Carrie Goldberg in Netizens (Train of Thought Productions)

This insightful documentary reveals the extremity of online harassment through profiles of women who endured it. They include Anita Sarkeesian, whose writings on how the video game industry depicts its female characters earned her acclaim and a readership, but also made her a target of trolls. When the film first catches up with her, armed escorts at conventions have become necessary based on the tweets directed at her, which threaten rape and murder and in many cases include her home address.

Tina Reine is a one-time financial trader whose ex plastered the Internet with fake websites alleging she was a sex worker, which led to three and a half years of not being able to find work in her industry. Attorney Carrie Goldberg specializes in cases involving domestic violence and social media. In her personal life, she is still in court with a stalker, and at one point, she visits a storage unit to show off all the boxes containing evidence against the defendant, including pages and pages of online messages she’s transcribed.

Jumping between these three story lines, director Cynthia Lowen delves into the emotional, mental, and financial damages this kind of highly personal assault can inflict, as well as the practical difficulties in fighting it. For Sarkeesian and “Celia,” a client of Goldberg’s who had her identity hijacked and dragged through the mud, the problem stems from not knowing who their attackers are. Yet even for Reine and Goldberg, who do know, there is the misery of a prolonged legal battle.

There is also, as Sarkeesian points out, the fact that the Facebooks and Twitters of the digital world are mostly unconcerned as to whether their female users feel safe, which she attributes to the male-dominated ecosystem of Silicon Valley. The film subsequently touches on the larger issue of men being either indifferent or entirely unaware of how vulnerable women are to online attacks, especially threats that could escalate to physical harm as a result of personal information being released. We get to witness this disconnect during a scene in which Reine shares her story to a room full of people, and as the camera focuses on their faces, it’s the men who wear highly dubious expressions. One of them even approaches her afterward, and in a highly condescending manner, he essentially tells her she needs to be less sensitive.

Although the film goes to great lengths to chronicle its protagonists’ suffering, it also humanizes them, delving into their respective backstories to depict them as more than just victims. Sarkeesian has used self-expression throughout her life in order to cope with all manner of difficult experiences, such as being awkward, pop culture-obsessed, and an Iraqi in America. This, in turn, hints at the importance to her of being able to express herself.

We also find out that Reine was born with a cleft palate, which led to much teasing and bullying until she had surgery later in life. The effect of this revelation is to convince us she’s a survivor, no matter what she will endure. Meanwhile, Goldberg attacks her legal work with passion and resolve, consulting with victims who suffered the same kind of harassment she herself faced, if not worse. In one of the most moving scenes, a client says she must have done something to deserve what she has happened to her, and Goldberg adamantly tells her she did not.

Though the protagonists never cross paths, they do have parallel narrative arcs, all of which entail perseverance and, ultimately, personal triumph. Along the way, we witness remarkable physical changes—in the case of Goldberg, she reaches a point at which she’s downright giddy at the prospect of expanding her practice. During these moments, she displays an openness that is a far cry from how she initially appeared, when she seemed considerably more world-weary and defensive.

The ending is cautiously optimistic, wisely refraining from being too upbeat, which seems appropriate, given how in real life the battle against Internet misogyny remains ongoing.