The 4chan imageboard at the center of at least one FBI investigation relating to the Oregon college massacre has come completely unhinged under a spate of media scrutiny.
The head-first descent into madness began Monday afternoon, after the Federal Bureau of Investigation warned Philadelphia-area universities of a threat made on /r9k/, a unique 4chan imageboard formally called ROBOT9001, which uses a script to block text and image reposts. These schools included Temple University, the University of Pennsylvania, and Drexel University.
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The thread above is part of what /r9k/ is calling a “beta uprising” or “beta rebellion.” Both terms have lingered in the dark corners of the Internet for years. Both of them refer to males, known as “betas,” who have been passed over by females because of their looks. (A more nuanced explanation of this phenomenon can be found on Reddit’s r/outoftheloop community.)
Beta uprising posts generally involve threats of violence, the targets of which often include females and “alpha” males. James Holmes, the 27-year-old who murdered 24 people at a Colorado movie theater in 2012, said the massacre was part of a beta uprising. The latest strain on /r9k/ often includes threats of more school shootings.
On Thursday, /r9k/ captured the world’s attention after it tried to pin the shooting at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg, Oregon, to one of its users called Eggman
As is often the case with pranks that start on 4chan (here, here, and here are some of its notable attempts), this latest “beta uprising” has been half baked and juvenile.
The following images are from /r9k/ threads made Monday evening. They show anonymous users continuing to make threats against schools.
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The “beta uprising” spilled over onto Twitter where some students expressed fear for their lives.
One student fed up with “beta uprising” was a Twitter user named gianna, who called out 4chan for its fear mongering and nonsense. Gianna also tweeted a grainy video she had found featuring the Pepe the Frog meme and what appears to be a bed full of firearms.
4chan’s /r9k/ was not pleased with gianna. They responded to her tweets with violent and porngraphic remixes of Pepe.
These /r9k/ users also dug up old photos of gianna posted on Twitter, printed them out, and masturbated on top of them (the following photos have been censored).
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The harassment resulted in gianna deleting her Twitter account.
The Daily Dot has reached out to 4chan for a comment regarding /r9k/’s actions.
Photo via Christopher Sessums/Flickr (CC BY 2.0)