I assume this has been a thing forever, but I’m reminded of gamergate tactics. Journos would toss out their inflammatory leftist opinions, 1 out of every ten thousand people would pop off with some racist or sexist online response, and that was all the journos needed to brand every last one of their detractors as a bigot. It’s disingenuous people weaponizing the white noise of the internet in order to deflect all criticism.

If you shovel a divisive opinion out to a hundred thousand people, what are the odds that you will receive at least one death threat? 99%? And if even one death threat occurs, are you then completely empowered to shift the conversation from your shit opinions to “muh harassment”? With that one death threat taken as a virtual given, journos have a built-in parachute to reliably escape the consequences of their own idiocy.