DoorDash and DARVO attacks on working-class women

On October 12, a young woman named Livie said she was on the job as a DoorDash deliverer when a customer exposed his genitals to her. The way Livie explained it, backed up with footage she originally posted to TikTok, was that she approached the customer’s residence and saw the door was wide open. Inside, a man lay motionless on the couch, with his pants and underwear pulled down to his ankles.

Laws vary by jurisdiction, but based on what Livie said and showed, this was a nonconsensual sexual act. Flashing, public indecency, sexual violence, and even sexual assault—the term Livie used—could all fit. But in the nearly two weeks since Livie posted about this and it went viral, racking up tens of millions of views, her DoorDash account has been suspended and the internet has turned her into the villain.

Now, in Livie’s TikTok comment section, her replies are littered with attacks mocking her pain and positioning her as the aggressor. She hasn’t posted in over a week, and she didn’t respond to an interview request. But for anyone familiar with DARVO (which stands for “Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender”), this cycle is all too familiar.

“I’m the one getting punished. He’s not getting in trouble,” Livie said in one video. “DoorDash punished me for exposing my assaulter, and TikTok is currently punishing me for exposing my storytime, and this is the only justice I’m getting, because I also reported this to the police and the police are doing nothing.”

Initially, people responded to Livie with support. Then, the tide turned. Now, the overwhelming majority of responses are defending the unknown man in Livie’s original video. How did this happen? The answer involves a combination of viral misinformation and misogyny aimed at a victim, in service of defending an alleged perpetrator.

@irlmonsterhighdoll

backup is @via von dutch

This story has played out on TikTok and elsewhere, over and over again. It happened to celebrity women like Amber Heard, Megan Thee Stallion, and Blake Lively. Then it started happening to everyday women. Now it’s happening to Livie, and this time, the societal urge to blame women for gender violence is aided by generative AI tools. Other TikTok creators have identified AI-generated commentary videos spreading misinformation about her story, using the real identities of Black creators to do so against their will.

But let me back up a little bit. After the initial incident on Oct. 12, Livie posted the footage on TikTok, and said the app removed her video and issued a strike against her account. Then she uploaded it again, minus the footage of the man, but said she got a second removal and strike. In the absence of the original videos, people online came up with a DARVO counter-narrative that caught on like wildfire and spread across different social media platforms.

They said that the man didn’t expose himself to Livie (they denied her allegations), that Livie pushed open the front door when she got to the house (they attacked her character), and that Livie violated his privacy and smeared him (they reversed the victim and the offender). There’s no evidence that Livie pushed the door open, but people cropped images from her original TikTok video to make it look that way. Now some people are even saying that the man is suing Livie or that she’s in jail, and there’s simply no evidence for any of that.

As this counter-narrative developed and started to gain traction, DoorDash issued its official response, which a spokesperson reiterated in a reply to my request for comment today.

“No one should ever have to experience sexual assault, harassment, or abuse, and DoorDash never deactivates someone for reporting it — full stop,” the statement said in part. “However, posting a video of a customer in their home, and disclosing their personal details publicly, is a clear violation of our policies. That is the sole reason that this Dasher’s account was deactivated, along with the customer’s, while we investigated.”

The TikTok comments on this statement are mainly people siding with the company, the customer, and against Livie. Blaming Livie is a convenient way to avoid having to question or hold anyone accountable for what she says happened. The customer, DoorDash, TikTok, and the local police who Livie says declined to investigate further all avoid further scrutiny, while Livie is left unemployed and facing an avalanche of additional harassment. In the past, this pattern of DARVO has been leveraged against celebrity women. Now, it’s targeting working-class women, creating excuses to justify their victimization and the consequences that arise from them reporting it.

And DARVO isn’t just weaponized against victims of sexual violence. For example, it has also been leveraged by Donald Trump’s administration against individuals targeted for illegal deportation, and it forms the basis of rhetoric blaming protestors for the causes they’re fighting back against. DARVO is a concept developed by psychology researcher Dr. Jennifer Freyd in 1997 to describe how perpetrators of abuse frequently respond to allegations with victim-blaming. They undermine the victim’s credibility and accuse them of being abusive through lying. Back in May, unrelated to Livie’s situation, Freyd told me in an interview that DARVO can be weaponized by people other than perpetrators in their defense.

“So if fans of a celebrity hear there has been an accusation against the celebrity for sexual or other misconduct, the fans can start to DARVO whoever made that accusation,” Freyd said. “We know from research that DARVO has an impact on the target, but it can also sway an observer.”

Beyond garden-variety misogyny, which is clearly informing some of the desire to smear Livie, there’s also money to be made on the internet in positioning women as the liars and villains and men as the innocent, smeared victims. And TikTok can be ground zero for these cases. Two years ago, I reported on how viral TikTok videos helped an everyday man smear his ex-wife for reporting his abuse to the Coast Guard, which investigated her allegations and discharged him for emotional, physical, and sexual abuse. A men’s rights activist and influencer who goes by Chloe Roma picked up the story and made multiple viral YouTube and Instagram videos attacking her, even after she learned the truth. Chloe has also hopped onto Livie’s case and branded her a “sexual predator,” spreading unsupported details to dramatize the story further.

But why stop there? According to a different, uninvolved TikTok creator, other accounts on the platform created AI-generated commentary videos unpacking this story from the DARVO perspective.

@muurlz

There are fully ai generated accounts using MY face to share videos on here. Tiktok won’t do anything about it ☕️🫢 #fypシ #ai #mediamurlz #trending

“People are profiting off of my face, ruining my credibility, and tarnishing my name,” said the real woman whose likeness was used in the AI-generated video. Now, the TikTok account behind at least one of the AI-generated videos butchering Livie’s story is gone, and it’s unclear whether TikTok took the page down. TikTok’s community guidelines prohibit misleading AI-generated content.

As long as misogyny continues to profit and resonate with mass audiences, there’s nothing stopping the churn, and AI can further accelerate the spread of DARVO narratives online.

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