It didn't take long for trolls to dig up activist Johnetta Elzie’s resume and old tweets in the wake of the 2014 shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. After going to pay her respects at the place of Brown’s shooting in the hours following his death, Elzie tweeted that there was still “blood on the ground” and “a cone in place where his body laid for hours today.” She documented the Ferguson unrest on social media as it unfolded, and the New York Times called Elzie “one of the most reliable real-time observers of the confrontations between the protesters and the police.”

“They were like: ‘How do you know anything about protests, you used to be a customer service agent?’ But, what does it have to do with tragedy arriving in the city where I’m from?” says Elzie, known as “Netta” among her followers.

Elzie says she has been called pretty much every insult under the sun. “I feel like I’ve been called everything possible. I’ve been called ‘nigger,’ as well as white racist combos like ‘nigger bitch’ and the typical racist shit,” says Elzie. “Then there are people who take my photos and do crazy weird things with them. I’ve had a few serious trolls who make new accounts over and over and over to troll me if I block one.”

Faced with all this, it’s not surprising that Elzie says she finds solace “off the internet.” But, that’s not to say that the internet doesn’t bring her joy. “I Iove how easily I get access to music from being online, especially on Twitter or on YouTube, and meeting new people has been fun. I’ve made a few friends from Twitter,” she says

Elzie says when she was younger she used to try to engage, but now that she’s older and wiser, she blocks and mutes anyone trolling her.

“I’ve learned not to engage. 29-year-old me, I’m just all about the block,” she says.