Troll confessions: I have been a part of this sub for 3 months, and didn’t believe for a second that you all were capable of making anything happen. Look at me now.

Hello. My real name is Sam, I’m a graphic design major at university in southeastern Pennsylvania, and I’m 20 years old. I am not a witch, I am not a woman, and I am not very political. I do, however, know a thing or two about data collection and social media, and I think I’ve finally figured out what I want to do with my life. <br><br>A few months ago, I saw an article about WvP while browsing Reddit (obviously not on this sub). From what I remember, it was a small town newspaper article that a local journalist had posted to a more popular sub, and it was mainly discussing the sudden influx of new followers and messages that this girl in his town had received over a short period of time. I remember being interested in the story, but I definitely didn’t take any of the “hexing Trump” stuff that the girl in the article was talking about seriously. <br><br>After reading the article, however, I decided to look up the “Witches Vs. Patriarchy Facebook page, just to see what it was all about. When I did, I was shocked to see that it had nearly 20,000 members. I joined the page, then started reading some of the comments. After about 10 minutes of reading the wall posts my jaw dropped – these people were serious. They were all talking about casting spells and hexing Trump, and no one seemed to take that stuff lightly. I thought to myself, “This must be some sort of joke. These people can’t possibly think that they’re actually making a difference by casting spells, can they?”<br><br>I decided to send WvP a friend request, thinking that it would probably get sent back really quickly. To my surprise, though, it didn’t – instead, I got a message asking for my e-mail address, and pictures of my driver’s license. I was a bit hesitant to share that stuff, but I ended up sending it all in. The Facebook account messaged me back within a day, asking me if I’d like to be an administrator for WvP. I was almost speechless – I had been on the page for less than 24 hours, and I was already being asked to be an administrator for the page? I was confused, but I didn’t want to miss out on the opportunity, so I agreed. <br><br>When I joined the moderator group for WvP, I realized that I had only been made an admin for the Facebook page – I wasn’t considered an “official moderator” for the group by any means. I wasn’t the only person in the group who had been made an admin; there was an entire list of people who were considered “junior” moderators by the main moderators for the group. I asked the other mods in the group if they had any idea why I had been made an admin, and they all said that they didn’t really know. <br><br>I decided to send a message to the WvP Facebook page, asking if I could get some more information on what I was supposed to do as an administrator for the page. To my surprise, I got a message back almost instantly – from Nikki. She was extremely nice, and told me a bit about herself – she was a graphic design major, just like me, and she was in her mid-twenties. We talked for almost an hour, until we both decided we had to go to class. <br><br>I don’t remember exactly how it happened, but more or less, I was invited to the moderator group for WvP after a day or two of talking with Nikki. I was shocked by the amount of people who I saw in there – the group was almost 10 times larger than the actual WvP Facebook page. I asked Nikki a question about how she had gathered everybody in the mod group, and she told me that she was a “social media influencer”. She explained to me that she had developed a lot of experience running social media advertising campaigns, collating demographic data on Facebook users, and collecting e-mails and pictures of driver’s licenses for different social media groups that she had worked with. I didn’t remember the exact words she used, but she basically told me that she had gathered everybody in the moderator group by trawling through Facebook in her free time – every night, about 10 hours a day. After a few days of talking with Nikki, she mentioned to me that she had gotten two death threats since I had joined the page. I didn’t take it very seriously – I figured that the people who were making those kinds of threats were just trolling. <br><br>I was wrong. <br><br>Over the past three months, I have gone from being a graphic design major to basically dropping out of school. Not because I’m lazy or hate my classes, but because I am now responsible for running the Facebook page and website for WvP, as well as the Instagram and Twitter pages. I have quit the two jobs that I had to work on that stuff instead (one of which was at an advertising agency – funny how things work out, right?). I have received two death threats since joining WvP, and at least 10 other messages that have made me question whether or not the people I’m talking to are actually capable of committing the violent acts they describe. <br><br>Three months ago, I thought I was going to spend the next two years in university studying graphic design, just so I could get a job at some soul-sucking corporate firm when I graduated. I am so, so glad that that didn’t happen. <br><br>You all are the most amazing, powerful, and compassionate people I have ever met, and I am so grateful to have been able to get to know so many of you over the past three months. I’m honored to be working with you all, and I can’t wait to see what we all can accomplish together – whether it’s through magic, or memes, or just taking the streets and protesting. <br><br>So thank you all for your kindness, and I’m excited to see all of the great things that we will do together in the coming months.