In Head in the Clouds: The Ridicule of Socrates in Classical Athens, Martijn Icks started a new year by looking to the past and examining how a satirical play may have impugned Socrates’ reputation decades before his execution.

Later in the month, Jennifer Keohane reflected on her own personal struggle with ad hominem attacks following an editorial she wrote, which criticized U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos and was published in the Baltimore Sun in Assassinating Academics.

Finally, Sergei Samoilenko explored the unique vulnerabilities of hashtag activism campaigns to message hijacking in #MeToo and Brandjacking of Social Movement Campaigns.