Prater, a trans woman, featured a video on her TikTok account of her dancing to Shania Twain’s ‘Any Man of Mine.’ In the video, Prater could be seen dancing in a kitchen with debris and broken parts in the background.
Who is Sabrina Prater?
Prater is a transgender social media star whose videos became the subject of a viral conspiracy theory that was rooted in transphobia. One particular video of Prater dancing video attracted hoards of attention, with people writing seemingly harmless comments. RELATED: Woman Shows How Quickly TikTok’s Algorithm Can Radicalize Users With Far-Right Content However, it didn’t take long though for the comments to turn sinister, with people calling Prater “Buffalo Bill” and accusing her of having “victims” in her home. Another video on Prater’s account seemed to attract the same attention and comments because of a screen that appeared in the background and showed two women. People on the app began to baselessly accuse Prater of kidnapping and holding the two women seen in the video hostage.
Sabrina Prater shut down the cruel serial killer allegations.
Prater has denied the accusations, saying that the two women are her daughters. A private subreddit dedicated to Prater was also created and has over 100 members where archived posts reveal that the page repeatedly misgenders Prater, who uses she/her pronouns. The subreddit also contains speculation regarding her legal name, place of work, family, and allegations of sexual misconduct. During a TikTok video that has since been deleted from her account, Prater accuses TikTok of taking down her content for violating the nudity and sexual-content policies, despite Prater never having violated them. “Here I am. I just got violated again for being me. I didn’t do nothing wrong,” Prater says in the clip. “You guys have got to stand up for me because I’m being wronged. I want to be loved and accepted, man. I’m getting treated worse than anybody else coming out like me.” Unfortunately, the harmful conspiracy theories of Prater kidnapping young girls and holding them hostage is the same kind of theories that regularly target transgender people.
Associations between transgender people and depraved criminals are common and deeply problematic.
The villainization of transgender people in media is a direct cause of the violence that they face in everyday life. According to a study done by GLAAD, they found that transgender characters were cast in a “victim” role at least 40% of the time. RELATED: What J.K. Rowling Has Said About Transgender People — And Why She’s Now Getting Death Threats On Twitter Transgender characters were also cast as killers or villians in at least 21% of episodes and storylines in movies and TV shows. — Mischa Coldwater (@RainbowOfRed) November 28, 2021 A previous study by GLAAD shows that 84% of Americans don’t personally know someone who is transgender, with most of their information and impressiosn about transgender people coming from media. The result of this translates to the dangerous, and sometimes fatal cirumstances that arise for transgender people. In 2020, 44 transgender people were killed in the United States, with 2021 on track to be even more deadly for transgender and gender noncomforming people. This year has seen at least 49 transgender or gender noncomforming people murdered, with LGBTQ people facing higher rates of online hate and harrassment. People who live near Prater have claimed they would seek her out and post videos of her online, while others have doxxed her, sharing pictures of her address. People who have made conspiracy videos about Prater have since deleted them, issuing apologies for any harm that was caused. Targeting a trans woman with baseless claims could have had a much different outcome, and instead of further perpetuating the theories, people need to instead share compassion and ways to help. RELATED: Why Cisgender Actors Should Never Be Cast In Transgender Roles — Under Any Circumstances Nia Tipton is a writer living in Chicago. She covers pop culture, social justice issues, and trending topics. Follow her on Instagram.
