her a “grievance-monger”; one TV personality had her on HuffPoLive to tell her she didn’t understand satire and call her views “stupid.”

Then Reddit users doxxed her, sharing her personal email, phone number, and home address online. She got an untraceable message on her phone: “I’m an ex-military sniper. You are fucked… I’m outside your house. I have a target on you.”

"I...felt like my independence and my privacy had been taken away," Park told Syfy.

Fearing for her life, she left Chicago for New York, but people stalked her even there. She started using burner phones and moving frequently from house to house. When she returned to Chicago, she wouldn’t go outside alone at night for a long time, fearing for her life.

In her talking-head moments on the show, Park describes this whole epoch in the past tense, composedly. She doesn’t specify what city she lives in right now, though, at least not in the preview above—and if I knew, I wouldn’t put it in a blog post.

The Internet Ruined My Life will air Wednesdays at 9 p.m. CST on SyFy.