Stop Monetized Bullying

LONG VERSION OF MY STORY ON VIDEO:




VIDEO OF MARLOWE DEFAMING ME:


The COMPLAINT has been filed. You are welcome to look at it here or here to verify.

To prove slander, which is verbal, the communications must charge plaintiff with a crime, imputes him with an “infectious, contagious, or loathsome disease”, or “impotence or want of chastity”, or tends directly to injure plaintiff in his occupation. See Cal. Civil Code section 46.

VEGAN CHEETAH IS NOT ONLY HARMING PEOPLE BUT MAKING ENOUGH MONEY TO LIVE BY DOING SO. YOUTUBE AND YOUNOW ARE ALSO MAKING MONEY OFF OF THIS. 

This case will be relatively straightforward as he has clearly made the path for a lawsuit very easy. See here and here for California defamation laws. 

LONG VERSION OF MY STORY:
There’s a little known dark secret from the dregs of the Internet: there is a profit to be made by bullying and abusing people online—to the point that it affects their personal lives and causes long lasting harm. Individuals make enough money to live their lives in expensive big cities like Los Angeles or New York and sustain their lifestyles, and are egged on by their gangs of trolls who lap it up and join in. And corporations like YouTube and YouNow profit off of this behavior by getting a cut of the ad revenue the individuals earn from playing beforehand on each video.

 

The companies claim to be against bullying, but do nothing about it because it seems their interests lie with ensuring they continue their money flow. As long as these individuals help them do it, they don’t really seem to pay much attention to long-lasting damage they are causing.

 

One such person I was, unfortunately, introduced to in this way was a man named Charles Marlowe, or Vegan Cheetah. He rose to prominence in the summer of 2016 in the online vegan community, attempting to expose the “Vegan Elite,” such as Freelee and Durian Rider, a pair of YouTubers who made a living slamming people who weren’t vegan. The former power couple also sold a vegan diet that was magically supposed to help you slim down by eating an unlimited number of calories. They needed to be called out, and they were, and he was responsible for changing the face of online veganism.

 

But then, Marlowe ran out of gossip about these two YouTubers. He began to speculate that Freelee and her boyfriend had AIDS or herpes and said he wanted to “Pound Freelee so hard in the ass that she’d have to wear diapers.”

 

His content shifted to negativity and he began to slam anyone who didn’t agree with everything he said. He spread a rumor that a YouTuber who is also a teacher exposed his genitals to an unwilling audience. He called anorexic women fat. He made fun of a man who was suicidal and had a wife dying of ovarian cancer. He called a man who didn’t like one of his videos a pedophile. He made fun of a recovering anorexic for her appearance. He laughed at people with chronic illnesses and diseases. He told a woman to go “take care of her retarded kid.” He called a man who spoke English as a second language “a retard.”

 

But he wasn’t doing it just for his pleasure. He was making a living doing so due to an audience of trolls, young and middle aged women.

 

And then it was my turn on the chopping block.

 

I had stopped watching him for the sole reason that I found his channel to be negative. My YouTube channel focused on educational content, where I shared thoughts and opinions about the philosophy of veganism, shared my journey of living with lupus SLE and interstitial cystitis and spoke about what I was getting my PhD in at the time: the Holocaust.

 

In one video, Marlowe blamed the death of another vegan YouTuber on another YouTuber by the name of Unnatural Vegan. Although I won’t get into specifics, it is hard to blame the death of someone with Stage 4 cancer on someone who lives halfway across the country from them. He created a video called “Vegan Kills Cancer Patient,” where he called her a “sociopath.”

 

During this time, I was invited into a Facebook group run by someone Marlowe disdained. Ignorant of the issues Marlowe had with most of the members, I joined. But someone in the group was taking screenshots, and a picture of me saying “I think his latest video is trashy” was enough for him to “prove” that I was a “psychotic witch” who was “conspiring against him” and that I needed to “be denounced.”

 

He created a video exposing some of my personal details as well as several other people’s. As a result, we submitted several privacy complaints. He was given 48 hours to take down the video by YouTube or get a strike on his channel. Not one to back down, he took the strike and waited until he was forced to have it removed.

 

I later admitted I had been one of the people to submit a privacy complaint, and he wrote on his tumblr that I had done so because we had a Skype conversation where I flashed him my genitals and kept going despite him asking me to stop.

 

I was floored. The two of us had spoken in private once, when I sent him a message about something Freelee had said. I didn’t even have his Skype address and don’t use the app very often, much less to expose myself to unwilling individuals as I am in a long-term relationship.

 

Marlowe then went online on his YouNow, doing a four hour broadcast entitled #SheDidWhatOnSkype. For 2 and a half hours of it, he spent time extrapolating on the phone call that never happened, accusing me of cheating on my partner and watching me go live on YouNow via a ghost account. He broadcasted me to his followers, laughing and joking about “how pissed she is.” They ate it up, and all the while he was earning money from his YouNow broadcast from a tip jar he had on his channel. And his fans were giving him actual money to stalk and harass me.

 

He even sang a song about me, talking about how I didn’t really turn him on.

 

I can’t even describe how I felt at the time. My nerves were shot. As someone who suffers with anxiety, I was having panic attack after panic attack. I didn’t sleep for months afterward. I cried on camera, to which others said made me “look crazy.” But I’m not sure what the protocol is to react to something like this.

 

His trolls invited me into his chat to confront him, so I did to try to put it to bed. When I got into the chat, his young female fans gleefully chanted, “She’s here OMG!!!”

 

So I guested with him.

 

He gaslighted, apologized for not being attracted to me.

 

I asked him to Skype me if he had my number, he could make it ring. He said he was afraid I would use his Skype information to hack into his computer (even though I would already have if we had previously Skyped). I asked him to say the name of my handle, and he said he didn’t want to be accused of doxing me, however I told him he had my permission. He clearly couldn’t produce it.

 

After the call I broke down crying and threw up. He was likely still watching me, as his followers made their way into my chat. At first, they pretended to be comforting me. But then the insults came.

 

“Cunt.”

 

“Liar.”

 

“Don’t make me call your school and tell them what you did.”

 

“Don’t make me call your family and tell them what a dirty whore you are.”

 

“How could you cheat on your partner like that?”

 

“Why are you so mad that Cheetah didn’t want to see your vagina? Are you that vindictive?”

 

“Anna lies like Hilary Clinton.”

 

Chants of “Anna Clinton” were typed in the chat until I blocked them all and logged off.

 

But I couldn’t get away from the rumor, even though it was untrue. When I googled my name, one of the second things to come up was “Anna Scanlon Accused of Offering Sex.” As someone finishing my PhD and working with college students, I couldn’t allow that to come up in search results.

 

Every time I logged on, Cheetah would follow me. Even though he was blocked, if I went to watch someone else’s stream, he was still able to chat with me.

 

“How’s your lupus, Anna?”

 

“I think I might have lupus too!”

 

“Do you guys know I saw her colonoscopy (sic) bag when she flashed me her growler?”

 

“I have lupus too but it’s incurable because I’m just looking for attention.”

 

I finally logged off YouNow once and for all and put all of my YouTube videos on private.

 

I tried to contact YouNow’s support team. I never got a response. YouTube was impossible to get ahold of. I contacted tumblr, where he had gone into detail about the fantasy. Nothing.

 

Next, I contacted his probation officer, as he was on felony probation for fraud and drug related charges at the time. I was told there was nothing they could do because his crimes are not related to computer use.

 

I contacted IC3, which is the branch of the FBI that deals in cyber crimes. After much deliberation, they determined the only course of action was a civil law suit, as he hadn’t done anything criminal.

 

I shut down all of my social media and locked it down to stop the abuse. I stopped making YouTube videos. I did the Internet equivalent of going into my house and shutting the door.

 

In February, he brought it up again, saying that he stands by the comments that I “sexually harassed him” and decided that me shutting down my social media accounts was “proof.”

 

I decided to take action.

 

I consulted an attorney, who advised me to tell him to cease and desist otherwise we would pursue legal action. We gave him a set amount of time to respond. He did not.

 

As legal fees are so expensive, the only way to go forward was to crowdfund for the money. Horrifically, this cannot be solved for free, and no corporations are paying attention to the actions their users are doing to damage people’s lives. Although it is cost prohibitive, I have been advised by several legal experts as well as the police that this is the only way to go forward.

 

But initiating a suit and filing a complaint has predictably ramped up the abuse.

 

After I made a complication of the abuse he showered on me to show why I am initiating a suit against him someone took it and reuploaded it onto their channel with commentary on how hilarious it was. He then guested with Vegan Cheetah saying that I had flashed him too and that I had no regard for my partner. When I asked him why he was saying this, he said he has the right under free speech and he hopes I lose the lawsuit so I learn that people in the US can say whatever they want.

 

I reported him for bullying and privacy violations. His channel was ultimately terminated due to other issues, but he goes online often to tell people that I was the downfall of his channel. His new channel even says, “Anna Scanlon took me down.”

 

Marlowe began to call me a “scam artist” and I got emails telling me I need to stop scamming people for their money and that I belonged in jail. Although I garnered lots of quiet support from the community, and a few loud supporters from big YouTubers who have also been the target of his abuse, his trolls only made things worse.

 

In addition to being accused of scamming, he made up an entire disgusting narrative abut me being incontinent and suing him because of my health problems and needing money to have a nurse change my diapers. Despite being a size 12-14 UK (8-10 in the US), he has also stated that I am likely on the list to have gastric bypass surgery, to which his followers have eaten up. He even claims I “might have herpes.” The few that have called him out have been slammed and in some cases, even banned, from his chats.

 

I got messages everyday from his fans telling me to grow up, that I was just an attention seeker, that I was a fake victim, that I should be raped, that they wished my family had died in Auschwitz so I had never been born. I even got messages saying they would think it was hilarious if I became so disabled by lupus that I couldn’t move. I also have a troll that likes to say that anyone who supports me is a Zionist shill and that my lawsuit funds settlements in Israel, despite my vocal opposition to them.

 

One of his fans even said she wouldn’t mind being sued if she could beat me up—it would be worth it. When I clicked on her profile, this woman I didn’t even know had created a lewd poem about me. I asked her why and she accused me of stalking her.

 

Of course, accounts on YouTube and Twitter have popped up dedicated to “exposing” me—although the attempts have been pathetic, they have been relentless. One person has a video of me showing 4 inches of my stomach on YouNow and tweets it to everyone who supports me trying to tell them that my ex-boyfriends have sent him “hot videos and nudes” of me, which don’t even exist.

 

Several more accounts have popped up dedicated solely this video, in an effort to try and either ruin my career or to get anyone who sides with me to see that I am, in fact, a slut who once showed four inches of her stomach.

 

Another “Expose Anna” account berated me for sharing my story to someone whose father just had surgery, saying my “BS was unimportant.”

 

Someone made a YouTube account dedicated to showing the world “my hypocrisy,” claiming that liking a joke between two friends proved I encouraged bullying and body shaming of other women, and the fact that I once published an article about farmers trying to decide what was and was not “ethical meat” (even though I don’t believe in it) means I am actually a meat eater. They even dug up comments I had made on XOJane and articles I had written for the website 4-5 years ago to show that I was raised in a wealthy area, which was meant to “expose” me.

 

Vegan Cheetah himself made videos about me saying he was looking forward to the lawsuit, but that it was a scam for non-existent medical bills (he either forgets or doesn’t understand I live in a country where social healthcare is a thing and therefore, despite my illness, I don’t pay for doctors visits). He followers chimed in stating that I was just looking to make money off of his back, despite the fact that I have three advanced degrees and at one point, he confessed to being unable to pay his phone bill. They said I was just jealous of him because I had no skills in which to obtain a job, despite my history in academia, writing and teaching.

 

And despite the complaint having been filed and a court date showing up on the Los Angeles Superior Court Website, he is instructing his followers to still treat me like I’m taking the money and running with it. He postures, saying he is not afraid of “diseased, fat chicks in the UK taking me to court.”

 

He and his followers are convinced I have several fake accounts that have been used to harass him over the past several months, and that I go into his YouNow to stick up for myself. Any time anyone makes a positive comment about me, he accuses them of being me and states that I have been posting his address online under various names. He also falsely claims have been tweeting him obsessively under various pseudonyms.

 

He called me suing him an “act of violence” and that I am a money grubber, despite being well aware that I am suing someone with limited assets, education or job opportunities due to the felonies on his record.

 

In addition to the comments, a man that I had been a friend of, at one point became obsessed with the case. Although I had not spoken to him in months, he told his followers over and over that I was an “attention seeking piece of shit” and that trying to get publicity for the case is “fucking childish and immature” and that I’m “ruining my reputation even further” by making it public. He doesn’t understand why I would want anyone else to know about the accusations made against me and says that exposing it is only making it worse for myself.  He has spent at least 10 hours of his life discussing how “crazy” I am for pursuing this.

 

Although I have not responded to his commentary, it baffles me that so many people feel that pursuing this lawsuit is not the right way to solve the issue. As there is no other way to make a change, I am attempting to speak up for myself and for others, and putting myself on the line in doing so..

 

I have witnessed his abuse of other people that is just as bad as he has dealt to me, and have also been there for individuals as they broke down crying over his indictments of their characters, all while making money for it. People have confided in me since publicly pursuing this lawsuit that he has taken them to very dark places, but they have been too scared to speak out, lest they become his target again or get slammed the way I have been.

 

While it is a shame an expensive lawsuit is the only way to bring attention to this problem, it deserves to have its airtime, and people need to know that this is happening. Although the bullying is “only online” and you have the “choice to log off,” people like Cheetah and his trolls ensure it follows you everywhere.

 

If the lawsuit somehow cannot be finished, he has threatened to ensure that it ruins my career and follows me anywhere I go.

 

This lawsuit is not about money, as I am more than aware I am suing someone without any. The most I can hope for is being able to pay back those who have donated and to reimburse myself for the few thousand I’ve already spent from savings and working over time trying to keep it going.

 

It cannot continue, and we need to work together to ensure it stops.  If the police, IC3 and YouTube and YouNow allow this to continue until someone is threatened with rape or death, are they not responsible for allowing it to escalate to that point?

Money still needs to be coming in in order to keep the case going. :)


YES the goal has been UPPED because the $15K was just an estimate and it may cost more if the case goes to trial, etc. I don't have an exact figure at the moment as these things cannot be accurately predicted. In my mind, it is better to raise more money and refund/donate any excess than to drop the case. If there IS excess you will be notified that you have donated in excess and you will be eligible for your money back minus the 9% fee.