YouTube star Mikayla Raines dies by suicide at 29, husband blames online abuse
Raines created a successful YouTube channel dedicated to her advocacy efforts rescuing foxes from fur farms.
Animal rescue activist and YouTube star Mikayla Raines has died by suicide, according to her husband. She was 29.
Ethan Raines announced her death in an emotional video he posted to her YouTube channel on Monday.
He said that for years his wife suffered from various mental health issues and struggled to cope with online criticism.
"She couldn’t bear what she was feeling any longer, and she ended her life," he said. "And it breaks my heart that someone who is selfless and devoted her life to animals could have so much negativity pointed at her."
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/obituaries/youtube-star-mikayla-raines-dies-suicide-29-husband-blames-online-abus-rcna214720Open linkView original on lemmy.world777
Comments238
How hollow that must feel. Not getting any justice or retribution.
And the disgusting people to blame are probably praising themselves, now.
RIP
From my cursory glance, yes, they are
It's times like these that I hope there is in fact a god and they are watching folks like that.
If there's a god, he's a cunt. Find your own justice.
I agree, but at heart I'm a pollyanna.
"Inside every cynical person is a disappointed idealist."
- George Carlin
On 4chan?
The real hollowness is found in the people who have nothing in their lives so they embrace hate and hound those trying to make the world a better place.
Sad, I watched her shorts sometimes. Apparently there was a hate 'snark' subreddit that just made up shit about her all day, with some members connected to the factory farming fur industry, and pedophilic artist KazeoLion, leading the harassment
So.....wait. I've never heard of her, but you're saying there was an entire subreddit deddicated to making up lies about her, saying she did horrible shit, KNOWING what they said was a lie? Because if I'm reading this right, that's pretty fucked up.
Apparently there are 'snark' (what the hell kinda name for a genre is that?) pages on Reddit for all sorts of niche stuff
There's snark pages on lemmy too, some of them moved here after getting kicked off Reddit.
Lol at Snarky Puppy getting caught up in that search result.
TIL there's a snarky puppy community here
Man, my life is kinda sad, but at least it's not "join a community specifically to hate on stuff" sad. What hosers.
quietly unsubscribes from all reddit sublemmies
Fundiesnark is often for people who leave insane religious institutions or crazy churches to talk about that and make fun of the people still trying to push their hateful religious agenda online, there’s a lot of survivors of some bad shit there, I support it frankly but like, foxes? Not like any of these people are coming from fur farms where they were personally abused and need a space to talk about its ridiculousness
Also snarky puppy is just a musical group it’s not a snark group
Snarky puppy is amazing!
I suppose they are incredibly small, disturbed people
So telling lies about people is a ok, but mentioning a green plumber is not. I'm fucking grateful that I'm banned from that cesshole of a website now.
It’s a pretty fucked up name if you ask me, specifically.
I follow her and she was a beautiful human. This news is so painful for me.
I think most people know about her through her fox, Finnegan the Fox
If there was an organized harassment campaign against her I wonder if there is any legal culpability for those involved.
It is a sad state of affairs when a person is doing something actually good to help animals and they get harassed. May her legacy live on forever.
My wife told me about this last night, supposedly the majority of the abuse came from OTHER FUCKONG RESCUERS!!!!
Must have been jealous of her.
That seems so crazy to me. I'm on a bunch of different guitar forums around the Internet, and I don't recall a single time when I've seen anyone attack or harass a content creator or anyone else. It's a really friendly, highly supportive, international community, and it's HUGE. Everybody feels like a friend.
It happens in photography, I think there's a competitive element.
The guitar world is pretty competitive, too. Perhaps the difference is the guitar is exceedingly difficult to learn, and we've ALL struggled with it, and have had help from others overcoming our problems. So we can all sympathize with each other, and want to share our help and knowledge.
From what i’ve seen of the dog rescue world, this seems right.
Also the shit the tiger king put Carol Baskin through. At least he is in jail.
I agree and I hope we all remember that mindset the next time we read about activists blocking a slaughterhouse.
These guys probably saw the Tiger King documentary and decided to armchair warrior to virtue signal how much more pro-animal rights their non-involvement and passivity was than her.
Be online and you will get harassed, it is the way.
I've never been harassed, probably only because of my gender identity.
Meat eaters can't stand animal rights activists
🤡🤡
@[email protected], you're wrong.
so you think vegans were attacking her? seems like you're an idiot
?
Why the hell would anyone feel any need to harass someone like this? Shit like this is never justified, but once in a while I can understand their motivations. Not this. RIP, she was pretty cool.
They are filled with hate, because they are deeply insecure, deeply afraid, and the current political and social climate tells them that this is not only an acceptable way to deal with those feelings, but encourages them to deal with those feelings in this manner.
Because it works.
kiwifarms has been doing this en masse for over a decade and others predated that.
It is gauche to link to it considering this is the umpteenth fucking person murdered by angry and hateful bastards. But Patrick Klepek, someone who has been targeted by these orgs for over a decade, wrote about this in the context of the emulator developer Near being murdered by kiwi farms et al a few years back https://www.vice.com/en/article/what-i-learned-from-near-an-emulation-legend-and-real-person/
He talked about it more on the Waypoint (now Remap) podcast, but it is very much an open secret that these hate campaigns are ongoing with the explicit goal of murdering their target (it is not fucking suicide if you were tormented until you picked up the gun). And how even fellow victims who usually will advocate for this kind of stuff are wary of raising their voices because they or their partner are semi regularly approached, in person, by these bastards.
My hope, as always, is that this will be the last time. That this will lead to focused efforts by those with platforms to speak out. The reality is that the mid tier "creators" will probably say something and give the trite "If you or someone you know is in crisis, please call the national suicide prevention lifeline". Or, well, these days "the national slip and slide prevention lifeline" because gotta stay fucking monetized. And then they'll remain silent. All while the biggies choose to stay fucking silent out of concerns of losing people in their audience who are part of those hate campaigns.
To be clear, I do not fault the people who are under attack and wary of reminding those murderers they exist. I specifically linked to Patrick's post because he and the (now Remap) crew did an amazing job of explaining exactly what goes into this and how painful it is and why they are genuinely afraid to speak up.
I do very much fault the ludwigs and charlies of the world who will mention this for clicks and then never care again. And if the truly massive outlets were to speak out against this kind of harassment and reach out to the victims? Suddenly youtube and twitch and reddit and the like would care and start moderating this shit rather than laughing that kotaku in action and the like are so popular and only occasionally link to where the REAL hate and doxxing happens.
So the motivations are... just to kill an innocent person without having to take responsibility for it? You're right, more needs to be done about this. Look what happened to Chrischan. Probably wasn't always willing to commit incest.
For one, there's good money in it.
See, I have no idea what to do with this idea that fits within the bounds of good ethics but I’m certain that there’s something deeply wrong with our species that gets worse the more isolated we can be without dying off. The further back you go the more likely being shunned for being an absolute piece of trash would lead to your death but now the most broken people can still proliferate and cause problems for everyone else without even really needing to leave their homes. I can think of a million better things to do than obssess over and relentlessly bully someone.
I’m glad that we’ve hit a certain point where more and more people are choosing to have higher standards, and maybe that will help, but holy fuck this is gunna take a while to sort out.
Some nasty people just see someone who appears vulnerable/has mental health issues and use that as an excuse to attack someone. there's this really fucked up site called Kiwifarms that's been around for over a decade that was specifically made for trying to harass and bully people to death for being "weird", trans, or neurodivergent. it could also be they were jealous of her popularity
"Body shaming is good when its men."
Accusing anyone that acts a way you don't like as having a micro penis seems like body shaming to me. I can't imagine that someone who has one and isn't a shitty human appreciates being associated with them.
Damn, you're dumb as hell. Cryptoableist, lmao.
Jesus, it really goes to show how shitty humanity really is.
I actually really liked watching those foxes laughing, it was a nice little bright spot in a world fully of cynicism and bullshit and if course shitty humans had to be shitty humans harassing her for being a decent human being.
Humans not humanity.
Why the fuck would you harass someone for saving foxes? Is it because she's a woman?
God gave us dominion over all creatures read the Bible!
There are children dying in the streets here, why don't you do anything about them?
The foxes bread for fur here are not capable of living in the wild, "rescuing" and releasing them is the real animal abuse.
I think fox fur is fancy, fuck you lady!
Just some examples I can think of off the top of my head. People can get pretty polarized when it comes to killing, or not killing animals.
In this case I'd say it's a difference between animals raised as a product vs animals as pets. Personally, I don't take issue with animal products as long as the animal is treated with care during life and dignity during death, but I definitely understand why some people are against animal products. Harassing them to the point of suicide is not an acceptable reaction. I'd also put some money down that the industries she targeted had at least some involvement in harassing her.
A perfect demonstration of my point. Thank you.
I would also like to know what the criticism was, but at the same time, I also feel like the internet can be shit sometimes whether there was reason to criticise or not.
Pretty sad story.
I did the research in the muck mines of the internet for y’all, and it is more complicated than it looks on the surface.
Several animals died in her care due to neglect, including leaving foxes on leashes and letting them get tangled up and baked alive in the sun. There are text messages that leaked of her having paperwork forged to make some animals look like they were bred in captivity. Her organization was registered as a fur farm to avoid some taxes and regulations. Lastly, she had an OnlyFans page where the regularly posed with dogs and foxes in ways that suggested she was trying to appeal to zoofiles, including text descriptions that are very questionable.
A subreddit was created called Save A Fox Snark that was tracking her questionable methods, and one user in particular, seemingly a furry, was very active in screenshotting all of her questionable content in hope that she would get shut down for animal cruelty. That furry is now also being targeted for harassment.
I went straight into the swamp for this info—you can read it all on KiwiFarms, Soyjak, OnlyFans, and the internet archive pages of the Save A Fox Snark subreddit.
Yeah sorry if I don't believe this when the source is fucking kiwifarms
The source isn’t just kiwifarms—the internet archive pages of the subreddit are still up to see exactly what they were posting. The OnlyFans photos have been archived and there are many of them.
Believe whatever you want, but there was a whole mountain of information out there.
And you need to keep in mind that targeted harassment campaigns are perfectly content twisting and manipulating the truth. I have plenty of experience with shit like that from my personal life. So I do not put a lot of stock in info sourced from places like those
In addition, I highly doubt the founder would have been this deeply affected by the harassment if she actually was a person that didn't care much for the animals or others and their opinions
I do keep that in mind, that’s why I just report what I saw and where I saw it. The OnlyFans posts were created by her directly, I don’t think there is any dispute that the account was hers.
People can believe what they want, I just did some digging to see what the accusations were that made her feel like suicide was her only option.
There's a whole mountain of misinformation as well, and you decided that looking into the loaded conclusions and supposed "leaks" that had no other facts to back them up than what they were telling you.
She was the subject of harassment for reasons, and here were some of them. Whether the allegations were true or not isn't the point, she still felt harassed enough to do something terrible.
Kiwifarms isn't always wrong, but they like to fuck up things major ways, usually by focusing too much on someone being a leftist and/or trans, and sometimes even covering up abusers. They managed to cover up a rapist by not only focusing on her being trans, but also harassed multiple of her victims as it usually were "drunken sex", which wasn't considered as rape by many. Also Kiwifarms has an obsession with the "let's paint our targets as irredeemable assholes, so driving them into suicide will be heroic, and also can be weaponized against the same group later on". (BPD, while often seem like a misdiagnosis of badly mishandled CPTSD, is pretty much "asshole disorder" in many people's minds.)
Never, ever source Kiwifarms. That org is fucking disturbing
They were the ones organizing some of the bullying—I wanted to see the posts she was seeing to better understand the nature of the harassment.
I don't think the veracity of claims on these sites is important, moreso what was said and how it might have affected the narrative and her.
Thanks for the context. Very helpful.
So basically, you consider going to the people who drove her to commit suicide "doing the research".
Doing the research to see what they were saying about her that might lead her to commit suicide, yes. If you want to know what the cyber bullying was that caused someone to commit suicide, it makes sense to look at the posts themselves, which is what I did.
I too look at ISIS propaganda when I want to see why they did what they did 🙄
There's a huge difference between reading Mein Kampf and praising it for its good points.
Where did I praise my sources, exactly?
They claimed she was not taking proper care of the foxes. I haven't read one thing that was in any way proven. It was just trash talking trolls doing what they do best, telling lies. They had story after story about the conditions. The woman was trying to do good, something none of those trolls harassing her have ever did. The trash reddit sub went private because now they fear consequences.
It was reddit. Reddit is dead center of this.
Edit: its amazing how being correctly identifying reddit as the culprit is downvoted on lemmy when its clear most of us are here because reddit sucks a skunks ass.
Proof? Not that I'm saying you're wrong, I'm just not familiar with this lady at all so would like to know more.
There was a whole subreddit called "r/SaveAfoxSnark" that went private after the news came out. One reddit mod there got doxxed, panicked, and deleted their whole reddit history.
Edit: The mod's reddit handle is/was KazeoLion. There are only quotes here about this, so take it all with a grain of salt until we know more. These are YouTube comments:
Those snark subreddits need to remember that they’re dealing with human beings.
The older I get the more I understand why the concept of demons was something people could accept.
Idk, some people are just bad. A cousin, adopted but my uncle's adopted son nonetheless, is a good example of this. He's no longer with us, thank fucking god, but this little devil was bad from the moment I met him to the point he died at... idk I think it was 18 or 19 years old.
His parents got him a pet weasel. It 'disappeared'. I don't remember the specifics but it was pretty clear it didn't just run away. His brother would show up at the dining table with bruises around his neck. Just fucking evil shit like that. Ended up running away at 17 years old, died in an attempted robbery sometime after that (his memory is not something I try to keep alive).
Point is: there is such a thing as irredeemable. At least, in my eyes.
I read a long write up about the trolls behavior and accusations but the machine I used for isn't accessible this morning. A little searching and you will find a better write up on it.
Tumblr users were also heavily involved
I forget tumblr still exists.
Wow, I'm shocked...
The internet mirrors humanity.
Not really. Nowadays, it's a funhouse mirror that is distorted in ways that rich sociopaths think are better.
It mirrors humanity when we're anonymous, which is why it's so awful. There are people who are publicly shitheads without being anonymous, sure, but they're far fewer in number.
Doing some sleuthing, it appears a former follower was mad about some incidents at the shelter, and started a subreddit against it:
::: spoiler SFW, but click at your own risk. https://web.archive.org/web/20250307232100/https://www.reddit.com/r/saveafoxsnark/ :::
The last web archive backup is old, but my guess is the subreddit snowballed (due to the Reddit engagement algo loving hatesubs, of course) and got us here.
So... yeah.
Rest in peace.
Reddit needs to be held accountable for the snark subs
I'm pretty okay with Duggar snark and Sister Wives snark. My girl follows all of it. Anything that spotlights the abuse inherent in fundamentalist Mormonism/Evangelicalism is mostly a good thing, in my book.
No clue about the particulars on this. Never heard of her before.
Jesus, every single post is made by the same person.
What a fucking nutjob
I would also like to add another perspective.
I think its important to bear in mind that there are plenty of examples of animal rights and environmental organisations that have been the target of harrasment campaigns bankrolled by corporate and political interests.
I'm not suggesting this is what happened here. I think we have to scrutinize any possible conspiracy -- I really want to make that clear. If you look through the other comments, there's a lot to delve through here.
But I would suggest bearing in mind that smear campaigns aimed at cultivating a kind of political nihilism is something that does happen.
The best you can do, if you care about these causes, is to continue to support them in whatever ways you can.
In my opinion, all animals deserve a hell of a lot better than this.
If only. The fact is there are also plenty of animal rights organizations that think they could have done a better job and/or that she was doing it wrong. I wouldn't be surprised if there were people who saw SaveAFox as another Tiger King.
Yeah there’s a big difference between rehabbing animals based on heavy human contact VS as minimal contact as possible, in this age, I can definitely see harassment from people who are very opinionated and have kind of lost the plot; who harasses people that are trying to help but have a method you disagree with versus the people who don’t care or are doing harm?
Fucking Tiger King and media literacy... The amount of people who stopped watching that and thought Big Cat Rescue was bad was crazy.
Tragic.
But listen, no one needs YouTube that bad. If you’re having issues because of it get off of it. It’s not real anyway. (YouTube, that is. People and foxes are, of course)
That advice is basically, don't work in your chosen vocation. Running animal rehabilitation is not free, you need some sort of source of funding.
If your job is causing you enough mental anguish to go through with suicide, it's reasonable to suggest you find another. That goes for any job.
If it's "just a job" like working retail at Target, sure, that's a respectable take. It's still blaming the victim, but it's also advocating for the victim to address the issue themselves.
But if it's not "just a job"? If it's your life's work, your calling, something you love more than anything else?
That idea is very likely what drove her to the brink. You really have no fucking clue what you're talking about.
I've been there and I almost didn't survive. Choosing to live isn't always so easy.
If you are just working for money, yeah.
People work for things that benefit everyone at a personal cost all the time, and advances are made because of people like that. It's a good thing, which had tragic consequences in this instance.
We need to protect people who put the world before themselves. This isn't her failing, it's ours.
I'm in agreement with you, though I still think it's a fair suggestion for people putting the world before themselves to find another line of work too. I'm not saying that's the only reasonable suggestion. I'm all for trying to mitigate the risk of abuse and trauma in the first place. I took Optional's comment as an intended show of support to folks that might be struggling with similar abuse in their life.
Alright, but in general just leaving the work to other people doesn't mitigate, it just shifts the abuse to other people.
Social workers, emergency aid, etc have high suicide rates.
And yet animal rehabilitation exists all over the world and has for decades without it. Somehow.
🤔
You think you're doing the right thing
You think you're doing the right thing
You think you're doing the right thing
You think you're doing the right thing
You think you're doing the right thing
You think you're doing the right thing
But they just won't listen.
How can you blame someone for doing what should be universally understood as a positive and still having nonstop trolling? Quitting YouTube wasn't going to stop the harassment. Quitting YouTube wasn't going to make her unsee the harassment. Quitting YouTube wasn't going to promote advocacy for the animals. But you think it's her fault for putting herself in a place that is both a primary media location and collection point for a bunch of toxic people?
Disagree.
Also disagree
You can change your circumstances. None of it is her fault. But if anyone is in that position they should understand that getting out is absolutely an option.
She got harassed and bullied by people she knew IRL. They would've slandered her even if she wasn't on youtube.
No, just saying people younger than me never had a time when none of these horrible things existed. (Other things did, but not YouTube fame.)
It’s different with the internet, but I don’t need to tell you that.
Fuck off, no one here is blaming her. But reality is holding no punches. I too would love for there to be no world hunger or violence in the world... Wait till you find out about this thing called "crime"!
Wtf she seemed so happy in her vids
Sorry that was a flippant reaction. I'm so sorry she struggled and wish she was able to get help before it came to this.
I have depression and I understand that you can seem outwardly happy and still nothing can bring joy on the inside.
Relevant:
This is a good reason to avoid getting Internet famous. The Internet is full of trolls, and you have to be prepared for it or it'll destroy you. It doesn't matter what content you're famous for, pieces of shit will try to tear you down just for the fun of it.
Particularly if you're a good person and you tend to internalize what others say about you. Lots of Internet Famous people are sociopaths who thrive on people trying to tear them down.
I saw a longer quote from him. He doesn't blame online abuse, rather says that it was a (major?) contributing factor. He also said that some of that abuse was coming from other animal rescues, so I'm sure he's fucking pissed on top of grieving.
The human race makes me really sick on a daily basis these days
It really feels like the human race is determined to destroy itself.
It really does.
I believe she had BPD as well, which in itself often gets you targeted harassment online while also making you extremely sensitive to said harassment.
I don't know her at all - is that BPD diagnosis something confirmed, thet she shared and all?
I have terribly mixed feelings about people with BPD.
On one side, lots of empathy: they often feel miserable and (not always, but) very often their BPD is the result of trauma or abuse.
On the other, and having lived it for a decade and a half: they can make the lives of people in their surroundings an absolute abominable horror-movie type of nightmare.
It's actually treatable but not all people with BPD seek treatment, it's a tough one.
I have an uncle who has been cut-off from the family because he refuses to treat his
BPDbipolar (whoops) and his sisters got tired of taking care of/cleaning up after him. "Doesn't like how the medicine makes him feel". Pretty sure he started self-medicating with other stuff and found a woman who enables him, don't know exactly (it's been two decades since I last heard from him)If he was taking medicine for it, it likely wasn’t BPD; BPD doesn’t have any chemical treatments. Treatment is usually Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to try and regulate the person’s emotions and establish a more normalized baseline emotional state. But that requires a lot of personal effort, and many people with BPD refuse to follow through with it. And CBT only really helps with the emotional outbursts; It doesn’t do a lot for the abandonment issues, desires to self-harm, dissociation, etc…
Maybe he was bipolar? Bipolar is in the same category as schizophrenia, because the mania produces delusions and hallucinations. And it is treated with meds similar to schizophrenia.
Bipolar is indeed what I meant, I forgot that Borderline Personality Disorder took the initialism. It's also probable that he has more than just that going on.
BPD relies on DBT and not CBT
There just aren't enough therapists learning how to administer dialectical behavior therapy. Very helpful for people with BPD, addiction problems, or PTSD.
BPD is brutal on the people close to the person with the disorder. Absolutely brutal.
Thank you, you're an amazing sibling. Just don't let her abuse you. I hope she is getting help, it can get better.
You're a good sibling. I had an ex that really fucked me up. I found out later that she was diagnosed with BPD a few years after our relationship.
After reading up on it, it explained so much... Didn't really help anything, but explained it. Made the mistake of reconnecting with her around the time of the pandemic. What a terrible idea that was lol.
I personally cannot confirm it, I just saw it being mentioned on one of the BPD subs on reddit.
I think it's important to differentiate people with mental health issues and bad people with mental health issues.
I have BPD, it sucks so much and I suffer a lot of emotional pain. I have hurt some people, but the first person I really hurt, I loved like no other, and when she told me what I was doing to her when she left me, I decided not to be that person anymore.
I've fucked up a lot of my life during my worse episodes, but I choose not to be a horrible person to the people around me. I don't always get it right, but I try.
A diagnosis doesn't make you evil or bad, that's a personal choice.
Bless you, take care of yourself and loved ones. If you do anything at all, please have safeguards against the most harrowing statistics with suicide on this diagnosis. Even worse if you are male but that's beside the point <3
Yeah, her husband shared it when he announced the news on Tuesday (or Monday?).
Wait what? People harass people online because they've got BPD? Like they specifically target people who are suffering from BPD? Why??
Fucking gross.
Because hurt people hurt people.
People with BPD can be very manipulative and controlling, they can leave you with your own psychological trauma if they're not self aware enough to realise what they're doing. And some people are just evil and don't try be better. So there are a lot of people who have been hurt by people with BPD and they then become a target for harassment.
Sad part is that most people with BPD just want to be loved. Unfortunately they can't trust love or anyone around them. It's fucked and really hard to manage, but possible with a lot of hard work.
I've been hurt a lot by people with BPD. I have provided a lot of emotional (and financial) support only to eventually be taken for granted and/or abused. Some people with BPD can be absolute monsters.
It's taken years of therapy and self healing to understand how they're hurting too and seriously don't understand how they're hurting others sometimes.
Just wish more people could learn to not lash out when they're hurt and seek healing. It's hard regardless if you've got BPD, PTSD, or whatever, but it's always the right way to go. Everyone deserves respect and understanding.
Is BPD bi-polar disorder? Or borderline personality disorder?
Latter
BPD is borderline personality disorder.
No, people don't specifically look for people with BPD. I believe you misunderstood.
Then what does this mean?
I believe some people react to bullying in a specific way that excites bullies. It's not like they say "hey, who's got BPD," it's just that people with BPD tend to get the reactions they seek. Don't mistake this as saying the bullies aren't doing wrong or ableist. It's still awful.
I would assume that the trolls are attracted to those people because they get more of a reaction to their vitriol. It's sad, honestly.
Yeah, I agree. If a sadistic person wants to see reactions naturally they'll continue to harass the people that give it to them.
Well, it is unfortunately symptomatic. Lived with one for 10 years. Gave everything. It is not easy to admit that most of the even self aware sufferers will automatically manipulate and stir up drama due to the impossible weight of their own guilt and anger which if you want to help you have to realise is never going away and more often than not continually hurt anyone around them. It's sad that giving energy and help to sufferers is so draining and destructive and if you want support many people react like you. Except in support groups. So if anyone is reading : take care of yourself first, giving more than you have is bad for everyone and it will be hard not to. Support groups are your friend as many that are in the same situation sharing and understanding is deeply important to survive
No, this was the SaveAFox person... This is like hearing if The Girl With The Dogs were to suddenly die tomorrow. I'm not sure I could handle so much good leaving the world so quickly.
They had been posting fundraising updates on their YouTube for the last couple weeks. I hope they can keep it going.
People need to start staying off social media, especially when they’re not doing well mentally
I couldn't bear to watch her husbands video, but I saw several comments on reddit that her "friends" were spewing this shit too.
While they have admirable goals and do important work, a lot of animal rights people are fucking nuts.
Correction * a lot of PEOPLE are fucking nuts.
As a long time supporter of SaveAFox, it's hard to really even process this. I am sure being an online personality to try and fundraise isn't easy, but never did I dream that there was such a degree of hate lobbed at Mikayla that she'd decide to end her own life. Someone so kind and devoted to the lives of creatures who are constantly exploited and cannot save themselves. It's just despicable, and all I can really hope for is that Mikayla's mission continues on in spite of such significant loss.
Weird how someone who became a minor celebrity opposing the lucrative live fur industry would be targeted and harassed to death.
I hope this isn't some kind of pattern, wherein public figures who speak out in defense of environmental and social welfare causes are defamed and driven into obscurity or death.
This has been an established pattern for decades...
I think it was around 2002, when i read about that girl that died from a car accident. She had taken her dad's car, without permission.
Iirc, one of the police officers that was at the accident site took lots of photos of her corpse or rather, from the pieces scattered along the road.
Somehow those photos were leaked online and trolls had nothing better to do, than keep sending emails to the girl's parents. The subject was something along the lines of , paraphrasing, "Hi Dad, I'm back" or "Guess who's back in town?"
The emails always contained some of the photos.
The parents moved and even changed their names.
Who the fuck does something like that? The same kind of troll, that now harassed Mikayla to death.
"Thralls of the Archons"
I knew kids in high school who tortured gophers, and who knows what else, for the stimulus. Kind of dead inside; in retrospect, badly sociopathic, but without coping techniques or charisma.
Oh yeah, Porche Girl. Got really popular on early /b/.
That's incredibly sad to hear. I watched this channel alot to see the various fox personalities, like Finnegan. I'm gonna be worried about the foxes for a while, now.
I really feel quite torn up over this news. I'd seen the channel and her videos sporadically, she seemed like a kind soul who really loved & cared for the foxes.
RIP Mikayla
Holy fuck, I loved SaveAFox, what the hell is wrong with people 😭🤮
I don't understand why anyone would be mad that someone was saving foxes from becoming pelts.
Unless you're the piece of shit profiting from the suffering and death of those animals, in which case, your opinion is null and void, nobody should be against the idea IMO.
It's incredible to me that anyone would carry such vitriol against such a noble cause.
May she rest in peace.
On any online forum, there are people who just like to stir the shit: doxxing, swatting, death threats, you name it. Most platforms have reduced their efforts to keep those slimebags at bay, and this is the result.
yeah I don't think the human brain was meant to cater to a million fans
This one hits me hard. So sad. So goddamn sad. Seeing her and those foxes really cheered me up. Her death just stabs me right through the heart.
There are a scant few people who deserve to be bullied for their actions of hurting others. Mikayla was NOT one of them. How someone can bully someone who is doing their best to help make the world better... I can never understand.
I saw people saying that she made a lot of mistakes that could have been avoided, and while that may be, at least she did something about it, unlike so many others.
Oh god I love the saveafox channel. This is such a tragedy.
It was a redditor, they also posted how proud they were, I posted a screnshot but ppl tweaked at me for using reddit and I deleted it rather than argue
Lemmy people are weird. Can you link/show me this person?
::: spoiler Title :::
Idk why. If it was the same person, the information is relevant to the discussion.
I'm happy to know that they were proud of what they were doing. I hope it was a light in their life.
It's terrible that anyone would hold any hate for someone trying to do the kind of work she was doing.
Another reason why the US healthcare system sucks shit.
I remember watching some fox channels with a lot of rescue foxes including one called Finnegan. Was that her? So sad that anyone would harass somebody like that.
Yes, that was her channel.
NOOOOO :(((( I am heartbroken:(((
poor fennigan and Dixie :(((
Hers was SaveAFox
My condolences to Mikayla. Remember, the internet and social media platforms are battlefields. Battlefields of ideas, feelings, images and our passions. I get "online criticism" from people every day for stance against genocide and for the incarceration of the "puppet master" that is responsible. I don't drink their Kool-Aid and their cult leader can go eat dirt.
There's no sense in this but we all would be wise to be supportive of friends and help them step back from social media.
The people who bombarded her account with negativity are empty shells of human beings themselves. Why give any of your precious energy to these people? Stay focus and block out the scum.
Deep condolences to her family and husband.
We sometimes forget everyone is human and should be treated better. The internet can be such a hostile place.
No one should ever take YouTube this seriously. People can leave such cruel and thoughtless comments when they’re hiding behind a username.
This is a death caused by tech companies' steadfast refusal to properly moderate their platforms. Humans are social primates and we will always have a strong reaction to our social environment.
This is crushing. Loved what she was doing. Loved her channel.
Genuine question: apart from the people who would profit from the activities she was fighting against, or the would-be patrons of such a business.... Why would anyone carry hate for what she was trying to accomplish?
I know there's a whole religious argument, which I find to be wretched at the foundation; just because you 'have dominion' over creatures does not imply that it's ok to torture them and/or kill them for their fur unnecessarily....
Anything else? I just can't think of anything.
I don’t really know any details about how stuff worked beyond just saving foxes, but my random guess would be people calling it woke and attacking that, there are many people who think things involved with helping the environment and things related to that is bad. It seems like anything considered remotely “woke” is attacked because of rhetoric coming from the right wing.
It seems to be related to fur and there are people who dislike the idea of losing access to animal products like fur coats and leather goods, that is likely related.
Mainly the same criticism of famous social media influencers who are not qualified or experts in the thing they are doing. Being passionate about something doesnt make everything you do the right thing. All that said, I don't agree that should cause hate, but criticism or opposing opinions were fair in this situation when it comes down to animal welfare.
Not the ending any reasonable person would want I would hope.
That's a fair point. I would argue that critique and constructive criticism should not be presented in a way that is, in and of itself.... Mean (to put it simply).
There's a lot of ways to do the wrong thing with the best intentions.
wth no!
Those posters should be identified and held accountable. Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back style maybe. What a horrendous situation.
Perhaps someone prone to depression and suicidal ideation might be well advised not to choose a highly visible public career where one is constantly exposed to the rantings of evil trolls.
This isn't victim-blaming, it's just an acknowledgement that the world as it currently is, is full of toxic backwaters that should be avoided.
That still sounds like victim blaming to me? Yes, there are a ton of shit people in the world, but I feel like rather than "she shouldn't have taken up that career", we should instead be fighting back against the idea that people are allowed to be this shitty:
I don't know the answer to these, but just saying 'she shouldn't have started in the first place' feels like a massive cop out to me.
Depressed people are told to get out and touch grass and do something good for the world, some go and do that and then get attacked and bullied for doing something good in the world. Then someone says well they shouldn’t have done this or not. IMO I would agree its victim blaming. Mental health systems suck in many countries where people rarely get the help they need and then people online bring cruel and inhumane because they can hide behind a screen.
Shut the fuck up, this is absolutely victim blaming. "Maybe she should've just wallowed in her depression quietly instead of trying to show others what it's like to help and advocate for helpless wild animals."
I've never heard the term "star" used for a Youtuber before.
yep good point good point, shoulda read the room.
F
“Press F to pay respects” if you don’t know the meme.
Thank you for providing context. I guess I'm officially old on the internet.
Anyone else not know who this person is & think they needed a psychiatrist?
That's the thing. You (and I) don't know she wasn't seeing a psychiatrist and/or mental health professional.
You can seek help and want to live while still losing the fight against suicidal ideation.
This is the correct comment.
Therapy doesn't solve suicide.
If it did, no one would kill themselves.
There's a huge difference between "always" and "never", and a huge variation in severity, duration, and underlying reasons for suicidal ideation and intent.
ok
Those of us that watched [trigger warning] her partner's video about it know that she was.
That's what I would have expected/assumed. I haven't had the time to review any of this in detail, so I'm not speaking from an informed position. Thus I generally keep my assumptions to myself.
Good to know.
As captain Picard said: it is possible to make no mistakes, and still lose.
Why? Do you know psychiatry? Do you know this person? Do you know that she needed one? How can you know that, if you don't know either of those things? You're insulting a person who died in pain because you're too ignorant to know what happened or how to prevent it. Shut up.
So you don't think they needed one? 🤡
It's not the most gorgeous of truths, but if it wasn't online abuse, it would likely be something else for her. 75% of people diagnosed with bpd will make at least one suicide attempt in their lifetime.
Gee, do you think someone with BPD would be more or less likely to die by suicide if they're facing an online harassment campaign. 🙄
More. As I said, the diagnosis is horrible and unfortunately this is not an unlikely occurrence. Seems people hate that as expected. But I know I would be happy to know this statistic earlier in life, so I am not ashamed to express it.
It's pretty disgusting to look at someone who died by suicide after facing a harassment campaign and then suggest "maybe it wasn't the harassment, maybe it was the BPD."
Unfortunately, it's just the truth. It's a strong predictor for death before age 25. Bless you, hope you can learn again and help people in need
You're not necessarily wrong. I certainly don't have any information to refute what you say....
I'm just not sure that pointing this out on a post about a woman's death is enhancing the discussion at all, so I'm not sure why you felt the need to share....
Read the other comments. It's a world where nobody is aware of the disorder and as someone close to the issue I feel an obligation to educate. It's not a fun thing to have or be around, and the sufferers and therefore the issue is surrounded by a hurricane of drama by its own design, to escape pain it creates even larger pain.
This is a case where you need to have hard skin before you're allowed to be a streamer or content creator or celebrity. This is always only a matter of time.
So the responsibility lies with the person who wasn't thick-skinned, and not with the (likely) hundreds of people who tormented them, got it.
Being sensitive and deeply affected by the treatment one receives from others is a normal human trait. It's not a moral failing. In fact, the world would be a better place with more sensitivity.
It's interesting how so many people won't criticize the bad actors, but easily criticize those on the receiving end of this behavior.
I think that both of you are right. The people doing the harassing are despicable and are culpable for their actions. At the same time, it's also unrealistic to become an internet celebrity without having thick skin.
The fault isn't on the streamer. It's on the potentially hundreds of people who don't think about their fellow human beings before they hit "submit". My heart goes out to Mikayla. I wish people could just be nicer to good people.
To give the commenter bit of credit... They didn't say who's fault it is. What they said, you put yourself in public? You have a target on your back. Some much larger than others. But the decision is ultimately up to them if they want to be exposed. Does that suck? Yeah. But that's the reality. It's not just sunshine and rainbows.
I have heard a lot of creators say they started creating content out of interest for their thing then got a thick skin afterwards. Mostly because they didn't expect the amount of hate. So by only having people who already have a thick skin be creators we would not have had a lot of creators. It would also lead to there being a larger part of creators who have a similar background. I don't have an exact percentage of how many wouldn't have started but all the creators I can think of who talked about how they deal with hate online said they learned how to after becoming one.
Could have just stopped the YouTube channel and done something else. I know this is a stupid comment but it makes you wonder whether a bit of therapy or support in that direction would have been a bit more accessible her life could have been saved.
I get what you're trying to say, but by saying it, you've demonstrated a significant misunderstanding of what it's like to live with depression and suicidal ideation.
As simply as I can: I wouldn't assume that she wasn't seeking mental health help when she ended her own life. Just because she was successful in removing her own life, does not mean she wasn't trying to save herself from that outcome.
Intellectually, the above statement is contradictory, if she didn't want to die, then why did she end her own life? That, is the very nature of suicidal ideation and depression. You can't intellectually ponder it out of existence, and you can want to live while still having suicidal urges that are hard to control.
This isn't a logic problem. Intellectual reasoning doesn't have a place in the discussion. The cognitive therapy you get from a mental health professional often needs to be paired with anti-depressants to mitigate the negative thoughts while you sort of work on rewiring how you think about the things that are causing you to feel depressed. Whether those things are internal thoughts, or comments from external sources...
Depression is a demon that isn't easy to overcome.
By saying she should have just gotten therapy trivializes the struggle that some people go through every day, so I would expect some down votes for your comment. I understand that your comment is meant to be helpful and coming from a place of caring, but it does not come across that way.
I'll add a disclaimer: all of the thoughts and ideas expressed here have no scientific, nor medical basis, I am not a doctor. These are from my own personal experiences and research, and have no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience. I may be wrong and if I am, I hope any readers will comment to let me know that I have erred.
A final note: to anyone struggling with mental health: I hope you get the help and support you need to overcome any struggles you may be experiencing. I sincerely hope you can find a path towards mental health that works for you.
Thanks for coming to my Ted talk.
Piss off you victim blaming ass
Work on your reading comprehension my dude
Work on not being a shitty person
hey uhh this isn't exactly a happy conversation,, but,, uh happy cake day 😅
Maybe if you could read you wouldn't need to call other people shitty but have a day I guess bye
Maybe if you wouldnt be a vile pile of pure garbage people would not call you shitty.
Maybe you wouldn't be a bad poo poo brain your dad wouldn't have left for cigarettes
See? You keep confirming what a shitty human being you are. Complete waste of cell. Blaming the victim for being bullied to death.
If you know it's a stupid comment, maybe don't make it
You're blaming the victim.
If you're going to put yourself out in the swamp of social media to rally attention for something, you better have the requisite thickness of hide. As sad as the situation is, she made the choice and probably should have backed out before she reached her breaking point. This story has hemophiliac choosing to work at a razor blade factory vibes :o
Literally no different than telling women they deserved to be raped cause of what they were wearing. People need to grow the fuck up and stop bullying people, that’s literally the only thing that needs to change here. There’s no reason to bully a person who’s simply working to rescue animals from abusive situations, them being on social media isn’t an excuse to be a garbage person and harass people, to death no less
"People should just not bully." Good luck with that. In the mean time, do what you have to in order to safeguard your mental heath.
Yeah I agree it's a shitty situation, and people should be better. But the thing is a shockingly large portion of those online just aren't and are not looking to be. At least not right now and probably not for the foreseeable future especially with Orange Julius promoting the sanctity of "free speech"
If you have a fragile psyche and put yourself out there to garner attention on social media in this environment and do not expect some serious trolling to happen, that's just being naive.
So a good cause is the same as working in a factory?
Your analogy would have been better to someone providing humanitarian aid in a warzone whilst suffering from a not-immune-to-bombs condition.
(And even in that analogy someone would have to deliberately target her specifically for the work she did, not just a random bombing.)