Forty-four new messages. All of them had the same subject line.
Email number one was short.
Subject: Re: “Hey feminazis! Get off my lawn!”
To: Melody Joo
From: Hungggger
Hey China Doll
The remaining forty-three emails were just as short, equally disturbing, and one was riddled with spelling typos:
Subject: Re: “Hey feminazis! Get off my lawn!”
To: Melody Joo
From: Christof Nugent
Go fetch me some coffee, you supid bitch. You feminists have lied so much and none can believe any words you say these days. The campus rape epidemic, the gender wage gap, all lies. Lies lies lies. Fuck you.
What the fuck was happening? I searched online for “Hey feminazis! Get off my lawn!” and found an article that had been posted at 8 P.M. EST by BetaGank, an online gaming magazine and message board for “serious gamers to come together to bash weak scrubs and noobs.” That was actually their tag line, not me making a harsh generalization. It was essentially Gossip Girl for hard-core gamer dudes. The article named me as a producer at Seventeen Studios and leaked some basic information about me. My greasy appetizers and wine made their way backward through my digestive tract as I read the article.
HEY FEMINAZIS! GET OFF MY LAWN!
By Anonymous
Our inside source at Seventeen Studios has confirmed that a new title, currently named Ultimate Apocalypse, will be released in six months, just in time for the holidays. Seasons Greedys!
It is unclear if this is a console game or a mobile one, but given the launch date we are betting it’s mobile. Our source “UltimateDDay” has also confirmed that the game will target FEMALE gamers who want to play shooter games. Apparently feministas now need to have their own special snowflake games catering to their feminine whims. Maybe they’ll have in-game clothes to buy and mascara in hidden treasure boxes. Head of production and game creator Melody Joo (pictured here) is a total newcomer to gaming, so we’ll see if this game actually launches on time, and if it will suck. We’re betting no, and yes. Click here to contact Melody.
I skimmed all my new emails. Thanks to an anonymous informant at Seventeen Studios, freaks and creeps flooded my inbox with lewd comments (including not-suitable-for-work images) and sexist diatribes. Who were they? Where was all this anger coming from? And why go after ME?
I texted Asher to let him know I couldn’t make the call.
Not knowing what to do next, I texted the one person who had to be awake.
How would you reply to people if they sent you, hypothetically speaking, dick pictures?
Nolan called me immediately. “Wait, what? Someone is sending you dick pics? Why?”
“Don’t worry. Never mind. I figured it out.” He stayed on the line with me while I downloaded an app that added googly eyes to any picture. With a few clicks and swipes, Hungggger’s dick photo had metamorphosed into a googly-eyed penis masterpiece. I emailed it back to Hungggger with the comment, “China Doll has a sexxxy pic for you.” I attached a return receipt and went to the next email to respond.
Proud of myself for coming up with a creative solution while drunk, I told Nolan exactly what I did. “Mel, what the hell are you doing? You shouldn’t respond to any kind of harassment. I’m serious! Ignore it all for now, and if it gets bad, we should talk to the police, depending on how fucked up this situation is.”
My inbox jumped to fifty emails. After picking a handful of more dick pic ones, I googly-eyeified them and sent them back. Dozens more emails appeared with each inbox refresh, and I couldn’t keep up with the volume. Hungggger had responded to my googly-eyed masterwork, venting his discontent with my mockery of his heroic cock. If every time I responded to any of the harassing emails it would turn into a heated escalation, this would quickly become an uncontrollable situation. Plus, HR wouldn’t like me sending googly-eyed dick pics from our company email server. I rubbed my temples, trying to think of what to do.
“Mel, I know this will be hard for you, but I think you should get off email and go to sleep. You can deal with this stuff in the morning. The last thing you should do is drunk-email people. You are smart enough not to do that.”
He was right. Emailing while drunk was a terrible idea, and my one inebriated decision to googly-eyeify penis pics already turned into an escalation. I