Remember where we came from, guys?
Not that long ago, people were urging Josh to sue them for defamation. Josh, in his frustration, demanded to know who would fund his litigation. Who would pony up the $75,000? Who indeed?
When Epik's defamation, Liz Fong-Jones' "girl talks," and Russell Greer's lawfare became too much to bear, Josh reached a breaking point. He asked if we were willing to crowdfund litigation. More than 1,600 people said yes.
After consulting with Hardin (and possibly some legal Kiwis), he set up the IOLTA for the required $75,000. I'm sure he didn't have high hopes for it. At most, he probably thought, we'd barely make the goal, and if we didn't he could bitterly use it as an example of why people shouldn't demand he sue. Particularly given all he's sacrificed to get this far.
Our enemies noticed too. They were giggling like crazy, remember? "Josh won't make it," they crowed. "He'll never reach his goal. His community is like the retards on /pol/- all talk, no action."
And then, in 24 hours, we reached our goal. And then, the number climbed higher- and yet higher. Our enemies began baselessly speculating. "Oh he's just going to take the money and run," they said. "He's fleecing you idiot Kiwis!" Yet the money grew- more than twice the original amount in credit card donations alone. We raised more money than Keffals did. We made Russell's trauma lumps throb. Our enemies panicked as they realized we were united behind Josh. Coping, seething, and dilating were the order of the day.
And why did we do this? First, we like this community and the retards who comprise it. We might snipe at each other, we might disagree violently, we might even rate someone's post Dumb and Autistic, but we're a tight-knit community, and we'll gladly set aside our differences and unite against our enemies.
Second, we trust Josh. In the spirit of America's Founding Fathers, Josh has put his life, his fortune, and his sacred honor on the line for this funny bird website- literally. A founder of Trans Lifeline showed up at his (mom's) house in 2016 with a knife, "just to talk." He spent his life's savings on keeping this website up and now lives in Serbia, surviving on fictitious internet money. His reputation, put simply, is ruined by over ten years of defamation. All of this for the sake of giving us a place to sneed. He helped us for more than ten years, and now we're doing our part to help him.
Third, our trust is not blind- Josh has proven himself trustworthy. During the dark days of #DropKiwiFarms, he did everything in his power to keep us online. He pulled miracle after miracle out of his butt, and here we are today. It would've been easy to wave the white flag, distribute the site's data, and disappear into eastern Europe. If he was willing to stand up for us during the darkest time in our site's history, no way he'd take our money and run (and that's before we get into the IOLTA being a legal fund that cannot be used for any other purpose.)
So where are we now?
Epik has officially retracted their statements. Russell Greer is currently hiding in Nevada, desperately trying to find a way to fight us in court. Our enemies are shocked that Josh is not like them- conniving, greedy, and manipulative. Liz Fong-Jones is hiding, especially after admitting he was responsible for getting us deplatformed.
I'm not going to pretend our fight is over, far from it. But this is a huge victory that belongs to us as much as it belongs to Josh. Josh would not have been able to fight this without our support, and we would not be here if Josh wasn't willing to fight.
United, we sneed!
