Poison Ivy

It’s a global phenomena. And its ugliest face is playing out very close to home.

Swati Chaturvedi set out to investigate online trolling two years ago. What followed was an incredible journey into the heart of digital deceit, bullying and harassment and a controversial book, I Am a Troll, released a few months ago.

Of the dozens of people she interviewed only one – a young woman called Sadhavi Khosla – was brave enough to come out in the open. And at Algebra, both Swati and Sadhavi took the stage for an intimate conversation to talk of the book, online trolling and what Sadhavi has called a “never-ending drip feed of hate and bigotry.”

It was an immersion into an ugly universe that lives in plain sight: the digital troll ‘armies’ who are now gatekeepers of public discourse online. They start communal fires, throw vitriol, issue rape and death threats, and hunt in packs. The disturbing thing is: they are hired by governments and political parties, most visibly by the BJP, to intimidate opponents and ordinary citizens in an organised way.

The conversation threw up many thorny questions, outside of political affiliation, about the murky new “normals” we live with, and its implications deserve much more thoughtful and hard-eyed discussion. This session is a good place to start.

Watch the full session above.