This Woman Spent a Decade Collecting Creepy Messages Men Sent Her Online

It’s no secret that women face unwanted advances each time they log onto social media, and one woman in particular took to Instagram to expose the online abuse. After spending a decade collecting the creepy messages she received, Mia Matsumiya created a special account to post her findings and provide a forum for other women in similar situations.

According to BuzzFeed, the violist was harassed both online and in real life when she started blogging while performing in various rock bands from 2003-2010. Living in New York back then, she didn’t reach out to the police until she received a death threat. That’s when authorities told her to “turn off” her computer and she stopped blogging. “I thought for sure that the messages were going to stop at some point, but they’ve persisted to this day,” she said.

Matsumiya says she began saving the messages because she’s obsessed with “documenting anything that elicits an emotional response” so she can review it later. She collected the data in a folder called “creepiness,” adding screenshots of her flooded inbox over time. When these messages wouldn’t stop, she decided to take action. “I didn’t deserve to be treated this way and neither did other women,” she said. “I decided I needed to do something about it, so I created the Instagram account.” (Side note: It boasts more than 25,000 followers to date.)

While the senders might think of their messages as complimentary, Matsumiya says they are “degrading, dehumanizing, and disgusting.” By exposing them, she hopes others will understand what women go through online. “I sincerely want the attention to be focused on the messages, and not myself,” she said. “I want these messages to demonstrate the crazy, awful, and unacceptable things women receive online.”