The recent suicide of Mikayla Raines, founder of “SaveAFox” animal rescue, has given cyber-bullying yet another public place setting, and with it the perennial question of how much free speech and opinion should be allowed on the table.
In the old days, bullying had to be done in person by someone physically able to back it up. Now, anyone able to put fingers on a keyboard can do it, and some oppressive fingers apparently did it to 30-year old Mikayla, who ran a complex animal rescue organization, recorded daily online and, recently revealed, suffered mental health issues including autism and depression.
Some of us take criticism better than others, but seeing this YouTube channel creator’s upbeat smile speaking to followers from her Minnesota farm, I would never have thought she was fragile.
Fragile enough to be so hurt by online comments that she took her own life, leaving a husband, a three-year-old daughter, and more than 50 rescued foxes behind.
SaveAFox had 2.4 million online followers on YouTube alone, generating hundreds of comments a day. The “cuteness factor” of faces and names—Finnegan Fox, Bongo, Seraphina, Jagger—among many foxes and some other species like jackals and coyotes, drew in daily viewers wanting to see the animals cuddled, fed and groomed by the attractive redhead in Minnesota.
SaveAFox was a niche rescue, focusing not on wildlife animals, but those from fur-trading farms and pet foxes (illegal in many states) whose owners decided they couldn’t handle them anymore. At peak times there were over 100 foxes on the property.
As any dog rescuer can attest, basics such as housing space, food, veterinary care, rescue transport and the obvious logistics make for a hard day’s work, plus you’ve got to be tough to witness the cruelty and neglect that goes with the mission of rescue itself. Fold all that into dealing with wildlife codes, permits, licenses, local, county and state laws, publicity, contracts and legalese.
SaveAFox got its share of criticism simply because their foxes were ineligible to be returned to the forest. Funding was a key issue, and in order to keep the operation going, constant filming was required for channel content. In one of her final videos, Mikayla commented that, though love of her charges had been her life, she seldom “enjoyed the moment “ since she was constantly videotaping.
Mikayla had rescued foxes since childhood (her mother was a rescue person) but SaveAFox became famous in 2020 when it went online on YouTube and other platforms.
Views and comments make or break the viability of a project, and YouTube policies do attempt to tame the ugliest remarks made about channels. But there’s Reddit, a platform that builds its name on permission to scathe. Trusting the public’s desire to tear public figures down, they have a particular way to help.
Sub-Reddit platforms called “snarks” specialize in negativity toward specific content creators, and on these platforms, few holds are barred. A channel title is followed by “snark” which lets you know it’s all going to be nasty. “SaveAFoxsnark” was built to criticize Mikayla and her operation (with news of her death Reddit has taken it down).
An old friend of mine with a sarcastic nature used to say, with a very serious look on his face, “Never miss a chance to critique” after someone had, in his judgment, gone too far in remarks. But that was in the days when people were in the same room talking out loud, and you knew who said what.
Today, you don’t necessarily know who’s saying what. Online usernames provide a degree of anonymity, as we locals know from Collinsville Residents and Residents Only Facebook pages. These pages have so many anonymous users that they have to be assigned a number—we may be up to “Anonymous 999” soon.
Just like we learn to recognize “Anonymous 998,” by manner of commentary, Mikayla knew some of the Reddit and subReddit users were former “friends,” close enough to SaveAFox to lob critiques that hurt.
One of the SubRedditors created an entire Excel spreadsheet of details so specific that only someone in the know could tell, such as she sometimes paid her workers in cat food. Others claimed lack of maintenance of her facilities led to serious injuries after a fox lost its leg, allegedly on a broken fence. And possibly the most egregious of all, because Mikayla filmed herself in scanty Yoga gear with a fox on her back, inferences of inappropriate conduct with animals formed a whole thread of remarks.
Details of her suicide on June 20 came out only lately. They were scant, her husband only revealing that he tried to give CPR for 15 minutes until paramedics arrived. He vows to sustain her mission of freeing fur-trade foxes from inhumane living conditions, but minus the strong personality that drove it, I would guess it’s likely to close soon.
So many issues converge in this sad news item that it’s almost impossible to focus on one.
Marilyn Stokes was a public school teacher in Fort Worth for 15 years and subsequently worked at KERA public television for four years. She retired after 15 years at Ford Motor Company, Southwest Region.