In a series of events that perfectly follows the natural life cycle of the internet, an anti-abortion group set up a website to enable Tex...
In a series of events that perfectly follows the natural life cycle of the internet, an anti-abortion group set up a website to enable Texans to become anonymous “pro-life whistleblowers”—that is now being beset by trolls, including at least one wielding Shrek porn.
The website, created by the powerful anti-abortion group Texas Right to Life, was meant to take advantage of a new law in Texas that’s scheduled to take effect on Sept. 1. Under that law, abortion could be banned as early as six weeks into pregnancy, before many people even know they’re pregnant. But, in an unprecedented legal maneuver, the Texas government won’t be enforcing the ban by itself.
Instead, people will be allowed to sue individuals who may have helped a patient get an abortion in violation of the ban. Someone who lost such a lawsuit could pay damages of at least $10,000, as well as attorney fees.
Visitors to the Texas Right to Life website have the option to fill out a form to send an anonymous tip on how “you think the law has been violated,” as VICE News reported last week. That form included a request for any “evidence,” plus the name of the doctor or clinic that pertains to their tip. Another page urges people to “join the team” to help enforce the Texas law.
But, in recent days, social media has discovered the website—and users on platforms like Twitter and TikTok issued calls to spam it.
“An anti-choice org is seeking anonymous tips for people helping others seek abortion care in Texas,” read a tweet from Nancy Cárdenas Peña, a Texas director for the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Justice. “Gosh, I wonder if they factored in people abusing the integrity of this system. Hmmm I hope [people] don't abuse this! That would be terrible.”
People on TikTok, meanwhile, didn’t even pretend they weren’t just going to troll the site.
“I found this website for, like, anonymously snitching on people who break the Texas Heartbeat Act,” one person said in a TikTok with more than half a million views. “You can attach any file you want to it, so I just sent them a bunch of Shrek porn. And you can do it too.”
“Wouldn’t it be so awful if we sent in a bunch of fake tips and crashed the site? Like, Greg Abbott’s butt stinks,” drawled another TikTok creator, referring to the Republican governor of Texas, as the TikTok depicted sending in a tip that read just that. The TikTok had more than 150,000 views.
Last weekend, the website crashed, according to a snapshot from the internet archive the Wayback Machine. But Kim Schwartz, the Texas Right to Life director of media and communication, told VICE News that the website has had no issues.
“We anticipated spamming from the very beginning. If you give people a form on the internet, the internet will do what the internet does. So we weren’t surprised by any of this,” she said. “We have it all under control.”
The group has taken some steps to shield the website: The site now blocks people from outside the country, as well as people who are using VPNS to mask their locations and people with a history of trying to spam the site by, say, submitting false reports. (Multiple VICE News reporters were also blocked from one page of the site as of Friday morning, before a conversation with Schwartz.)
In a sign of the endless and pointless escalation of online bickering, the website prochoicetrolls.com also now directs people to the Youtube video of Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up”—which, in case you haven’t spent enough time on the internet, is called rickrolling.
More than 20 Texas abortion providers have sued to stop the Texas ban from taking effect, as they allege that the law “will create absolute chaos in Texas and irreparably harm Texans in need of abortion services.” A hearing in that case is currently set for Monday.
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