Wednesday Showed Me The Best And The Worst Of The Internet
Today was a weird day. I woke up and there was a power outage in my neighborhood. I got ready in the pitch black and didn’t make my lunch for work because I didn’t want to open up my fridge and let out the cold air since I was going to be gone all day, I didn’t know when the power was going to be turned back on, and I didn’t want my groceries to spoil. During my 40-minute drive to work, I rear ended a woman who stopped short while making a right turn. We both pulled over and I offered to give her my information, but she kept emphatically saying that she was already running late and that she’d just get my number and my license plate. She drove off. I arrived at work and checked my Twitter before I clocked in. That’s when I saw it.
A little backstory: A few months ago, a Twitter account tweeted me with a link to a video they had made about me. I’ve been doing comedy on the internet for most of my adult life, so sometimes that happens. A person makes a supercut video of the show I do. Or they make an awesome reaction gif of me. Or they draw an insanely cool illustration of my face. I clicked through the link and my stomach dropped. These people made a news segment with a puppet as a host and the entirety of the video was of this puppet talking about how it was really shitty of me that I had such amazing breasts and didn’t show them off more and that I was doing a disservice to the world by keeping them covered up. I hated it. It made me feel gross and sad. But I ignored it, because that’s what I’ve learned to do over the years.
So, back to this morning. Sitting at my work computer, I saw another @ mention of this same video from the people who made it. My stomach dropped again. I felt a rush of shame and embarrassment that comes with simply being in the body I’m in. I thought about what to do. This time, they insinuated that the button up shirt and vest I wore in the most recent episode of my web series was a response to their video. I prayed about how I felt and what I should do. I wanted it to stop. I replied to them, saying, “I don’t like the video you made. It makes me feel uncomfortable. I ignored it at first. If you tag me again, I will block you.” I honestly like to give people the benefit of the doubt. Sometimes the internet makes us forget that the people who are on it are actually human beings. I hoped that showing them that the video made me uneasy would allow them to realize the aforementioned fact and maybe they would take the video down or, at the very least, stop reminding me that it exists.
A few minutes later, they responded with, “Yeah we figured. Block away, just don’t continue to ruin yourself.”
“Ruin yourself.” That part kept echoing in my head. They didn’t even feel bad. They knew it was a real shitty thing to make about me. But they were going to keep it up anyway. Not only that, but they still felt like they had the right to tell me their opinion about how I lived in my own body. I realized that my simple request, from one human being to another, wasn’t going to be respected. I made the decision to post a screengrab of the exchange to Twitter and my personal Facebook and a caption that said, “Ok, so this Twitter account posted a video on YouTube about how I am being terrible for not showing my breasts in my videos. I hate it and they keep tagging me with the link to it. If you are willing, could you please report the account to Twitter and then block them? Thank you!”
All in all, I thought it was a very polite and respectful request. Honestly, even though I was so uncomfortable, I still felt like I was wrong to be upset. I mean, after almost ten years of doing comedy on the internet, I’ve had a lot of hateful and disgusting shit lobbed my way. People commenting on a video about Star Wars, chatting about how much they want to cum on my face. People commenting on a video about romcoms, expounding on how my short haircut makes me look like an ugly dyke and that no one is going to want to fuck me anymore. Believe me, this stupid video was almost tame in comparison. Today, though, I reached my threshold.
While I was sitting at my desk — still trying to get my work done, mind you — every fucking comment that I’ve ever seen about myself came FLOODING back into my consciousness. Not about whether I’m funny or not, because comedy is subjective and I know I’m not going to be everyone’s cup o’ tea, but the ones aimed directly at my performance as a woman. My hair, my face, my clothes, my body, my voice… All of them. And I was exhausted.
About four months ago, I had a very sad and unexpected breakup over dinner at a Denny’s. Part of the reason that we split is that we were both at different levels of commitment in our comedy careers. He’s still only a few years into the local comedy scene, whereas I’m rounding the corner on my seventh year in Los Angeles and I was experiencing some serious burnout. Comedy just wasn’t as fun anymore; I felt like I was constantly pushing, pushing, pushing. But, on top of that, I was exhausted. I tried to explain it to him at the time, but I couldn’t really find the words to make him understand.
A career in comedy is hard. I know that, believe me. There are no guarantees and you can work so goddamn hard and you still may never make it. You get booed at. You get shit on. You fail… A lot. All of this is just part of the game. Now, being a woman in comedy? Or anything, for that matter? Yeah, that adds on a whole extra level of pain, frustration, and anxiety.
(Note: This is also the case for performers of color, LGBTQ performers, and performers with disabilities. I am a white, straight, able-bodied, cisgender woman, so I am speaking solely about my experience. Trust me when I say that I know I have it WAY fucking easier than others.)
Not only do I have to worry about making sure that my writing and performing is the best it can be, but I also have to think about what to wear during shows so that people won’t yell things about my boobs. Or worry that some guy in an improv scene will grab me and try to pull me down on top of him to simulate sex without my consent (true story). The list goes on and on and on…
And when those sorts of things happen, when those sorts of feelings crop up, it is very easy to feel very alone. To think, “I’m overreacting.” Or, “I’m being too sensitive.” Or, “That’s ok. It was ok, right?” This morning, when I had to look at that video again and my face flushed red with shame, I felt as alone as I ever had in my life.
And then the responses started to pour in.
On Twitter and Facebook, people began to respond. They told me how they blocked and reported the account. How they shared it with others. How fucked up the whole situation was and that they were so sorry that I had to deal with it. As I read reply after reply, that isolation that I had felt inside of myself began to drip away. People I’ve performed with for ten years. Friends I’ve known for five. Fellow performers who I’ve known for two years… For six months. Complete strangers, even. Comedians retweeted it to their followers who care about them enough to care about me and my well-being. I was floored by the response. I know it sounds kind of trite, but I favorited every Twitter response and liked every Facebook comment as fast as they came in; I couldn’t possibly thank every single person individually, but you can damn well bet I clicked those buttons as fast as I could. The gratitude and love is still pulsing through me as I write this.
But, even with all of this gratitude and acknowledgement that the situation was super fucked up, another feeling started to creep in. It was guilt.
I felt guilty that these guys could now possibly have their Twitter taken down and their video disabled because of me. I texted my best friend about my guilt. “Inteeeernaliiiiized misoooogynyyyyy,” she responded. She was right. No matter how awful that video made me feel, I still ultimately believed that their feelings about the situation, their well-being, their outcome, were more important than mine. How fucked up is that?
I talked to my parents about it. My dad said two things: 1) That he wanted to find these guys and beat the shit out of them and 2) That he had no idea I faced this sort of harassment online. Just straight up didn’t think it happened. And it’s not his fault. I mean, like I said before, the internet is one of those places where it’s very easy to forget that the person you’re tearing into with all of your hate and fury is actually a human being, just like you. When I told my mom about how exhausted I am just by being woman in this world, she responded with, “Man, can you imagine how exhausted Hillary Clinton is right now?” And I can.
We as women keep going. We keep pushing. We compartmentalize these feelings because if we thought about this shit all the time, we’d never leave the house. And sometimes, that’s actually the case. We just have to take a break from the world.
In the flurry of responses and retweets today, a male friend of mine in the comedy community and a male follower became embroiled in a discussion with a stranger who didn’t understand what was so bad about the video. How do I know? Because my Twitter handle was mentioned in all the tweets. The exchange went something like this:
Stranger — “It’s lame and not funny at all, but I don’t see what the big deal is tbh. Maybe I’m missing something.”
Friend — “Katie has outright said it makes her uncomfortable, that should be enough. Just believe her and don’t argue.”
Stranger — “I do want to listen, and I am. I find your PoV interesting. I do think I disagree with it, however.”
Follower — “It’s not about your or even my POV. It’s about @kawillert & her point of view.”
Friend — “Consider why you are asking questions to us, two men, and not Katie, the person this happened to.”
Stranger — “I’ve tagged her in almost every one of my inquiries.”
And you know what? He’s right. He did tag me in this conversation and I didn’t respond. Why? Because by this point in my day I had already woken up at five a.m., banged every imaginable body part on furniture while getting ready in the dark for work, drove 45 minutes to my job, got in a fender bender on the way there, processed immense shame about my body while also simultaneously working eight hours at my job, drove an hour in traffic on the 405 to help a friend of mine who was trying to finish a time-sensitive project, drove home, and started to write this piece. I’m exhausted and I just don’t want to have to explain my feelings to someone who so easily dismissed them in the first place.
I’m not complaining, though. Far from it. I have a busy and full life and sometimes things suck, but I’m going to push through it because I don’t have any other choice. Here’s the thing, though: Think about how many women in comedy (or, like, anywhere else) have dealt with this in their day-to-day lives; the normal adult and career stress and anxiety topped with the spirit-crushing harassment, judgement, and shame that comes from simply being a woman. Think about how many women have stopped doing comedy because it was just too goddamn much. Do you blame them? I don’t. We all deserve to be happy and treated with respect. It doesn’t have to be rainbows and unicorns all the time, but, for Christ’s sake, when a woman tells you that something makes her uncomfortable, please don’t argue with her about it. She’s exhausted.
