Weaponizing Outrage: Online Agitators Create A Monster

On August 8th, 2020, while diners were sitting at outdoor tables in front of 4th Avenue’s Red Chair Cafe enjoying their meals, a customer was assaulted. An egg was allegedly dropped from the neighboring apartment tower, striking a customer from an undetermined height. Police were called, a report was filed, and a suspect is now being sought.

That same afternoon, restaurateur Laile Fairbairn took to the social media account of South Restaurant, one of several properties she owns. In an 852-word post, Ms. Fairbairn describes a variety of unpleasant interactions. “Lots of name calling online and people sharing half-truths and misinformation without questioning it,” she says. “Some people have chosen to boycott, some are trying to cause havoc by ordering food and not paying, some are calling to yell at our young staff, and some have threatened our staff or buildings with harm.”

Just two days before either incident, the self-described “broadly Judeo-Christian” blog Alaska Watchman reported that Red Chair Cafe had planned to open in defiance of Mayor Berkowitz’s emergency order, EO-15. Must Read Alaska also included the cafe in their list of defiant businesses. Red Chair co-owner David Seube says that although the owners had internally debated whether to defy EO-15, they ultimately decided to instead set up tables on the sidewalk in front of the building. That final decision to comply was not publicized or reported.

From above the diner, it would be impossible to tell that the indoor seating was closed and that the restaurant was complying with EO-15. But if you had been listening to the online agitators and decided to commit a crime against those you perceived to be blatantly defying a public health mandate, it would be easy from that height.

Seube says that he fully supported the mayor’s mandates until the most recent one, and that his frustration mostly comes from an apparent communication breakdown between the Mayor’s office and CHARR after EO-14 in late July.

“The mayor is treating our problem and ignoring all the side effects,” Seube says. “I’m getting really frustrated with his lack of leadership beyond the basics of what we need to do for COVID. I feel there’s next to no leadership as far as addressing the side effects.”

As for the Must Read Alaska conspiracy implying that the mayor’s office passed advance knowledge to his business partners to minimize the impact of EO-15, Seube isn’t buying it. “I don’t really believe that,” Seube says. “But the mayor doesn’t seem to be interested in avoiding the appearance of impropriety, nor is he addressing it.”

Laile Fairbairn says that her 22-year business connection to the mayor did not factor in her readiness for the latest mandate.

“I did not play any role in getting G Street closed, we got federal funding just like 11,000 other Alaskan businesses, and we did not get advance warning of this closure,” she says. “We did, however, see the writing on the wall.”

A fair explanation from a long-successful restaurateur whose businesses thrived long before they became an object of nepotistic suspicion. But Seube is right; in the absence of comment from the mayor, anyone with an axe to grind may fill the void. And right now, nearly 17% of the Anchorage population has been filing for unemployment. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates the service industry to employ 9.6% of the total population. That’s a lot of people afraid about their immediate future.

And in the absence of comfort from leadership, online agitators are converting fear into outrage for clicks and political gain. What happens when they go too far? What happens when they’ve convinced a vulnerable and desperate person to seek violent retribution for a scandal that does not exist? Best case scenario, eggs and verbal harassment. Worst case scenario, a man walks into a pizza shop and fires an AR-15 into a closet he believed would lead him to a child trafficking ring in the basement.

Imagine how bad the Facebook comments are under a local news story these days. Now imagine that all of those comments got together and fomented rage, whipping themselves into a frenzy of misinformation and hypotheticals. Because in the Facebook Group ‘Save Anchorage’, that’s exactly what they do. It wasn’t enough for this mob to demand the freedom to patronize Kriner’s; local promoter Darrin Huycke had the temerity to call his Spenard Food Truck Carnival “law-abiding” and they mobbed up on him for exercising his freedoms. Actual quote: “You lost my business forever when you said ‘law-abiding’”.

Just last week, popular Anchorage radio figure Bob Lester had to implore his followers to not show up armed to the mayor’s private residence. That hasn’t stopped ‘Save Anchorage’, they’re still debating whether or not to “storm” the mayor’s residence, despite the pleadings from Must Read Alaska’s Dan Fagan. Maybe Fagan feels a fraction of the dread and horror Dr. Frankenstein felt while his monster plodded away, unshackled and feral.

We have crossed the threshold of violence. Now, we are bordering on the edge of tragedy. We owe it to each other to check our emotions, to think critically about the news we ingest, and to behave like a city that can shake off a 7.0 earthquake by coming together and helping each other in need, politics be damned.

Encourage your friends and loved ones to do the same.