I was astonished recently to read on /r/The_Donald that Teen Vogue engaged a virulently racist freelance writer, Lara Witt @femmefeministe (archive here). Witt claims that “[…]white people are evil. Whiteness is evil” (archive here). Such statements could be considered criminal in England. Witt also recently launched a veiled attack on members of 4chan coupled with a bizarre demand they hack US and Russian government email accounts. I asked her clients if they agree and invite readers to share their feelings with Witt’s various editors as well as her donations payment handler over at PayPal.
Lara Witt is a virulent racist, a fact not excused by the alleged historical mistreatment of her ancestors. In the United Kingdom, she would be prosecuted.
In England, section 19 of the Public Order Act 1986 makes it a criminal offence to publish written material which is “threatening, abusive or insulting” if, “19 (1) (b) having regard to all the circumstances racial hatred is likely to be stirred up thereby”. A casual glance at the replies shows that the insulting remark is in fact stirring up racially motivated hatred. The offence is punishable on conviction upon indictment by imprisonment up to seven years. If Lara Witt lived in England, she could be in serious trouble with the law.
Astonishingly Witt is not some ranting homeless person but according to her Medium profile (archive here) writes for Teen Vogue, Rewire News, The Establishment, WHYY Newsworks, Wear Your Voice Mag, Seven Scribes & “more”. I was able to find a single article by Ms Witt on the Teen Vogue website here (archive here). The article, entitled, “What I Learned from DAPL Protestors as a Woman of Color” extols the evils of “environmental racism”.
Witt’s profile describes her as a “Desi-Kenyan Feminist / Writer” yet she also claims that, “I have dedicated my life to dismantling white supremacy but I don’t weaponize my racial identity to do so” (archive here).
Whilst claiming not to “weaponize” her racial identity, Witt writes an article about racial identity.
This seems to be a tendentious view, as much of her Twitter feed is about her grievances arising from her identity, for example as below (archive here).
Whilst she claims not to “weaponize” her identity, much of Lara Witt’s writing is er … forthright … commentary based upon her identity.
Witt also authored an article (archive here) in which she presumes to lecture the hackers responsible for the so-called “Fappening” (a leak of celebrity female nudes) and demands they turn their skills to left-wing friendly purposes such as releasing Donald Trump’s tax returns (a felony) and shutting down Breitbart news (a felony). She specifically encourages a hack and dox of Steve Bannon and Vladimir Putin. Insofar as she is calling for politically motivated crimes against domestic and foreign officials she is calling for the commission of terrorist cyber-offences.
Witt describes those responsible for the “fappening” – essentially a veiled attack on users of 4chan – in the following terms, “Women ignore them and we dislike them when they meet them”. Then having condemned them she demands they commission felonies and terrorist hacking offences.
Witt’s lack of self awareness or understanding of her own hypocrisy leaves her blind to the fact that, far from reducing or dismantling racism, she is fanning the flames. If ever the far right wanted a poster-woman, Witt is nearly perfect. A singularly charmless and aggressive “social justice warrior” she achieves the rare feat of being almost as loathesome as ex-Gawker writer Sam Biddle. You can virtually feel white supremacism swelling every time she commits pen to paper.
The editor of Teen Vogue is Elaine Welteroth, who can be reached at Elaine_Welteroth@condenast.com. I contacted her to ask if she endorsed Witt’s vile racism and whether her words had been distributed by Teen Vogue in the UK. I also contacted Jodi Jacobson the editor of Rewire (Jodi@rhrealitycheck.org, press@rewire.news), Nikki Gloudeman co-founder and Editorial Director of “The Establishment” (nicholemarie29@gmail.com), the President of Whyy.org William Marrazzo (wmarrazzo@whyy.org) and the editor of “Wear Your Voice Mag” Ravneet Vohra (ravneet@wyvmag.com).
I asked each of them whether they agreed with Lara Witt’s words. Not one editor of the 5 I contacted responded defending her (although none condemned her).
For her part, Witt was unrepentant posting my inquiry email in her timeline and later thanking her supporters for PayPal donations. It occurs to me that PayPal terms (archive here) prohibit the promotion of hate speech. Specifically, “Prohibited Activities […] 2. (f) the promotion of hate, violence, racial intolerance […]”.
Lara Witt’s controversial racist statements have netted her PayPal donations. PayPal terms prohibit funding hate speech, so why not let them know?
Concerned members of the public may report breaches of PayPal’s terms, politely, to aupviolations@paypal.com. Lara Witt advertises her PayPal as paypal.me/larawitt and her email as LaraWitt@gmail.com. Those opposed to racism and bigotry may also choose to send polite, respectful feedback to the editors listed above. None of them have objected to publication of their email addresses.
Vile racist bigots like Lara Witt have no place in public life.
I’m just blown away by the breakdown of layers/criminal activity in this article. I encourage all to express any concerns to PayPal (contact noted in this article) for breach of terms regarding promotion of hate speech.
Sorry, I’m new here – I found your website through the Lara Witt Twitter situation. Are you a troll? You seem like you’re serious but you’ve chosen the persona of a historical figure responsible for the deaths of hundreds of innocent people; the very term “witch-hunting” now implies mass hysteria and baseless accusations in modern times. This seems like an odd choice if your intention is to come across as a credible resource. Is this blog meant to be a satire?
The term “witch-hunting” has been made popular on the internet for quite some time; just because they used the word once does not make the entire article satire. Using the article’s serious tone as context, it’s plain to see this isn’t satirical.
Interesting, thanks for responding. I posted the question because the whole Twitter deal got posted up in my internet friend political debate Facebook page (we have people from all sides of the political spectrum it usually stays pretty civil) and the conservatives all started arguing – some of them said that you have kind of a reputation with the right wing as a crazy person because of weird personal vendetta stuff and unstable behavior? and the others thought you were satire to make the right look bad because your pen name is too on the nose for it to be real lol. Anyway thanks for clearing that up.
The person who wrote Response is not me. I just approved all the posts. The article is not satire and I have no personal, “vendetta” against Lara Witt she is simply newsworthy because of her comments and call for terrorist attacks.
I’m half-Japanese half-white American and I’m sickened to see this anti-white nonsense from this woman. Not all mixed race people are self-loathing anti-white liberals, and I’m proud that both sides of my family value things such as hard work, education, respectfulness, and being polite. I also think it’s cool how many Americans regardless of background have an interest in Japanese culture, and how many Japanese people have a lot of respect for ‘white’ culture, such as classical music, traditional French or Italian food, artwork from Europe and so on.
I believe that racism towards any race is wrong—and that includes racism towards white people. Sadly, the mainstream media glorifies anti-white nonsense.
Japan has it’s own localized equivalent Teen Vogue (called Vogue Girl) and to my knowledge, it is nowhere near as political as the American Teen Vogue. Also, I find the slogans for Teen Vogue to be immature and disturbing. It says ‘Rise, Resist, Raise Your Voice’. It sounds like they want to brainwash girls and women into being warriors and perpetual victims rather than decent human beings—and it shows in their anti-male, anti-white, left-wing propaganda.
i wish people would not write in white on black backgrounds. It is so hard on the eyes. I can’t read this whole thing because it literally hurts my eyes. Please put your writing on white backgrounds. Why do people insist on doing this? There’s a reason all the major websites are written on white backgrounds. If you want to be read, make it easier.
Is Gene Ross’s site criminal?