Disturbed: My first hate mail

I just got my first hate comment. In response to my last post. I don’t know what to think. I’ve never gotten a hate remark thrown at me before, to be honest.

I’ve deleted it for the vulgar language. But here it is without the obscenities:
“ugh, youre such a [sexual vulgarity]. i seriously hope someone beats the s%#@ out of your [racist slur] a*&.”

So, my first thought is, WHO IS THIS?? Is this someone I know? Automatically I find my mind racing through who it could be – who that I know well or vaguely – until my more rational, less neurotic, and more optimistic (if this can be considered positive) side of me decides it’s probably a random person who stumbled upon my blog. But still I have to wonder, who?

My second thought is, is receiving hate mail a normal part of life for journalists? I’d like to ask some veteran science writers about that.

In the meantime, I wanted to document this case as part of the process of keeping a blog, and having semi-personal writing that anybody in the world can randomly stumble upon – but also perhaps more broadly as part of the “transition from being a private figure to public figure.”

I’m really really angry.

After I stop fuming, I’ll write more.

Writing more, Monday night:
1. I’d still be interested in knowing who this is.
2. I wonder if there is a way to track the ISP address of who posts comments on one’s blog. Or if Blogger tracks these particular cases?
3. My VERY very first thought upon seeing the comment was that maybe I should start restricting who can comment on my blog, so that they at least have to leave an e-mail (even if those can be fake). Eliminate the anonymous posting option. But that would be a pity.

Sunday night:
A veteran science writer friend told me that no, it is not common for science journalists to receive these kinds of remarks. Journalists will receive lots of hateful mail that verges on personal attacks, but it usually stems from the discussion at hand. Those discussions (her descriptions remind me of ones I’ve had with climate skeptic Republicans about climate change) can take on very personal tones and get over-emotional, unreasonable, and totally out of hand. The remark I received, however, had nothing to do with anything, except perhaps it was expressing a dislike for my writing or my particular post. My friend has never received any mail like this and encouraged me to investigate potential courses of action.

We discovered that while a hate mail letter or phone call IS illegal, an online note is not – at least not necessarily. It looks like this gets us not only into debates about free speech and hate crimes, but both in the fuzzy world of internet laws.

Anyway. This is not, then, a “normal” part of the experience of becoming a journalist.

I take that as a good thing.