How I survived a Shitstorm - and used the hatred creatively
Bianka Echtermeyer worked at ChroniquesDuVasteMonde.com from 2008 to 2016. In the meantime she is a freelance journalist and lives in Hamburg.
ChroniquesDuVasteMonde.com: In 2012 ChroniquesDuVasteMonde.com was in a state of emergency. Your comment on skateboarders who did not want to grow up had drawn the hate of the skater community. Do you still think often about this time?
Bianka Echtermeyer: Yes, one does not forget such a drastic experience. At that time the phenomenon Shitstorm was not so well known, and the concentrated hatred totally surprised and rolled over me. In Internet forums I have suddenly found photos of me, under which Hater called for rape. That scared me. No one could promise me that no one would make his fantasy come true.
ChroniquesDuVasteMonde.com: Were you also attacked on the street?
Fortunately, I did not experience violence, but I had to endure small comments. However, the Potsdam psychologist Dorothee Scholz has explained that virtual violence can hurt just as much as the physical, because self-esteem is challenged from the outside.
ChroniquesDuVasteMonde.com: So, did you decide to write a book?
The writing was a creative outlet for me to express my feelings. The whole powerlessness that I experienced during this time was deep inside of me. In writing, I could leave many thoughts free.
ChroniquesDuVasteMonde.com: Why did you write a thriller and not an autobiographical book?
If I had only talked about myself, it would have gone a lot to my inner life. With the thriller, I had the chance to turn the drama into excitement and action. In the story, a journalist is actually murdered after a shitstorm, and her colleague Charlotte Schmidt goes in search of the murderer.
ChroniquesDuVasteMonde.com: Does she find him?
Well, of course I do not want to reveal too much. Only this: My protagonist becomes the target of haters in her research and has to fight through this extremely negative side of the internet. But she does not give up. Just like I did not give up.
Book info: ?Net out of fear? by Bianka Echtermeyer (200 pages, Midnight by Ullstein, 11 Euro)
